Best Of Texas Blog: Clear Lake

STS-107 Columbia remembered ...

2012-02-01T08:16:00.000-08:00

February 1, 2012 is the eighth anniversary Space Shuttle Columbia disaster, which claimed the lives of all seven crew members.

The shuttle disintegrated during reentry after superheated gases penetrated a damaged spot on its left wing. The initial damage had occurred shortly after launch, when a briefcase-sized piece of insulating foam broke off from an external fuel tank and smashed against the wing.

Columbia disintegrated about 15 minutes before it was scheduled to touch down at Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla.

As a result of the disaster, President Bush announced his eventual goal to retire the remaining space shuttles but assured the public that the manned space program would continue. "The cause in which they died will continue," he said. "Mankind is led into the darkness beyond our world by the inspiration of discovery and the longing to understand. Our journey into space will go on."

Late January also marks the dates of two other dark moments for NASA and the nation's manned space program.

The Columbia Space Shuttle disaster claimed the lives of Commander Rick D. Husband, Pilot William C. McCool, Payload Commander Michael P. Anderson, Payload Specialist Ilan Ramon, Mission Specialist Kalpana Chawla, Mission Specialist David M. Brown and Mission Specialist Laurel Clark.

READ MORE HERE

Severe weather expected today in Houston area

2012-01-25T07:22:00.001-08:00

KRPC: You can see a wall of heavy rain," KPRC Local 2 meteorologist Anthony Yanez. "From 10 o'clock to 2 o'clock is the time to watch for these dangerous storms."

"Do not take these warnings lightly. Typically, whenever we get these and see a pattern like we had this morning, we'll see a handful of tornadoes," Yanez said.

Gusty winds and scattered showers moved through the area at 2 a.m., knocking out power to 30,000 CenterPoint Energy customers. As of 6:30 a.m., approximately 18,000 people remained without electricity.

"Earlier this morning, we had wind gusts of 50 to 55 mph," Yanez said. "That's what knocked down some of those trees and power lines. We could still see some 60 mph straight-line winds, hail and lots of lightning."

A low-pressure system is responsible for strong storms in central and northern Texas, which are expected to drench the Houston area most of the day.

"There's a couple of lines that we're tracking. The strongest one will arrive in Houston around noon. It's a concern for this morning until early afternoon. The radar is picking up a lot of twisting winds," Yanez said. "It's going to be wet from 8 o'clock all the way through 2 o'clock. By 5 p.m., this storm system will be in our eastern counties."

Yanez said south of Interstate 10 is not expected to see the strongest storms.

"It's a lot more scattered and not as well put together," Yanez said.

Power outages caused problems for some southwest Houston businesses.

Whataburger on the Southwest Freeway near Weslayan had to turn away customers when employees could not prepare food for the morning rush.

"Their lights just came back on (at 6 a.m.), but they weren't ready to serve yet," customer Carol Bennett said.

Many Houstonians were worried about flooding after severe weather left its mark on Jan. 9.

Houston firefighters performed about 140 water rescues when people became stranded in high water.

Officials warned drivers to "turn around, not drown" if they approached rising water.

Flooding is the most common hazard in Houston and many times, individuals are not able to judge the depths of water along roadways and find themselves in perilous conditions.

Officials said 6 inches of water can cause tires to lose traction and begin to slide, and 12 inches of water can float many cars. Two feet of rushing water will carry off pickup trucks, SUVs and most other vehicles.

Water across a roadway may hide a missing segment of road or a missing bridge, officials said.

In flash floods, waters rise so rapidly they may be far deeper by the time you are halfway across, trapping you in your vehicle.

Be especially cautious at night, when it's even more difficult to gauge the amount of water in a roadway.

The safest option is to simply avoid driving over water and find an alternate, safer route, or wait until the danger has passed.

Demolition crews bring down Houston skyscraper

2012-01-09T06:38:00.000-08:00

by KHOU
KHOU
Posted on January 9, 2012 at 7:57 AM
Updated today at 8:14 AM

HOUSTON — A big boom could be heard on Sunday at the Texas Medical Center in Houston as demolition crews brought down a 20-story building that was once the home of KVUE's sister station, KHOU-TV.

Rare treat: Houstonians can watch as Space Station crosses Moon

2012-01-04T11:03:00.000-08:00

A slice of Houston will have a chance to view a rare treat this evening.

Not only will the International Space Station make an incredibly bright, six-minute track across the sky tonight, some observers will be able to see the orbital laboratory blink across the moon.

Beginning at 6:28 p.m. the station will rise above the northwest horizon in Houston, and disappear just above the southeast horizon some six minutes later. Skies are forecast to be partly cloudy.

Along this path, for some parts of Houston all the way to Galveston, the station’s track will bring it across the face of the moon.

The following map, made by Steve Clayworth of Observable Universe, shows the approximate area from which this will be visible.

Clear Lake woman poses as Texas Workforce Commission contractor.

2011-12-13T14:38:00.000-08:00

By FLORIAN MARTIN

A Clear Lake woman is being sued by the state of Texas for allegedly posing as a Texas Workforce Commission contractor.

The state accuses Rebecca Lynn Dauler of approaching several Clear Lake area businesses pretending to work with the TWC and selling them safety posters that they could have obtained for free from the TWC.

According to the petition, the TWC was contacted by several businesses that stated that Dauler claimed that the TWC hired her company, 4 Compliance Today, to conduct inspections of the businesses to determine their compliance with Texas workplace laws and regulations.
She would then point out safety posters that she said were not in compliance with the law and sell them posters that she claimed were for $49.99 each, according to the lawsuit.

She also allegedly told one business that it could be shut down if it didn’t comply and to another, which refused entry to her, that she would “make a note” that the company would not let her into the facility, according to the document.

In a sworn affidavit, the director of TWC’s office of investigations, Bradford Ward, said he called Dauler on Aug. 12 and told her to stop pretending to be a TWC representative or the agency would sue her. He also said Dauler denied that she told businesses that she worked with the state.

However, Ward said, he received another complaint regarding Dauler pretending to work with the TWC from a business after the conversation with her.
The state is asking the court to impose penalties over $20,000 on Dauler for each of the six alleged violations of the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Consumer Protection Act, to order Dauler to pay back the money that she received from the businesses as well as to pay the court costs

Poster in Katy draws complaints ...

2011-11-14T08:12:00.001-08:00

KHOU: Imagine a poster that shows a man being hanged and a couple dozen armed cowboys posing under him, with a caption that reads "Lets Play Cowboy's And IRANIANS!"

Then imagine that poster hanging in your local restaurant. Do you find this offensive? or funny?

Nonmacher's Barbecue in Katy, Texas, is fighting with that very scenario.

One customer told KTRK in Houston, "You know it's 2011, looking at it now, I see nothing really more than a display of racism and bigotry." He continues to say, "I don't think something like this should really be accepted by any community."

The owner of the restaurant, John Nonmacher, tells Desmond that the poster has been there on the wall for 30 years and he has never had a complaint. Now that the word is being spread, his phone has been ringing off the hook.

He says the poster was made by some Houstonians in 1979 as a reenactment of the Iran Hostage crisis. Iranians held more than 50 Americans for 444 days.

Nonmacher says "I laughed and I'm still laughing. I mean, they don't understand what it is. They don't care to understand, and somebody's taking it upon themselves to campaign and crusade."

If you're ever in Katy, Texas, and stop by Nonmacher's Barbeque, take a minute to find the poster. Despite requests to remove the poster, Nonmacher says, "It's my choice to have it up. It's your choice to go where you want to go. But I'm not going to take it down."

League City man faces child pornography charges.

2011-10-26T13:56:00.000-07:00

SANTA FE, Texas — A 34-year-old League City man faces child pornography charges after investigators claimed the man downloaded illegal images to his computer, Santa Fe police said.

Santa Fe police Detective Heather Burd, who is a member of the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, tracked a series of child pornography downloads to a League City Internet address.

James Karl Dunivan was arrested at his home in the 1200 block of Halls Bridge in League City on Monday morning.

Quake shakes South Texas ...

2011-10-20T11:08:00.001-07:00

Click to enlarge:

A shallow, moderate earthquake struck southern Texas (TX) on Thursday morning, according to the United States Geological Survey (USGS). It was the strongest earthquakes to hit the U.S. state in 45 years.

The 4.8 magnitude quake, upgraded from 4.6mb, occured at 07:25 AM local time (13:25 PM GMT) and was recorded at an extremely shallow depth of 3km (1.9 miles). It struck below Fashing, but was felt as far as Corpus Christi, San Antonio and Austin.

The epicentre of the quake was located 22 km (14 miles) NW (321°) from Pawnee, TX; 23 km (14 miles) SSW (213°) from Falls City, TX; 26 km (16 miles) WSW (249°) from Karnes City, TX; 60 km (37 miles) NW of Beeville, TX; 76 km (47 miles) SSE (154°) from San Antonio, TX; 92 km (57 miles) E of Pearsall, TX; 166 km (103 miles) SSW of AUSTIN, TX; and 463 km (288 miles) SSW (197°) from Dallas, TX.

The last time Texas experienced a tremor similar in intensity to Thursday’s quake was on July 20, 1966. The magnitude 4.8 earthquake was centred in the Panhandle, near Borger and Amarillo.

The most recent earthquake to strike the region hit on 25 April, 2010. The 4.0 magnitude earthquake was recorded 56 km west of Corpus Christi.

Houston fights NYC to get space shuttle back

2011-10-18T07:30:00.001-07:00

Folks in Texas who are close to the space program were not happy from the get-go. Here they were, home to the Johnson Space Center, Mission Control, the Astronaut Corp., and they didn’t get one of NASA’s retired space shuttles.

They were angry. “No city in the world deserves an orbiter more than Houston, Texas,” said U.S. Representative Pete Olson from Texas.

Now, they are even angrier. “It’s a bait and switch,” U.S. Representative Ted Poe told CNN. Why does Poe say that?

At a cost of nearly $30 million dollars a piece, dozens of museums bid for one of the retired space shuttles. New York’s Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum on the Hudson River was one of the winners. It gets Enterprise, a test shuttle that never flew into space, currently at the Smithsonian.

That’s what got Texans angry to begin with. Poe says, “New York - God Bless them - they’re a wonderful city, but they have no connection to the space program and no connection to NASA, so why would the shuttle go to New York? It’s like putting the Statue of Liberty in Omaha.”

What set Texans off again and sparked the “bait and switch” remark is the Intrepid Museum’s plan for housing the shuttle Enterprise.

Back in May of 2010, before the shuttles were awarded, here’s what the museum’s director Susan Marenoff-Zausner told CNN: “On the west end of the pier we currently have the Concorde. And we would look to shift the placement of the Concorde and place the shuttle in that spot.”

Well, all that has apparently changed. The new plan is to construct a building for the Enterprise not on the pier but across a busy highway on land the museum doesn’t yet own. The land is now a parking lot next to a car wash, warehouses and a bagel shop. A walk bridge over the highway would connect the main museum to the Enterprise Building.

Back when the museum was still lobbying for a shuttle, officials there were more than anxious to talk with us. Now, they turned down our request for an interview. Instead, they issued a statement, “We look forward to Enterprise’s arrival at the Intrepid, which will quickly become New York City’s newest landmark and seen by millions of visitors to our great city. While we continue to be in the planning stages, we remain on track with both our logistics and our fundraising.”

But, it’s not what they promised. Says Representative Poe: “Time to re-open the bidding process again because the person that got the bid really isn’t fulfilling the obligation that they agreed to. So, re-evaluate it.”

You often hear the expression, “location, location, location.” Location is one of the primary reasons NASA selected New York. The space agency wants its retired shuttles to be seen by as many eyeballs as possible. New York has a huge advantage there.

NASA’s Administrator Charles Bolden seems fine with New York’s new plan and location saying, “I don’t tell them how to suck eggs. You know, they gave us a plan. They told us they would have the money. They gave us a schedule and everything and as far as I know, they’re on schedule and so I trust them that they’re gonna deliver what they said.”

It will be at least a year before any of the retired shuttles are delivered to museums. Atlantis will stay in Florida at the Kennedy Space Center. Endeavour goes to the California Science Center in Los Angeles. The Smithsonian gets Discovery. To make room for Discovery, Enterprise has to move to New York.

If its new building isn’t ready, Enterprise would likely be housed in a climate controlled tent at the city’s JFK Airport.

