CSW WEATHER: NWS "Winter Weather Advisory" For S.W. (Kansas) K.C. MetroRegion

If you live in or around the Ottawa- Garnett and Emporia KS areas- you're seeing the likelyhood of "2 to 4-inches of snow" overnight tonight into Sunday morning.

Here in Metro K.C.- we can expect 1 to 3 inches of snow- with the heavier accumulations being on the Kansas side.


URGENT - WINTER WEATHER MESSAGE
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE TOPEKA KS
226 PM CST SAT JAN 2 2010

...LIGHT SNOW ACCUMULATION TONIGHT...

KSZ035-037-054>056-058-059-030430-
/O.NEW.KTOP.WW.Y.0001.100102T2200Z-100103T1500Z/
(Kansas Counties Included are) DICKINSON- MORRIS- LYON- OSAGE- FRANKLIN- COFFEY- ANDERSON-
INCLUDING THE CITIES OF... ABILENE... EMPORIA... OTTAWA
226 PM CST SAT JAN 2 2010

...WINTER WEATHER ADVISORY IN EFFECT UNTIL 9 AM CST SUNDAY...

THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN TOPEKA HAS ISSUED A WINTER WEATHER ADVISORY FOR SNOW...WHICH IS IN EFFECT UNTIL 9 AM CST SUNDAY.


* TIMING...LIGHT SNOW WILL INCREASE IN COVERAGE AFTER 6PM TONIGHT. ACCUMULATING SNOW WILL BE POSSIBLE THROUGH SUNRISE SUNDAY.

* TOTAL SNOW ACCUMULATIONS...2 TO 4 INCHES OF ACCUMULATION WILL BE POSSIBLE BY SUNDAY MORNING.

* WINDS...NORTHEAST WINDS AROUND 5 TO 10 MPH ARE EXPECTED.

* IMPACTS...A DRY POWDERY SNOW WILL FALL OVERNIGHT. THIS TYPE OF SNOW WILL BE EASILY BLOW ABOUT BY FAST MOVING VEHICLES WHILE TRAVELING ON AREA ROADWAYS. THIS MAY CAUSE SUDDEN DROPS IN VISIBILITY OVERNIGHT. AREA ROADWAYS MAY ALSO BECOME SNOW COVERED AND SLIPPERY OVERNIGHT.


PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS...

A WINTER WEATHER ADVISORY FOR SNOW MEANS THAT PERIODS OF SNOW WILL CAUSE PRIMARILY TRAVEL DIFFICULTIES. BE PREPARED FOR SNOW COVERED ROADS AND LIMITED VISIBILITIES...AND USE CAUTION WHILE DRIVING.


Temperatures will remain bitterly cold- in the single digits- but even colder air will move in by mid to late next week- along with a stronger snowstorm.


We'll be on this storm as well as the coming storm here at CSW....

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Fire Districts Consolidate In N.W. Johnson County KS

Citizens in De Soto and surrounding areas won't really notice a change- but The DE SOTO EXPLORER reported that De Soto's city fire department and that of the rural fire district around De Soto have merged resources and administrative functions.


The new fire district is now known as the "Northwest (JoCoKS) Consolidated Fire District" and should result in a more economically-streamlined operation.

There will be no changes in fire station coverage or response times in the affected area.

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CSW BREAKING: House Fire In Unincorporated Ferrelview MO

Six companies of the KC-MO Fire department are currently on-the-scene or enroute to the location in the 300 block of North Chester in unincorporated Ferrelview- east of K.C.I. airport in Platte County.

The fire was reported at 8:17 pm and by 8:21 pm the first-in responding company Pumper 16 reported "heavy smoke showing from I-29 and Cookingham" Drive.

Sixteen's arrived to the "single-story" home saying "one room" was involved in flames at 8:22 pm..

Two handlines were used on the fire until it was brought under control at 8:42 pm with heavy damage to the home reported.

Two occupants of the house escaped uninjured and the fire marshal was been summonded for an offical investigation as to the cause of the fire.

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Three Dead After Butler MO New Year's Morning Shooting

Three people- including the suspect- are dead in Butler MO after a shooting around 5 am Friday morning on that Bates County (BaCo) city's east side.


A BaCo sheriff's department spokesperson said the dead are "a 25-year-old male and a 29-year-old female- brother and sister. The male was found in the street in front of the residence and the female victim was found inside."

The suspect- "a 26-year-old male"- had driven from the scene and "was found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot" a short time later by police "inside his pickup truck sitting outside his father's house in Butler."

