Spate of fatal shootings has many concerned about perception that Fayetteville is dangerous

The headlines scream from the front pages: "Rampaging gunman kills 2" and "3 die in shooting."

At least six Cumberland County residents died in a week's span of violence that erupted from domestic problems. At least a dozen other people have been shot in the county since July 5, three of them fatally.

The violence - in an Army community that cannot shake the "Fayettenam" moniker from the 1970s - feeds the perception that Fayetteville and the neighborhoods around it are dangerous.

And that is a perception, officials say, that hits everyone in the community, whether they have ever been touched by violence or not. Crime - especially violent crime - shakes confidence in the community. It makes companies thinking about bringing investment and jobs to Fayetteville reconsider. And that leaves too many residents mired in poverty.

The more poverty, research shows, the more crime and the more overwhelming the perception that people are not safe even in their homes.

Some of the comments about a Fayetteville Observer story on Facebook speak volumes about the perception that Fayetteville has become increasingly violent. The story, first posted Tuesday, was about a gunman shooting a mother and her son to death in front of a home in Eureka Springs, on the edge of Fort Bragg.

Investigators have since identified the shooter as Gerald Marr and his victims as 14-year-old Zachary Phillips and 31-year-old Diana Maria Hathaway. Zachary's 15-year-old sister, Kelsey, was wounded.

On Facebook, many of the comments offer prayers and condolence.

Others offer this:

"It breaks my heart that there is so much violence in Fayetteville."

"Another shooting? Wow it's daily now; what the hell is going on?"

"A tragic occurrence that is happening all too frequently."

The story spread swiftly on social media. It landed on national news wires and Internet sites. So did stories of murders seven days earlier, when a man shot and killed two members of his wife's family and seriously wounded a Cumberland County deputy while emptying a high-powered rifle into a home in Crystal Springs. The shooter, Andrew Michaelis, died in a shootout with deputies.

The stories - sensational and horrific - feed into the image that Cumberland County is turning more violent.

Fayetteville Police Chief Harold Medlock says that is not the case, at least not within the city limits. Both of the incidents that resulted in multiple deaths over the past two weeks happened in neighborhoods outside the city.

Medlock cites police statistics showing that there were 165 aggravated assaults - violent acts in which someone was hurt - in the city through the first seven months of this year, compared with 174 in the same time period of 2013.

Homicides are down from 12 to 11 in the period, Medlock said. Looking only at July, aggravated assaults fell from 30 in 2013 to 27 this year, he said.

Violent crime is down 4.2 percent from last year, and overall crime fell by 11.4 percent, the chief said.

But Medlock said he is aware of the perception of a more violent Fayetteville. He said he heard about it from a number of residents during National Night Out gatherings last week.

"You can give them those numbers, but it's what they see on TV and what they read in the paper," Medlock said. "That's what folks see, and it scares them."

It scares people who are not from here, too.

Last week, Kim Breeden, chief executive of Big Brothers Big Sisters of the Triangle, talked about the dire need to establish a satellite office in Fayetteville. Like so many others, Breeden has seen news reports of the recent violence in Fayetteville.

"It's just breaking my heart to see what's happening there," Breeden said. "It's just every day now."

Preconceived notions

Dr. George Corvin, a forensic psychiatrist in Raleigh, said Fayetteville has unique circumstances, created in part by being a military town. Corvin runs through the usual list - high unemployment, poverty, transient residents, young soldiers and domestic violence.

But Corvin said all cities have most of those problems, to varying degrees.

"It's just how we tend to categorize them," he said.

The murder late last month of University of North Carolina professor Feng Liu was a horrible crime, Corvin said. So was the murder of UNC student president Eve Carson in 2008. But Corvin said nobody paints a picture of Chapel Hill as the wild west.

Instead, they see it as a city of rolling hills, smart students, stately homes and expensive cars. Bad things that happen there don't stick, Corvin said.

By contrast, many people from outside Fayetteville view this city as young soldiers in fast cars, strip clubs and blighted neighborhoods. In a fiction piece for Rolling Stone Magazine in 1996, author Tom Wolfe described Bragg Boulevard as "the gaudy gullet of hell."

People's preconceived notions are hard to reverse, and violence in Fayetteville tends to get magnified because of its reputation, Corvin said.

"Those things sort of stick in your memory," he said.

Corvin said he had a similar image of Fayetteville, until he began visiting here.