Police need help finding robbery suspect

2011-10-04T12:07:00.000-07:00

PASADENA, Texas - Police are asking for help from the public to find a suspect in three robberies reported within a two-week period in Pasadena.
The robberies took place between Sept. 12, Sept. 20, and Sept. 25.

The first robbery was reported at 12:45 p.m. Monday, Sept. 12 at a Shell fuel station in the intersection of Fairmont Parkway and Preston Road.

The second robbery was reported after 1 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 20 at a Chevron fuel station also in the intersection of Fairmont Parkway and Preston Road.
The third robbery was reported before 5 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 25 at a Mobil fuel station on Strawberry Road near Everglade Drive.

The suspect entered each store before sunset, threatened clerks on duty with a knife and demanded money, according to a statement released Tuesday by the Pasadena PD. He is described as a Hispanic man who stands at a height of between 5 feet 5-inches and 5-feet 7-inches tall, weighs between 130 and 150 pounds with short black hair, a goatee. Surveillance video captured images of the suspect wearing sunglasses, a long-sleeved blue-gray sweatshirt, possibly matching pants, and white gloves.

Police describe the vehicle a tan or gray newer model sport utility vehicle, possibly a Ford Expedition. During at least one of the robberies, the SUV was driven by a female.

Anyone with information on the identity of the suspect and/or driver in these cases is asked to contact the Pasadena Police Department by phone at 713-477-1221 or Crime Stoppers at 713-222-8477 (TIPS).

Read more: http://www.myfoxhouston.com/dpp/news/local/110927-pasadena-store-robberies#ixzz1ZqEt6RZn

NASA allocating 1.6B to private sector for space taxi.

2011-09-20T08:48:00.000-07:00

NASA on Monday unveiled a plan that will allocate $1.61 billion to private companies that will transport U.S. astronauts to the International Space Station and low Earth orbit.
The program, which will run from July 2012 to April 2014, will provide funds to multiple companies, which must design and maintain spacecraft, launch vehicles, launch services, ground and mission operations, and recovery.

"This is a significant step forward in America's amazing story of space exploration," NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said in a statement. "It's further evidence we are committed to fully implementing our plan—as laid out in the Authorization Act—to outsource our space station transportation so NASA can focus its energy and resources on deep space exploration."

NASA retired its space shuttle fleet over the summer and has since relied on Russian spacecraft to get its astronauts to the ISS (at a price of $50 million per person). During the most recent Soyuz landing, however, communications between the landing craft and Russia's Roscosmos space agency broke down for several minutes after the Soyuz capsule had de-orbited. Contact was re-established before landing and no one was injured, but the "space taxis" announced by NASA this week gives the agency another option for getting its astronauts to the ISS.

The effort, known as Integrated Design Contract (IDC) "will bring us through the critical design phase to fully incorporate our human spaceflight safety requirements and NASA's International Space Station mission needs," said NASA Commercial Crew Program Manager Ed Mango. "We look forward to strong U.S. industry response."

To push development, NASA also said it will fund some optional programs negotiated as add-ons to existing Commercial Crew Development (CCDev2) Space Act Agreements (SAA) initially awarded in April. Specifically, Sierra Nevada Corp. will get $25.6 million for a total of $105.6 million, while Boeing will take home another $20.6 million for a total of $112.9 million. Space Exploration Technologies/SpaceX and Blue Origin have also been awarded contracts.

"All four CCDev2 partners are performing very well and meeting their milestones," said Phil McAlister, director of NASA's Commercial Spaceflight Development. "These additional milestones were selected because they sufficiently accelerated the development of commercial crew transportation systems to justify additional NASA investment."

NASA wants to build most powerful rocket ever - but if wishes were horses -beggars would be riders...

2011-09-15T13:23:00.001-07:00

WASHINGTON (AP) — To soar far away from Earth and even on to Mars, NASA has dreamed up the world's most powerful rocket, a behemoth that borrows from the workhorse liquid-fuel rockets that sent Apollo missions into space four decades ago.

But with a price tag that some estimate at $35 billion, it may not fly with Congress.
NASA Administrator Charles Bolden and several members of Congress on Wednesday unveiled the Obama administration's much-delayed general plans for its rocket design, called the Space Launch System. The multibillion-dollar program would carry astronauts in a capsule on top, and the first mission would be 10 years off if all goes as planned. Unmanned test launches are expected from Cape Canaveral, Fla., in six years.

Calling it the "largest, most powerful rocket built," NASA's exploration and operations chief, William Gerstenmaier, said the rocket will be tough to construct. But when NASA does it, "we'll have a capability to go beyond low-Earth orbit like no other nation does here on Earth," he said in a telephone briefing Wednesday.

The rocket resembles those NASA relied on before the space shuttle, but even its smallest early prototype will have 10 percent more thrust than the Saturn V that propelled Apollo astronauts to the moon. When it is built to its fuller size, it will be 20 percent more powerful, Gerstenmaier said. That bigger version will have the horsepower of 208,000 Corvette engines.

NASA is trying to remain flexible on where it wants to go and when. The space agency is aiming for a nearby asteroid around 2025 and then on to Mars in the 2030s. There could even be a short hop to the moon, but not as a main goal. All those targets require lots of brute force to escape Earth's orbit, something astronauts have not done since 1972.

The far-from-finalized price tag may be too steep given federal budget constraints.
"Will it be tough times going forward? Of course it is," Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., said in a separate news conference. "We are in an era in which we have to do more with less — all across the board — and the competition for the available dollars will be fierce. But what we have here now are the realistic costs" verified by independent experts.

Although five senators of both parties who are leaders in science issues praised the plan in a joint press release, outside experts are skeptical that Congress will agree to such a big spending project.

"In the current political environment, new spending is probably the most taboo thing in politics," said Stan Collender, a former Democratic congressional budget analyst. He put the odds of this getting congressional approval at "no better than 50-50 this year. There are going to be a lot of questions asking what kind of commitment we're going to be making here. You can find yourself with a rocket that no one wants to fire."

Nelson puts the cost of the program at about $18 billion over the next five years. But that estimate is mostly for development and design through the first test flight in 2017, and doesn't include production of later rockets, Gerstenmaier said. Gerstenmaier wouldn't give a total estimate, but it is almost double that, according to senior administration officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to make the announcement.

READ THE REST OF THE STORY ON YAHOO NEWS

Bastrop is burning ...

2011-09-06T10:06:00.001-07:00

BASTROP

- The most destructive wildfire on record in Texas showed no signs of slowing down Monday, destroying 25,000 acres in Bastrop County and 476 homes, more houses than any single wildfire before and more than all other fires this year combined, according to the Texas Forest Service.

With more than 60 new wildfires raging across the state, Gov. Rick Perry left the campaign trail Monday in South Carolina to address the public and organize requests for more federal aid.

Closer to Houston, a fire in Magnolia burned 20 homes and more than 1,600 acres, and was threatening subdivisions in Montgomery and Grimes counties late Monday. It had moved southwest into Waller County last Monday.

It was one of several fires to hit the area, straining state and local resources as officials focused on the most dangerous blazes. One firefighter was injured and one fire engine burned in blazes in the Magnolia area, said Lt. Dan Norris, spokesman for the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office.

Authorities did not yet know how much of the most dangerous fire had been contained Monday, but planned to continue fighting it "as long as necessary," Norris said.

Strong winds and dry conditions fanned the flames and aided the blaze's rapid growth, forcing the evacuation of more than 150 homes. Montgomery County officials were encouraging evacuations from the intersection of FM 1774 and FM 1488, about 42 miles northwest of Houston, up to the Grimes County line, an official said.

Magnolia fire

The Magnolia fire, located off FM 1774 and FM 1488, jumped FM 1488 late Monday and forced further evacuations, although some families were being allowed back to their homes. The Magnolia Independent School District canceled classes today because of the fires. Evacuation shelters were being set up throughout the area, including at Magnolia High School.

Another fire in the area had burned 100 acres and was 80 percent contained, Norris said. It had destroyed one structure and caused no injuries after 50 homes were evacuated.

A fire covering about 100 acres was burning in Oak Ridge North late Monday.

A fire near Nacogdoches that started Sunday night raged to 300 acres Monday and forced 60 families to evacuate their homes, said Ralph Cullom, a spokesman for the Texas Forrest Service. That fires grew with strong gusts of winds and fed off of dry conditions on the ground.

"This drought we're having is just unprecedented," Cullom said.

No injuries have been reported in Bastrop, but two people were reported killed in a North Texas fire Monday. A woman and her 18-month-old child died when a fast-moving fire near Gladewater, east of Dallas, set their mobile home on fire and they were unable to escape.

The Bastrop County Complex Fire, pushed by strong winds and fed by plenty of dry grasses, shrubs and trees, steadily moved south Monday and expanded throughout the day. It jumped the Colorado River twice.

"We will be working days on end," said Mike Fisher, the Bastrop County Emergency Management Coordinator. "The fire is so dynamic we really have no idea where it is."

'Lives at stake'

Perry said the wildfire burning in the central part of the state is "as mean looking" as he's ever seen.

Driest year on record plagues Texas ...

2011-08-29T08:35:00.001-07:00

VOA: Weather forecasters and agriculture experts in the southwestern U.S. state of Texas say there is no relief in sight for what already is the worst drought year on record. The searing heat and dry conditions have caused devastating wildfires in the western part of the large state and led to crop losses, cattle deaths and water rationing in areas of east Texas that are normally wet at this time of year.

Driving through the countryside northwest of Houston, one sees dried up fields, dying trees and livestock ponds that are not much more than a puddles of fetid, algae-covered water. In some towns, farmers' markets have been cancelled because local growers have little to offer. Those with wells for irrigation are struggling with the high cost of fuel to run their pumps.

Debbie Cross, who operates a farmers' market near Cypress, Texas, says people are becoming discouraged by the lack of rain and the high temperatures, which are around 40 degrees most days.

“The drought is hurting everything. It is hurting all the crops, the cattle, the hay. There is no grass. The chickens are miserable. I mean everybody is just miserable. We need water,” Cross said.

Cross says local farmers are unable to supply much fruit and vegetables and that she is getting by with produce trucked in from other states where conditions are better.

“We are getting it from the local southern states and southwestern states are kicking in -- Arizona, New Mexico, Louisiana, Oklahoma. Everybody knows that the Texas market is a great consumer market, so they are helping out a lot here,” Cross said.
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One of the hardest hit agricultural sectors is livestock. Texas is the biggest cattle producer in the United States and ships beef to many foreign markets. Earlier this year, ranchers endured one of the worst winters on record, with several days of subzero temperatures in a region where freezes are rare. The drought has made it even harder, driving up the cost of hay and leaving some areas so dry that cattle have died of thirst in their pastures.

One rancher who has managed to get through this crisis with most of her stock in fairly good condition is Dorie Damuth, owner of the Flying D ranch near Magnolia, Texas.

Damuth raises prize-winning Texas Longhorns for breeding and she has managed to find hay and enough water to keep them alive. She says she has seen dry spells before, but nothing that compares to this year.

“The drought is something I, as a cattle woman, and all of my fellow cattlemen and cattlewomen have never experienced before. This is probably the 100-year drought, just like you can have a 100-year flood. It is very devastating for all of us ranchers who work so hard to provide beef for our country as well as for around the world,” Damuth said.

In a dried up lake on her property, there is a Longhorn skull sitting on top of cracked earth that is muddy and soft underneath.

“We have had lakes and stock ponds on the ranch that have dried up because of no rain, no rainfall. They will dry down to a little mucky place in the middle that is still wet and the cattle will sometimes go down and try to get water and they can't. And they step into that mucky mud and it is kind of like quicksand, and they can't get out.”

Lately, there have been beautiful fluffy clouds floating over the area. But ranch hand Chris Quinters is not encouraged by them.

“Those are some nice clouds, but it don't look like they are going to bring any rain,” Quinters said.

Tough water restrictions in League City ...

2011-08-16T08:50:00.000-07:00

LEAGUE CITY, Texa s – Severe drought conditions have prompted city officials here to order the strictest water restrictions in Southeast Texas.
At Kelley’s Country Cookin in League City, diners are finding something unusual.
"This is the first year that it’s ever happened," says manager Jennifer Salas.
The city called her last week and told her stage 5 water restrictions were in effect.
That means restaurants can no longer offer water. They can only serve it if customers specifically ask.

