NATION BRIEFS

MINNESOTA/Fire kills six, including kids

A fire swept through a two-story Minneapolis building that housed several apartments and an Irish pub Friday, killing six people, including three children, authorities said. Friends and relatives said they believed those who died included a bartender who lived above McMahon's Pub and five members of his girlfriend's family, who had been visiting the bartender the night before. Firefighters arrived shortly after 6 a.m. to find heavy flames and smoke pouring from the building, where the roof eventually collapsed, authorities said. The blaze began in a second-floor apartment, but the cause hadn't been determined Friday evening, said Assistant Minneapolis Fire Chief John Fruetel.

WASHINGTON/Violations at deadly refinery

A Washington state oil refinery hit by a deadly blast and fire early Friday was recently fined for safety violations amid what federal watchdogs call a troubling trend of serious accidents at refineries. The blast struck the Tesoro Corp. refinery in Anacortes, about 70 miles north of Seattle on Puget Sound, around 12:30 a.m. Employees were doing maintenance work on a unit that processes highly flammable liquid derived during the refining process, the company said. Three men died at the scene and a woman died later at a Seattle hospital. Three others were hospitalized with major burns over the majority of their bodies. It was the largest fatal refinery accident since a 2005 explosion at a BP American refinery in Texas killed 15 people and injured 170.

ALASKA/Newborn reindeer arrives

The first of 19 expected reindeer calves has been born at an Alaska farm that's the only reindeer research facility in North America. Workers discovered the 17-pound newborn calf Thursday at the University of Alaska Fairbanks research farm. The other 18 pregnant does are expected to give birth within a week or so. The research program hosts an annual contest to name its new calves, with the winners receiving birth certificates for the reindeer they've named. The facility experiments with feeding techniques to aid ranchers.