"I think you have a great town," he said.

But it is far from perfect. Only four of North Carolina's 100 counties - Mecklenburg, Durham, Lenoir and Robeson - had a higher violent crime rate than Cumberland in 2012, the most recent year for which complete statistics are available from the State Bureau of Investigation.

Fayetteville's crime rate is nearly four times as high as that of Orange County, where Chapel hill is located.

Marketing the city

As president and chief executive of the Fayetteville Regional Chamber, part of Doug Peters' job is to market the city to businesses looking to relocate.

"What is frustrating to me is that when these sorts of events happen, as unfortunate as they are, it does reflect on the community and in the eyes of many an unfair stigma of our community," Peters said.

Two years ago, Jay Garner of Garner Economics in Atlanta produced an economic planning strategy for the county.

Garner said public safety is the No. 1 quality-of-life issue that businesses consider when expanding or relocating. Their employees want to feel safe, Peters said.

"It's very important and obvious it will have a profound consequence on Fayetteville and Cumberland County if the crime statistics don't go in an opposite direction," Garner said.

Peters said the community will always be at a disadvantage until it comes together to help find solutions to our crime problems and public image.

Medlock said he is moving the Police Department in the right direction, but it could take years to make a significant dent in the violent crime rate.

The high-profile murders in the past two weeks were characterized as domestic-related, cases in which some kind of relationship tensions exploded into violence.

But much of the violence that regularly plagues the community occurs in isolated pockets among young men, ages 18 to 28, who have adopted a high-risk lifestyle, Medlock said.

"That's not an absolute, but that's the reality," he said.

"We the cops, the officers, sometimes become discouraged, but we are going to make folks feel safe in this city," Medlock said. "We just need the public's help. But we are making gains day by day, week by week.

"It's not the Wild West here."

barnesg@fayobserver.com

Army begins questioning Bergdahl about disappearance, Taliban capture

HOUSTON — The U.S. Army has begun questioning Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl about his disappearance in Afghanistan that led to five years in captivity by the Taliban, his attorney and an Army spokeswoman said Wednesday.

Bergdahl was questioned at Fort Sam Houston in Texas where he has been staying since returning to the U.S., said his attorney, Eugene R. Fidell.

"Sgt. Bergdahl answered all questions put to him. The interview is proceeding. It has been a productive expenditure of time," Fidell said in a telephone interview during a break in the questioning. Fidell declined to comment on what specific questions Bergdahl was asked.

Lt. Col. Alayne Conway, an Army spokeswoman, said Bergdahl was advised of his rights under Article 31 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Article 31 pertains to individuals being informed of the nature of the accusation against them and says that they do not have to make any statement to investigators.

"This in an ongoing investigation; the investigating officer has 60 days from his appointment to conclude his investigation; however, he can request additional time if he feels it is necessary," Conway said in an emailed statement. She did not respond to an inquiry about what type of questions investigators asked.

Maj. Gen. Kenneth R. Dahl, who is heading the probe into the 28-year-old's disappearance, questioned Bergdahl on Wednesday, Fidell said.

A well-known lawyer and military justice expert who is currently a visiting lecturer at Yale Law School, Fidell described the setting of Bergdahl's interview as "a comfortable environment," a room with a sofa and a couple of chairs. He said there were four people in the room, the interview was being recorded and that they were taking breaks throughout the day.

It was not immediately known how long the interview would last. But Fidell said he expected this would be the only interview Bergdahl would be giving as part of the investigation.

"There is no reason to think there will be more than one," he said.

The Idaho native was freed by the Taliban May 31 in a deal struck by the Obama administration in which five senior Taliban officials were released from detention at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Bergdahl had disappeared from his post in Paktika province in eastern Afghanistan on June 30, 2009. Some ex-members of Bergdahl's former unit have labeled him a deserter, asserting that he chose to walk away and saying some were wounded or killed looking for him.

The investigation's findings will help determine whether Bergdahl is prosecuted for desertion or faces any other disciplinary action.

Bergdahl had been receiving care at Fort Sam Houston since returning to the United States on June 13. He was treated at Brooke Army Medical Center at the fort but was later shifted to outpatient care at the military base.

Earlier this month, the Army announced Bergdahl had been given a desk job, ending the formal phase of his transition from Taliban prisoner to not-quite-ordinary soldier.

