Ignited

The Maryland Occupational Safety and Health Administration fined Domino Sugar $4,000 for allowing sugar dust to accumulate in its refinery, which is believed to have caused an explosion last year at the Key Highway plant in South Baltimore, according to a state report. The Nov. 2 explosion echoed across the harbor, and authorities said they suspected sugar dust might have ignited. Three employees suffered minor injuries, several pieces of equipment were destroyed and dozens of windows were shattered in the blast.

Maryland's Fire Marshall has banned sky lanterns, the increasingly popular paper balloons that are sent aloft by the heat of a candle or fuel cell suspended from the bottom. "They're made with oiled rice paper and bamboo - it's almost kindling," said Deputy State Fire Marshal Bruce D. Bouch. "They have to land somewhere, and sometimes they're still partly on fire when they hit the ground. They've been known to ignite dry vegetation. " Bouch said the fire marshal's office frequently gets calls from people interested in using sky lanterns in weddings or other celebrations who want to know if they are legal in Maryland.

My kids spotted the fireworks stand right away. We passed it as we rode to the beach. We were in Chincoteague, Va, where fireworks are legal.And after much pleading, we stopped at the stand. My wife and I agreed to let our children experience the patriotic joy of combustion. We put on a family fireworks show one night in Virginia in June. Pinwheels spun. Fountains flared. And "snakes" crawled, although it took considerable effort and a flaming newspaper to get the carbon snakes going.The kids wrote a program for the show, thereby ensuring that each of them ignited an equal number of devices.

When Alissa Harrington was diagnosed with breast cancer at age 38, she did what she's accustomed to doing when she needs answers. She reached for her smartphone. The Stevenson University technology professional says mobile apps helped her overcome one of the biggest burdens for anyone confronting a life-threatening illness: Managing the deluge of medical records and appointments and communicating what comes out of those to friends and family. "Mobile apps have really eliminated that," said Harrington, who as an instructional designer builds online courses and trains faculty how to apply technology to learning.

Camp Meade Road near Baltimore-Washington International Airport was closed for more than an hour yesterday morning as firefighters worked to extinguish a fire that ignited when construction workers severed a gas line.A construction crew doing road repairs triggered the fire in the 800 block of Camp Meade Road at 9:50 a.m., fire and police officials said.The fire burned a small grassy area until Baltimore Gas and Electric turned off the gas, said fire department Battalion Chief Gary Sheckells.

A smoldering cigarette ignited a bed in a second-floor bedroom of a townhouse in the 6500 block of Carrolltowne Village Road in Sykesville at 11 a.m. Monday. Fire officials said the fire caused about $500 in damage.One firefighter suffered second-degree burns to his left wrist and hand and was treated at the scene, fire officials said.FireGamber: Firefighters assisted Baltimore County at 3: 10 p.m., responding for a house fire on Nicodemus Road. Units were out 10 minutes.Pub Date: 4/25/96

A $728,000 lawsuit against a merchant accused of selling a glass window ornament that caused a fire in a Columbia condominium has been dismissed.The suit accused John Yingling of selling the beveled glass ornament to Edward Shore on March 7, 1988 at the Columbia Mall. The ornament reflected sunlight so strongly that it ignited curtains and started a fire June 5, 1988, that caused $664,000 in damage to two condominiums.The lawsuit was dismissed June 19 because Mr. Yingling provided records showing he was not working as a vendor at the Mall on March 7. He had moved his business, "A Touch of Glass," from the Mall on March 6. Mall records confirmed Mr. Yingling's account.

A one-alarm fire, caused by a bag of mulch that ignited, severely damaged an Ellicott City house yesterday afternoon, causing an estimated $350,000 in damage, a fire official said.Howard County Fire Capt. David Carroll said the fire broke out just after 5 p.m. at a residence in the 10170 block of Bracken Drive.Firefighters from Howard and Baltimore counties extinguished the fire in about two hours, Carroll said.At the back of the house, a bag of mulch, which was left next to the outside vent of a pellet stove, was ignited by the stove's heat, Carroll said.

Eight volunteer firefighters fighting a brush fire near Salisbury suffered respiratory problems yesterday when pesticides in a storage shed ignited, shooting out plumes of green and orange smoke.The firefighters from Sharptown and Mardela Springs were treated at Peninsula Regional Medical Center in Salisbury and released, fire officials said.Sharptown Volunteer Fire Chief William White said that Jerry Matyiko was burning a dilapidated shed on land he owns along Elzey Brown Loop near Sharptown about 11 a.m. when the fire got out of control and spread to surrounding brush and trees.

