Carnival Cruise Lines’ boss said today he would go aboard and apologise personally to passengers for foul and dangerous conditions while the stricken liner Triumph was adrift for five nightmarish days.

Carnival Cruise Lines has cancelled a dozen more planned voyages aboard the Triumph.

A five-year-old US boy has been safely released after a day long stand-off between police and his abductor.

Airbus SAS plans to open a commercial jet assembly line in Alabama, its first in the US, to meet demand as North American airlines renew their fleets.

US authorities charged 14 people, most of them Americans, as participants in “a deadly pipeline” that routed money and fighters from the United States to the militant group al-Shabab in Somalia.

A congressman seeking to become Alabama’s first black governor today lost to a white Democratic primary opponent who had garnered support from the state’s four major black political groups.

A man accused of throwing his four young children to their deaths from an Alabama bridge unexpectedly pleaded guilty, telling a judge he wanted to be put to death.

Four young children are feared dead today after their father told police he threw them from an Alabama bridge after an argument with his wife.

England’s Karen Stupples continued her return to form following the arrival of her son, Logan, in April with a closing 69 for six under par in the Mitchell Company Tournament of Champions in Alabama.

One week after Hurricane Katrina devastated the region, miles-long lines of vehicles crawled into suburban New Orleans today as residents were allowed to return to salvage what was left of their homes. New Orleans’ mayor warned that 10,000 people may have died.

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice defended President George Bush today against charges that the government’s sluggish response to Hurricane Katrina showed racial insensitivity.

Announcing itself with shrieking, 145-mph winds, Hurricane Katrina slammed into the Gulf Coast just outside New Orleans yesterday, submerging entire neighbourhoods, swamping Mississippi’s beachfront casinos and killing at least 55 people.

Hurricane Ivan struck the Alabama coast today with 130 mph winds spawning tornadoes and torrential rain, sending floodwaters surging over roads and swirling around homes. Power was knocked out to 200,000 people.

Hurricane Ivan claimed its first lives in the United States today, hours before the eye of the massive storm came ashore.