Bergdahl has not commented publicly on the circumstances of his disappearance, and the Army has made no charges against him.

It is unknown whether Bergdahl's family has seen him since his return to the United States. Army officials have said because of a request by Bergdahl's family for privacy, they cannot comment on that matter.

EUCOM sends advisers to Ukraine to assist in crash probe

STUTTGART, Germany — U.S. European Command has dispatched a small team of advisers to Ukraine to support the investigation into the downing of the Malaysian airliner last month.

About 12 servicemembers were sent to Kiev, but they will not venture to the site of the crash in eastern Ukraine. The team will provide assistance to U.S. diplomatic personnel in areas such as communications, logistics and surveying, the Pentagon's spokesman said on Tuesday.

"Recovery operations is something, tragically and unfortunately, the U.S. military has to do and has to be good at. And these people are -- they have expertise in that regard," Navy Rear Adm. John Kirby told reporters.

The troops, who arrived in Ukraine on Monday, were mobilized at the request of the State Department, Kirby said.

U.S. officials have accused pro-Russian separatists of shooting down the commercial aircraft, which crashed on July 17 in the heart of contested territory not far from Ukraine's border with Russia.

Close to 300 people were killed, prompting widespread international condemnations. Soon after the incident, U.S. and European officials levied additional sanctions on Russia. U.S. officials have accused Russia of supplying separatists with advanced anti-aircraft weapons systems that it believes were used in the attack.

The separatists also have been accused of preventing access to the crash site, and hampering the investigation and the recovery of remains.

In recent weeks, Russia has moved more than 10,000 troops back to its border with Ukraine, according to U.S. officials, raising concerns that tensions in the region could further escalate.

"What matters is that they continue to reinforce these units, that they are very capable and very ready across what we call combined arms capabilities -- armor, artillery, air defense, special forces -- and that they are closer to the border than they were in the spring," Kirby said.

Vandiver.john@stripes.com

As disability awards grow, so do concerns with veracity of PTSD claims

The 49-year-old veteran explained that he suffered from paranoia in crowds, nightmares and unrelenting flashbacks from the Iraq war. He said he needed his handgun to feel secure and worried that he would shoot somebody.

The symptoms were textbook post-traumatic stress disorder.

But Robert Moering, the psychologist conducting the disability examination at a Veterans Affairs hospital in Tampa, Fla., suspected the veteran was exaggerating.

Hardly anybody had so many symptoms of PTSD so much of the time.

As disability awards for PTSD have grown nearly fivefold over the last 13 years, so have concerns that many veterans might be exaggerating or lying to win benefits.

Moering, a former Marine, estimates that roughly half of the veterans he evaluates for the disorder exaggerate or fabricate symptoms.

Depending on severity, veterans with PTSD can receive up to $3,000 a month tax-free, making the disorder the biggest contributor to the growth of a disability system in which payments have more than doubled to $49 billion since 2002.

"It's an open secret that a large chunk of patients are flat-out malingering," said Christopher Frueh, a University of Hawaii psychologist who spent 15 years treating PTSD in the VA system.

Diagnosing PTSD can be difficult in the best of circumstances. Experts have long debated how to define the condition. One person can suffer crippling anxiety from an experience that wouldn't faze someone else.

Assessing PTSD becomes even more difficult in a VA system that gives veterans a financial incentive to appear as sick as possible, former and current VA mental health clinicians said. The number of veterans on the disability rolls for the disorder has climbed from 133,745 to more than 656,000 over the last 13 years.

Vietnam and the recent wars have fueled the growth in roughly equal measure.

Frueh and other critics of the disability system have sparred in medical journals with senior VA mental health officials, who argue that the extent of malingering is impossible to know without more research.

The veteran Moering evaluated was already receiving $1,600 a month in disability pay for PTSD as well as various joint problems. But he wanted to increase it.

Three tests designed to detect dishonest patients by looking for highly unlikely response patterns strongly suggested that the veteran was exaggerating,

According to disability records that Moering allowed The Times to review. The case is one of eight that Moering opened to the newspaper. In each, he challenged a PTSD diagnosis. The records were redacted to hide names and other identifying information.

Moering said he could not determine whether the veteran was feigning entirely or simply stretching the truth.

"This is the dilemma we face," Moering said. "How can a disability rater honestly rate this veteran?"

