(File Photo: Source for Photo: The Clairton Coke Works, a U.S. Steel coking plant, is seen Monday, Aug 11, 2025, in Clairton, Penn. (AP Photo/Gene Puskar)

(AP) An explosion at a U.S. Steel plant near Pittsburgh left one dead and dozens injured or trapped under the rubble Monday, with emergency workers on site trying to rescue victims, officials said.

The explosion sent black smoke spiralling into the midday sky in the Monongahela Valley, a region of the state synonymous with steel for more than a century. An Allegheny County emergency services spokesperson, Kasey Reigner, said one person died in the explosion and two were currently believed to be unaccounted for. Multiple other people were treated for injuries, Reigner said.

Allegheny County Emergency Services said a fire at the plant started around 10:51 a.m. The explosion sent a shock through the community and led to officials asking residents to stay away from the scene so emergency workers could respond.

“It felt like thunder,” Zachary Buday, a construction worker near the scene, told WTAE-TV. “Shook the scaffold, shook my chest, and shook the building, and then when we saw the dark smoke coming up from the steel mill and put two and two together, and it’s like something bad happened.”

Dozens were injured and the county was sending 15 ambulances, on top of the ambulances supplied by local emergency response agencies, Reigner said.

Air quality concerns and health warnings

The plant, a massive industrial facility along the Monongahela River south of Pittsburgh, is considered the largest coking operation in North America and is one of four major U.S. Steel plants in Pennsylvania that employ several thousand workers.

Democratic Sen. John Fetterman, who formerly served as the mayor of nearby Braddock, called the explosion “absolutely tragic” and vowed to support steelworkers in the aftermath.

“I grieve for these families,” Fetterman said. “I stand with the steelworkers.”

The Allegheny County Health Department said it is monitoring the explosion and advised residents within 1 mile (1.6 kilometers) of the plant to remain indoors, close all windows and doors, set air conditioning systems to recirculate, and avoid drawing in outside air, such as using exhaust fans. It said its monitors have not detected levels of soot or sulfur dioxide above federal standards.

The plant converts coal to coke, a key component in the steel-making process. According to the company, it produces 4.3 million tons (3.9 million metric tons) of coke annually and has approximately 1,400 workers.

The plant has a long history of pollution concerns

In recent years, the Clairton plant has been dogged by concerns about pollution. In 2019, it agreed to settle a 2017 lawsuit for $8.5 million. Under the settlement, the company agreed to spend $6.5 million to reduce soot emissions and noxious odors from the Clairton coke-making facility.

The company also faced other lawsuits over pollution from the Clairton facility, including ones accusing the company of violating clean air laws after a 2018 fire damaged the facility’s sulfur pollution controls.

In 2018, a Christmas Eve fire at the Clairton coke works plant caused $40 million in damage. The fire damaged pollution control equipment and led to repeated releases of sulfur dioxide, according to a lawsuit. Sulfur dioxide is a colorless, pungent byproduct of fossil fuel combustion that can make it hard to breathe. In the wake of the fire, Allegheny County warned residents to limit outdoor activities, with residents saying for weeks afterward that the air felt acidic, smelled like rotten eggs and was hard to breathe.

In February, a problem with a battery at the plant led to a “buildup of combustible material” that ignited, causing an audible “boom,” the Allegheny County Health Department said. Two workers who got material in their eyes received first aid treatment at a local hospital but were not seriously injured.

Last year, the company agreed to spend $19.5 million in equipment upgrades and $5 million on local clean air efforts and programs as part of settling a federal lawsuit filed by Clean Air Council and PennEnvironment and the Allegheny County Health Department.

The fire at the Clairton plant knocked out pollution controls at its Mon Valley plants, but U.S. Steel continued to run them anyway, environmental groups said.

The lawsuits accused the steel producer of more than 12,000 violations of its air pollution permits.

Environmental group calls for an investigation

David Masur, executive director of PennEnvironment, another environmental group that has sued U.S. Steel over pollution, said there needed to be “a full, independent investigation into the causes of this latest catastrophe and a re-evaluation as to whether the Clairton plant is fit to keep operating.”

In June, U.S. Steel and Nippon Steel announced they had finalized a “historic partnership,” a deal that gives the U.S. government a say in some matters and comes a year and a half after the Japanese company first proposed its nearly $15 billion buyout of the iconic American steelmaker.