The female victim's 8-year-old daughter also sustained non life-threatening injuries in the incident from reported "bullet fragments."

The suspect and the victims reportedly knew one another.

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Five Killed In Eastern MetroRegion K.C. House Fire

The Carroll County sheriff's office and the Associated Press reports that five were killed- 3 children and 2 adults- in a house fire east of the small northwestern Carroll county hamlet of Reynolds early New Year's Day.


A father- mother and one of their children were among the dead along with 2 yet-undisclosed-identity minors.

Two others escaped the fire- one reportedly going to a neighbor's house to call 9-1-1 around 5 am Friday morning.

Carroll County Sheriff Troy Hofstetter said the fire was "a strange one" in that it was restricted to the basement of the single-story rural home.

Awaiting an official report from the Missouri Fire Marshal's office....

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Shooting Victim Becomes KC-MO 1st Murder For 2010

The female gunshot victim reported earlier here at CSW has died- resulting in KC-MO's first homicide of 2010.



Police say 25-year-old Latasha Prewitt was shot as a result of a physical altercation while in the parking lot of the Crescent Hotel at 5701 East Longview Road in south KC-MO around 1:15 am Friday morning.

The shooter was reported to be the other female that Ms. Prewitt had been fighting with inside Joshua's nightclub at the hotel.

A bouncer had escorted the 2 fighting women out of the club before the shooting. The suspect female is in custody and will likely be charged.

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2010 Starts With A Bang In Metro Kansas City

Or so it sounds...

A VERY Happy 2010 by the way to you the reader and to all of your family and friends.

Since about 1:30 am- I've heard a 40-ish-year-old female who was struck by a car in front of Chubby's in the 3700 block of Broadway.

MAST-EMS said the car was moving around 40 mph had the woman struck had a broken leg among other injuries.


MAST-EMS also transported a critically-injured-by-gunshot 30-ish-years-old female to a south-midtown KC-MO hospital. Can't tell you where that happened.


Speaking of MAST-EMS- the KC-MO paramedic/ambulance service was down to one or no ambulances citywide for about 20 minutes around 2 am..

Catch you all on the other side of New Year's Day 2010....

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Central States Go Into The Deep-Freeze

Anybody looking for an extended melt to this 8 to 12-inches of snowcover had best be patient.


Arctic cold fronts will keep make appearances through the coming first week of the New Year- along with at least 3 chances for more snow through next weekend.

The snow chances are late New Year's Night with a possible dusting to an inch- a more vigorous storm system late Saturday night into Sunday that could drop another 1-3 inches- and yet another storm mid-week that could add another several inches of snow.

Temperatures will stay below to well-below averages for the first of the year through at least next weekend.

Keep the snow shovels handy and buy plenty of ice melt!

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CSW Becomes A 'Nielsen Family'

I've had relatives who've filled out Nielsen TV ratings books- but had personally not been recruited until now.

Starting with the late-January "sweeps"- this family will be keeping track of our viewing on the 4 televisions around here.

This ought to be interesting- since Ms. Rittenhouse and I watch mostly cable channel fare if not DVDs- (ahem) VHS tapes or just plain surfing the unlimited variety of Web sites.

Local TV news may be in trouble when it comes to what we fill in those slots- since in many cases I AM local news (and weather).

I'd like to ESPECIALLY complain how the USCA government made over-the-air TV watching difficult to nearly impossible for analog TV owners- making it almost necessary for owners of such sets to get cable or satellite JUST to get COMMERCIAL TV!

Also- too bad you cannot note on the Nielsen diaries how BAD commercials are infiltrating every damn thing we watch on those commercial channels and how we're being gouged by cable TV rate increases.

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Rusho Limberger Makes It Easy For Those Who Don't Like Him

The so-called "conservative" talker who makes a living calling people names that don't agree with his twisted agenda has been hospitalized for "chest pains."



The guy told medicos he takes medication for a back problem- heh- what a wimp ole Rusho is.

I had major back surgery in 1982 which effectively ended any further firefighting career- but as of this day- the only "medications" I take for the occasional back pain (shovelling snow) is the occasional aspirin.

But- I understand Rusho's problem- having been previously hooked on Oxycontin. No- actually- I DON'T understand Rusho's problem.

Either on-the-air or off of it.

Best wishes anyway Rusho- hope they find the source of your chest pains since it CAN'T be your heart and they can relieve your chronic hypocrisy....

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CSW BREAKING: Serious Injuries In KC-MO Crash and Raytown Armed Robberies

There are reported 3 serious to critically-injured people in a 2-vehicle crash involving a vehicle rollover at the intersection of Truman Road and Benton Boulevard.