Government policy in cases without a clear answer is to give the veteran the benefit of the doubt. The VA left his disability rating intact.

War's psychic toll

In some ways, the explosion in PTSD cases is a sign of progress.

Though descriptions of the disorder show up in literature as far back as Shakespeare, it did not become a formal diagnosis until 1980, and even then remained controversial. After decades of downplaying the psychological toll of war, the government has finally acknowledged the damage and boosted assistance to veterans in need.

The VA has increasingly recognized non-war-related PTSD as well, extending monthly compensation to tens of thousands of veterans traumatized by accidents -- both on- and off-duty -- that occurred at the time they were enlisted. In one case The Times reviewed, a woman was awarded PTSD compensation based on breaking her leg in a fall walking to the mess hall.

As the number of cases has climbed, so has debate over their legitimacy.

A 2007 study of 74 Arkansas veterans with chronic PTSD, most of them from the Vietnam War, concluded that more than half were exaggerating symptoms. Other research has found little evidence of malingering.

In the aftermath of serious trauma, most people experience symptoms of the disorder. But the nightmares, concentration problems and heightened state of alert usually go away in a few weeks. In a minority of cases, certain combinations of symptoms persist. That's PTSD.

Because the diagnosis relies mainly on what patients report, it is easy to exaggerate.

In online forums, veterans trade tips on how to behave in their disability evaluations. Common advice: Dress poorly and don't shower, refuse to sit with your back to the door, and constantly scan the room.

If an examiner asks about homicidal thoughts, a Vietnam veteran posted, say: "Doc, doesn't everyone, I mean didn't you ever think about killing someone? Hell, I think about it every time someone gets too close to me."

He also urged veterans to purposely fail memory and other cognitive tests.

The motivation behind such advice is not always clear. It may be aimed at helping veterans get what they deserve from a system that many see as rigged against them. Exaggeration can also be a sign of distress itself.

Though VA investigations have exposed scams -- including disability recipients who never served in the military -- the department has focused on making the system friendlier to veterans.

To get paid for PTSD, veterans must link their symptoms to trauma that occurred during their service. In 2010, the VA expanded what situations could qualify.

Credible fear of being attacked -- without actually suffering or witnessing violence -- became sufficient.

The VA also dropped its requirement to support each case of war-related PTSD with records of the underlying trauma. Those veterans are now taken at their word.

After the changes, the number of new PTSD claims rose 60% to more than 150,000 a year, and approval rates jumped from 55% to 74%.

The shift raised new concerns.

In a 2014 paper, Arthur Russo, a VA psychologist in Brooklyn, argued that the disability system is prone to "collusive lying," in which veterans fake mental illness and clinicians go along with it.

He cited an email from an unnamed VA chief psychologist to staff members instructing them not to diagnose malingering or "make any comments that appear to question patients' reports of trauma."

Gail Poyner, an Oklahoma City psychologist, said she was dismissed in 2010 from a company the VA hired to conduct disability exams because she insisted on giving veterans tests to determine whether they were exaggerating.

"It's political," Poyner said. "It's not prudent to suggest that people who have served our country are not being honest."

The VA issued a statement to The Times saying it encourages examiners "to conduct comprehensive, accurate and thorough evaluations" and to use their clinical judgment in deciding whether to test for malingering.

An issue of honesty

The quest for VA disability benefits begins before service members leave the military.

Jill Wilschke, a therapist who worked at Camp Lejeune, N.C., until late last year, said many of her patients had witnessed the horrors of war and were being forced out of the military because of PTSD.

"People I worked with were really hurting and scared about how they would survive when they left," Wilschke recalled.

But in several cases, she said, Marines whose symptoms were fading expressed concern that medical records documenting their progress would be used against them in disability exams. One with mild PTSD was contemplating putting off college because he worried attending would make him appear too healthy.

Wilschke worried that some patients weren't being honest with her.

Several VA mental health providers said the incentives of the disability system have undermined their relationship with patients and inhibited them from fully engaging in treatment.

In 2005, the VA office of the inspector general looked at 92 cases of PTSD and found that while most veterans received treatment when their disability ratings had room to rise, visits dropped off after their ratings topped out at 100% disabled.

Frueh and other researchers have argued that the incentives of the disability system may help explain why veterans tend to report less improvement than other patients in response to treatment.

