A GIANT gushing wall of white water approaches, cold spray douses your face, mist swirls all around; a thunderous roar rings in your ears.

THE landscape where Jane Urquhart sets her latest novel is as rich in stories as it once was in the fruit trees the eccentric Stanley Butler cultivated.

The death toll from a tornado in the US has risen to at least seven after storms unleashed a “war zone” of destruction in north-west Ohio.

A US man tasted freedom for the first time in nearly 30 years after an Ohio judge threw out his conviction because DNA evidence showed he did not rape an 11-year-old girl.

More than 130 fisherman stranded for up to four hours on a miles-wide ice floe that broke away from Lake Erie’s shoreline were plucked to safety.

SCIENTISTS have discovered the underground remnants of an ancient lake in Sudan’s arid Darfur region, offering hope of tapping a precious resource and easing water scarcity, which experts say is the root of much of the unrest in the region.

CANADIAN police are investigating the suspected murders of eight men whose bodies were left in a remote wooded area on a farmer's property.

OHIO, home state of seven US presidents and the state that denied John Kerry the White House, is used to being in the centre of presidential elections.

A MAN and three friends died when they tried to rescue his fiancee who was dragged underwater as she waded in surf off a beach.

A man and three friends died when they tried to rescue his fiancee who was dragged underwater as she waded in surf off a beach.