Free Republic

Maj. Gen. Christopher Donahue, commander of the Army’s 82nd Airborne Division, and Ambassador Ross Wilson, charge d’affaires at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, were the final Americans to step aboard the last U.S. military C-17 cargo jet shortly before it lifted off from the Afghan capital’s sole international airport Monday. All told about 6,000 U.S. citizens were evacuated from Afghanistan. They represent the “vast majority” of those who wanted to leave the war-torn country, Marine Corps Gen. Frank McKenzie, commander of U.S. Central Command, told reporters Monday. “There’s a lot of heartbreak associated with this departure. We did not get...

Washburn and his wife were incredulous at how this dog, tucked into a tiny nook between rocks, could have ended up where it was. The whimpering dog was, as Washburn said, "in awful shape." He was convinced it would have died if left without food or water for much longer. The couple tried to coax the dog up out of the rocks and down the mountain but it was clear the dog was too injured and weak to move. "We knew we weren't going to be able to get her out by herself," said Washburn. "Her paws were completely raw...

The temperature outside on the night of Dec. 30, 1987, was 45 and dropping. Cold for most anyone, but perilous for a newborn baby girl wrapped in a towel and stuffed in a brown paper bag like trash. She probably wasn't meant to be found alive. When Steve Gibbons, a California Highway Patrol officer, pulled off Interstate 280 to stop and stretch his legs, she was just hours old. Her temperature had plummeted to a dangerous 90 degrees. If she had been there much longer, she would have died near the intersection of Cañada and Edgewood roads in Redwood City....

How a Hartselle teen became trapped for nearly three days in a railroad tanker car used to store processed fertilizer was apparently too complicated for the boy to describe Monday to police.