While Salas said she’s received no complaints from customers, some of them wondered Sunday whether the restriction was necessary.
"It’s probably a little much," Yessika Katcham said. "Because we’re used to drinking water at restaurants."
Still, Salas agreed with the city’s conservation efforts due to the record-breaking drought.

The water rationing means League City residents can’t water their lawns at all.
"My yard is looking horrible," Adrian Keith said. "My trees - it looks like fall at my house."

Businesses like professional carwashes can use water only between 9 a.m. and 6 p.m. The city has also closed its pool and won’t maintain the water level.
Violations could cost up to $500.

League City may have the toughest water restrictions. But they are certainly not the only ones in place around Houston.

Galveston has also banned all outdoor watering – although it hasn’t gone as far as League City with other restrictions. Residents in the Woodlands can only soak their lawns on certain days. Katy and Sugar Land have voluntary restrictions.
Houston’s mayor says the city will likely move to mandatory restrictions by the end of this week.

Clear Lake to host water quality conference

2011-08-16T08:44:00.000-07:00

By Texas State University

CLEAR LAKE — The Texas Stream Team, based at Texas State University-San Marcos, and the Houston-Galveston Area Council will host the Meeting of the Monitors Conference Sept. 29 through Oct. 1 in Clear Lake at the Hilton Houston NASA Clear Lake.

Attendees can network with staff from more than 15 environmental organizations such as the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, the Water Environment Association of Texas and the Galveston Bay Foundation.

The conference will provide educational and networking opportunities for resident water quality monitors and professionals working in the environmental field.

It also will provide opportunities for the public to learn about relevant water quality issues in Texas.

Attendees will have the opportunity to participate in trainings and workshops on macroinvertebrate identification; fish dissection; data analysis; the monitoring of nutrients, turbidity, streamflow, mussels, invasive species and phytoplankton.

“A collaborative approach to watershed planning is essential,” said Kerry Niemann, the TCEQ nonpoint source program manager.

“That is why it is so important to actively engage citizens by bringing them together to help in information gathering, such as volunteer monitoring efforts and decision making.

The forecast?

2011-08-03T06:14:00.001-07:00

Drought uncovers space shuttle Columbia debris

2011-08-02T14:52:00.001-07:00

(CNN) -- The recent drought has ruined millions of acres of farmland in Texas, turning lakes into mud puddles, and has many praying for rain.
But in the East Texas city of Nacogdoches, authorities say, the drought may have done something good by helping unearth a piece of the space shuttle Columbia.

The object, which is about 4 feet in diameter, was found in a local lake. NASA says it is a tank that provides power and water for shuttle missions.
"It's one of ours," said Lisa Malone, a spokeswoman for the agency.
Malone added that NASA is trying to develop a plan to recover the item,
But it could take weeks to get it, she said.

"We're looking into whether we'll send a team out or local authorities can," Malone said.

Authorities say the object was found after the drought caused the waters to recede in Lake Nacogdoches, and they notified representatives from NASA on Friday.

"The lower water level has exposed a larger than normal area on the northern side of the lake," said Sgt. Greg Sowell of the Nacogdoches Police Department.
The item is full of mud and is in a remote area near a private shoreline, Sowell said.

Nacogdoches made headlines in 2003 when debris from the shuttle Columbia disaster was found there.

The spacecraft broke up while re-entering Earth's atmosphere near the end of its mission on February 1, 2003.

"We want to remind everyone that the rules are the same as they were back in 2003. If this object is indeed a part of the shuttle, it is government property, and it is a criminal offense to tamper with it," Sowell said.

Wells Fargo robbers sought ...

2011-07-26T14:50:00.000-07:00

By MARY ALYS CHERRY

A team of four robbers — three toting shotguns — are being sought by Houston Police and the FBI after they held up the Wells Fargo in the Randalls grocery store at the intersection of Space Center and Clear Lake City Boulevards Monday morning.

The masked men entered Randalls about 10:55 a.m. Monday and then walked to the far end of the store to rob the Wells Fargo branch bank, which is in the store. They arrived in a silver SUV, later found to be stolen, and initially parked it out in front of the store.
As they left, they fled in the SUV, but ditched it in back of the store after driving it into a guard rail. A fourth man may have been waiting for them in a black car, which drove off with the robbers shortly before HPD officers arrived, but this could not be verified.

One of several 9-1-1 calls from Randalls shoppers and employees came in at about 10:55 a.m., HPD spokeswoman Jodi Silva said. The first caller reported that an armed man in a mask was robbing the bank.

When police and deputies from the Precinct 8 Constable’s Office arrived, they found a silver SUV, believed to have been stolen, that had crashed into a guard rail behind Randalls. Thinking the trio may have fled on foot, they called in the HPD helicopter and began searching the area by car and on foot.
An hour later, employees at both the bank and the grocery store were clearly still upset over what they had just witnessed.
THIRD HOLDUP
It is one of three robberies in the past three days.

One was at a bank in Dickinson Saturday morning and another was the holdup of an armored car just outside the Bank of America near Gulfgate about 8 a.m. Monday. The armored car driver reportedly exchanged gunshots with one of the robbers but no one was injured.
Wells Fargo Service Manager Michael Sprott declined to comment about the holdup at his bank as he locked the door, and HPD Sgt. G.A. Llanez referred any questions to the FBI.

TWO SOUGHT
Police also are looking for two men who held up the Texas First Bank in Dickinson shortly after the bank opened at 8 a.m. Saturday, July 23.

The suspects, who robbed the tellers at gunpoint, were described as young, possible in their mid to late 20s, and dark skinned. The suspects were wearing masks and were armed with handguns, Dickinson Police said. They fled the bank in a late model Toyota.
The Toyota was later recovered on Oleander just west of Highway 3, less than one mile from the bank. The vehicle had been stolen earlier in the day during a reported carjacking in Galveston, officers said.

An undetermined amount of cash was taken from the bank. No injuries were reported.

Space Shuttle Atlantis home - end of an era.

2011-07-21T05:30:00.001-07:00

USA TODAY:

Atlantis is home," said NASA control moments after its arrival at 5:56 a.m. ET. "Its journey complete. A moment to be savored."

In its final act before beginning the long journey home, Atlantis sent a small payload into orbit on Thursday.

As an era comes to a close, nearly 200 satellites, probes and spacecraft have emerged from the cargo bays of NASA's five space shuttles since the Columbia launched from Kennedy Space Center on April 12, 1981.

"We really wish we could share with everybody this really cool glow," Commander Chris Ferguson radioed as he and his crew entered the Earth's atmosphere in a plasma of heated air before touching down. "We're doing fantastic."

The perfect landing is bittersweet. As sorrowful employees greeted the fabulous flying machine for the final time, plans for NASA's next grand venture remain largely on the drawing board. United Space Alliance, one of the space program's largest employers, will lay off about 2,000 employees on Friday.

President Obama has charged NASA with finding a way to transport astronauts into deep space, either to Mars or an asteroid, but that flight could be a generation away.
Most of the nation's baby boomers can remember the thrilling moment Apollo 11 astronauts Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong stepped onto the moon, inspiring a generation of kids who idolized astronauts and devoured space science.

The Generation X grew up on the space shuttle, which astronomer and former NASA historian Steven Dick says provided little in the way of ground-breaking exploration and discovery, but great engineering breakthroughs.

"It's definitely the end of the era," Dick said. "The shuttle has been a magnificent flying machine, an engineering marvel, but it has consigned Americans for two generations to low-Earth orbit. I think that's a negative."

Without the excitement of a heart-pounding launch of astronauts blasting toward the stars, America's space program seems destined for a decade of obscurity. American astronauts will hitch rides to the International Space Station on the Russian Soyuz until commercial space companies develop the rockets and capsules to transport humans.

"I hope we won't lose a whole generation. Kids get excited by exploration," Dick said. "I think NASA, in some ways, is doing the right thing by off-loading the routine work of the space shuttle. The only problem is we're a long way from getting something that will take us out of low-Earth orbit."
Until then, NASA is hoping to capture American imagination with telescopes, probes and and unmanned spacecraft.

READ THE REST OF THE STORY HERE

End of shuttle program hurts Houston in more than lost jobs ...

2011-07-11T13:08:00.000-07:00

GULFNEWS

The end of the space shuttle programme is hitting its Florida launch home in the pocketbook with some areas practically becoming economic ghost towns. But Houston, home of Mission Control, is getting hit somewhere else: prestige.

Aerospace ranks only fourth among booming industries, far, far behind king oil, Mayor Annise Parker said. It's a pride thing for a city whose baseball team is the Astros and whose basketball team is the Rockets.

Space is "part of our psyche here", Parker said. "It's how we view ourselves as a city."
This is a metropolis of four million people that has tied its identity to space and to the shuttle specifically. But that identity has taken three hard hits and the loss of thousands of jobs is just one of them.

The first blow came in 2004, when then-President George W. Bush announced the end of the space shuttle programme. His plan was to replace it with a return-to-the-moon programme run out of Houston.

Then in 2010, President Barack Obama cancelled that over-budget Houston-centric shuttle replacement programme. He proposed going to an asteroid in a plan that at the moment is less detailed, especially when it comes to Houston's role.

The concept relies on private companies to take Nasa's place when it comes to shuttling people to Earth's orbit and the International Space Station, with Nasa buying rides on these private ships. Many of those private companies — including the acknowledged leader, SpaceX, have little connection to Houston.

Then in April came what some in this city consider the cruellest blow: Houston would not be getting one of the retired shuttles to display.
Many locals, from hotel housekeepers to the mayor, are angry.
"We need space because space was the heart and soul of Houston," says Bob Mitchell, president of the Bay Area Houston Economic Partnership. "We've got the knowledge and skilled people to move forward."

Last year, 16,613 people in Houston had jobs because of the Johnson Space Center in Houston. Nasa's economic impact in Texas was $6.5 billion (Dh24 billion) last year with $2 billion of that because of the space shuttle, the space agency calculated in a recent report. Most of that is in the area around Clear Lake, south of downtown. But Harris County, which includes Houston, has more than 2 million people employed.

And while Nasa means a lot of money, it represents just a fraction of 1 per cent of the state's gross domestic product.

The Houston area has already lost about 2,000 space shuttle jobs — government and private contractors — in the past several months, Mitchell said. Another 1,800 or so lay-offs will come after space shuttle Atlantis lands, ending the programme.
Harris County's May unemployment rate of 8.2 per cent is almost a full percentage point below the national average and looks robust compared to the 10.8 per cent jobless rate on the Florida Space Coast.

The space shuttle's work force nationwide peaked in 1991 at 32,000 government and private contract workers. In 2006, that number was about half that, and now is about 6,300 and shrinking, according to Nasa.

Houston has always been the brains of the space shuttle programme while Florida has been the muscle, the technicians who refurbish, prepare and launch the spacecraft.

Tribute ... last shuttle flight.

2011-07-08T12:59:00.001-07:00

God's speed Atlantis! Last shuttle blasts into orbit.

2011-07-08T09:02:00.001-07:00

Atlantis' journey to the International Space Station is NASA's 135th and final mission in the space shuttle program, which began 30 years ago.

(CNN) -- The space shuttle Atlantis lifted off Friday morning on the final mission of America's 30-year space-shuttle program.

The four-member crew blasted off on a 12-day mission just before 11:30 a.m. The four -- all shuttle veterans -- are on their way to deliver supplies to the International Space Station.

The possibility of storms had raised doubt about whether the launch would take place as planned, but NASA gave the shuttle a "go" for launch a few minutes before liftoff.
Thousands of people, including some who came to Kennedy Space Center three decades ago for the first launch, were gathered to watch. Almost a million people were expected to be on hand to witness the historic event.

One onlooker flew in with a friend Thursday from New York. Unable to find a hotel, the men went to a Walmart and picked up a tent, air mattresses and some tortilla chips and camped out on a nearby spit of land to wait for the launch. Seeing the shuttle blast off, they said, will let them check an item off their things-to-do-before-you-die bucket list.

Last flight ...

2011-07-08T05:51:00.001-07:00

LINK: HERE

Astronauts reflect on Space Shuttle program ...

2011-07-05T08:50:00.000-07:00

With Atlantis poised to leave Earth one last time, signaling an end to more than 30 years of flying the Shuttle Orbiter, some of the nation's best-known astronauts are speaking out about NASA retiring its reusable spacecraft, and what it might mean to the future of manned space flight.

