Padilla became the subject of a legal battle over President Bush's wartime detention powers, which ended when he was added late last year to an existing terrorism conspiracy and support case. The "dirty bomb" allegations weren't mentioned in that case.

Padilla's lawyers say they haven't had nearly enough time to go through summaries of 50,000 intercepted phone calls, including 827 transcripts translated from Arabic.

Complicating the lawyers' task is the classified nature of much of the evidence and the difficulty they have in meeting with Padilla, who is kept in his maximum-security cell at a federal detention center 23 hours a day.

U.S. District Judge Marcia Cooke has sought for months to keep the case on track for a September trial but decided to postpone it until Jan. 22. Federal prosecutors supported the delay.

Also charged are Adham Amin Hassoun, allegedly Padilla's al-Qaida recruiter, and Kifah Wael Jayyousi, who published a newsletter describing global Islamic jihad. All have pleaded not guilty, and only Jayyousi has been granted bail.

Attorneys for Hassoun and Jayyousi also supported the delay.

The explosion at about 7:30 a.m. left a crater filled with charred, splintered wood where the house had stood. Debris was hurled as far as a block away in all directions, and two vehicles parked nearby were blackened.

Bob Eskew, who lives a couple of houses away, said he was working on a computer when he "heard two loud explosions, kind of like an F-16 flying over real low." His house shook and some of his front windows shattered.

Leigh Morris, a spokesman for St. Louis-based Ameren Corp., the supplier of natural gas and electrical service in the area through its AmerenIP subsidiary, said the company had reviewed its records and received no reports of anyone calling about a suspected gas leak in the neighborhood.

He said that Ameren would leave it up to state authorities to determine the cause of the blast, but that utility employees were assisting in the investigation.

Police identified the dead as 55-year-old Margaret Hatlen, whose body was found in the basement of the destroyed home, and her 9-year-old grandson, Michael Albracht.

Her 27-year-old son had burns over 30 percent of his body, and a 15-year-old boy was severely burned, Haley said. Both were taken to Memorial Hospital's burn center in Springfield, about 55 miles away.

Carlinville is a community of 5,800 people about 60 miles northeast of St. Louis.

Later Wednesday, at least 13 firefighters were injured when a two-story house exploded in Constantia, 15 miles northeast of Syracuse, N.Y. The homeowner wasn't hurt.

The explosion, which ignited while firefighters were battling a blaze at the home, sent one firefighter flying out a door, two others rolling out a window, and a fourth stuck beneath a fallen rock wall, neighbor Matthew Whaley said.

"I was dumping cold water on a guy whose skin was coming off his forehead and his mustache was melted to his face," Whaley told The Post-Standard in Syracuse.

"Alton Towers is disappointed that the planned Family Fun Day Sunday 17th September has had to be canceled," the park said in a statement. A park spokeswoman said Islamic Leisure would refund those who bought tickets.

Islamic Leisure's phones were not being answered on Wednesday.

Organizers had hoped to fill a niche for Britain's 1.7 million Muslims, some of whom may be uncomfortable with mainstream entertainment.

But the fun day had caused some consternation: a non-Muslim couple scheduled to hold their wedding at the park's hotel complained to newspapers that event organizers told them the bride and female guests would have to cover up.

The park promised the party would be exempt from the rules. A park spokeswoman said the wedding would take place as planned.

Rumsfeld suggested that complaints about his decision could be politically motivated.

"Let's be honest: Politics enters into these things, and maybe the person raising the question is interested in that," said Rumsfeld, without identifying anyone. The defense secretary said he had testified in the past and was not reluctant to face off against some of the committee's more vocal war critics, including Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (news, bio, voting record), D-Mass.