U.S. 97 bridge closes for months
The estimated 5,100 drivers who cross the Columbia River daily at Biggs Junction, a small crossroads in Eastern Oregon, will have to find a new route as of today.
Crews replacing the bridge deck will close the Biggs Rapids-Sam Hill Bridge carrying U.S. 97 between Oregon and Washington until Memorial Day. The closure is expected to divert thousands of cars and trucks.
Oregon and Washington are splitting the $16 million tab to update the crumbling two-lane roadway. Completion is expected in 2009.
Highway officials plan to reopen the bridge on Memorial Day, in time for the beginning of the summer travel season, but will close the span again after Labor Day so construction can continue.
Spokane
Schools leader holding online chat
Spokane Public Schools Superintendent Nancy Stowell will host her monthly online chat from noon to 1 p.m. today.
The public is invited to submit questions for the superintendent by visiting the district’s Web site at www.spokaneschools.org and clicking on “Chat with the Superintendent.”
Transcripts from previous chats – held the first Wednesday of each month – are available on the Web site.
Whistler, B.C.
Avalanche blamed on victims
An avalanche in a permanently closed area at the Whistler, B.C., ski resort has killed one man and injured another.
Royal Canadian Mounted Police say they believe the men, who were from the area, triggered an avalanche by going in the remote area on skis and snowboards and were swept over a cliff.
One man died of injuries that police believe were sustained in the avalanche.
The other has been sent to a Vancouver hospital for treatment of serious but non-life-threatening injuries.
The men have not been identified.
Kennewick
Assessor worried about office’s air
Potentially unhealthy indoor air has prompted the closure of the Benton County assessor’s satellite office in Kennewick, with the eight employees moving to the department’s main offices at the county courthouse in Prosser.
Assessor Barbara Wagner said she’s closing the office for at least two weeks. She said an air quality survey conducted at the satellite office in the Benton County annex detected high levels of mold spores in several offices, behind walls and inside the air ducts that are supposed to provide fresh, healthy ventilation.
She added that she’s had employees who have used up all of their sick leave with such problems as sinus and ear infections.
Benton County Commissioner Claude Oliver said a contractor has been asked to evaluate the office.
East Wenatchee
Wildcat logo stolen from school
A wildcat is missing in East Wenatchee.
Somebody stole the wildcat logo from its spot about 30 feet above the entrance of Eastmont High School.
Police say the school’s head custodian reported the fixture missing Friday.
Principal Mark Marney said the logo was affixed very high on the two-story building, near lettering that spells out Eastmont. He said whoever took it during the school’s current winter break likely would have had to get on the roof to remove it or knock it down.
The school has been on break since Dec. 19, with classes scheduled to resume today.
The plastic logo – about 3 feet wide – was purchased about three years ago by the Eastmont Associated Student Body.
Police say they have no suspects, but that nothing else was reported missing from the school.
Vancouver, Wash.
Cold hampers biodiesel buses
Cold weather has frustrated plans by C-Tran, the transit service in Washington’s Clark County, to use biodiesel to power its buses.
Last May, the agency started using B-20, a diesel mix with 20 percent of the fuel derived from soybeans.
John Hoefs, C-Tran director of maintenance and development, said everything went fine until the temperatures dipped into the 30s, which caused the fuel to cloud or jell.
Hoefs said that as a result, vehicles with newer diesel engines couldn’t fully burn the fuel and started losing power.
The agency switched back to a 5 percent biodiesel fuel mix for most of its fleet about a month ago. Hoefs said C-Tran hopes to resume using B-20 biodiesel in the spring.