At a June gathering of astronauts during SpaceFest III held at the Starr Pass Resort in Tucson, Atlantis' final launch on Friday sparked strong opinions from nearly a dozen Apollo and shuttle astronauts.

Apollo 7 astronaut retired Marine Col. Walter Cunningham, 79, Houston, Texas

"They aren't moth-balling the shuttle, they've quit it. They've stopped it. It's the worst decision ever made by NASA, to ground the shuttle, without a replacement. And a replacement would be very difficult because this is the greatest flying machine ever developed and built; it's the safest spacecraft that we have ever flown into orbit. It's really bad for NASA, but more importantly, it's terrible for our country. Because right now, it's doing away with the kind of imagination and dreaming that it takes to reach out and explore. And when you can't be the preeminent space nation in the world, you're surrendering things. I'm much more concerned about it's impact on the country than I am just it's impact on NASA.

"We better hope that the so-called space industry is successful, because it's the only thing we're going to have going for us. And there's no question that a commercial company can cut through some of the delays and cost, because they're not big and bureaucratic yet. So, it might be a little bit cheaper, but it's going to be a hell of a lot more expensive than they think, and it's going to take a lot longer than they think before they can have any kind of man-rated vehicle flying."

Cunningham was selected by NASA to train as an astronaut in 1963. On Oct. 11, 1968, he served as lunar module pilot for the Apollo 7 mission, along with spacecraft commander Walter M. Schirra, Jr., and command module pilot Donn F. Eisele. The 11-day flight was the first manned flight test of the third generation U.S. spacecraft. Cunningham was also the backup lunar module pilot to the crew of Apollo 1. When the Apollo 1 spacecraft burned up on the pad, killing the entire crew, Cunningham, Schirra, and Eisele were assigned to fly the first manned Apollo mission. After retiring from NASA in 1971, Cunningham wrote "The All-American Boys: the human side of the space program," released in 1977.

Apollo 10 astronaut retired Air Force Lt. Gen. Thomas P. Stafford, 80, Florida

"I explained to a lot of congressmen that one time I had a chance to one-on-one with (President) Richard Nixon, and I told him this was the thing to do to go forward. At times we were very small in the astronaut group, (NASA director of Flight Crew Operations and astronaut) Deke Slayton, myself and (Apollo 13 command module pilot John) Jack Swigert. We did a lot of the landing and approach testing and simulating."

Of the last shuttle flight, Stafford said: "I think it's a little short sighted. Sure we needed to look at this as a result of the Columbia accident; they recommended you have the crew separate from the cargo, after the Columbia accident. But also, they're still doing a great job . . . we need to move on and continue. America has led human space flight starting with the Gemini program, while the Soviet Union led before that. It turns out we set the lead with Gemini, and now we're falling back."

READ THE REST OF THE STORY HERE

Houston Area 4th of July Celebrations ...

2011-06-27T10:15:00.001-07:00

by Stacy Morrow / khou.com staff
khou.com

The Houston area is buzzing with activities for the celebration of our nation's independence. You can find events from fireworks displays to parades, in just about every city and community. Here's a list we've compiled of the things we have heard about so far. If you see we have missed anything, or if you want to add something, let us know in the comments below!

HOUSTON
Freedom Over Texas
Houston will set the stage for an extraordinary patriotic celebration at Mayor Annise Parker’s official Fourth of July event, Freedom Over Texas. The annual event is held at Eleanor Tinsley Park from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. and culminates with a fireworks extravaganza set to a perfectly timed bed of patriot and current musical selections. Free with a can of food benefiting the Houston Food Bank or $8 per person (children under 2 free) Information from: http://www.freedomovertexas.org

ExxonMobil Star-Spangled Salute, Miller Outdoor Theatre
Enjoy an evening with Michael Krajewski and the Houston Symphony. Astronaut and vocalist Chris Hadfield will also sing Big Smoke, a song inspired by his first shuttle mission.

Make sure to stay until the end for the 1812 Overture—complete with booming cannons! This celebration concludes with a magnificent display of fireworks provided by the City of Houston through the Miller Theatre Advisory Board. Hours: 8:30 p.m. - 10:30 p.m. at 6000 Hermann Park Drive, Houston, TX 77030, Phone: 281-FREE-FUN or 281-373-3386 Information from: http://milleroutdoortheatre.com/events/133/

Bayou Bend Family Days Independence Day Celebration
Start your Fourth of July at Bayou Bend, where America's Colonial era is celebrated in patriotic style. Ring in the holiday with an extravaganza of Americana—performers, crafts, activities, refreshments, and more—and don't forget to sign the Texas-sized Declaration of Independence before you leave! With its unique blend of the arts and American history, Bayou Bend is the perfect place to spend Independence Day. From 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. FREE! Information from:
http://www.mfah.org/visit/bayou-bend-family-days/

Kidpendence Celebration | Children's Museum of Houston
Friday, Jul 1 2011 6:00 AM to Monday, Jul 4 2011 10:00 PM CDT
We’re seeing stars and stripes at this special Independence Day celebration! Join us for a patriotic 21-soda geyser burst salute on the 4th of July and plenty of fun-filled activities that will cover you in red, white and blue! Claim Your Independence Discount: We know rising gas prices are making you see stars and stripes, so it is time to claim your independence from them! Receive up to $12 off/ 6 people on July 1 - 4. Special Activity - 21 - Soda Geyser Burst Salute: Celebrate America with a CMH tradition - 21 patriotic bursts of soda that will help you get excited for the rest of the day's activities. 1500 Binz, Houston TX 77004. Phone: (713) 522-1138 Informaton from: http://www.cmhouston.org/en/cev/2570

BELLAIRE
July 4th Parade and Festival
The parade begins at 9:30 am and the festival runs from 10 am to 1 pm. The parade route begins at the Bellaire Triangle and travels down Bellaire Blvd. and S. Rice Ave. A children's parade leads the big parade. Kids are encouraged to decorate trikes, bikes and wagons and meet by Community National Bank at Bellaire Blvd. & Fifth Street. No need to enter the children's parade ahead of time, just show up at 9 a.m. in the CNB parking lot. The festival begins in Bellaire Town Square immediately after the parade. Enjoy live entertainment, carnival games, food, a mini ferris wheel, petting zoo, moon jumps, dunk tank and much, much more! Admission into the festival is free, but games take tickets and the food is an additional cost. Join us for some home town fun! Information from: http://www.ci.bellaire.tx.us/index.aspx?nid=879.

CITY OF EL LAGO
July 4th Picnic
For this year’s July 4th Picnic, we are going to take it down home with a parade and then bar-b-que at the pool. Join us at 10:00 a.m. at McNair Park for the annual non-motorized parade around the park. Prizes will be awarded in the following three categories: Most Sparkling, Most Creative and Most Patriotic. After the parade, we will retire to the El Lago Swim and Racquet Club to visit with friends, listen to some music and enjoy a burger together. The City will provide the drinks, burger, bun and burger fixings; we are asking residents to bring a side dish and/or desert. You will also want to bring your lawn chair or blanket for relaxing around the pool and spray ground in the afternoon. Information from: http://www.ellago-tx.com/events.html#july4

CONROE
July 4th Walden and Bentwater Fireworks Show
Fireworks will be shot off at Dusk from the Marina near the Walden Yacht Club, 13101 Melville Dr, Montgomery. Parking at the Yacht club is reserved for dinner guests. There is limited parking on the streets. Suggested viewing is from the water. Information from: http://www.conroetoday.com/evps/evitem.cfm?evid=4548

FORT BEND
Freedom Rings Concert featuring the Fort Bend Symphony Orchestra
Program includes Star Spangled Banner Finale with soloist, Armed Forces Salute, America the Beautiful – Dragon, God Bless the USA, Liberty Fanfare -Williams/Aguero, Joplin Rag, You're a Grand Old Flag, Variations on a Shaker Melody – Copland, Strike Up the Band, Sousa Marches, Gems of Stephen Foster and 1812 Overture. Event will be at the Stafford Centre from 7p.m. to 9 p.m. and a fireworks show will begin at 9 p.m. Location:10505 Cash Road, Stafford, TX 77477. Information from: http://www.fbso.org/
KATY
Annual Freedom Celebration at Katy Mills Mall
The 22nd Annual Katy Freedom Celebration fireworks display will be held at Katy Mills Mall on Monday, July 4. The fireworks are launched between the east side of the mall and Katy Fort Bend Road. The display begins at dark (approximately 9:00 p.m.) and can be viewed from several miles around the mall area. Information from: cityofkaty.com/katy-freedom-celebration-july-4/
KEMAH
Kemah’s Independence Day Parade
Kicking off the Independence Day Celebration activities is the Kemah 4th of July Parade, Monday, at 11:00 a.m. with the Children’s Parade starting at 10:30 a.m. The parade line up is behind the Kemah Visitor Center at 9:00 a.m. with the parade route travelling along the Kemah Lighthouse District. The theme for the patriotic parade this year is “The Spirit of Volunteerism.” The parade is open to all and easy to enter with no registration fee. Monday evening is the July 4th Kemah Boardwalk Fireworks, “Star Spangled Skies” extravaganza. From the Kemah Boardwalk and surrounding areas all will be able to see the fantastic light show over Galveston Bay. The annual fireworks display scheduled to begin at 9:30 p.m. For more information on these activities or lodging needs contact the Kemah Visitor Center at 281-334-3181. Information from: http://www.kemah.net/July_4_2011_Kemah_press_release.pdf

LEAGUE CITY
July 4th Citizen Appreciation Day
Mayor, City Council, Parks Board and staff will be serving free refreshments in appreciation of the citizens of the City of League City at League Park from 11:30 a.m. - 4:30 p.m. There will be live music and other entertainment. FREE. Information from: http://www.leaguecity.com/calendar.aspx?EID=1348

NASSAU BAY
July 4th Parade and Fireworks Show
Decorate your bikes, floats, baby strollers, cars, or just yourself! Various prizes will be awarded. Join your friends and neighbors for a fun-filled evening. Bring a picnic dinner and a blanket for the fireworks show. Parade begins at 6:30 p.m. from Gloria Dei and ends at Lake Park Nassau. Activities at the park including bounce houses, food vendors, face painting, and live music. Fireworks Display begins at 9 p.m. Information from: http://www.nassaubay.com/CivicAlerts.aspx?AID=48

PASADENA
Pasadena's Annual 4th Fest Event will take place Monday, July 4th, 2011
from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. at the Pasadena Convention Center.
There will be a 20-minute long fireworks show, live music by “The Slags,” a car show, kidzone, USMC Toys for Tots BBQ Cook-off, games, prizes, vendors, water balloon war zone, sports and other entertainment. Information from: http://www.ci.pasadena.tx.us/default.aspx?name=prk.event-4thfest

PEARLAND
Celebration of Freedom
This year's program will begin with an explosion of patriotic excitement! A full-size carnival will be on site at noon on Monday. Stadium and Field seating will be available at no charge beginning at 6 PM on Monday. A VFW military salute will begin the evening's entertainment, followed by the National Anthem. The stadium will be filled with the tunes of Texas country recording artist, Hamilton Loomis. At sundown, enjoy a spectacular 20-minute fireworks display from your seat inside the stadium.. For more information, call 281-412-8900. Information from: http://www.pearlandparks.com/celebration_of_freedom.html
SUGAR LAND
Celebration of Freedom
The City of Sugar Land’s 26th annual Red White and Bluefest will set the skies ablaze over Oyster Creek Park. Celebrate America’s 235th birthday with family, friends and fellow residents while enjoying new main stage performances, delicious county fair-type goodies and numerous children’s activities. A free shuttle service will be provided from Mercer Stadium, 16403 Lexington Blvd., to Oyster Creek Park, 4033 State Highway 6 South, from 4:30-11 p.m. Information from: www.sugarlandtx.gov
THE WOODLANDS
South County Fourth of July Parade “Celebrating the American Dream”
On Sunday, July 3, stroll through Market Street - The Woodlands for its Fourth of July parade, “Celebrating the American Dream” starting at 9 a.m. The festivities continue later that evening when the Houston Symphony performs its Star Spangled Salute, a free concert at the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion starting at 8 pm. Information from: http://www.4thofjuly.org/

Houston Symphony presents Star-Spangled Salute
The Pavilion dons red, white and blue July 3 for the return of the Star-Spangled Salute. This free Independence Eve spectacular features the Houston Symphony in a selection of patriotic favorites under the direction of Michael Krajewski. Don’t miss commemorating the birth of our nation by joining the Symphony in this grandiose celebration. It’s an evening of good, old-fashioned family fun complete with cannons blasting from the top of the hill during Tchaikovsky's "1812 Overture." Pre-concert activities begin at 6:30 p.m. in the Fidelity Investments Plaza.FREE event. Information from: http://www.woodlandscenter.org/tourarchive.html?n_id=346

Red, Hot & Blue Festival
The Woodlands will celebrate July 4 weekend with one of the largest firework displays in the greater Houston area, hot dog and watermelon eating contests, live entertainment, and more! Now in its 14th year, the annual Red, Hot & Blue Festival will be held Monday, July 4, 2011 from 6 - 10 pm at Town Green Park and Waterway Square, both located along The Woodlands Waterway. Admission to the event is free and tickets for food concessions and games may be purchased on-site. Information from: http://www.thewoodlandscvb.com/redhotblue/

Alvin woman jumps on hood of beer thieves ...

