WASHINGTON

Led by older Americans, six a day die from binge drinking

America’s binge drinkers are fueling an average of six alcohol-poisoning deaths per day, according to a new government report.

Women who have four or more drinks on an occasion and men who have five or more are considered binge drinkers by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

But nearly every week, more than 38 million people report consuming an average of eight drinks during one episode, or binge, the CDC found.

That kind of heavy drinking over a short period, such as two to three hours, can prove fatal.

Most of the estimated 1.5 billion binge-drinking episodes each year involve Americans 26 and older, the CDC said. But CDC researchers were surprised to find that people ages 35 to 64 accounted for 75 percent of America’s roughly 2,200 alcohol-poisoning deaths each year from 2010 to 2012.

SALT LAKE CITY

Federal officials ban swings and ropes on iconic arches

Federal officials are temporarily banning daredevil rope-swinging, rappelling and other rope activities from several iconic Utah arches.

The Bureau of Land Management announced a two-year restriction at Corona Arch and Gemini Bridges on Tuesday.

The agency says rope activities can disturb people in the popular hiking areas and the arches are showing signs of wear.

The ban comes after two people died in swing accidents in 2013.

COLORADO SPRINGS

Investigators look into explosion near NAACP office

Authorities are looking for a man who may have information about a homemade explosive that someone set off near the Colorado Springs chapter of the NAACP.

The blast happened Tuesday outside a barber shop that’s next door to the group’s office, which is about an hour south of Denver. There were no injuries and only minor damage, police said.

An improvised explosive device was detonated against the building, but it was too soon to know whether the nation’s oldest civil rights organization was the target, FBI spokeswoman Amy Sanders said. The agency sent members of its Joint Terrorism Task Force to help investigate.

Investigators were examining a red gasoline canister with a yellow nozzle that had been placed next to the explosive device but did not ignite.

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