A recall on papayas has been expanded to three brands, with more recalls possible, after the Food and Drug Administration narrowed in on the source of a salmonella outbreak that has been blamed for at least one death and has sickened over 100 more dating back to May.

A natural gas explosion at Minnehaha Academy in Minneapolis on Wednesday collapsed part of the building, killing two people and hospitalizing nine others, officials said. The explosion was caused by contractors doing work on the building, Minneapolis Assistant Fire Chief Bryan Tyner said.

Farmers Insurance Exchange will refund $315,000 to more than 1,600 Minnesota drivers, after authorities found that the firm wrongfully charged the said drivers with higher auto insurance rates. The state’s Commerce Department said the insurer charged drivers with higher rates solely because they were home renters rather than homeowners.

Just because a carrier can’t get a hold of their at-fault policyholder or hasn’t received word of the crash from them doesn’t excuse them from having to pay third-party claims, the state of Minnesota reminded insurers and residents last month.

Jason Stolis looked on with amazement and relief as he analyzed his hail riddled home. “Every window and all of the siding (is damaged). Broke a couple pieces of our patio furniture,” he said.

A "massive" lightning bolt started a house fire in Golden Valley on Monday, according to fire officials. Golden Valley Fire Chief John Crelly says the call came in at 2:43 p.m., and just a couple minutes before that, multiple people said the house was hit by "one heck of a lightning bolt."

Everything is big in Texas, including hailstorms. The National Insurance Crime Bureau (NICB) said today that insurance claims for hail damage in Texas last year exceeded the previous two years combined.

A home in Woodbury is being called unlivable after being gutted by a fire triggered by a suspected lightning strike. Residents said a lightning strike that shook the entire neighborhood was to blame.

The claim costs and other metrics of 18 state workers’ compensation systems are analyzed in depth in a new series of studies, CompScope™ Benchmarks, 17th Edition, released by the Workers Compensation Research Institute (WCRI).

Leading travel insurance trends aren’t just focused on hurricanes and illness anymore. A considerable number of traveler inquiries are now seeking to make certain that they are protected against losses from terrorism, too.

On Friday, the meteorology community was riding a major high as stunningly high-definition images came in from the nation’s newest and much-anticipated earth observation satellite. The high came crashing down that evening, though, as the first hints of significant cuts to the budget of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration began to emerge.

If we’ve said it once, we’ve said it a million times: You don’t want your vehicle to catch on fire. For that reason, Mercedes-Benz is recalling more than 354,000 vehicles.

An annual state-by-state analysis of auto insurance reveals rates continue to increase after filing just a single claim. According to a fourth annual study by insuranceQuotes, drivers now pay an average of 44 percent more for car insurance after making a single claim of $2,000 or more.

People sparked most US wildfires in recent decades, causing longer fire seasons and increasing the amount of scorched earth, according to a new study published Monday. Researchers found that humans caused 84 percent -- or four out of five -- of the total 1.5 million wildfires studied between 1992 and 2012.



In addition, human actions tripled the length of the fire season during those two decades and were responsible for 44 percent of the total acreage burned, researchers reported in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

United Technologies Corp’s (UTX.N) Carrier unit expanded a recall of some air conditioners and heat pumps as their power cord plugs can overheat, posing a fire risk, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission said on Thursday.