LOS ANGELES
6,000 stranded in airport customs snafu
About 6,000 international passengers were stranded for as long as six hours Saturday at Los Angeles International Airport because a computer failure prevented them from passing through customs, authorities said.
The passengers were stranded in four airport terminals and in 24 planes starting at about 1:30 p.m. because of a breakdown in the computer system. The system contains the names of arriving passengers and law enforcement data about them, including arrest warrants, said Los Angeles World Airports spokesman Paul Haney.
“That system allows our officers to make decisions on who we can allow to enter the United States,” said Mike Fleming, a Customs and Border Protection spokesman. “You just don’t know by looking at them.” The cause of the shutdown was not known, and there was no estimate on when the system would be repaired, Fleming said.
Authorities had begun using a backup system by 7:45 p.m. and were processing passengers in order of their arrival.
However, the system could only support half of the inspection booths normally used by customs officers, Fleming said.
Customs officials were working to divert incoming flights to airports in Ontario, Calif., and Las Vegas, Fleming said.
HONOLULU
Surf will be up, but Flossie should weaken
Hurricane Flossie strengthened to a Category 4 storm Saturday as it spun more than 1,000 miles south of Hawaii.
The hurricane could pass by Hawaii late Tuesday or early Wednesday, forecasters said, but by then cooler waters should weaken Flossie considerably to a tropical storm.
At 3 p.m. MDT, Flossie had intensified with maximum sustained winds near 135 mph about 1,035 miles southeast of Hilo, Hawaii.
The storm, with gusts of 161 mph, was expected to weaken later in the day as it passed over cooler waters. It was traveling west at about 12 mph.
Jeff Powell, lead forecaster at the National Weather Service in Honolulu, said a “ramp up” of surf on the Big Island was expected late Monday.
The island’s southeastern shores could see waves of 8 to 12 feet, forecasters said, with the surf rising during the day Monday and peaking Tuesday.
ST. JOSEPH, Mo.
Fire kills six family members; dad escapes
A fire broke out in a home without smoke detectors early Saturday, killing six members of a family, officials said. The father escaped by leaping out a second-
story window and was being treated for injuries.
“I guarantee the family would have got out alive if they’d just had one working smoke alarm,” said Steve Henrichson of the St. Joseph Fire Department.
The father thought his wife and children were out of the four-
bedroom, two-story home, relative Anthony Lopez said.
SAN JOSE, Calif.
Meteor shower will rain down tonight
Looking for some dirt-cheap entertainment tonight? Just look up in the sky.
The annual Perseids meteor shower will peak this evening as tiny meteors hit Earth’s atmosphere at a high rate of speed and then leave streaks on the skyscape as they burn up.
The Perseids peak in mid-August and are visible for several days. This year, the optimal viewing hours will be late tonight and in the wee hours Monday, when there’s a new moon or no moon.
“If you can get to a site that is reasonably dark, like a large park or some remote location away from city lights, it should be pretty nice. You should be able to see a meteor on average every minute or so,” said Marni Berendsen of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific in San Francisco.
