Alert

A leak in Deep Creek Dam in Garrett County prompted an alert to area residents, Maryland Department of the Environment officials reported. There was no immediate threat of the dam failing, according to state officials. "MDE has sent staff from our compliance program to investigate the leak," MDE Secretary Shari T. Wilson said in a statement. "We will continue to monitor the situation as long as necessary to ensure the safety of Maryland residents living in the vicinity." The leak is in the penstock, which takes water from Deep Creek Lake to the dam's powerhouse.

Harford County Executive David Craig says the Harford County's Department of Emergency Services, the Harford County Sheriff's Office and municipal, state and federal law enforcement partners are working cooperatively to ensure public safety following the bombings in Boston Monday. On Tuesday, Craig urged citizens to report to law enforcement any suspicious circumstances they may be aware of and remain vigilant at all times. "Our thoughts and prayers are extended to the people of Boston and Mayor Thomas Menino following the horrific and unconscionable bombings yesterday in that great city.

WASHINGTON - Intelligent, well-intended people are distributing the anti-terrorism alerts that have been sweeping across the country. But the citizens are confused and the media are confounded. Unless we change the way we announce threats, we will numb America to real dangers, lower our guard and increase our vulnerability to attack. But first a sympathetic word about why communicating fair warning of attack is so difficult. The warnings really speak to two different audiences. Law officers and likely targets (such as the owners of power plants or private aircraft)

Maryland transit police are warning travelers to be alert on trains and buses, amid a long-running rash of mobile-device thefts targeting riders who were texting, listening to music or talking on the phone. The Maryland Transit Administration has logged more than 200 such incidents since it began tracking them at the beginning of last year in response to a series of customer complaints. A spike in these crimes followed the 2011 release of Apple's iPhone 4S, and the trend has kept up, with thieves taking music players, e-readers and tablet computers.

An open letter to Marvin L. "Doc" Cheatham, president of the Baltimore NAACP chapter: Dear Mr. Cheatham: This letter is in response to the e-mail you sent to Baltimore news media outlets Nov. 16. You chided us for not covering the march on the U.S. Department of Justice that same day. Several civil rights groups -- including the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People -- and many individuals marched to protest what they perceive as...

NEW YORK -- Midtown is feeling blue, while the Village is a little green. If you head uptown, red could be the color du jour, while in Soho, yellow isn't so sunny. No, I'm not a poet, just a New Yorker who prefers basic black, trying to make sense of it all. Unveiled recently by homeland security czar Tom Ridge, the government's newly developed color-coded alert system was designed in part to satisfy complaints about the frequent issuing of vague and unspecific terror alerts, often rendering an already anxious public even more confused.

FORT WORTH, Texas -- The Federal Aviation Administration will alert aircraft owners across the nation this week that hydraulic fittings sold by a North Texas company could be corroding.The fittings, sold by Bailey Hydraulics in Southlake to aircraft manufacturers and repair shops nationwide, could possibly have been identified as being suitable for carrying corrosive fluids when they are not, officials said.The rarely issued notice, called an airworthiness alert, stems from an ongoing criminal investigation by a federal panel into whether Bailey Hydraulics intentionally mislabeled the parts to sell them at a higher price, sources close to the investigation told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram last week.

WASHINGTON -- Fearful of terrorist retaliation after the arrest of a key suspect in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, the U.S. government has alerted airlines in the United States and Europe to take special security precautions, informed sources say.The Federal Aviation Administration issued its alert amid predictions that Ramzi Ahmed Yousef, who pleaded not guilty yesterday in New York in connection with the attack on the Manhattan skyscraper, would...

It sounds like a "Dr. Strangelove"-type movie.A massive nuclear strike is launched against the United States by the Soviet Union.The president transmits an order for a retaliatory nuclear strike.His order is relayed from a giant Boeing 747 aircraft, the U.S. Air Force's E-4 U.S. National Command authority, also known as the flying White House.The order is received by one of 30 TACAMO -- for Take Charge And Move Out -- aircraft.These planes slowly circle the sky. They carry no weapons but are equipped with electronic generators able to blast a very low frequency signal down to the ocean through 5-mile-long wire antennae.

WASHINGTON - The FBI has drawn up a sweeping domestic contingency plan to counter possible attacks prompted by an invasion of Iraq, including monitoring Iraqis and potentially thousands of others who might launch "sympathy" strikes, officials said yesterday. Bush administration officials also lowered the nation's terror alert yesterday by one level to code yellow, or "elevated" risk of attack, but stressed that Americans remain at "significant risk" of attack. "The lowering of the threat level is not a signal to government, law enforcement or citizens that the danger of a terrorist attack is passed," Attorney General John Ashcroft and Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge said in a joint statement.

