IN BRIEF

'SUSPICIOUS' BLAZE IN LAS VEGAS

Fire in abandoned apartment building under investigation

Firefighters are investigating a suspicious Saturday night blaze in an abandoned apartment building that caused $100,000 in damage.

Las Vegas Fire Department spokesman Tim Szymanski said firefighters arrived about 8 p.m. to the two-story building at the Porter Apartments, 1821 Santa Paula Drive, near St. Louis Avenue and Las Vegas Boulevard North.

It took firefighters 15 minutes to bring the fire under control. Nobody was injured.

Neighbors told investigators the building was vacated in January by the city of Las Vegas for poor living conditions, Szymanski said. They saw a maintenance man removing appliances from the building in recent days, he said. Investigators believe the fire started under suspicious circumstances in an upstairs bedroom.

SIERRA NEVADA CORPORATION

Sparks company gets stimulus funds for spacecraft program

Some $20 million in stimulus funds from NASA could put Northern Nevada at the forefront of the United States' commercial spacecraft industry.

Sparks-based Sierra Nevada Corporation was one of five companies awarded funds. The company is developing the Dream Chaser, a seven-passenger craft designed to shuttle astronauts to and from the International Space Station as it orbits the Earth.

Mark Sirangelo, vice president of the company's Sierra Nevada Space Systems, said the craft is expected to be operational by 2014.

NASA's space shuttle will fly its last mission this year. U.S. astronauts will then use Russian spacecraft for missions. That will cost about $15 million per flight, per astronaut.

TRAFFIC SNARLED FOR HOURS

Chase, standoff with driver of U-Haul truck disrupts I-10

Traffic on Interstate 10 was snarled for hours Sunday afternoon after a man called authorities and said he was being forced to drive a U-Haul truck filled with illegal immigrants to Mexico.

The resulting chase and standoff closed I-10 in both directions near Casa Grande for several hours, clogging the main route between Phoenix and Tucson. But after several hours, a SWAT team determined the truck was empty.

PIPES ALLOWED TO DRIP

Water credit saves money for city's residents during winter

By allowing pipes to drip, Aztec and its residents are saving money.

The New Mexico city issued a 1,000-gallon water credit in January to all water users to encourage them to let water drip from their faucets.

City officials said it reduced the number of reports of freezing pipes.

The city has on occasion offered water users the credit for more than 20 years, typically during periods of long, sustained subfreezing temperatures similar to weather experienced this year.

Officials maintain there is no accurate way to determine the money the city and water users saved by dripping water from the pipes.