Rebecca Hersher

As the death toll continued to rise from a wildfire that destroyed parts of Gatlinburg, Tenn., officials began to assess the response to a blaze that grew out of control in a matter of minutes.

The unmanned rocket stopped transmitting data about six minutes after it took off from Kazakhstan and never made it to space. This is the third botched launch of a Russian spacecraft in two years.

The northernmost community in the U.S. has voted to officially restore its traditional Inupiaq name.

The second man to walk on the moon fell ill during a trip to the South Pole and was flown to New Zealand. Aldrin is 86 years old.

Gov. Jack Dalrymple said Wednesday his emergency evacuation order for areas near the route of the Dakota Access Pipeline did not authorize roadblocks or forcible removal of people.

Ball's Antarctic Tundra Beetle was small and brown, and it has been extinct for millions of years. The scientists who discovered it named it in honor of another beetle scientist's 90th birthday.

Eight new blazes raged Wednesday near Gatlinburg, Tenn., where fire has already destroyed more than 150 structures and injured dozens of people. "There were rivers of fire," said a resident who fled.

Former North Charleston Officer Michael Slager is on trial for shooting a black man named Walter Scott in the back. Slager testified he "fired until the threat was stopped, like I'm trained to do."

At least three people died and hundreds of structures were damaged or destroyed in Tennessee's Sevier County after a wildfire moved through populated areas overnight.

Current state rules don't prohibit California lawyers from engaging in sexual relationships with their clients. Some lawyers oppose the proposed rule change, saying it would violate their privacy.

The judge in the federal trial of Dylann Roof, who is accused of murdering nine people in the basement of a historically black church, has ruled that the defendant may represent himself in court.

The Obama administration has removed Arctic locations from planned oil and gas leases for the next 5 years. Ten of the 11 approved lease areas are in the Gulf of Mexico.

The judge has set Monday's hearing to decide if Dylann Roof is mentally competent to be tried in the murders of nine people. The judge said the hearing will be closed to help assure Roof a fair trial.

A federal appeals court did not uphold a previous order that Dassey be released from prison while the state appeals a judge's decision to overturn his conviction for murder and sexual assault.

A new report finds $85 million in loans for a U.S.-supported hotel and apartment project in Afghanistan are gone, and that the buildings are unfinished and appear to be abandoned.

The agency says the so-called Wolfcamp shale in Texas contains 20 billion barrels of oil and 16 trillion cubic feet of natural gas that are recoverable by hydraulic fracturing and other means.

The musician won the 2016 Nobel Prize for literature. He told the committee in charge of the award ceremony that he had "pre-existing commitments" and was unable to accept the prize in person.

Russia is withdrawing its signature from the treaty establishing the ICC, after the court released a report calling the 2014 seizure of Crimea from Ukraine an "international armed conflict."

The civilian police commission overseeing the Los Angeles Police Department held a public hearing on Tuesday devoted to the issue of bias in policing.

The endangered Florida panther has bred only south of the Caloosahatchee River since 1973. Now, a female has turned up on the north side, and it could be a good thing for the future of the species.