The crash occurred around 8:15 pm Wednesday evening and police were seeking one person in one of the vehicles who ran from the scene.

Extrication of 2 of the crash victims was necessary by KC-MO fire companies.

Those crash victims include "a 24-year-old male passenger" who was "found on top of the (22-year-old male) driver- both going to Truman Med Center-Hospital Hill.

***

KC-MO sources also report "2 armed robberies in Raytown" a short while ago- "one at the Popeye's and one at the Arby's" fast food restaurants along M-350 in Raytown.

Only suspect information was that of a black male....

CSW BREAKING: Grandview MO Hit and Run Driver Leaves Teen Bicyclist Injured

Around 7:38 pm- Grandview emergency services were sent to an address in the 7000 of East 134th Terrace where reportedly a teen male bicyclist had been struck by a motorist who left the scene.

The 14-year-old reportedly suffered "an ankle injury" Grandview sources say- and the suspect vehicle was said to be a "black" colored "older-model Acura" that was driven by "a white male."

At 7:56 pm- it was determined the injured teen would be taken to a hospital via a family vehicle and police were gathering information for the report.

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More Taxes To Publicize Independence Square Bad Idea

According to this story in the INDEPENDENCE- BLUE SPRINGS- GRAIN VALLEY EXAMINER- Tom Waters- president of the Independence Square Association- wants to city to approve (an additional) "community improvement district (CID) tax" to publicize the Square's businesses.

Never mind that the CID ALREADY has a tax imposed on it- or that the places MOST people want to do their shopping or relax at are in and around the 39th Street and M-291 corridor that Indy's leaders heavily subsidized.

Additional taxes on taxes raise the prices people pay- who the Hell wants that???

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CSW BREAKING: Shooting In KC-MO Midtown

A shooting was reported in the 3900 block of College at 2:53 pm Wednesday afternoon.


Police arrived about 7 minutes later and reported the victim had received a gunshot wound to the abdomen.

Officers gave a suspect vehicle description from witnesses as "an older- boxy-style Chevy Suburban" that had "a broken-out window with plastic covering it.

The vehicle contained "a black female and 2 black males" and they drove "northbound" from the scene.

The "41-year-old male" shooting victim was transported by MAST-EMS to a Metro medical trauma center in serious to critical condition.

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Two Downtown Sedalia MO Buildings Collapse

On Christmas Eve- The SEDALIA (MO) NEWS-DEMOCRAT reports that two buildings in the downtown area collapsed on Christmas Eve.



The buildings- shown here in better times via Google's StreetView- were in the 100 block of South Osage.

No one occupied the collapsed structures nor was anyone nearby when the buildings inexplicably came down.

The City of Sedalia was giving the building's owners 2 weeks (2 weeks??!!) to clean up the mess that's blocked Osage Street in front of the collapsed buildings.

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Central States Cities See Budgets Drain With Snowfall

I mentioned this BEFORE the Christmas Blizzard of 2009- how municipal budgets already strained by The Recession (Depression) have seen even more tightening now that almost of week of snow clearing/removal has arrived.



Among cities claiming the snow-removal budget is approaching or have exceeded budgeted amounts are Des Moines - Omaha and Manhattan KS..

I imagine we'll be hearing REAL soon from Kansas City MO's governmental leaders on how the Winter of 2009-10 will be draining already bare city coffers and MAYBE how the city wishes they had monies like the half-million spent on a stupid downtown convention hotel study.

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Arrow Trucking Shut-Down Left Employees High and Dry

This happened a few days before Christmas- when the Arrow Trucking Company suddenly went out of business and left truckers on-the-road both unpaid and with invalid fuel cards- stranding a number of their employees across the nation.

(Photo courtesy of The TULSA WORLD)

The TULSA WORLD says a considerable number of former Arrow employees have filed claims with the State of Oklahoma- but doubt many if any employees get relief from the bankrupt company.

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Kansas City STAR Carrier Just Can't Get It Right

A couple of days ago- we complained on this blog that we hadn't gotten a STAR newspaper Christmas Day- the day after and the day after that.

So I called the toll-free 800 number The STAR provides and got THAT taken care of.

Well- sort of.

Since the papers started arriving again THIS week- the carrier manages everytime to miss the snow-free double driveway we have and chooses to throw the paper in the 8-14-inch snow-drifted yard.

You can see by this morning's images that the carrier even misses the previous tracks we've had to make to get Monday and Tuesday's papers.

Yes- that orange wrapper in the snow is the Wednesday morning paper which nobody has braved the snow drifts (plus 2-inches of NEW snow overnight) to retrieve.

