Amelia Templeton

Two explorers have discovered more than a mile of caves underneath a glacier on Mt. Hood near Portland, Oregon. They suspect the beautiful formations account for a significant loss of the glacier's ice, and they have set out to measure how much the inside of the glacier is melting each year. It's dangerous work, but it could reveal that some glaciers in the Pacific Northwest are retreating faster than anyone realized.

Voters in Oregon are deciding whether to raise their taxes to make up for lost timber payments from the federal government. In Josephine County, the sheriff has laid off 80 percent of his deputies.

Two giant wildfires burning in eastern Oregon have finally been contained. Although few people live in the affected area, cattle ranchers have seen hundreds of their livestock burned to death. The fire has an economic impact on the ranchers not only because of the lost livestock but also because these ranchers grazed their cows on federal land. And federal rules say that after a burn, land needs to go ungrazed for at least two years.

Astronomy buffs in the western U.S. were treated to an eclipse known as the Ring of Fire over the weekend. Technically, it's an annular solar eclipse, during which time the moon passes between the earth and sun. The moon blocks out much of the sun's light and casts a giant shadow on the earth.