NATION AND WORLD BRIEFS

No injuries or hazardous spills in Minnesota train derailment

COOK, Minn. – No one was injured and no hazardous material spilled when 10 Canadian National Railway cars derailed in northern Minnesota, officials there said.

The derailment happened just before 8:30 p.m. Monday in a rural, unpopulated area about 6 miles north of Cook, the St. Louis County Sheriff’s Office said in a news release. Sheriff’s deputies and firefighters who responded found five of the derailed cars had tipped over, while the others remained upright.

Two of the cars contained liquefied propane and butane, but none appeared to have spilled, according to both the sheriff’s office and Canadian Railway.

The sheriff’s office had originally reported that nine cars had derailed.

The cause of the derailment was being investigated, Canadian Railway spokesman Jonathan Abecassis said, and cleanup was continuing Tuesday. Abecassis said he could not give an estimate of when the rail line would reopen to traffic.

Jetliner’s evacuation slide falls in Chicago neighborhood

CHICAGO – An emergency evacuation slide fell from an airliner Monday and landed in the backyard of a home near Chicago’s O’hare International Airport, causing no injuries but damaging a roof, officials and witnesses said.

The Federal Aviation Administration said a United Airlines Boeing 767 had landed safely at O’hare on Monday on arrival from Switzerland when maintenance workers realized an emergency slide was missing from the plane’s side.

The aircraft was carrying 155 passengers and 10 crew.

WLS-TV reported that Patrick Devitt was not home at the time but his son and father-in-law were present and heard a “boom” shortly after noon. Devitt dragged the slide from his backyard to the front.

He said the slide hit part of the house, damaging the roof, downspout and a window screen.

France, Italy send firefighting planes to Greece as fires burn

Italy and France are each sending two firefighting planes to Greece to help it cope with wildfires burning on multiple fronts around Athens, with more extreme heat on the way.

The planes and their teams of firefighters are part of an EU civil protection mechanism, and they will join about 30 Romanian firefighters already stationed in Greece as part of a seasonal EU fire program, European officials said Tuesday.

Wildfires continued to burn out of control Tuesday to the north and west of Athens, including a blaze near the resort town of Loutraki, where more homes were damaged and evacuations were expanded.

Several smaller fires also broke out nearer the capital, where winds remained moderate but scrub and forest land has been dried out by extreme temperatures last week.

Panama’s former president sentenced for money laundering

PANAMA CITY – Former Panamanian President Ricardo Martinelli was sentenced Tuesday to more than 10 years in prison for money laundering.

Martinelli, 71, had been trying to mount a political comeback in next year’s general elections, but a judge sentenced him to 128 months in prison in a case that revolved around the purchase of a media company.

The supermarket magnate who governed Panama from 2009 to 2014 was elected by his party last month as its presidential candidate for the May 5 election.

The case, known locally as “New Business,” dates back to 2017 and concerns the 2010 purchase of a publishing company that owns national newspapers.

Prosecutors said companies that had won lucrative government contracts during Martinelli’s presidency funneled money to a front company that was then used to purchase the publisher. The transactions involved a complex series of foreign money transfers totaling $43 million. The front company collecting the money was called “New Business.”