2011-06-23T07:39:00.001-07:00

Wildfires ravage area

2011-06-20T07:48:00.000-07:00

Firefighters from Cut and Shoot, Caney Creek, Splendora, Montgomery County and Bear Creek fire departments were still at work by deadline Monday trying to put out a nearly 200-acre wildfire about 10 miles northwest of Cleveland.
No structures were harmed.
Four bulldozers, including one from the Texas Forest Service, worked to set up a fire perimeter to keep the fire contained.
Helicopters made 38 drops of water to squelch the flames. The cause was undetermined Monday night.

Yates case though tragic - still helping shine light on PPD

2011-06-20T07:43:00.000-07:00

Juliana Heyward felt good after the birth of her first child two years ago. She had decided to put medical school on hold to be a stay-at-home mom, and she was excited about what awaited her.

Heyward and her husband, Tom, adjusted happily to the late-night feedings and diaper changes for their son, Noah. But soon Heyward found that she had trouble sleeping, lacked an appetite and had nagging doubts about her parenting skills. Frightening thoughts slipped into her mind.

"We have a spiral staircase, and I would be nervous walking down because I would have images of dropping him over and over again," said Heyward, 27. "I realized something was not normal. I knew I loved my son and I was happy to have a baby."

She called her father, a physician, who recognized the classic symptoms of postpartum depression and urged his daughter to get to a hospital. She was quickly diagnosed and prescribed medication, and a month later she was symptom-free, she said.
Another mother, Andrea Yates, struggled with similar symptoms a decade ago. But her battle with the illness ended in a tragedy that shocked the nation and put a spotlight on postpartum depression.

Ten years ago today, Yates drowned her five children, ages 6 months to 7 years, one by one in the bathtub of the family's Clear Lake home. The 36-year-old mother suffered from postpartum psychosis, the most severe but rarest form of postpartum depression.

In 2001 most people, including many doctors, didn't know about the condition and many women who had it suffered in silence, experts said. The past decade, however, has brought education and greater awareness, lessening the stigma and making it easier for women to seek help.

Screening tools have been developed to identify and assist mothers in getting further evaluation and medical care. Research on the causes and treatment of postpartum depression has advanced.

Lawmakers in a dozen states, including Texas, have passed legislation mandating screening or the distribution of information to mothers.
Last year, the Mother's Act became law as part of the federal health care reform legislation, signaling the government's commitment to fight the debilitating condition. The Department of Health and Human Services is coordinating efforts in research, education and support service programs.

"The act mandates that as a nation we start paying attention to postpartum depression and psychiatric illness, and that's groundbreaking," said Dr. Lucy Puryear, a Houston psychiatrist and president of Postpartum Support International, an advocacy group. "A lot of things have changed in 10 years."

Yet more work needs to be done, experts said. Mental health providers are scarce and many women lack access to speciality care.

Postpartum depression is common, with 1 out of 8 mothers developing it after delivery. Women generally experience sadness, difficulty sleeping, guilt and crying. They may also be afraid they or something else might harm their child.
One out of 1,000 women experiences postpartum psychosis. Mothers may feel confused, hear voices, see things and have thoughts of harming themselves or their baby.
The upside is that treatment with therapy and medication is effective. Therapist Sherry Duson, who runs a postpartum depression support group at Texas Children's Hospital, said she's never seen a woman fail to get well with treatment.
"I see moms come back to life," Duson said.

Attorney George Parnham, who represented Yates during her two capital murder trials, said he had never heard of postpartum depression when he got involved in the case.
Parnham and his wife, Mary, have since become staunch advocates. The couple founded the Yates Children Memorial Fund in partnership with Mental Health America of Greater Houston in 2002. The fund's advisory committee has launched initiatives to educate mothers, families and physicians.
Yates, who declined to be interviewed, is aware of the fund and its activities, Parnham said. She has written notes of thanks to the advisory committee. She also designs cards and aprons, which are sold in the gift shop at the Kerrville State Hospital where she is being treated. She sends the proceeds to the fund every 45 days, he said.

Yates was moved to the facility after a Harris County jury found her not guilty due to insanity at her second trial in 2006.
The Parnhams said Yates is stable and doing well. They visit her often and she has become part of their family, they said.
"We'll always defend her by keeping the children's legacy alive," Parnham said.
Yates' ex-husband, Rusty, said he appreciates the efforts of the Parnhams and others involved with the fund.

"They are helping families cope with postpartum mental illnesses, which is a great tribute to my children," Yates said. "The 10-year anniversary is a painful reminder to me of my family's loss. At the same time, I'm encouraged to see that the public's overall awareness of mental illness has significantly increased since then."
The couple divorced in 2005, but Yates keeps in touch with his ex-wife. He said she's looking forward to one day regaining her freedom and rebuilding her life.
The fund's advisory committee lobbied for a Yates-inspired bill, passed by the Legislature in 2003, that requires physicians to give expectant mothers information and resources on postpartum depression.

The committee also launched a program to screen low-income mothers at sites where they seek nutrition benefits, using a two-question assessment to identify and refer those who show indications of the condition to mental health professionals who provide free services.

About 6 percent of more than 60,000 screenings since 2006 have shown positive results, according to city health department records.
The fund's outreach efforts have included the development last year of a pilot program focusing on outreach, screening and training strategies for pediatricians and their staffs.

Read more: HERE

Texas Local Web Site Blooms into a Flower for the Community

2011-06-15T05:44:00.001-07:00

New exciting things are developing in the Summer of 2011 for ExploreHouston.com

Best Publications wants to welcome the public to this new web business directory and informational mecca for ExploreHouston.com that will continue to be filled with. . . Community Links and Events, Guide Pages for Restaurants, Weddings, Florist, Services, Auto Sales, Entertainment, Real Estate, Eye Care, Dental, Medical, Employment, Shopping! Read a variety of Articles | Forums Topics | Daily Deals | Coupons | Directory Hot Links | Interact Page to Join the Community Fun!

Register with ExploreHouston.com site so you can gain the benefits. User can post Social and Public Events.

Take the opportunity for High School and University Students to announce Sports and School Events, Professional Sports Links and Ticket Information | Post a photo or comment on other people’s Photos, Comment of Articles or Forum Topics | Post a Scan of your Child’s Artwork | Free Classified Postings & Add Your Own

The staff of ExploreHouston wants the community to benefit from the information we can share... as well as encourage you to participate. Send us a comment.

Post your event or Your Organization Benefit in ExploreHouston.com Event section. We want our information to accurate, so we depend on our community to help us stay in touch.

Are you a writer that wants to be published? Got an article? Send it in a word document to info@ExploreHouston.com

Engage! Enjoy! Grow with us!

~ ExploreHouston.com Staff

Endeavor launch picture perfect ...

2011-05-16T15:47:00.000-07:00

A Great Launch, A Challenging Mission Ahead
Mon, 16 May 2011 10:35:13 AM CDT

Space shuttle Endeavour is officially on its way to the International Space Station on its STS-134 mission and final flight. Endeavour lifted off from NASA's Kennedy Space Center on time at 8:56 a.m. EDT, soaring through a few clouds, after a relatively smooth countdown.

"I can't thank the teams that got this vehicle ready to fly and for all the work they've done," said Associate Administrator for Space Operations Bill Gerstenmaier referring to the Auxiliary Power Unit (APU) heater issues and said, "The teams worked really hard to get through that, get it behind and to understand what the problem was -- and it was no problem to us at all during the count."

"The teams stayed focused, and made this launch a success," Gerstenmaier added. "The mission in front of us is no easy mission, the EVAs (extra vehicular activities) are very demanding -- but it'll be exciting to see the AMS (Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer) get installed on the station and get some real research data for the ISS."

"We showed our determination to succeed on a very complex mission," said Michel Tognini, head of the European Astronaut Center and former ESA astronaut, "and this is the model of human exploration for the future."

Mike Moses apologized (in jest) about the view not being the best and the longest because of the cloud cover." But the data that we were looking at in the launch center was absolutely perfect," said Moses. "We had the clouds where we needed them, so we went."

There were a few minor problems, but they were managed and worked immediately, including the minor tile repair, reported Moses.

After every launch an award is given to one of the teams, according to Shuttle Launch Director Mike Leinbach, and today's honor was given to the combined APU repair/test team. "It was an outstanding countdown, lots of pats on the back in the lobby of the LCC (launch control center) afterwards when we were eating our beans and corn bread (a traditional post-launch snack)," said Leinbach. "Endeavour's on orbit safely and it's going to perform a great mission and we'll see her back here on June 1."

"It's a great day here at Kennedy Space Center and for the Shuttle Program," added Leinbach.

Autopsy on boy who died on soccer field pending ...

2011-05-09T07:42:00.000-07:00

LEAGUE CITY, Texas - The results of an autopsy performed on a four year old boy who collapsed at soccer practice and later died are still pending, but sources close to the investigation say there may have been swelling around the child's heart.

The boy died Wednesday night after collapsing at the League City YMCA's soccer field. A relative who contacted FOX 26 News has identified the boy as Cade Carpenter.
"Practice started at 6:30 and about 10 minutes later, the little boy complained to his father that his stomach hurt," said Trazanna Moreno, spokesperson for the YMCA. "Almost immediately after that he collapsed."

The YMCA runs a soccer program for kids as young as 3-years-old. Parents submit basic information, but are not required to give medical information. A physical is also not required.

Clear Lake Greek Festival this weekend!

2011-05-06T07:22:00.000-07:00

The 18th annual Clear Lake Greek Festival will be from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. today, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Saturday and 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sunday at Clear Lake Park in the Landolt Pavilion, 5001 NASA Parkway, in Seabrook.

There will be food, live music, rides, moonwalks and traditional dancing.

All guests will receive a commemorative program book.

General admission is $4, and presale tickets for $12 include admission fee and a meal of your choosing.

Visit www.clearlakegreekfestival.com or call 409-939-9852.

Texan heads Bin Laden raiders

2011-05-04T05:35:00.001-07:00

The commander of the U.S. military unit responsible for killing elusive al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden — Vice Adm. William H. McRaven — is a San Antonio native and graduate of the University of Texas in Austin.

McRaven, 55, earned a bachelor's degree in journalism in 1977, although a campus dean said a computer listing didn't indicate whether the Naval Reserve Officers Training Corps member had an interest in the print side of news coverage, broadcast or public relations.
A fellow ROTC member recalled McRaven as eager for military service.

"He was extremely focused on preparing for special forces details," said Curtis Raetz, of McKinney, who majored in engineering at UT, served in the Marine Corps and now works in private business.
'He had drive.'

Raetz, who graduated a year before McRaven, said the ROTC program included required courses such as naval science.

James Gruetzner, who served in the same Navy ROTC batallion as McRaven, told Cox Newspapers, "He had drive. He went on extraordinarily long runs to stay in shape. He was very dedicated."
McRaven's Navy biography states he attended the Naval Postgraduate School and was its first graduate in Special Operations/Low Intensity Conflict. In 1995, he wrote a book called Spec Ops: Case Studies in Special Operations Warfare Theory and Practice.

McRaven became commander of the U.S. military's Joint Special Operations Command in 2008.
In that role, he reportedly led the planning and execution of bin Laden's death Sunday at the hand of Navy SEALs, an acronym that stands for Sea, Air and Land.

Endeavor set for last flight today ..