I'm now on a first-name basis with Pam from The STAR's toll-free complaint number and the almost-daily calls are really getting to be a PITA.

Thanks Kansas City STAR for caring about your dwindling number of subscribers....

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CSW BREAKING: House Fire In Raytown MO

Five companies of the Kansas City MO Fire department are assisting the 3 companies of Raytown Fire fighting a house fire in the 10200 block of East 63rd Street near downtown Raytown.


The alarm sounded at 11:10 am- and when the first fire company arrived at the scene at 11:13 am they say flames shooting from the front door of the single-story house.

The structure was reported to be vacant of any occupants- and as of this post no injuries have been reported.

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New Kansas Turnpike Interchange Open In Leavenworth County

According to this article in Bonner Springs KS' THE CHIEFTAIN- that new interchange on the Kansas Turnpike (I-70) south of Tonganoxie was to open at 10:30 am this morning.

The new interchange is reportedly "fully automated"- which I assume means they have no way to accept cash tolls.

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Things You May or May Not Have Seen On Today's News - Sunday December 27 2009

First off- a shout-out to Birthday Boys Jeff Meyer and Phil Wall on their 55th and 57th respectively such annual occasions.

WE don't need no stinkin' Grecian Formula...


On my last night of providing KSHB-41 Action News with weekend overnight news tips- I ended my nearly six-year run with more than 4400 emergency calls for 2009 and nearly 25000 calls since the first news report for 41 back on January 30- 2004.

I thank the great guys and gals at 41 for the teamwork- particularily the guy who hired me- the Honorable Steve Kaut. A Great 2010 to all...


Violence- grief- woe and destruction was pretty light overnight with the following exceptions:


In KC-MO: At 1:53 am came the report of two people stabbed in the 5200 block of East 6th Street.

One was reported by MAST-EMS as "a 34-year-old male with multiple stab wounds on his back" who was taken to a Metro hospital in serious to critical condition.

The other male's injuries were less serious.

Police still couldn't say if this was a knife fight between the two or there was a suspect at large.


At 12:42 am- a "31-year-old male possible victim of an assault" was found "face down" outside the Tool Shed bar at U.S. 40 and Phelps Road.

His condition was considered serious when MAST-EMS took him to Centerpoint Med Center.

KC-MO police had no other information on this incident either.


Two males got into an altercation at the "Fox and Hound" tavern at 10428 Metcalf in Overland Park around 12:15 am Sunday morning.

One person went to a hospital via MEDACT-EMS with non life-threatening injuries and the other went with OP police for a complimentary night's stay.


Fire department crews were also on the run Sunday morning...

At 4:23 am- 5 companies of the KC-MO department were called to a house fire in the 2100 block of Maddi in south-central.

When Pumper 30 pulled up to the address on the snow-covered street at 4:28 am- the single-story structure was already heavily-involved in flames. A minute later comes the report of "a partial-collapse" of the house's roof.

Firefighters used at least 2 hoselines and knocked the fire down in about 20 minutes.

No one got hurt and the cause was given as suspicious origin.


Two minutes after the fire call- at 4:25 am- KC-MO Pumper 41 was sent to the 9800 block of Marsh on a reported carbon monoxide gas buildup in a home there.

Twenty minutes later- the first of 3 MAST-EMS units were being dispatched here for the 5 people- 4 of them minors- exposed to the toxic gas.

Two of the minors- "a 10-month-old and 2-year-old" child seemed fine- but at least one of them are taken to Children's Mercy hospital for examination.

The other two minors- "a 16 and a 17-year-old" did exhibit CO2 poisoning symptoms as well as the mid to late-30's adult mother of at least some of the minors.

They were taken to Research Med Center and were all expected to be okay.

FD Pumper 41 aired out the house and the gas company was summonded.

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K.C. STAR: Where Are Our Newspapers???

Sunday morning marked the 3rd day that we have not received our part of a subscription contract with The KANSAS CITY STAR and we're not happy to put it mildly.

Sunday morning also marks the 3rd day of calls made to some automated/recorded subscriber's complaint department with no results.

We actually get a return automated call by mid-afternoon today saying our 9:30 am "call was too late (cutoff 9am??) for today's newspaper delivery" and would we call back "to re-schedule delivery of (the Sunday paper)" some OTHER day or "get (monetary) credit."

I'm calling a LIVE person at The Star tomorrow (Monday) to ASSURE we either get 3 days credit on the bill for missed delivery of their product or cancelling our subscription altogether.

HELL of a way to run a business Kansas City STAR!

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