The pursuit by Nippon Steel for the Pittsburgh-based company was buffeted by national security concerns and presidential politics in a premier battleground state, dragging out the transaction for more than a year after U.S. Steel shareholders approved it.

Clairton Mayor Richard Lattanzi said his heart goes out to the victims of Monday explosion.

“The mill is such a big part of Clairton,” he said. “It’s just a sad day for Clairton.”

(File Photo of the Hopewell Township Police Department Logo)

Noah Haswell, Beaver County Radio News

(Aliquippa, PA) According to a Facebook post yesterday from beaver county 911, alerts and news, a 911 call yesterday reported a person in a goat costume was chasing children around Hopewell Community Park in Aliquippa that day. There is an unknown reason at this time as to why this unidentified individual that was equipped fully with a goat mask was doing this at the park located on 2500 Laird Avenue. That is all the information that we have at this time. If you see this person, call 911 or the Hopewell Township Police Department at 724-378-0557.

(File Photo of Police Siren Lights)

Noah Haswell, Beaver County Radio News

(Pittsburgh, PA)  A man was killed last night after both getting hit by a vehicle and getting shot in the Lincoln-Lemington-Belmar neighborhood of Pittsburgh. According to Pittsburgh Police, officers got called to the 6900 block of Wiltsie Street around 10:30 p.m. last night after people in the area reported hearing possible gunshots. Police confirm that both the chest and the leg was where the male victim was shot twice and witnesses told police that he was hit by a vehicle after he got shot. That man was pronounced dead at the scene and according to police, the investigation into this incident is ongoing by Pittsburgh Police because the cause of the shooting is unknown at this time. The identity of the man that died last night in the Wiltsie Street area has not yet been released.

(File Photo: Source for Photo: FILE – In this Dec. 13, 2018, file photo, gamblers place bets in the temporary sports betting area at the SugarHouse Casino in Philadelphia. State regulators said Monday, July 19, 2021, that Pennsylvania smashed its record for gambling revenue, reporting nearly $3.9 billion in the last fiscal year as every category of wagering showed growth in one of the nation’s largest casino and gambling states. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke, File)

Noah Haswell, Beaver County Radio News

(Harrisburg, PA) Pennsylvania Attorney General Dave Sunday is currently making a push for a federal crackdown on offshore gambling. According to Sunday and other law enforcement officials, offshore gambling puts youth and consumers at risk and deprives states of billions in tax revenue. A letter was also recently sent by prosecutors from around the country which included Sunday in Pennsylvania to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi to make sure justice is given to operators of sites for offshore gambling. According to the letter, these sites, based outside the United States, often fail to verify the age of users and also offer scant consumer protections or none at all and do not pay taxes and because of these platforms, states that are estimated are not getting over $4 billion in yearly revenue. Sites that are legal for gambling in Pennsylvania must have a license secured, must exclude access to those younger than twenty-one-years-old from gambling and must follow regulations of consumer regulation. According to a statement from Sunday, attorneys general in Nebraska, Connecticut, Massachusetts and Utah are leading the push for federal action.

(Photo of Corbin Blake Partin Courtesy of WPXI/WFMJ/ WPXI/WFMJ)

Noah Haswell, Beaver County Radio News

(New Castle, PA) A man recently pleaded guilty to shooting and killing both a woman and his uncle in New Castle on July 13th, 2024. According to court documents, thirty-six-year-old Corbin Blake Partin pleaded guilty to two counts of third-degree murder. Police confirm that on July 13th, 2024, Partin killed his uncle, seventy-two-year-old Albert C. Rotz and sixty-six-year-old Rebecca Frank at a home on the 700 block of Arlington Avenue. Frank was also the long-time girlfriend of Rotz. Partin was arrested at the house of his parents on the 1000 block of Beckford Street, where he was staying,  on the same day.  Multiple people that were at a pool party near the house reported hearing that shots got fired after an argument that occurred during that time. Among the witnesses was a woman that was related to the victims who told police that Frank told her, “Corbin shot us.” A separate witness reported spotted Partin walking out of the home and departing the scene in his vehicle following the shooting. According to police, they found a percussion cap consistent with the firing of a black powder or cap and ball weapon at the scene of the crime. The Beckford Street house also had two boxes of black powder and cap and ball weapons found there and police said contents inside one of those boxes did not get accounted for. Rotz died at the site of the scene was and Frank died at a hospital later on at that time. Partin will be in jail for thirty-five-to seventy years. After Partin was arrested on July 13th, 2024, he was held without bond in the Lawrence County Jail.