2011-04-29T07:40:00.001-07:00

Fri, 29 Apr 2011 09:32:07 AM CDT

Space shuttle Endeavour's external tank is fully loaded with more than 500,000 gallons of liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen in preparation for today's 3:47 p.m. EDT launch. Tanking operations began at 6:22 a.m. and concluded at 9:24 a.m.

The countdown has entered a planned 2.5-hour hold at T-3 hours, during which the tank will remain in "stable replenish" mode, the Close Out Crew will prepare the White Room for astronaut arrival, and the Final Inspection Team will conduct its inspections.

Forecasters continue to predict a 70 percent chance of favorable weather for today's launch. The only concerns are low cloud ceilings and high crosswinds at the Shuttle Landing Facility at time of liftoff.

Follow along with Endeavour's countdown milestones on NASA's Launch Blog at http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/launch/launch_blog.html.

NASA funding possible shuttle successors:

2011-04-19T10:15:00.001-07:00

BBC: Nasa has given an indication of the companies it thinks may be closest to offering commercial systems to carry American astronauts into space.

With its shuttles about to retire, the agency has offered $270m (£166m) of funds to four firms to help them mature designs for new orbiting vehicles.

Blue Origin, Boeing, Sierra Nevada Corp and SpaceX hope to sell astronaut "taxi" services to Nasa by mid-decade.

Until then, US crews will have to go to the space station on Russian rockets.

"We are pleased to be completing a significant milestone today in the development of US commercial crew systems, and we are very excited about the future," said Philip McAlister, acting director of commercial spaceflight development at the US space agency.

"We hope someday soon we will see commercial human spaceflight to low-Earth orbit as a robust, vibrant, profit-making, commercial enterprise with many providers and a wide range of public and private users."

The winning companies have a range of concepts under development.

SpaceX, which has garnered much publicity recently, is perhaps the most advanced in its plans. The Hawthorne, California, company has already flown a rocket called Falcon 9 and a capsule called Dragon. It is being offered $75m over the next year if it meets certain targets in advancing Dragon's crew-carrying capabilities.

Boeing's Crew Space Transportation (CST) 100 craft
The long-established Boeing company stands to win the largest award depending on its achievement of goals set by Nasa. Boeing's Houston, Texas, team has a capsule design called CST-100 which could transport up to seven astronauts to the space station. The $92.3m support on offer will help the company get the vehicle through to a key, or preliminary, design review.

Sierra Nevada Corporation (SNC) of Louisville, Colorado, has already received considerable financial support in Nasa's Commercial Crew Development (CCDev) effort. It is now in line to get a further £80m in the latest round of funding. SNC is developing a shuttle-like vehicle called the Dream Chaser that would launch atop a rocket.

The fourth recipient, Blue Origin, of Kent, Washington, is a company set up by Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos. Blue Origin has kept much of its space development activity secret, but it has requested funds from Nasa to help it mature systems for a cone-shaped crew vehicle. It has been awarded up to £22m.

Perhaps just as interesting as the companies that have won awards are the companies that have missed out.

These include ATK which makes the solid-fuel rocket boosters (SRBs) that lift the space shuttle off the ground. ATK wants to marry an evolution of these SRBs with the main core stage of Europe's Ariane 5 rocket. The concept, known as Liberty, would be used to launch other companies' capsules and spaceplanes.

SpaceX has already flown its Dragon capsule
ATK will now have to secure funds elsewhere if it wants to carry the Liberty idea forward.

Also missing out on CCDev money is United Launch Alliance (ULA). This is the company that operates Atlas and Delta rockets for the US Air Force and for Nasa.

These vehicles frequently orbit satellites, but ULA believes the rockets could be modified to launch humans also.

Sierra Nevada, Boeing and Blue Origin had all talked about using an Atlas 5 to loft their proposed crew ships.

Where Monday's announcement from Nasa leaves ULA's plans is uncertain. Again, it will need to use its own funds or find a partner if it wishes to continue with the project to man-rate the Atlas and Delta rockets. The CCDev process is not a down-selection, so it is conceivable ULA could get an award in a further round.

"Given enough time and money I am confident that multiple US companies could develop safe, reliable and cost effective commercial crew transportation systems," Mr McAlister said.

"And it is my sincere hope that the companies not selected for award today will continue maturing their systems and making progress on their designs so that they can potentially be available at some point in the future for purchase by Nasa and other customers."

Blue Origin is a space company set up by Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos
Nasa awarded about $50m in its first round of commercial crew contracts. It plans to substantially increase this funding next year to $850m.

There is still much debate, particularly in the US Congress, about the readiness of the private sector to provide safe crew transportation systems. There are also doubts over whether the procurement strategy will deliver significant savings to the US taxpayer.

READ MORE HERE

Shuttle workers get pink slips ...

2011-04-18T09:28:00.001-07:00

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla. — NASA’s prime space shuttle contractor, United Space Alliance, told employees April 15 that half of them will need to find other jobs this summer.

The official notification was long expected, as the shutdown of the 30-year-old shuttle program has been under way for several years.

“We’re starting the process,” USA spokeswoman Kari Fluegel says. “We’ll take self-nominations [for layoffs] first, then determine who else needs to go.”

The company, which has been whittling down its workforce over the past year, currently employs about 5,600 people under the shuttle processing contract in Florida, Texas and Alabama. Up to 2,800 will be laid off this summer, after completion of two final shuttle missions. The cutback will affect 1,850-1,950 employees in Florida, 750-800 in Texas and 30-40 in Alabama.

“We are committed to making this transition as smooth as possible for them,” USA President and Chief Executive Virginia Barnes said. “Though USA will be a significantly smaller company after the space shuttle program is completed, we are optimistic about our future.”

New York City? Get a Rope!

2011-04-15T08:53:00.000-07:00

CNN) -- Texas lawmakers are demanding to know why the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center in Houston was not chosen to be a permanent home of a retired space shuttle.
In a letter to NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, members of the U.S. House of Representatives Texas delegation asked the administrator, "What factors did you use in making your decision?"

NASA announced Tuesday the locations to receive the four remaining space shuttles -- three historic orbiters and the program's test vehicle. The space shuttle Atlantis will be displayed at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex in Florida; the Endeavour, at the California Science Center in Los Angeles; the Discovery, at the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Virginia; and the test shuttle Enterprise at the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum in New York.
During a teleconference after the decision was announced -- with Houston conspicuously not on the list of locations getting retired shuttles -- NASA officials were asked where Houston's bid had failed.

NASA's assistant administrator, Olga Dominguez, whose Strategic Infrastructure Office made the site recommendations said, "Houston did not in any way, shape or form fail. It has always been a critical piece of NASA's shuttle and space program. We just did not have enough to go around, and Houston and JSC (the Johnson Space Center) will always be a critical piece of NASA's space program and of our future."

Dominguez said the locations selected offered the best value to the American public, including domestic and international access. Dominguez said all of her office's recommendations were followed by NASA Administrator Bolden.
The Johnson Space Center is where NASA's Mission Control Center is located and it is the center for human spaceflight research. Because of the important role the Johnson Space Center plays in human space flight, it was not just Texans who were shocked that a space shuttle would not be going to Houston.

But it is 17 members of the Texan House delegation who say in the letter that they are prepared to use their power in Congress, "including legislation to prevent funding of the transfer, to stop this wasteful decision."
NASA had no further response Thursday to the Texas delegation.

The decision the lawmakers seem most concerned about is the one to send test shuttle Enterprise to the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum in New York City. The Enterprise currently is on display at the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Virginia. The Enterprise, which never flew in space, will be moved to New York so the Smithsonian can make room for Discovery.
"It defies logic for a shuttle to go to New York City, a place with no connection to NASA. It's like putting the Statue of Liberty in Omaha," Rep. Ted Poe, R-Texas, said in a statement.

Housing a space shuttle is not just an honor -- it means money, according to the executive director of New York's Intrepid Museum. Susan Marenoff estimates that once the shuttle is in place, her museum will see an additional 300,000 people and $106 million in economic benefit.

That is a benefit Texans believe is rightfully theirs. Rep. Pete Olson, also a Texas Republican, bluntly reiterated that in a statement, saying, "No city in the world deserves a shuttle more than Houston, certainly not New York."

NASA announces shuttle retirement homes

2011-04-12T12:04:00.001-07:00

NASA Administrator Charles Bolden on Tuesday announced the facilities where four shuttle orbiters will be displayed permanently at the conclusion of the Space Shuttle Program.

Shuttle Enterprise, the first orbiter built, will move from the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Virginia to the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum in New York.

The Udvar-Hazy Center will become the new home for shuttle Discovery, which retired after completing its 39th mission in March.

Shuttle Endeavour, which is preparing for its final flight at the end of the month will go to the California Science Center in Los Angeles.

Shuttle Atlantis, which will fly the last planned shuttle mission in June, will be displayed at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor’s Complex in Florida.

NASA also announced that hundreds of shuttle artifacts have been allocated to museums and education institutions.

Various shuttle simulators for the Adler Planetarium in Chicago, the Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum of McMinnville, Ore., and Texas A&M's Aerospace Engineering Department

Full fuselage trainer for the Museum of Flight in Seattle

Nose cap assembly and crew compartment trainer for the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio

Flight deck pilot and commander seats for NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston

Orbital maneuvering system engines for the U.S. Space and Rocket Center of Huntsville, Ala., National Air and Space Museum in Washington, and Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum

League City plagued by vandals ...

2011-04-12T08:31:00.000-07:00

LEAGUE CITY NEWS 11 , Texas — More than 20 homeowners in a League City neighborhood awoke Sunday morning to find graffiti spray painted on their homes or cars.

Residents in the Bay Colony subdivision, just north of FM 646, reported someone had spray painted random lines, shapes and phrases on cars parked in driveways or on brick facades, garage doors and fences.

Police didn’t know how many people were involved in the graffiti spree and had made no arrests, League City police Sgt. David Hausam said.

League City to begin operating traffic signal!

2011-04-11T13:07:00.000-07:00

By City of League City
Special to The Daily News

LEAGUE CITY — The Texas Department of Transportation has informed League City administrators that it will transfer the maintenance and operation of traffic signals on state highways to the city on June 1.

The responsibility of traffic signal operation and maintenance is the duty of incorporated cities with a population of 50,000 or more, according to the Texas Administration Code.

League City had been anticipating the population to exceed 50,000, and it was confirmed when the 2010 census data listed League City’s population as 83,560.

The city’s public works and engineering department has been working for the past year to prepare for the transition.

“We are in the process of completing a traffic signal maintenance plan, cataloging all intersections and preparing signage, as well as working with contractors on various elements of the project,” Linc Wright, League City’s traffic engineer, said. “The city plans to take a very proactive approach, and we believe the transition will be a smooth one.”

Battle begins over Space Shuttles

2011-04-11T08:52:00.000-07:00

WASHINGTON - With competition fierce to land a retired space shuttle orbiter, the cities and states vying to bring one home have gotten creative.

Lobbying strategies range from a humble lapel pin to a videotaped sales pitch by a former president. There are pledges of extravagant buildings and millions of visitors if chosen.

NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said he'll announce the winners on April 12, the 30th anniversary of the first shuttle flight. The announcement will end years of jockeying by dozens of competitors, but it's also likely to bring more disappointment than celebration.

After all, only three orbiters remain and Discovery is already committed to the Smithsonian Institution's National Air and Space Museum.

That leaves Endeavour and Atlantis up for grabs, and 29 museums and institutions -- including Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex -- in the race to be a shuttle retirement home, each promoting their site with the energy of a carnival barker.

"That decision will be fair, sir," Bolden told a lawmaker at a recent congressional hearing.

The goal is to house the shuttles where they can be used as educational displays to promote human spaceflight and inspire interest in exploration.

Federal law says the shuttles should retire to places "with an historical relationship with either the launch, flight operations or processing" of the spacecraft.

That would seem to give the edge to KSC, which launched every shuttle mission and landed half of them, and Johnson Space Center in Texas, where mission control is located.

Bolden is expected to be at KSC on April 12 -- the same day he announces his decision -- to celebrate the anniversary of the first flight. He flew four shuttle flights, including one in 1986 with Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Orlando.

"One of the shuttles will have to go to KSC," Nelson said matter-of-factly.

The importance of making sure the shuttles are accessible to as many Americans as possible has come up again and again -- suggesting geographical diversity will play a role in Bolden's decision.

