Bellamy Pailthorp

The Makah tribe in Washington state will be able to resume their longstanding tradition of whaling, after NOAA Fisheries decided Thursday to give them a waiver for a hunt.

This weekend, residents of Washington state will mark one year since a massive mudslide devastated a small community, killing 43 people and destroying dozens of homes in a matter of minutes.

A record number of people are hiking the Pacific Crest Trail. This year, more than a thousand backpackers applied for permits to complete the entire 2,650 mile trek between Mexico and Canada, though just about half of them are expected to actually finish as the season wraps up this October.

This week, a Continental flight from Houston to Chicago used a biofuel blend made in part from algae, and Alaska Airlines will fly passengers using a fuel made in part from cooking oil. The fledgling environmental effort has many hurdles, as biofuel costs nearly six times as much as regular jet fuel.