(File Photo of a Gavel)

Noah Haswell, Beaver County Radio News

(West Chester, PA) A former teacher from Montgomery County, Pennsylvania was charged on Friday for allegedly engaging in inappropriate conversations with a minor during her stint as a teacher. Sixty-two-year-old Rebecca Kaelin got a first-degree misdemeanor charge of one count of corruption of minors. Kaelin allegedly engaged in inappropriate conversations with a seventeen-year-old girl from Rayne Township in Indiana County, Pennsylvania. That minor was enrolled as a cyber school student at the Pennsylvania Leadership Charter school where Kaelin was a teacher. Troopers confirm that the alleged conversations happened outside of classroom and school club hours during video chat sessions. According to a media release from Pennsylvania State Police, conversations were captured on the family’s in-home “nanny-cam,” which the victim’s parents installed to ensure that their daughter was doing her schoolwork. Troopers learned after an investigation into a child welfare report from December of 2023 that Kaelin and the student discussed religion, sexuality, the mental health of the victim and other various topics. The parents of the victim also reported significant changes in the thoughts and behaviors of the victim during that time. According to Pennsylvania State Police, Kaelin mailed the victim a book suited for “mature young adults” and planned to mail her a cell phone. Kaelin also had a discussion about plans for the minor to live with her after the minor graduates from the Pennsylvania Leadership Charter School. The preliminary hearing for Kaelin is on September 22nd, 2025, at 10:20 a.m. 

(File Photo: Source for Photo:Ukrainian soldiers from air-defence unit of 59th brigade fire at Russian strike drones in Dnipropetrovsk region, Ukraine, Sunday, Aug. 10, 2025. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)

DONETSK REGION, Ukraine (AP) — In a dugout where each nearby blast sends dirt raining from the ceiling and the black plastic lining the walls slipping down, Ukrainian soldiers say peace talks feel distant and unlikely to end the war. Explosions from Russian weapons — from glide bombs to artillery shells — thunder regularly overhead, keeping them underground except when they fire the M777 howitzer buried near their trench.

Nothing on the Eastern Front suggests the war could end soon.

Diplomatic peace efforts feel so far removed from the battlefield that many soldiers doubt they can bring results. Their skepticism is rooted in months of what they see as broken U.S. promises to end the war quickly.

Recent suggestions by U.S. President Donald Trump that there will be some ” swapping of territories” — as well as media reports that it would involve Ukrainian troops leaving the Donetsk region where they have fought for years defending every inch of land — have stirred confusion and rejection among the soldiers.

Few believe the current talks can end the war. More likely, they say, is a brief pause in hostilities before Russia resumes the assault with greater force.

“At minimum, the result would be to stop active fighting — that would be the first sign of some kind of settlement,” said soldier Dmytro Loviniukov of the 148th Brigade. “Right now, that’s not happening. And while these talks are taking place, they (the Russians) are only strengthening their positions on the front line.”

Long war, no relief

On one artillery position, talk often turns to home. Many Ukrainian soldiers joined the army in the first days of the full-scale invasion, leaving behind civilian jobs. Some thought they would serve only briefly. Others didn’t think about the future at all — because at that moment, it didn’t exist.

In the years since, many have been killed. Those who survived are in their fourth year of a grueling war, far removed from the civilian lives they once knew. With mobilization faltering and the war dragging on far longer than expected, there is no one to replace them as the Ukrainian army struggles with recruiting new people.

The army cannot also demobilize those who serve without risking the collapse of the front.

That is why soldiers wait for even the possibility of a pause in hostilities. When direct talks between Russia and Ukraine were held in Istanbul in May, the soldiers from 148th brigade read the news with cautious hope, said a soldier with the call sign Bronson, who once worked as a tattoo artist.

Months later, hope has been replaced with dark humor. On the eve of a deadline that U.S. President Donald Trump reportedly gave Russia’s Vladimir Putin — one that has since vanished from the agenda amid talk of a meeting in Alaska — the Russian fire roared every minute for hours. Soldiers joked that the shelling was because the deadline was “running out.”