The chairman of the House space committee, Rep. Ralph Hall, R-Texas, has joked with NASA officials that he thinks that's fine -- just so long as Texas gets one.

"It all started there," Hall said of his state. "There's a lot of heroes of this land that are based there or started out there."

Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., pitched the Intrepid aircraft carrier docked at a Manhattan pier. He said the shuttle would join a Mercury space capsule and a supersonic Concorde jet there, and could bring in 1 million extra visitors a year.

Ohio wants to house the Atlantis shuttle at the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. President Barack Obama's proposed fiscal 2012 budget includes $14 million for the idea.

"While the budget request is not the last word, it is encouraging that the administration agrees with us," said Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio.

At a House Appropriations subcommittee hearing last month, lawmakers interrupted each other to sell Bolden on their shuttle retirement proposals.

Consider the Museum of Flight in Seattle, which gets 450,000 annual visitors, suggested Rep. Norm Dicks, D-Wash.

Rep. Steve Austria, R-Ohio, offered Bolden a lapel pin saying, "Land the Shuttle in Ohio."

An Alabama Republican recommended a particularly easy approach to the anything-but-easy decision facing Bolden. Maybe the winning state should be chosen alphabetically, offered Rep. Jo Bonner, whose Alabama district recently lost a $35 billion Air Force contract to Boeing in Dicks' district.

Former astronauts also have jumped into the fray.

John Herrington, who commanded a shuttle flight, is leading the Tulsa Air and Space Museum's bid to "Land the Shuttle" in his native Oklahoma.

"I hope Chicago gets the shuttle, and if we do, I'll fly it here myself," said Jim Lovell, a retired astronaut who flew on Apollo 13 and serves on the board of the Adler Planetarium in Chicago -- another contender.

Dicks' push to send a shuttle to Seattle is backed by Bonnie Dunbar, a retired astronaut who flew aboard five shuttle missions and has worked for years supporting the Museum of Flight's bid.

Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland mentioned to Obama last June that his state was the home of Orville and Wilbur Wright as well as astronauts John Glenn, the first man to orbit the Earth, and Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon.

"Ohio should be a site for one of the shuttles," Strickland said in an interview. "The Wright brothers are from Dayton. The shuttle should be in Dayton."

With three Texas locations vying for a shuttle, former President George H.W. Bush recorded a video supporting a new museum building at Texas A&M University near his presidential library.

"Howdy," Bush says in the video. "I invite you to participate in an exciting opportunity to obtain a retired space shuttle and display it in an expansion of the Brazos Valley Museum of Natural History."

Some sites, such as the KSC Visitor Complex, are touting new buildings as an added selling point. The complex plans a $100 million, 64,000-square-foot exhibit to house an orbiter for 1.5 million annual visitors. The shuttle would be displayed as if in flight, with its payload bay doors open.

March Field Air Museum in southern California designed a space-exploration building with retractable doors that could be opened at night so the shuttle would be visible from Interstate 215.

Chicago's Adler Planetarium plans a space pavilion that would frame an orbiter with views of Lake Michigan on one side and Chicago's skyline on the other.

Seattle's Museum of Flight, which already has the first jet version of Air Force One and a Concorde, broke ground last June on a space-gallery building that could house a shuttle.

"We have our fingers crossed," Dicks said.

Snakes alive!-

2011-04-05T13:07:00.000-07:00

By Hayley Kappes
The Daily News

LEAGUE CITY — Karla Williams is accustomed to spotting the occasional grass snake in her yard.

But lately, the League City resident has noticed an increase of serpents, some more troublesome than grass snakes, on the property.

Williams’ yard worker during the weekend found seven snakes, including a 5-foot-long water moccasin while he was mowing near a small pond in the backyard off Butler Road.

The gardener shot the snake.

“We have killed other snakes on our property, but never this many in one weekend,” Williams said. “If we see a snake once a month, that’s a big deal. The only other time we’ve had problems with snakes was 12 years ago and it was during a drought.”

Texas Parks and Wildlife Department biologists said poisonous snakes are awakening from hibernation this time of year and could end up in suburban yards that have water sources.

“From late February through April, there seems to be a lot more snake movement in general,” Keith Crenshaw, a wildlife biologist with the state parks and wildlife department, said.

“It’s the changing of the seasons. They’ve been dormant, and they can go months without eating. It’s starting to warm up, and they need to go eat something.”

Residential sprinkler systems or pools might attract water moccasins, a name that refers to several types of dark-colored semiaquatic snakes, including cottonmouths and copperheads, Crenshaw said.

Coral snakes, cottonmouths and copperheads are the most venomous snakes in the region, but don’t bite unless harassed, he said.

Cottonmouths appear plump even when the animals haven’t recently eaten and have a prominent black stripe that extends from the nose to the eyes, Crenshaw said.

Animal control officers refer poisonous snake cases to a Texas Parks and Wildlife Department game warden for removal from a residential yard, League City Animal Control Superintendent Laural Powell said.

Snake-A-Way, a dry mixture sprinkled around yards, deters snakes by smell, but humid conditions in the area require more frequent applications, Crenshaw said.

“We suggest if you do yard work, wear gloves and don’t stick your hand anywhere you can’t see what you’re reaching for,” he said.

READ THE REST OF THE STORY HERE

League City officials respond to accusations on watchdog website

2011-03-29T09:08:00.000-07:00

by Hayley Kappes/ The Daily News
khou.com
Posted on March 24, 2011 at 10:43 AM

LEAGUE CITY, Texas — High-ranking city staff members have responded to allegations that have been circulating and were published by a website claiming to be a League City governmental watchdog.

The website berates the city for wasteful spending on projects, including the renovation of city hall. It also claims there’s a conflict of interest in city-awarded engineering contracts and that special preference was given to maintenance of Fourth Street, a public road leading to the Clear Creek Gun Range owned by the father-in-law of Mayor Toni Randall.

City Manager Marcus Jahns at Tuesday’s council meeting addressed some of the allegations, which have circulated before the website launched.

"In keeping with our values of being open and transparent, I thought it would be best to address council so they hear the same thing," Jahns said. "A lot of this is purely not true, and it’s starting to impact staff."

The site was registered Feb. 9 through Domains By Proxy, a company that allows users to anonymously launch a website.

A representative from the company could not be reached Wednesday.

The company website states that in special situations, it might be necessary for Domains By Proxy to reveal the name and some personal information of someone who has registered privately, including when required by law, or in "the good faith belief that such action is necessary in order to conform to the edicts of the law."

The website accuses the city of awarding a couple of design engineering contracts to Aledo-based Wasteline Engineering because some of the company’s employees previously worked for Lubbock-based Oller Engineering, owned by Rich Oller, League City’s assistant city manager of public works.

READ THE REST AT KHOU

Last Space Shuttle moved to pad

2011-03-29T09:04:00.000-07:00

Crews at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida are preparing space shuttle Endeavour for the STS-134 crew's Terminal Countdown Demonstration test this week.

Endeavour's six astronauts are scheduled to arrive at Kennedy's Shuttle Landing Facility tonight at approximately 7 p.m. EDT to begin the dress launch rehearsal and other related training. The arrival will be shown live on NASA TV.

Once at Kennedy, STS-134 Commander Mark Kelly and Pilot Greg H. Johnson, will practice shuttle landings in shuttle training aircraft.

The crew members for space shuttle Endeavour's STS-134 mission are Commander Mark Kelly, Pilot Gregory H. Johnson and Mission Specialists Michael Fincke, Greg Chamitoff, Andrew Feustel and European Space Agency astronaut Roberto Vittori.

During the 14-day mission, Endeavour will deliver the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) and spare parts including two S-band communications antennas, a high-pressure gas tank, additional spare parts for Dextre and micrometeoroid debris shields.

NORAD exercise tomorrow over Houston

2011-03-14T14:55:00.001-07:00

The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) will conduct exercise flights tomorrow morning as they practice intercept and identification procedures. Exercise flights will take place over Southeastern Texas. Although they are scheduled for mid-morning, the exercise flights could be delayed due to weather concerns.

Those living southeast of Houston, specifically near Ellington Airport, may hear and/or see NORAD-controlled fighter jets in close proximity to a military or military contracted aircraft, which will be taking on the role of a Track of Interest (TOI).

In order to test responses, systems and equipment, NORAD continuously conducts exercises with a variety of scenarios, including airspace restriction violations, hijackings and responding to unknown aircraft. All NORAD exercises are carefully planned and closely controlled.

NORAD has conducted exercise flights of this nature throughout Canada and the U.S. since the start of Operation Noble Eagle, the command’s response to the terrorist attacks that occurred on Sept. 11, 2001.

18 charged in rape of 11 year old girl.

2011-03-07T19:26:00.001-08:00

(CNN) -- Thirteen adults and five juveniles have been arrested as part of an investigation into the alleged rape of a Texas girl, police said.

Darrell Broussard, assistant police chief for the Cleveland, Texas, police department, said Monday that the investigation into the incident "is continuous," with more significant developments possible. Cleveland is about 50 miles northeast of Houston.

"There have been leads during our investigation that have alerted us to other possible persons of interest," Broussard told CNN. "The investigation is ongoing."
The 18 individuals charged thus far are between 14 and 27 years old, he said.

On Friday, the Cleveland police department announced that four students in the Cleveland independent school district had been arrested on charges of aggravated sexual assault of a child under 14.

They appeared Monday in a Liberty County court, in the town of Liberty, to face the charges.
Police noted that some but not all suspects are students at Cleveland High School, though all those named thus far are from the town.

Mike Little, the district attorney in Liberty County, said police would likely decide whether more people would be charged. He offered few other details, saying, "We are very careful about pretrial publicity."

The incident allegedly happened late last year in Cleveland. The case has sharply divided the community, according to CNN affiliate KHOU.

"It just seems like a dream," said Sherry Fletcher, whose 20-year-old son Devo Shaun Green is among those charged according to Cleveland police. "I just hope everything comes out well, because some of these kids are innocent."

Those adults arrested and charged with sexual abuse of a child, a first-degree felony in Texas, could face 25 year to life in prison if convicted, according to the police department.

Life is wild at JSC!

2011-02-16T08:24:00.000-08:00

NASA Johnson Space Center employees have learned that if a fawn is curled under a tree, it doesn't need a blanket; it's not abandoned. They now know that orange cones on a parking lot may be protecting a killdeer's nest.
And if they give their lunch leftovers to the ducks, the birds will start going to the cafeteria around noon every day for more handouts.

Oh, and those eggs in the outdoor ashtrays? Left by muscovies. The JSC Safety Action Team's wildlife committee will take care of the awkwardly placed nests.

The 1,580-acre JSC site in the Clear Lake area, where engineers, astronauts and other personnel work on out-of-this-world projects, is also a wildlife refuge. Gulf Coast prairie and marsh grasslands fill the undeveloped areas, which are much the same as they were before JSC opened in the 1960s. A pond surrounded by green space also sits in the center of the campus.

White-tailed deer are easy to spot. Grazing along Avenue B at Gate 4, they barely acknowledge the traffic. On a recent tour, the chair of the wildlife committee noted that she needed to remind employees to watch for deer crossing the road, especially at dawn and dusk.

Stephanie Walker, who is also a wildlife rehabilitator, says fawns begin to appear around the buildings in June.

"We usually see four or five. You never know if you are seeing the same ones," said Walker, who estimates about 150 deer in four or five groupings make JSC their home. The mothers sometimes settle their young ones under bushes near a building or maybe even in a parking lot while they forage.
"We figured out that these deer are so acclimated to people that when they are taking their fawns somewhere safe, it is actually safer for them to leave them among all these people than out in the back area where there are coyotes and things," Walker said.

When Walker gets a call about lone baby deer, she checks to make sure the animal doesn't look dehydrated or have fire ants on it.
"But usually no. They are just sitting out there waiting for mom," Walker said.
Big, small problems

A few years ago the animals were part of a Texas A&M study to evaluate the effectiveness of a contraceptive in white-tailed deer population control.
Researchers estimated about 170 deer were on the property, which is surrounded by an 8-foot fence. When the three-year study ended in 2008, about a quarter of the females had been given the single-dose contraceptive, which stabilized the population, said Roel R. Lopez, associate professor of A&M's Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Sciences.
While deer are the biggest wild animals at JSC, Walker deals with everything from rabbits to geckos.

