Flames

Take the heart of Guns N' Roses, the soul of Stone Temple Pilots and add a shot of attitude from Wasted Youth, and you get the supergroup Velvet Revolver. With its driving throwback approach to rock, the quintet (lead guitarist Slash, bassist Duff McKagan, and drummer Matt Sorum, all formerly of GNR; Dave Kushner of Wasted Youth; and lead singer Scott Weiland of STP) returns fully charged on the newly released Libertad. The album, whose title is Spanish for liberty and freedom, is the much-anticipated follow-up to Contraband, VR's multi-platinum 2004 debut.

Rick Sharpe restores Chris-Craft boats in his garage in Millersville and has completed work on his 1927 Cadet. The previous owner modified the boat by putting in a different engine, gauges and exhaust system. Sharpe had to use only five nonoriginal pieces of wood in the restoration. The boat still has its original Chris-Craft wooden flagpole and sports a 289-cubic-inch flathead Chrysler engine. Sharpe is now restoring a 1948 Runabout.

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. -- No one could claim surprise last week when tall flames raged across more than 3,000 acres and consumed 254 homes. The ingredients for a devastating wildfire have long been in place in the Tahoe basin, where 32,000 houses are tucked into an overgrown forest of pine and fir. Three million visitors a year come to relax on the shores of one of the deepest and clearest lakes in the world. Investigators said the blaze was started by an illegal campfire. It was mostly contained, and some firefighters were beginning to withdraw, they said.

Under normal circumstances, it's not too difficult to differentiate Venice, Italy, from Providence, R.I. But on certain summer nights, the magic of Venice is clearly reflected in Providence's three canal-like rivers, especially when two authentic black-lacquered Venetian gondolas manned by equally authentic blue-and-white-stripe-shirted Venetian gondoliers pole their way past dozens of burning braziers, their flames dancing across the gently rippling waters...

Lionel Bankston remembers that he was installing skylights on the roof of The Maples of Towson when he spotted the flames shooting through the assisted-living facility's attic vent. He rushed from the roof to the third floor of the building, grabbed a fire extinguisher and put out a fire in a resident's bathroom. Then, he said, he returned to the roof to extinguish the remaining flames -- and spotted an attic door with a bright orange glow. "I backed away from it and started getting everybody out," he recalled yesterday.

Barbecued anything definitely gives apple pie a run for its money in the competition for all-American food. More than 17 million barbecues were sold in 2006, according to the Hearth, Patio & Barbecue Association, and 81 percent of Americans own a barbecue. More than half grill year-round, and 47 percent barbecue at least twice weekly in the summer months. The truth is, pretty much anything tastes better hot off the grill. It's something about the flames, the smoke, the tongs, the-meat-on-metal sizzle that no broiler or fry pan can reproduce.

In a chaotic few minutes, six lives were gone. Five never got out, one died at a hospital. Seven others were badly hurt - some clinging to life last night - in one of the deadliest fires in Baltimore's history. The tragedy unfolded yesterday morning on the city's east side, near Green Mount Cemetery, in a rented rowhouse packed with an extended family that the owner had tried to evict a month ago. There were a mother and a child who used a wheelchair, relatives and cousins, maybe friends.

A tanker rig overturned and burst into flames yesterday evening on a curving interstate ramp over Baltimore's South Hanover Street, killing the driver and sending a burning stream of its load of ethanol into the street below, igniting a row of parked vehicles, authorities said. The wreckage burned for more than three hours as firefighters sprayed water and foam into the flames - with the driver's body still in the truck cab. His name and the company he worked for were not divulged last night, but the tanker - which was carrying 8,000 gallons of ethanol - was from a local trucking company, said Cpl. Jonathan Green, a spokesman for the Maryland Transportation Authority Police.

A three-story Canton rowhouse under renovation by its owner was destroyed last night during a fire that was fueled by the rupture of a natural gas pipe, authorites said. No one was injured in the blaze, which was reported at 10:17 p.m. in the 3200 block of Foster Ave. It quickly burned out all three floors, causing much of the structure to collapse onto Foster Avenue and onto a rear alley. A second alarm was sounded at 10:27 p.m. Feeding the fire was the natural gas that continued to burn despite huge quantities of water being poured onto the house.

The lone occupant of a pickup truck died last night when the vehicle burst into flames after crashing into a bridge abutment near Fork, Baltimore County police said. About 11:20 p.m., the vehicle was northbound in the 11700 block of Harford Road between Sharon Drive and Hartley Mill Road when, for an nknown reason, it left the road and struck the bridge abutment, police said. Police said that the vehicle was engulfed in fire immediately, trapping the unidentified driver behind the steering wheel.