In its statement, the VA pointed to several studies casting doubt on that view and said "it is counterproductive to disparage VA disability policies and treatment efforts without clear supporting evidence."

Many veterans -- including those receiving disability pay -- make substantial progress with treatment, it said.

Among the most encouraging results came in a study published last year in JAMA Psychiatry. It looked at 1,888 veterans who began a treatment known as prolonged exposure therapy. Nearly 800 went on to fall below the threshold for PTSD on a standard assessment scale. Their traumas included combat, sexual violence and painful childhood experiences.

In the VA disability system, however, the disorder is usually permanent.

Of the 572,612 veterans on the disability rolls for PTSD at the end of 2012, 1,868 -- a third of 1% -- saw a reduction in their ratings the next year, according to statistics provided by the VA.

Even some veterans whose diagnosis falls under deep suspicion have managed to keep their disability ratings.

In one case that Moering reviewed in 2009, he searched military records and concluded that a Navy veteran on the disability rolls for PTSD had lied to VA clinicians about having served in the elite SEALs and concocted his combat history.

The VA responded by reducing his PTSD rating from 50% to 30%, records show.

alan.zarembo@latimes.com

Post-9/11 GI Bill turns 5

Seventy years ago, the original GI Bill provided a bridge to the middle class for veterans returning from war who may have otherwise found limited opportunity in the civilian world.

Five years into the Post-9/11 GI Bill era, this newest incarnation has done much the same, veterans education officials said.

But serious challenges may lie ahead for the highly popular program.

“Protecting the benefit is an increasingly important piece of the puzzle,” said Matt Randle, interim chief of staff for Student Veterans of America. “If we cannot demonstrate [the Post-9/11 GI Bill’s value] to the lawmakers of this country — and ultimately to the taxpayers of this country — then I think that it can and may well become part of the discussion in a budget-conscious Congress.”

Most veterans have two GI Bill benefits to choose from: Post-9/11 and the Montgomery GI Bill.

Their preference is clear — last year, nearly eight times as many vets used Post-9/11, compared to Montgomery.

Except in particular, rare cases, Post-9/11 is the more generous benefit by far. It covers the full cost of in-state tuition at all public colleges and universities or up to $19,198 at private schools in the 2013-14 school year.

It also provides a housing stipend, which varies by school location and is based on the Basic Allowance for Housing offered to an E-5 paygrade with dependents. Post-9/11 beneficiaries also receive a stipend of up to $1,000 per year for books and supplies, depending on course load.

And all these benefits can be transferred by the vet to a spouse or child, under certain conditions.

Montgomery cannot be transferred, offers no stipend and covered no more than $1,648 per month for college costs in 2013-14, though under some circumstances, vets can pocket the difference when tuition falls below the $1,648 level.

The money that Post-9/11 typically provides has attracted the attention of many student veterans — as well as schools and skeptical public officials.

Such officials have focused on for-profit schools, charging that some take advantage of student vets, sucking up their benefits while offering little in return. For-profit school representatives and even veterans service organizations have pushed back on that characterization, saying there are good and bad schools of all types, whether for-profit, private or public.

Still, talk of schools squandering Post-9/11 benefits continues and could lead to doubts about whether the cost is worthwhile.

“In order to preserve the benefit, we need to be able to show policymakers that student veterans are succeeding in higher ed,” said Ryan Gallucci, deputy legislative director for Veterans of Foreign Wars.

But that can be difficult. Veterans using the Post-9/11 GI Bill often come to school with transfer credit and sometimes attend part time, due to career or family obligations. Such students cannot be counted in the traditional student success measures established by the Education Department.

In March, SVA released a study attempting to track vet graduation rates. But the study relied on a sample of students dramatically different from the typical veteran population and used an inconsistent method to determine success, casting doubt on the results.

Curtis Coy, a VA deputy undersecretary, said this lack of outcome data can hurt vet students trying to decide on a school.

“You get 36 months of benefits. It doesn’t leave you much room for error,” Coy said, adding that VA is working to figure out methods to measure the success of student veterans at particular schools.

For its part, SVA last month rolled out a “Not Recommended” schools list, to warn vets away from institutions that it believes could squander their benefits.

Perhaps the other biggest concern related to the Post-9/11 GI Bill was addressed just last week, as part of a comprehensive veterans reform bill passed by Congress. One provision requires public universities to offer in-state tuition rates to all Post-9/11 beneficiaries, thus eliminating a tuition gap that vets sometimes had to make up themselves when their military service prevented them from establishing residency in a particular state.