“We are on our land. We have no way back,” said the commander of the artillery group, Dmytro Loviniukov. “We stand here because there is no choice. No one else will come here to defend us.”

Training for what’s ahead

Dozens of kilometers from Zaporizhzhia region, north to the Donetsk area, heavy fighting grinds on toward Pokrovsk — now the epicenter of fighting.

Once home to about 60,000 people, the city has been under sustained Russian assault for months. The Russians have formed a pocket around Pokrovsk, though Ukrainian troops still hold the city and street fighting has yet to begin. Reports of Russian saboteurs entering the city started to appear almost daily, but the military says those groups have been neutralized.

Ukrainian soldiers of the Spartan brigade push through drills with full intensity, honing their skills for the battlefield in the Pokrovsk area.

Everything at the training range, only 45 kilometers (28 miles) from the front, is designed to mirror real combat conditions — even the terrain. A thin strip of forest breaks up the vast fields of blooming sunflowers stretching into the distance until the next tree line appears.

One of the soldiers training there is a 35-year-old with the call sign Komrad, who joined the military only recently. He says he has no illusions that the war will end soon.

“My motivation is that there is simply no way back,” he said. “If you are in the military, you have to fight. If we’re here, we need to cover our brothers in arms.”

Truce doesn’t mean peace

For Serhii Filimonov, commander of the “Da Vinci Wolves” battalion of the 59th brigade, the war’s end is nowhere in sight, and current news doesn’t influence the ongoing struggle to find enough resources to equip the unit that is fighting around Pokrovsk.

“We are preparing for a long war. We have no illusions that Russia will stop,” he said, speaking at his field command post. “There may be a ceasefire, but there will be no peace.”

Filimonov dismisses recent talk of exchanging territory or signing agreements as temporary fixes at best.

“Russia will not abandon its goal of capturing all of Ukraine,” he said. “They will attack again. The big question is what security guarantees we get — and how we hit pause.”

A soldier with the call sign Mirche from the 68th brigade said that whenever there is a new round of talks, the hostilities intensify around Pokrovsk — Russia’s key priority during this summer’s campaign.

Whenever peace talks begin, “things on the front get terrifying,” he said.

(File Photo: Source for Photo: This undated recent image, taken from video broadcast by the Qatari-based television station Al Jazeera, shows the network’s Arabic-language Gaza correspondent, Anas al-Sharif, reporting on camera in Gaza. Al-Sharif and four other Al Jazeera staff members were killed by an Israeli drone strike on their tent in Gaza City shortly before midnight on Sunday. (Al Jazeera via AP)

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel’s military targeted an Al Jazeera correspondent with an airstrike Sunday, killing him, another network journalist and at least six other people, all of whom were sheltering outside Gaza City’s largest hospital complex.

Officials at Shifa Hospital said those killed included Al Jazeera correspondents Anas al-Sharif and Mohamed Qreiqeh. The strike also killed four other journalists and two other people, hospital administrative director Rami Mohanna told The Associated Press. The strike also damaged the entrance to the hospital complex’s emergency building.

Both Israel and hospital officials in Gaza City confirmed the deaths, which press advocates described as retribution against those documenting the war in Gaza. Israel’s military later Sunday described al-Sharif as the leader of a Hamas cell — an allegation that Al Jazeera and al-Sharif had previously dismissed as baseless.

The incident marked the first time during the war that Israel’s military has swiftly claimed responsibility after a journalist was killed in a strike.

It came less than a year after Israeli army officials first accused al-Sharif and other Al Jazeera journalists of being members of the militant groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad. In a July 24 video, Israel’s army spokesperson Avichay Adraee attacked Al Jazeera and accused al-Sharif of being part of Hamas’ military wing.

Al Jazeera calls strike ‘assassination’

Al Jazeera called the strike “targeted assassination” and accused Israeli officials of incitement, connecting al-Sharif’s death to the allegations that both the network and correspondent had denied.

“Anas and his colleagues were among the last remaining voices from within Gaza, providing the world with unfiltered, on-the-ground coverage of the devastating realities endured by its people,” the Qatari network said in a statement.

Apart from rare invitations to observe Israeli military operations, international media have been barred from entering Gaza for the duration of the war. Al Jazeera is among the few outlets still fielding a big team of reporters inside the besieged strip, chronicling daily life amid airstrikes, hunger and the rubble of destroyed neighborhoods.

