(Continued from page 23)

Thursday as an equally strong Oscar contender.
• All three are locks for a best picture nomination. And while "Gravity," with a cast of just a few, won't reap the acting nods that the acclaimed ensembles of "American Hustle" and "12 Years a Slave" will, it holds an edge in technical categories. Cuaron's box-office hit ($670 million worldwide) has been hailed for its innovative visual effects, which are sure to be honored by the academy.
• The Golden Globes are typically a weak forecaster to the Oscars, but last Sunday's ceremony reflected consensus by naming "American Hustle" best comedy and "12 Years a Slave" best drama. Hollywood's guilds, whose members largely make up the academy, have in their awards nominations also voiced strong support for Paul Greengrass' Somali pirate docudrama "Captain Phillips," Martin Scorsese's finance fiasco "The Wolf of Wall Street" and Alexander Payne's black-and-white road trip "Nebraska."
• But an added bit of intrigue, as has been the case in recent years, is how many best-picture nominees there will be. It could be anywhere between five and 10. Films somewhere on the bubble are "Dallas Buyers Club," ''Her," ''Saving Mr. Banks," ''Philomena" and "Inside Llewyn Davis."
• ___

• CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) -- It's a nightmare scenario that became all too real in West Virginia: a chemical seeped into the water supply and threatened to sicken hundreds of thousands of people.
• While no one became seriously ill from last week's chemical spill, some homeland security experts said the emergency was proof the United States has not done nearly enough to protect water systems from accidental spills or deliberate contamination.
• Officials found out about the spill when people started calling in complaints about a strong licorice-type smell in the air. West Virginia American Water, which supplies 300,000 people with water in the central part of the state, said it would not have detected the chemical because it's not a substance utilities test for. Before the spill, no standards existed for measuring the chemical, 4-methylcyclohexane methanol, in water, the utility said.
• Congress last addressed water security in a 2002 law that required utilities to assess their vulnerabilities and report them to the Environmental Protection Agency,

(Continued on page 25)