“That was a huge push for us,” Randle said.

Still, Randle expressed some concern about the future of the overall benefit, noting that if Congress lets the Post-9/11 GI Bill continue as is, without scaling it down, it “would be the first” GI Bill to receive such hands-off treatment.

Coy said he wishes he had “a good crystal ball” to divine what changes Congress may make to the benefit in the future. But whatever may happen, he said, the benefit is a great investment for the country, and Congress is likely to want to ensure vets have such a bridge to civilian success.

“This Post-9/11 GI Bill will spawn the next ‘greatest generation,’ ” Coy said. “I would suggest that the American people believe that this is a benefit that has been richly earned by veterans.”

Ex-grunt's brewery to tap in to good cause

A former Army officer who has launched a microbrewery knows that everyone will raise a glass to help support a veteran-owned business that gives a portion of its proceeds to charities backing military members, policemen and firefighters.

It’s the second glass that’ll make the difference.

“There is no shortage of excitement about a new brewery opening up in this town,” said former Capt. Kevin Ryan, a 1996 West Point graduate whose Savannah, Georgia-based Service Brewing Co. had its launch event in July at a local American Legion post. “The majority of places that sell craft beer are going to want the new local beer on tap. The job is to make sure they want it on tap again.”

Ryan, who commanded two 4th Infantry Division companies in Iraq, has some prior-service talent on staff to make that happen:

■ Dan Sartin, another West Point graduate and former captain, who “went to Germany as his first duty station and fell in love with great beer,” Ryan said. After leaving the Army in 1985 and doing a hitch in the corporate world, Sartin became a master brewer and a beer sommelier.

■ Jeff Hyatt, who retired as a chief warrant officer 4 last year after flying helicopters out of nearby Hunter Army Airfield. He used his terminal leave to get his brewing bona fides and works for Service Brewing as an assistant brewer.

■ Ryan himself, the owner/CEO who left the Army in 2004, taking non-malt-related jobs until going to work for his father’s business in 2010. His father died in 2011, and Ryan decided that he “needed to chase his own dreams.”

Ryan’s girlfriend gave him a home-brew kit, and the rest was history. And fundraising. And staffing. And scouring Savannah for a brewery site — a historic building with more than 28,000 square feet.

“Writing a business plan that is well done is probably the hardest thing to do,” Ryan said when asked what advice he could give to other Army entrepreneurs. “No good plan survives first contact, but you have to have something to work from.”

Other tips: Seek out local small-business agencies, which generally offer help with planning at no cost. And rely on communication skills developed by the service.

Part of what made Ryan’s business plan attractive to investors — including many former classmates and other Army connections — was the mandate to donate part of the proceeds to charity. For the July launch, all proceeds went to benefit Honor Flight Savannah, which arranges visits by World War II and Korean War veterans to their respective memorials in Washington, D.C., and the 200 Club, which has donated more than $700,000 to the families of fallen law enforcement officers and firefighters in the region, according to its website.

Service Brewing plans to donate some proceeds to a different national charity each year — first up will be Fisher House — and to Healing for Heroes, a Georgia agency that rescues dogs from shelters and trains them to assist former service members with disabilities.

But what will the beer taste like?

“We’re not trying to go to any extreme,” Ryan said. “We’re trying to make very good craft beer that’s drinkable. And has an alcohol content low enough that you can have more than one.”

Drinkers have three choices:

■ Ground Pounder Ale, which the brewery’s website describes as “a good balance of malt and hops for a clean and pleasing drinking experience.”

■ Compass Rose IPA, recently emerging from the brewery’s 30-barrel brewing system (each barrel is 31 gallons). It has “citrus and herbal character with a medium-bodied malt presence.”

■ An as-yet-unnamed seasonal offering that will have hints of pecan and apricot, Ryan said.

The brews will be on tap and in cans in the greater Savannah area, and Ryan said he’s received requests from New Mexico, New York and Alaska seeking samples.

The brew staff is also planning a Dec. 13 trip to the Army-Navy game, where Ryan hopes to take part in Tailgate for Troops, a charity that supports military causes.

