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On Thursday, the Commerce Department said that retail sales have declined in February. The decline has taken place for the third consecutive month.

Last month, retail sales plunged 0.6% and in January, the decline was of 0.8%. The decline might have come because consumers remained hesitant to spend the money that they have been able to save from gasoline prices. Also, bad weather created hindrance for shoppers.

Autos, gasoline, building materials and restaurants were the few areas where sales did well. Dip in temperature and snowstorms affected the sales in February, pushing Americans to stay at home. Sharp decline in gasoline prices dropped the sales in December and January.

In the final three months of 2014, Americans' net worth, fueled by higher stock and home values, has reached a record high.

On Thursday, the Federal Reserve said that household wealth has shown a 1.9% rise during the October-December quarter and has reached to nearly $83 trillion.

Stock and mutual fund portfolios have gained $742 billion, whereas the value of Americans' real estate assets increased by $356 billion.

The typical household didn't gain much, as most of the wealth remained concentrated among richer families. About 80% of the stocks are owned by the wealthiest 10% of US households. This greater wealth could still help improve spending and economic growth.

An announcement has been made by Greg Hayes, Chief Executive Officer, United Technologies, that the company is planning spin-off of Black Hawk helicopter unit. United Technologies is consolidating many departments and restructuring so that overhead costs can be decreased.

According to the company, the headquarters will be moved from the Gold Building in downtown Hartford to the former headquarters of Otis elevator by the end of the year.

Hartford, Connecticut-based United Technologies revealed that they concentrate on acquisitions in range of $5 billion of higher. Back in 2012, aerospace supplier Goodrich Corporation was acquired by the company. Goodrich Corporation was acquired in a deal of $16 billion. The company's one of the lowest-margin units is Sikorsky Aircraft.

The California Wildlife Center, an organization that works to rescue and rehabilitate native wildlife in Southern California, will require license from the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) for marine mammals that the organization rescues. According to reports, approved facilities of the country must show proper species care protocol and should have adequate rehabilitation facilities.

Earlier, the great lifeguards at Zuma Beach in California saw a sea lion pup. After that, they corralled the little pup and kept him safe overnight until marine mammals rescue crew from the California Wildlife Center came and took the pup with them. The pup and two others about the same age that were rescued from different beaches were taken to the center in Calabasas.

Climate change contrarians have come up with all kinds of explanations to prove that humans aren’t responsible for global warming, ranging from changes in solar activity to natural cycles in Earth’s own wobbly climate system.

One of the increasingly popular reasons given by them was cosmic rays, which contains highly energetic particles from outer space sources that are constantly bombarding our planet.

Since long, scientists have considered this argument to be baseless, and now, a latest study has further focused on this point and has proved it right.

In the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers have reported that changes in amount of cosmic rays hitting Earth could affect temperatures only in the short term, and not in long term.

According to German researchers, many regions in Europe, Russia and the United States have been facing longer heat waves due to weakened summer winds. The researchers said that climate change has been weakening the summer winds that bring in cool ocean air.

On Thursday, the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research said in a report in the journal Science that Arctic region has been warming rapidly and it is disturbing air streams in ways. Due to that, Europe, Russia and the US have been facing longer heat waves. In 2010, hot weather in Russia devastated crop harvests and had caused wildfires.