WBEZ 91.5 Chicago

One year after a deadly blowout at BP's Macondo oil well, deep-water drilling companies in the Gulf of Mexico are just now getting back to work.They're doing so under a tough new regulator and with a lot more rules governing them.

It's bug season again. And once again, most people won't bother spraying or slathering on repellents.That bugs the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention because biting insects are more than an itchy annoyance. Tick bites cause 30,000 Lyme disease infections every year.

If it's April in Panama City, Fla., it must be spring break.Here and in other beach towns along Florida's panhandle, hotel and restaurant owners are smiling once again, a year after the worst oil spill in history.

High school and college students from across North America are in Houston for the annual Shell Eco-marathon, where teams compete to see who can build the most fuel-efficient vehicle.Among the 70 teams this year are six girls dubbed the "ShopGirls" of Granite Falls High School in Granite Falls, Wa

The one-year anniversary of the Gulf oil spill is April 20; that's also the deadline to join a massive lawsuit to recoup economic damages from the companies involved.It may seem simple: You get wronged, you sue.

The Gulf of Mexico is known for its bounty — blue crab, shrimp, grouper, tuna, oysters — but ever since oil tainted a portion of the Gulf's fishing grounds, the seafood has been a tough sell.Even though much of the oil that spilled from last April's Deepwater Horizon rig explosion has been cleaned

In Liberal, Kan., if it weren't for the rogue bits of cotton resembling light snow around the building, you'd have to step inside the Plains Cotton Cooperative Association warehouse to realize what's being stored here.