At least 24 killed, 271 hurt as Taiwan gas explosions rip apart streets

KAOHSIUNG, Taiwan — At least 24 people were killed and 271 injured when several underground gas explosions ripped through Taiwan's second-largest city, hurling concrete and cars through the air and blasting trenches in the streets, authorities said Friday, as a search for the cause began.

The series of explosions about midnight Thursday and early Friday struck a densely populated district where several petrochemical companies operate pipelines alongside the sewer system in Kaohsiung, a southwestern port with 2.8 million people.

Firefighters called to the neighborhood to investigate a gas leak were among the victims when the blasts went off several hours later, upending at least five red fire trucks amid the rubble of pavement and dirt.

Four firefighters were among the 24 dead, and 271 people were injured, the National Fire Agency said. The death toll could rise, because many of the seriously injured were still being treated, officials said.

"Last night around midnight, the house started shaking and I thought it was a huge earthquake, but when I opened the door, I saw white smoke all over and smelled gas," said Chen Qing-tao, 38, who lives 10 buildings away from the main explosion site.

The fires were thought caused by a leak of propene, a petrochemical material not intended for public use, but the cause and source of the leak were not immediately clear, officials said.

The exploded gas line belongs to government-owned CPC Corp., which told The Associated Press it showed no signs of problems before the explosions. CPC officials at the scene Friday declined to offer information about reasons for the blasts.

Video from the TVBS broadcaster showed residents searching for victims in shattered storefronts and rescuers pulling injured people from the rubble of a road and placing them on stretchers while passersby helped other victims on a sidewalk. Broadcaster ETTV showed rows of large fires sending smoke into the night sky.

At least five blasts shook the city, Taiwan's Premier Jiang Yi-huah said.

Chang Jia-juch, the director of the Central Disaster Emergency Operation Center, said the leaking gas was most likely to be propene. One of the fires, along a 10-meter stretch of gas line, is still on fire, the National Fire Agency says on its website.

The source of the leak was unknown. Chang said, however, that propene was not for public use, and that it was a petrochemical material.

The government's disaster response center said Friday it was trying to prevent any knock-on gas explosions in the same place or nearby.

"In terms of what we can prevent, we're afraid another explosion could happen, as there is that possibility," said Hsu Lee-hao, an economics affairs ministry section chief staffing the disaster response center. "We're afraid it could be in the same place or elsewhere."

Most of the injured were people outside on the street, mostly hit by rubble blown toward them or crushed by cars sent flying in the blasts, a police officer at the scene said. Police and firefighters were burned while trying to control blazes.

Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chu said several petrochemical companies have pipelines built along the sewage system in Chian-Chen district, which has both factories and residential buildings.

"Our priority is to save people now. We ask citizens living along the pipelines to evacuate," Chen told TVBS television.

Rescue workers are looking for people trapped in the rubble but expect to find few, if any, because no buildings collapsed, Hsu in the disaster response center said.

Power was cut off in the area, making it difficult for firefighters to search for others who might be buried in rubble. About 12,000 people lost power and 23,600 lost gas service.

CNA said the local fire department received reports from residents of gas leakage at about 8:46 p.m. and that explosions started around midnight. CPC says it got reports around the same hour.

Closed-circuit television showed an explosion rippling through the floor of a motorcycle parking area, hurling concrete and other debris through the air. Mobile phone video captured the sound of an explosion as flames leapt at least 30 feet (9 meters) into the air.

One survivor of the blast said he tried to help before paramedics arrived.

"I was on my scooter just across the street, suddenly there was the explosion, a white car was blown toward me, and I saw the driver trapped in the car," said Wong Zhen-yao, 49, owner of a car repair shop in the disaster area.

"There was still fire nearby. I tried to pull the guy out but couldn't," he said. "Only after the smoke was gone did I realize there was such a big hole in the middle of the road."

One of the explosions left a large trench running down the center of a road, edged with piles of concrete slabs torn apart by the force of the blast. A damaged motorcycle lay in the crater, and other cars were flipped over. The force of the initial blast also felled trees lining the street.

After dawn on Friday, Taiwan's Global News television channel showed a crane removing a van from a trench more than a meter (yard) deep. It showed other vehicles smashed completely. Flats and shops along Sanduo Road, near an elementary school, showed exterior damage such as burnt walls and toppled signs.

The explosions affected an area of two to three square kilometers, much of it sealed off.

Associated Press writers Ralph Jennings in Taipei, and Gillian Wong and Ian Mader in Beijing contributed.