A six-month examination of more than 150,000 reports filed by pilots and others in the aviation industry over the past 20 years reveals surprising and sometimes shocking safety breaches and close calls at local, regional and major airports throughout the country.

Just as Doug Drost was landing at the Shell Lake airport, his wife, Karen Drost, saw something hurtling out of the darkness toward their Cessna 210. Something big. “Deer, deer, deer!” she screamed. That hit on the northwestern Wisconsin runway — which caused $12,000 in damage — is a story that plays out over and over in this increasingly deer-ridden country.

Despite the continued concern over preventable boating accidents and fatalities, Wisconsin lawmakers tried but failed in the last session to pass new laws mandating life jackets for children and cracking down on intoxicated boating.

At University of Wisconsin campuses, most victims do not report crimes. The statistics are inconsistent. And most rapists go free.

Douglas Meyers, who died on a rural road in October, was one of 18 traffic fatalities in Marinette County in 2009 as the county traffic death toll tied an all-time record.

Drivers beware: There’s a woman driving a stretch of Interstate 90 between Sparta and Tomah — without a license or any training about Wisconsin’s traffic laws.

In the last 10 years, about one-third of the post-conviction DNA testing in Wisconsin has resulted in a conviction being overturned.

Officials at the University of Wisconsin-Madison say they defused threats from 125 troubled students, employees and area residents under a little-known program launched two years ago in response to deadly tragedies on college campuses in Virginia and Illinois.

But the program didn’t identify at least three individuals before they caused problems at Wisconsin’s flagship campus, including threats against a campus leader, a bomb threat and a murder near campus.