2008 Year In Photos: US

Seven people died and dozens were wounded when a construction crane collapsed in Manhattan and destroyed a town house and damaged other buildings on Thursday, March 15, 2008.

Residents look over damage caused by tornadoes in Suffolk, Va., Tuesday, April 29, 2008. Three tornadoes smashed houses, tossed cars and injured more than 200 residents.

Tina Story, right, and Brandi Neil pick through debris from a tornado damaged home, Friday, May 2, 2008, in Center Ridge, Ark. A powerful storm system packing tornadoes and heavy winds roared across the nation's midsection early Friday, killing at least seven people in Arkansas, including a teenager crushed by a tree while she slept.

Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., waves as he returns to his Hyannis Port, Mass., home, Monday, June 9, 2008, after undergoing brain surgery on a malignant tumor the week before at Duke University.

Children from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in El Dorado, Texas, wait to be released to their mothers on Monday, June 2, 2008, in Fort Worth, Texas. More than 400 children taken from a polygamist sect's ranch two months before began returning to the arms of their tearful parents, hours after a judge bowed to a state Supreme Court ruling that the seizure was not justified.

New Day Dawns At Delta — AP Photo/Brennan Linsley

The sun rises over the Camp Delta detention compound which has housed foreign prisoners since 2002, at Guantanamo Bay U.S. Naval Base, in Cuba, Friday, June 6, 2008.

Phyllis Lyon, right, kisses her partner Del Martin, after being married by San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom in a special ceremony at City Hall in San Francisco, Monday, June 16, 2008. Lyon and Martin became the first officially married same-sex couple after California's Supreme Court declared gay marriage legal. In November, California voters passed a ballot proposition limiting marriage to between a man and a woman.

A firefighter watches a wildfire burn out of control in Big Sur, Calif., Thursday, July 3, 2008. The blaze near Big Sur was one of more than 1,700 wildfires, most ignited by lightning, that scorched more than 770 square miles across northern and central California over a two-week period.

President-elect Barack Obama, left, his wife Michelle Obama, right, and two daughters, Malia, 7, and Sasha, 10, wave at an election night rally in Chicago, Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2008.

Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange Thursday, Nov. 20, 2008. The Dow Jones fell to 7,997.28. It was the first time since 2003 that it had fallen below 8,000. The decline coincided with a report from the Labor Department that the Consumer Price Index fell by one percentage point in October, the steepest one-month drop since the index debuted in 1947.

Fish remain stuck in a fence as flood waters caused by Hurricane Ike recede, in West Orange, Texas, Monday, Sept. 15, 2008.

Part of the engine from a F-18 fighter jet is seen in a San Diego residential neighborhood after the jet crashed Monday Dec. 8, 2008. The fighter jet returning to a Marine base after a training exercise crashed in flames in San Diego, killing three people on the ground, leaving one missing and destroying two homes. The pilot of the jet ejected safely just before the crash.

O.J. Simpson is taken into custody after being found guilty on all 12 charges, including felony kidnapping, armed robbery and conspiracy Oct. 3, 2008, at the Clark County Regional Justice Center in Las Vegas.

A wind-driven brush fire burns along the foothills of Sierra Madre, Calif., on Monday, April 28, 2008. It was another busy year for firefighters battling wildfires in the West.

Attorney Gary Udashen, left, and The Innocence Project board of directors member John Stickels, right, look on as DNA exonoree Patrick Waller, reacts to the announcement in court that his conviction of a crime that sent him to jail for more than 15 years was being overturned July 3, 2008, in Criminal Court District 2 at the Frank Crowley Courts Building in Dallas.