The network has suffered heavy losses during the war, including 27-year-old correspondent Ismail al-Ghoul and cameraman Rami al-Rifi, killed last summer, and freelancer Hossam Shabat, killed in an Israeli airstrike in March.

Like al-Sharif, Shabat was among the six that Israel accused of being members of militant groups last October.

Funeral-goers call to protect journalists

Hundreds of people, including many journalists, gathered Monday to mourn al-Sharif, Qureiqa and their colleagues. The bodies lay wrapped in white sheets at Gaza City’s Shifa Hospital complex. Ahed Ferwana of the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate said reporters were being deliberately targeted and urged the international community to act.

Al-Sharif reported a nearby bombardment minutes before his death. In a social media post that Al Jazeera said was written to be posted in case of his death, he bemoaned the devastation and destruction that war had wrought and bid farewell to his wife, son and daughter.

“I never hesitated for a single day to convey the truth as it is, without distortion or falsification,” the 28-year-old wrote.

The journalists are the latest to be killed in what observers have called the deadliest conflict for journalists in modern times. The Committee to Protect Journalists said on Sunday that at least 186 have been killed in Gaza, and Brown University’s Watson Institute in April said the war was “quite simply, the worst ever conflict for reporters.”

Al-Sharif began reporting for Al Jazeera a few days after war broke out. He was known for reporting on Israel’s bombardment in northern Gaza, and later for the starvation gripping much of the territory’s population. Qureiqa, a 33-year-old Gaza City native, is survived by two children.

Both journalists were separated from their families for months earlier in the war. When they managed to reunite during the ceasefire earlier this year, their children appeared unable to recognize them, according to video footage they posted at the time.

In a July broadcast al-Sharif cried on air as woman behind him collapsed from hunger.

“I am taking about slow death of those people,” he said at the time.

Al Jazeera is blocked in Israel and soldiers raided its offices in the occupied West Bank last year, ordering them closed.

Al-Sharif’s death comes weeks after a U.N. expert and the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists said Israel had targeted him with a smear campaign.

Irene Khan, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on freedom of expression, on July 31 said that the killings were “part of a deliberate strategy of Israel to suppress the truth, obstruct the documentation of international crimes and bury any possibility of future accountability.”

The Committee to Protect Journalists said on Sunday that it was appalled by the strike.

“Israel’s pattern of labeling journalists as militants without providing credible evidence raises serious questions about its intent and respect for press freedom,” Sara Qudah, the group’s regional director, said in a statement.

(File Photo of Police Siren Light)

Noah Haswell, Beaver County Radio News

(Pittsburgh, PA) A man is in critical condition after getting shot in the arm and another man is in custody after a shooting occurred in the Homewood neighborhood of Pittsburgh yesterday. According to a Pittsburgh Police spokesperson, officers responded to Upland Street between North Murtland Street and North Lang Avenue around 10 a.m. yesterday for a ShotSpotter alert totaling 10 rounds. The victim and the suspect got into a dispute outside that area and shots were fired by the suspect and the victim got hit once in the arm. The suspect then escaped in a vehicle and officials confirm the suspect hit a vehicle on the Hamilton Avenue and North Braddock Avenue intersection. The suspect then escaped on foot. Officers then pursued the suspect briefly and then apprehended him. The unidentified man that got shot was taken to a hospital in the area by EMS personnel. There were no other injuries that were reported from that shooting. The unidentified man in custody will have expected charges filed against him. The Mobile Crime Unit recovered several spent shell casings after processing the scene on Upland Street. A firearm also got recovered from the vehicle of the suspect. This incident is being investigated by detectives.

(File Photo of Candle)

Noah Haswell, Beaver County Radio News

(Coraopolis, PA) On Saturday, a vigil was held for the man that was killed in a hit-and-run crash in Coraopolis last Sunday. Sixty-one-year-old Ulises Media Montalvo of Coraopolis was killed last Sunday when a driver of a black SUV hit him when he was crossing Fourth Avenue in Coraopolis. This occurred near the Citgo gas station there, which was where the vigil took place to honor Montalvo. According to those that attended the vigil, Montalvo will be remembered as somebody that made his community a better place. The unidentified male suspect that allegedly caused the hit-and-run crash that killed Montalvo is in ICE custody after being arrested at his Ambridge home. That suspect is an immigrant that is undocumented and his identity has not been released yet.