An oilfield company and a company executive have been indicted in the 2019 poisonous gas deaths of a worker and his wife. The federal grand jury in Midland charged Odessa-based Aghorn Operating Inc. and Aghorn Vice President Trent Day with violating federal clean air laws and obstructing a federal job safety investigation, according to a Justice Department statement Tuesday. They and an Aghorn affiliate also were charged with federal safe water laws and making false statements on forms documenting the mechanical integrity of Aghorn’s injection wells. Aghorn also was charged with three job safety crimes causing the deaths. Jacob and Natalee Dean died Oct. 26, 2019, after inhaling hydrogen sulfide gas at an Aghorn pump house in Odessa. According to the Ector County Sheriff’s Office, Aghorn officials dispatched Jacob Dean to check on the facility. When he didn’t return as expected, his wife tried to reach him by phone but got no answer. She drove with their two children, ages 6 and 9, to the pump house. She left the vehicle to approach the pump house and also was overcome by the colorless, highly corrosive gas when she entered the building. The children were left in the car and weren’t harmed….

A former San Antonio police officer has been indicted for firing at fleeing juvenile suspected of trying to open car doors, officials said Friday. A Bexar County grand jury indicted Oscar Cruz Jr. on Wednesday on a count of deadly conduct with a firearm, the district attorney’s office said in a statement. The third-degree felony is punishable by two to 10 years in prison and a fine of up to $10,000. Cruz had been suspended indefinitely after the March 2020 incident. In response to a call of juveniles pulling on vehicle door handles, Cruz tried to detain a suspect who eluded capture. Cruz chased the youth on foot when another juvenile threw a rock that hit him in the face. Cruz fired two shots at the fleeing youths, missing them. Cruz, 27, was arrested Thursday and released on a $5,000 bond. Jail records list no attorney for the former officer, and no published telephone number for Cruz could be found. Courtesy of Texas News – NBC 5 Dallas-Fort Worth …

SpaceX’s Elon Musk said last Thursday that the first orbital flight of his towering Starship — the world’s most powerful rocket ever built — could come in another month or two. While he anticipates failures, he’s confident Starship will reach orbit by the end of this year. Musk provided his first major Starship update in more than two years while standing alongside the 390-foot (119-meter) rocket at SpaceX’s Texas spaceport. He urged the nighttime crowd, “Let’s make this real!” “This is really some wild stuff here,” he said. “In fact, hard to believe it’s real.” Space X Effect SpaceX Effect Nov 18, 2021 The “SpaceX Effect” on the Lone Star State SpaceX Effect Nov 18, 2021 Will SpaceX Turn Brownsville Into the Next Texas Boomtown? SpaceX Effect Nov 18, 2021 SpaceX Effect Extra: Josh Mejia Extended Interview NASA…