Two Anne Arundel County public works employees were badly burned and four others were also hospitalized yesterday afternoon when something triggered an underground sewer explosion in the northern part of the county. The men were working inside the system, near the Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. facilities in the wooded area between Solley Road and Fort Smallwood Road, when a flash fire ignited about 1:30 p.m., said Capt. Robert Rose, a spokesman for the county Fire Department. Public works spokeswoman Pam Jordon said power tools may have ignited a normal buildup of gases in an underground "vault" that provides access to pipes.

Two men suffered burns in Harford County last Thursday evening when they tried to ignite a pile of brush with gasoline, fire investigators said. The incident occurred at 7 p.m. in the rear yard of a home in the 100 block of Robin Hood Road near Havre de Grace. According to a notice of investigation from the Maryland State Fire Marshal's Office, Patrick Mitchell, 25, suffered first and second degree burns, and Christopher Hyman, whose age was not given, suffered first degree burns.

The Baltimore City Fire Department battled a three-alarm fire at a warehouse at 1200 Baylis St. in the Canton area late into the night Sunday, bringing it under control around midnight. Capt. Roman Clark, a department spokesman, said about 60 residents in the block were evacuated. No homes were involved in the fire, but heavy smoke and the fire's proximity to residences spurred the evacuation, said Chief Kevin Cartwright. An MTA bus was called to shelter residents. Power was also out in the immediate area.

On a Maryland squad that can run as many as nine midfielders, Landon Carr doesn't garner much attention. But the junior short-stick defensive midfielder has been a sparkplug for the No. 10 Terps' transition game, recording four goals and two assists thus far. Carr has posted three goals and two assists in the team's past three contests. He has taken just six shots this season and is 11-of-15 in his last two years. Carr's contributions did not escape the attention of coach John Tillman, who said he and his staff reviewed Carr's numbers recently.

At the 2:17 mark of Britney Spears' 2011 hit single "Hold It Against Me," dubstep entered the mainstream. It had been bubbling around pop's surface before Spears put her glossy touch on it, but this was Top 40's most blatant — and effective — use of the increasingly popular electronic dance music sub-genre. As Spears' vocals cut out, the track builds to a climactic "breakdown," signified by dubstep's trademark bass wobble. It's deep enough to crush your chest, and it's a huge part of what makes the genre so appealing: A song builds and builds until the rug is suddenly ripped from under it, only to re-form.

Tonight's challenge: Simultaneously watch DWTS and the Ravens on Monday Night Football. Yikes! But challenge accepted. The action in the ballroom was far more impressive than the action on the ballfield, so that's what we'll focus on here. Had penalties been enforced on DWTS there might have been one called when it nearly came to fisticuffs between judge Len Goodman and pro Maksim Chmerkovskiy. It all started when Len called Hope Solo's rumba with partner Maks her worst dance of the whole season.

Severna Park senior Rachel Mia hasn’t always taken the draws for the Severna Park, but in Wednesday night’s state Class 4A-3A girls lacrosse championship against No. 4 Westminster, she had the magic touch. Mia helped the No. 11 Falcons, who have struggled with the draw at times this season, win the first eight of the second half to spark a nine-goal run and break the game open in a 14-7 victory over the previously unbeaten Owls. "It was like draw after draw when we went into the second half, and we were getting them and getting them and it was goal after goal.

A fire broke out on top of a Charles Village apartment house yesterday, sending dozens of Johns Hopkins University students onto the street and creating a thick plume of black smoke seen for miles around the city.The two-alarm blaze began about 10 a.m. as workers were re-roofing the 11-story building, an off-campus apartment house for Hopkins students in the 3200 block of N. Charles St., authorities said.No one was injured, and there was little damage to the building, Fire Department Battalion Chief Hector L. Torres said.

DEWANA, India -- With a name meaning understanding and agreement, the Samjhauta Express linking India and Pakistan was a symbol of hope that the two nations might finally trade decades of enmity for friendship. Now, that ideal of cooperation appears to have been as much a target as the scores of passengers who burned to death yesterday in a fire that swept through two of the train's carriages as it headed toward the Pakistani border. The blaze was apparently sparked by a pair of crude bombs, prompting speculation that it was the work of attackers bent on crippling the two nations' halting steps toward peace, including a high-level meeting set for today between the arch-rivals.

University of Maryland, Baltimore County campus police reported Sunday finding two Molotov cocktails a day earlier in a dormitory stairwell. The two homemade incendiary devices, filled with a flammable liquid with a wick inserted into the mouth of the container, were discovered about 10:20 a.m. Saturday by a UMBC employee in an exterior stairwell of Gunpowder-Terrace Apartments, a student dormitory on the Catonsville campus of the university, said...

It might not look that way now, but MADD and its allies won a battle in the war against drunken driving during the General Assembly session that ended a week ago. The bill that passed in Annapolis will increase the number of drunken drivers who are compelled to go on an ignition interlock program, where they must mount a device in their vehicles that won't let them start the engine unless their breath is free of any significant amount of alcohol....