Explosion kills at least 9 on Russia’s island of Sakhalin

A gas explosion in an apartment building has killed at least nine people, including four children, on the island of Sakhalin in far eastern Russia. Local authorities said a section of the five-story building in the town of Tymovskoye collapsed after a gas cylinder exploded Saturday in one of the apartments at around 5:30 a.m. Moscow time. The provincial governor says rescue teams are searching for more victims under the rubble. He says some of the 33 people known to have lived in the building remained unaccounted for. Sakhalin is located in the Pacific Ocean, north of Japan.