NEW ORLEANS (AP) - Hurricane Laura was hardly done ripping across Louisiana before scientists started combing through satellite imagery and drone footage and preparing to survey coastal areas to see what damage was caused by the monster storm. Southwest Louisiana's gulf coast is a fragile yet vibrant region, home to important fisheries, petrochemical plants and small communities of people who live at the water's edge. But numerous factors have contributed over the decades to erosion, which can be exacerbated by hurricanes. Some key takeaways of the immediate analysis of Laura's effects have emerged: IT WILL TAKE MONTHS TO KNOW EFFECTS: Scientists say some coastal impact from Hurricane Laura is inevitable. Pounding waves can tear at the marshes that make up most of the coast, and storm surge can inundate wetland areas, depositing sand and sediment in places that didn't have so much before. Laura certainly moved things around, but it could take months to figure out if the hurricane caused any significant and permanent land loss. Bren Haase, who heads the state's Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority, said the eastern Cameron shoreline "got pounded pretty hard." But they haven't been able to measure what has happened yet. In the western parts of Cameron Parish, where the shoreline is more sandy beach, many homes were badly damaged and helping people recover is the top priority, but the beach itself seemed to have fared well, he said. Kara Doran, an oceanographer with the U.S. Geological Survey, said about 70% of the coastline from from Gilchrist, Texas, to Pecan Island, Louisiana - about 125 miles (200 km) - had overwash. That means sand was transported landward, covering as much as 165 yards (150 meters) of marsh. "There was a tremendous amount of...

NEW ORLEANS (AP) - Hurricane Laura was hardly done ripping across Louisiana before scientists started combing through satellite imagery and drone footage and preparing to survey coastal areas to see what damage was caused by the monster storm. Southwest Louisiana's gulf coast is a fragile yet vibrant region, home to important fisheries, petrochemical plants and small communities of people who live at the water's edge. But numerous factors have contributed over the decades to erosion, which can be exacerbated by hurricanes. Some key takeaways of the immediate analysis of Laura's effects have emerged: IT WILL TAKE MONTHS TO KNOW EFFECTS: Scientists say some coastal impact from Hurricane Laura is inevitable. Pounding waves can tear at the marshes that make up most of the coast, and storm surge can inundate wetland areas, depositing sand and sediment in places that didn't have so much before. Laura certainly moved things around, but it could take months to figure out if the hurricane caused any significant and permanent land loss. Bren Haase, who heads the state's Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority, said the eastern Cameron shoreline "got pounded pretty hard." But they haven't been able to measure what has happened yet. In the western parts of Cameron Parish, where the shoreline is more sandy beach, many homes were badly damaged and helping people recover is the top priority, but the beach itself seemed to have fared well, he said. Kara Doran, an oceanographer with the U.S. Geological Survey, said about 70% of the coastline from from Gilchrist, Texas, to Pecan Island, Louisiana - about 125 miles (200 km) - had overwash. That means sand was transported landward, covering as much as 165 yards (150 meters) of marsh. "There was a tremendous amount of...

CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) - Wyoming's governor is promoting a Trump administration study that says capturing carbon dioxide emitted by coal-fired power plants would be an economical way to curtail the pollution - findings questioned by a utility that owns the plants and wants to shift away from the fossil fuel in favor of wind and solar energy. Gov. Mark Gordon's endorsement of the study Thursday is the latest effort by the top coal-mining state to prop up the industry, which President Donald Trump has promised to rescue since its U.S. output has fallen by about one-third over the past decade. In recent years, Wyoming contributed $15 million to test carbon capture at a coal-fired power plant, and Gordon signed a bill in March establishing a $1 million program to promote coal despite utilities nationwide switching to cheaper and cleaner-burning natural gas and renewable energy to combat climate change. Supporters say carbon capture would save coal by pumping carbon dioxide - a greenhouse gas emitted by power plants - underground instead of into the atmosphere. To date, carbon capture has been implemented at only one commercially operating coal-fired power plant in the U.S., the Petra Nova facility outside Houston that's been idle since May. "I know it's often easy to take shots at carbon capture and say it's uneconomic. But if you really talk about what we need to do to get carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere, to actually reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, this is the way you do it," said Gordon, a Republican who asked the U.S. Department of Energy to conduct the carbon-capture study in 2019. The study that Clairsville, Ohio-based Leonardo Technologies Inc., the University of Wyoming and others did for the government examined potential carbon-capture economics at four Wyoming...

CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) - Wyoming's governor is promoting a Trump administration study that says capturing carbon dioxide emitted by coal-fired power plants would be an economical way to curtail the pollution - findings questioned by a utility that owns the plants and wants to shift away from the fossil fuel in favor of wind and solar energy. Gov. Mark Gordon's endorsement of the study Thursday is the latest effort by the top coal-mining state to prop up the industry, which President Donald Trump has promised to rescue since its U.S. output has fallen by about one-third over the past decade. In recent years, Wyoming contributed $15 million to test carbon capture at a coal-fired power plant, and Gordon signed a bill in March establishing a $1 million program to promote coal despite utilities nationwide switching to cheaper and cleaner-burning natural gas and renewable energy to combat climate change. Supporters say carbon capture would save coal by pumping carbon dioxide - a greenhouse gas emitted by power plants - underground instead of into the atmosphere. To date, carbon capture has been implemented at only one commercially operating coal-fired power plant in the U.S., the Petra Nova facility outside Houston that's been idle since May. "I know it's often easy to take shots at carbon capture and say it's uneconomic. But if you really talk about what we need to do to get carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere, to actually reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, this is the way you do it," said Gordon, a Republican who asked the U.S. Department of Energy to conduct the carbon-capture study in 2019. The study that Clairsville, Ohio-based Leonardo Technologies Inc., the University of Wyoming and others did for the government examined potential carbon-capture economics at four Wyoming...

MEXICO CITY (AP) - The number of mammoth skeletons recovered at an airport construction site north of Mexico City has risen to at least 200, with a large number still to be excavated, experts said Thursday. Archaeologists hope the site that has become "mammoth central" - the shores of an ancient lakebed that both attracted and trapped mammoths in its marshy soil - may help solve the riddle of their extinction. Experts said that finds are still being made at the site, including signs that humans may have made tools from the bones of the lumbering animals that died somewhere between 10,000 and 20,000 years ago. There are so many mammoths at the site of the new Santa Lucia airport that observers have to accompany each bulldozer that digs into the soil to make sure work is halted when mammoth bones are uncovered. "We have about 200 mammoths, about 25 camels, five horses," said archaeologist Rubén Manzanilla López of the National Institute of Anthropology and History, referring to animals that went extinct in the Americas. The site is only about 12 miles (20 kilometers) from artificial pits, essentially shallow mammoth traps, that were dug by early inhabitants to trap and kill dozens of mammoths. Manzanilla López said evidence is beginning to emerge that suggests even if the mammoths at the airport possibly died natural deaths after becoming stuck in the mud of the ancient lake bed, their remains may have been carved up by humans, somewhat like those found at the mammoth-trap site in the hamlet of San Antonio Xahuento, in the nearby township of Tultepec. While tests are still being carried out on the mammoth bones to try to find possible butchering marks, archaeologists have found dozens of mammoth-bone tools - usually shafts used to hold tools or...

MEXICO CITY (AP) - The number of mammoth skeletons recovered at an airport construction site north of Mexico City has risen to at least 200, with a large number still to be excavated, experts said Thursday. Archaeologists hope the site that has become "mammoth central" - the shores of an ancient lakebed that both attracted and trapped mammoths in its marshy soil - may help solve the riddle of their extinction. Experts said that finds are still being made at the site, including signs that humans may have made tools from the bones of the lumbering animals that died somewhere between 10,000 and 20,000 years ago. There are so many mammoths at the site of the new Santa Lucia airport that observers have to accompany each bulldozer that digs into the soil to make sure work is halted when mammoth bones are uncovered. "We have about 200 mammoths, about 25 camels, five horses," said archaeologist Rubén Manzanilla López of the National Institute of Anthropology and History, referring to animals that went extinct in the Americas. The site is only about 12 miles (20 kilometers) from artificial pits, essentially shallow mammoth traps, that were dug by early inhabitants to trap and kill dozens of mammoths. Manzanilla López said evidence is beginning to emerge that suggests even if the mammoths at the airport possibly died natural deaths after becoming stuck in the mud of the ancient lake bed, their remains may have been carved up by humans, somewhat like those found at the mammoth-trap site in the hamlet of San Antonio Xahuento, in the nearby township of Tultepec. While tests are still being carried out on the mammoth bones to try to find possible butchering marks, archaeologists have found dozens of mammoth-bone tools - usually shafts used to hold tools or...

Jasper Bulldogs hosts the Silsbee Tigers for the first game of the season for both teams following Hurricane Laura.

Jasper Bulldogs hosts the Silsbee Tigers for the first game of the season for both teams following Hurricane Laura.

West Orange-Stark canceled its Week 3 game against Jasper Thursday afternoon because of a lack of power and other damages left over by Hurricane Laura.

West Orange-Stark canceled its Week 3 game against Jasper Thursday afternoon because of a lack of power and other damages left over by Hurricane Laura.