The answer to easing the energy crunch in one of the nation's most populous states could lie underwater. Imagine if your utility company could harness the ocean's current to power your house, cool your office, even charge your car. Researchers at Florida Atlantic University are in the early stages of turning that idea into reality in the powerful Gulf Stream off the state's eastern shore. "If you can take an engine and put it on the back of ...

As the economy continues to flounder, many families are forgoing summer vacations in favor of staying at home. But there's a more interesting option that is just as cheap: vacationing in someone else's home. Growing numbers of people here and abroad are seeking a thrifty change of scenery by skipping all the hotels and looking instead to swap houses with strangers. Agree to use each other's cars, and you can save big bucks on rentals too. Home exchanges ...

Skydiving and parachuting, canoe polo, rhythmic gymnastics, orienteering, dragon boat races and korfball are among the air, land and water sports to kick off the first day of The World Games in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, on Friday. Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou will mark the start of the 11-day event Thursday night during the opening ceremony at the new Main Stadium in front of a capacity crowd of 40,000. The games adhere to the Olympic charter, but unlike the Olympic games, the ...

After the 2000 presidential election debacle, a friend of mine in New York voiced a snide but widely shared sentiment: "The best thing about Florida," he told me, "is that it's a place to keep Floridians." I've often said the same thing about Manhattan. But I'm recalling my friend's remark now as I look east and see hurricanes lining up in the Atlantic like bombers on an aircraft carrier, threatening to blow mango trees into my Miami living room from now until Halloween. After ...

If there was ever any question over the importance of finding the black boxes from Air France flight 447 then there is certainly none now. Most of what we heard from Thursday's briefing by the investigating team only serves to deepen the mystery behind the loss of the Airbus A330. Lead investigator Alain Bouillard sums matters up when he says: "As of today we are far from having any real idea of the causes of this accident."" Consider what we ...

After nine grueling months, the Volvo Ocean Race has finally come to an end following the 10th and final leg from Stockholm to St Petersburg. Spanish team Telefonica Black was first to reach the Russian city to take consolation line honors early on Saturday morning, with overall winner Ericsson 4 -- which clinched overall victory in the penultimate leg -- coming home in fifth place. American outfit Puma Ocean Racing followed Telefonica Black home by just a minute to consolidate ...

Search crews have recovered the bodies of the flight captain and a steward from the Air France flight that crashed off the coast of Brazil. The two flight members are among the victims that have been identified, Air France said in a statement Thursday. About a dozen victims have been identified among roughly 50 bodies recovered from the crash of Flight 447, which killed 228 people on June 1, authorities in Brazil said this week. Crews continue to ...

Accident investigators on Tuesday denied that a weak signal had been detected from the missing flight data recorders of the Air France airliner that plunged into the Atlantic earlier this month. The June 1 crash killed all 228 people on board. France's Le Monde newspaper reported on its Web site Tuesday that the Nautile mini-submarine set out Monday after French navy vessels detected the ping several hundred kilometers off the coast of Brazil. But the French team investigating the ...

Eleven of the 50 bodies recovered from the crash of Air France Flight 447 this month over the Atlantic Ocean have been identified, Brazilian authorities said. They were five Brazilian men, five Brazilian women and a foreigner, according to a statement Sunday from the federal police and secretary of defense of Pernambuco. They did not release the foreigner's nationality. The June 1 crash killed 228 people. At the request of family members, none of the names of the bodies recovered ...

The "black box" is actually an orange cylinder -- about 13 pounds of metal wrapped around a stack of memory chips and designed to withstand the force of being slammed high-speed into a brick wall. One such device -- currently sitting more than two miles below the surface of the Atlantic Ocean -- is now the object of a massive international search and could hold the answer to why Air France Flight 447 mysteriously plunged into the sea off the ...