The night before Robert Gladden Jr. took his father's gun to Perry Hall High School, he texted a friend about the plan, but begged him to keep it a secret. "I am going to bring a shotgun and 21 shells, ill let your imagination do the rest," the 15-year-old Gladden said in a message sent around 7:30 p.m. on Sunday, Aug. 26. "And I trust you not to tell anyone about this so please don't. " The friend kept silent, according to newly released investigative documents, and Gladden kept his word.

In a cheery room in Cockeysville, two dozen people sit with their heads down, focused on the papers in front of them. The only sound is the scratching of pencils on paper. The sight triggers memories of school days, but this is no group of middle schoolers eking their way through a math class pop quiz. It's the Brain Aerobics class at Broadmead Senior Living Community. Once a week, speech pathologist Chuck Warnke leads the class through a variety of mental activities, including riddles, word games and history puzzles - one activity challenged class members to remember the prices of products, from a gallon of milk to a pair of women's leather boots, from 1972.

Police report four incidents in the past two weeks during which packages or goods delivered to the front of homes in Towson have been stolen in the afternoon hours. According to police reports, on Feb. 14, between 1:30 and 5 p.m., a package containing a men's LLBean jacket and an Edible Arrangement were stolen from two different homes on Picadilly Road. Then, on Feb. 21, betweem 11 a.m. and 4 p.m., a FedEx package was taken from a house in the 6900 block of Bellona Avenue. Yesterday, a box from Amazon containing children's toys delivered by UPS to Murdock Road was stolen at around 3 p.m. Lt. Randy Guraleczka, of the Towson Precinct, said police are asking residents to keep an eye out for suspicious persons on their neighbors' properties and to call 911 if they witness suspicious activity.

This story has been updated. Baltimore County Police on Tuesday night canceled their search for an elderly man who had been missing from the Perry Hall area. Tony Louis Vitilio, 83, was found unharmed, police said. He had been missing since 3 p.m. Tuesday from the area of Elinor Avenue in Perry Hall.

Mary Alma O'Connor Lears, a former Walters Art Museum volunteer guide whose keen eyes alerted officials to a $1 million theft later linked to a gallery security guard, died of lung disease Jan. 24 at Gilchrist Hospice Care. The Towson and former Roland Park resident was 88. Born Mary Alma O'Connor in Baltimore, she was the daughter of Dr. John A. O'Connor, chief surgeon of the Baltimore Police Department and medical examiner, and Alma Obrecht, a homemaker. Raised in Govans and on Springlake Way in Homeland, she was a 1942 graduate of Notre Dame Preparatory School and was class president all four years.

A Baltimore student's tweet raised red flags 3,000 miles away this week, spurring a local investigation into a possible threat to a city high school, city police confirmed Thursday. Anthony Guglielmi, spokesman for the city's police department, said the Royal Canadian Mounted Police alerted the department Wednesday to the Twitter post, which he described as "a threat indicating an individual was threatening to do harm" at Forest Park High School. Officials did not release details about the nature of the threat.

Western Maryland College students received fliers this week asking them to be alert after two recent incidents in which a BB or pellet gun was fired in a parking area near a dormitory on the Westminster campus. At least two students received minor injuries in the first shooting, when someone fired at them about 1:15 a.m. Aug. 31 while they were walking behind the Blanche Ward Hall dormitory, according to Westminster police and a college spokesman. "The students had been shot with what we believed to have been a BB gun," said Capt.

WASHINGTON - The government yesterday lowered the terror alert level for five high-visibility financial institutions in Washington, New York and Newark, N.J., citing improved protective measures at the buildings. The institutions affected are the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, both a few blocks from the White House; the New York Stock Exchange and the Citigroup Center in New York; and the headquarters of Prudential Financial Inc. in Newark. Computer files seized in Pakistan this summer had identified the facilities as being under surveillance by al-Qaida.

The Baltimore City Health Department has issued a code blue cold weather alert for the rest of the week because of frigid temperatures with the potential to cause health problems, such as hypothermia. Under the alert, which runs through Sunday, city emergency shelters will extend hours and private shelters will be encouraged to do the same. Emergency workers will reach out to the homeless, elderly and other vulnerable residents to make sure they have shelter and heat. City health officials are also minding residents with a heart condition not to exert too much physical activity.

Howard County police are asking for the public's help in locating a elderly man who has been missing since Saturday afternoon, and have issued a Silver Alert in an attempt to find him. Huber Earl Smutz, Jr., 82, was reported missing around 3 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 19. According to police, a family member woke up around noon and Smutz was gone from his home in the 700 block of Driver Road in Marriottsville. He left in a 2007 silver Honda Accord with MD tag HYR743, police said. Smutz is described as a white male, balding, with straight gray hair and blue eyes, no facial hair and a medium build.