Her duties have including finding ways to discourage skunks from nesting under buildings, taking baby squirrels that have fallen from their nests to the Wildlife Rehab & Education Center in Houston and reminding everyone that it is not safe to throw sandwiches to alligators sunning in a canal.
"We don't want to encourage them to think of people as a place where you get food," Walker said.

If there is a bigger problem, Walker usually gets Texas Parks and Wildlife Department game wardens involved because most of the wildlife is protected by federal and state regulations.

But that isn't always necessary. When Walker discovered a nest of great horned owls next to construction site, the workers started at the other end of the project to give the young birds time to fledge, she said.

"The guys there were very interested in the owls, so they were willing to coordinate their work in other areas until the babies had flown off," Walker said. "We had lots of people watching those babies."

READ THE REST OF THE STORY HERE

Breaking: Explosions rock Belvieu plant!

2011-02-08T11:55:00.001-08:00

Multiple explosions, fire at Mont Belvieu plant

Credit: AIR 11
A fire at Enterprise Products in Mont Belvieu was burning out of control more than an hour after witnesses heard multiple explosions.

by Michelle Homer / khou.com
khou.com
Posted on February 8, 2011 at 1:05 PM
Updated today at 1:39 PM

MONT BELVIEU, Texas – Several explosions at a Mont Belvieu plant were followed by flames that could be seen from miles around.
The explosions happened at Enterprise Products at 135 Sun Oil Road around 12:25 p.m.

Witnesses reported seeing workers fleeing from the Chambers County plant. Other workers were being told to stay inside.
The company hasn't released any details about injuries. An employee, who didn't want to be identified, said at least one contractor has not been accounted for.

The employee said the explosion happened in a subsection of the plant.
Chambers County officials say there's no known threat to the public at this time.

They have not called for evacuations.
State Highway 146 is closed near the plant.

The fire was still burning out of control nearly an hour after it began. The flames could be seen 25 miles away in Houston.

A Houston caller named Pat said she was talking by phone to a relative inside the plant when the first set of explosions happened. There were three more explosions while they were still on the phone. "Anywhere from eight to 11 explosions," according to Pat.

READ MORE AT KHOU

Fiery wreck in Katy claims one - sends another to hospital.

2011-02-07T13:01:00.001-08:00

Fiery Katy wreck leaves 1 dead, 1 hospitalized
by khou.com staff
khou.com

KATY, Texas – One person was dead and another in the hospital Monday after a driver crashed into a tree in Katy.

Police said an Infiniti was traveling north on Katy Hockley Road near Pecan around 2:30 a.m. when the driver failed to make a turn in the road, struck a curb and crashed into a tree.

Police said the car burst into flames, severely burning the passenger, who died at the scene.

The driver, a 26-year-old male, was found lying on the ground upon officers’ arrival. He was airlifted to the hospital in unknown condition.
Authorities were investigating the cause of the crash. It was not known whether charges would be filed.

Controversy surrounds teen beating by Houston police

2011-02-05T18:56:00.001-08:00

(CNN) -- Houston's mayor and police department were on the defensive Friday, two days after graphic video came out showing several police repeatedly kicking and beating a 15-year-old burglary suspect as he lay on the ground.
An internal police investigation of the incident last March led to the firing of seven police officers, said spokesman John Cannon of the Houston police department.

Two successfully appealed and returned to their jobs, said Houston NAACP President D.Z. Cofield.

Five other officers were disciplined in other ways, Cannon said. And a Harris County grand jury indicted four of the officers this summer, based in part on the video.
Harris County District Attorney Patricia Lykos opposed the video becoming public and felt doing so might prejudice potential jurors and force the indicted officers' trials to be moved out of the county.

Quanell X, a local activist, got hold of the surveillance tape showing the scene outside a storage facility and gave it to the media.
He said he had every right to obtain the footage and make it public.

"I will show my people what they deserve to see, and let the public see what you don't want them to see," Quanell X said.
Mayor Annise Parker said the police leadership and city acted properly.

"I resent any implication that we were trying to hide the tape," she said.
After viewing the footage, Houston Police Chief Charles McClelland Jr. fired the seven officers and a grand jury called for misdemeanor charges against four of them in June.

Lykos told reporters Thursday there was not sufficient evidence to pursue more serious charges, such as aggravated assault.
"Without revealing what was presented to the grand jury, in order to have aggravated assault you have to have serious bodily injury or impairment or use of a deadly weapon," she said. "None of that was apparent in this case."

The tape, first shown Wednesday on CNN affiliate WTRK, shows the 15-year-old boy -- being chased by police and falling to the ground after being upended by a moving police car. He then falls face first and places his hands on the ground.

A disciplinary letter from McClelland, dated June 23 and posted online less than two weeks later by CNN affiliate HTRK, says that the boy had his hands behind his head and neck area, in an obvious position of surrender.

Then, the letter adds and the tape shows, Officer Raad Hassan "then ran toward (the boy) and kicked him a total of 15 times," then later kicked him more times in the groin area even after he "was handcuffed and no longer a threat."

READ THE FULL STORY ON CNN

Controversy surrounds teen beating by Houston police

2011-02-05T18:48:00.000-08:00

NASA mulling keeping shuttles in service until 2017

2011-02-03T14:01:00.001-08:00

NASA is studying plans to keep the space shuttle Endeavour in flight-worthy condition after its last scheduled mission. The ‘what if’ NASA study comes as United Space Alliance proposes a plan to continue flying Endeavour and Atlantis as commercial space vehicles.

The story, reported by msnbc, says the review includes the potential for keeping Endeavour – the youngest shuttle in the fleet – in operation through 2017. The shuttle, along with its sisterships, is currently due for retirement later this year and eventual transfer to a museum.

Another lifeline study for Endeavour? (Guy Norris)

The proposal — called Commercial Space Transportation Service, or CSTS — would use Endeavour as well as a sister shuttle, Atlantis, to fly two missions a year from 2013 to 2017 at an annual cost of $1.5 billion. United Space Alliance, the contractor that currently manages the shuttle program on NASA’s behalf, has offered the proposal for the second round of funding from the space agency’s Commercial Crew Development initiative, also known as CCDev 2.

NASA could award as much as $200 million in the second round of the CCDev initiative. During the first round, the agency distributed $50 million in stimulus funds to five companies to advance the development of crew-capable replacements for the shuttles.
Some of the recipients of first-round funding — such as the Boeing Co. and Sierra Nevada Corp. — have made proposals for second-round funding as well. The second-round competitors also include SpaceX and Orbital Sciences, which are already receiving NASA funds to build spacecraft for transporting cargo to the space station.
United Space Alliance is the only venture proposing to keep the shuttles operating rather than retiring them this year, as currently planned.

Bay City Substitute Teacher Arrested For Making Death Threats

2011-01-27T11:25:00.001-08:00

by khou.com staff
khou.com
Posted on January 27, 2011 at 11:23 AM
Updated today at 11:23 AM

BAY CITY, Texas – A substitute teacher has been arrested and charged in connection with death threats made to students in Bay City ISD, the Matagorda County Sheriff’s Office said Thursday.

Paul Nolen May, 41, was arrested on Wednesday.
He’s charged with 12 counts of making a terroristic threat – all of which are third-degree felonies.

The threats began on December 28 when the district received a hand-written, profanity-laced letter, purportedly from the parent of a student.

In the letter, the sender expressed anger over their child being disciplined at school. The letter detailed new "rules" for the school to follow regarding discipline and threatened to "kill a random student" if the demands were not met.
About a week later, a second threat was sent via text message.

The message, sent from an anonymous source and forwarded among Bay City ISD students, said this: "Hey! Forward this to everyone…1 rule broken, two girls dies at the jr. high and 2 from high school, dnt go! The school will be on lockdown."

It was not clear if May was suspected in both threats. Investigators declined to release any additional information Thursday.

May was being held in the Matagorda County Jail on bonds totaling $240,000.

Shuttle cracks cause found ...

2011-01-11T14:59:00.000-08:00

CAPE CANAVERAL, FL -- NASA finally knows what caused the cracking in space shuttle Discovery's fuel tank, a potentially dangerous problem that likely existed on the previous flight, managers said Tuesday.

Discovery's final voyage has been on hold since the beginning of November. If the remaining repair work goes well, the shuttle could fly to the International Space Station as early as Feb. 24.

At a news conference, NASA officials refused to discuss the flight status of astronaut Mark Kelly, the husband of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, who was shot in Arizona last weekend. He's supposed to command shuttle Endeavour's last mission in April. His identical twin brother, Scott, is currently serving as the space station's skipper.
"Out of respect to the family, we really are not ready to answer those questions today. We're going to let Mark decide really kind of what he needs to do," said Bill Gerstenmaier, head of NASA space operations. "Our hearts and prayers go out to the family, and we're really thinking about Mark in everything we do."

On the orbiting lab, Scott Kelly took a call Tuesday from Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.

"There are no people in Russia who are not touched by this terrible news," Putin said through a translator.

The Endeavour mission is the last on NASA's official shuttle flight lineup before the fleet is retired. The space agency hopes to add one last trip to the space station by Atlantis at the end of August to bring up extra spare parts, provided there's funding. Officials initially were targeting the end of June for the launch, but said Tuesday they would prefer more time between flights.

As for Discovery's prolonged grounding, shuttle program manager John Shannon said a combination of inferior material and assembly issues is to blame. Cracks occurred in five of the 108 aluminum alloy struts in the center of the tank, which holds instruments. The damaged struts have been patched. Technicians will reinforce the remaining struts as a safety precaution, using thin 6-inch strips of aluminum.
Shannon called it "a very simple, elegant fix to the problem."

"We're going to fly with a lot of confidence in this tank," he told reporters. "We've gotten rid of the uncertainty."
The tank is covered with foam insulation, and NASA was concerned the cracks could force pieces to break off during liftoff, with chunks possibly striking the shuttle.

A slab of foam doomed Columbia in 2003.
Engineers also worried that if four or more struts in a row failed, the entire structure could catastrophically buckle.

The cracking was discovered after an unrelated problem -- a hydrogen gas leak -- halted Discovery's launch countdown on Nov. 5.
Shannon said a batch of the material used for some of the 21-foot support struts, through heating, ended up more brittle.

In addition, weaknesses were introduced during assembly of the pieces.
The bad batch of material likely ended up on the fuel tank that launched Atlantis last May, Shannon said. Every indication is that the tank performed normally, even if cracks were, indeed, present, he noted.

The tank currently being prepared for Atlantis also has struts made of the suspect material and will need to be repaired. Engineers believe Endeavour's tank is unaffected, but extra tests are likely, which would push that mission into mid- to late April.

Once the 30-year shuttle program ends, the White House wants NASA focusing on expeditions to asteroids and Mars, rather than servicing the space station.

Death Threat Concerns Parents/FBI Investigating

2011-01-05T11:14:00.000-08:00

BAY CITY, Texas -- A hand-written death threat letter to a South Texas school district prompted the parents of hundreds of students to keep their children home.

A message Wednesday on the Bay City Independent School District website says classes continue with increased emphasis on safety and security.

The FBI and the Texas Department of Public Safety are investigating.
Parents on Monday were advised by Superintendent Keith Brown of the anonymous letter received Dec. 28. The letter to Brown contains profanity, misspellings and refers to the sender’s child getting in trouble. The sender included new "rules" on discipline and threatened to "kill a random student" if the demands were not met.

About half the students in the nearly 3,800-student district missed school Tuesday.
Bay City is about 70 miles southwest of Houston.

Michael Jackson's Doctor Clueless

2011-01-05T08:17:00.001-08:00

Los Angeles, California (CNN) -- The pretrial hearing for Dr. Conrad Murray continues Wednesday as a Los Angeles County Superior Court judge decides whether there is "probable cause" to try him on an involuntary manslaughter charge in the death of pop star Michael Jackson.

The hearing, which began Tuesday, is expected to last two or three weeks, with 20 to 30 witnesses testifying.
On Tuesday, Jackson's former security chief testified that Murray seemed not to know how to administer cardiopulmonary resuscitation as he waited for paramedics to arrive at the singer's house.
Faheem Muhammed said he and and guard Alberto Alvarez saw Murray crouched next to Jackson's bed "in a panicked state asking, 'Does anyone know CPR?' "

"I looked at Alberto because we knew Dr. Murray was a heart surgeon, so we were shocked," Muhammed said.

Jackson's doctor heads to court Murray faces court hearing Events surrounding Jackson's death

When defense attorney Ed Chernoff asked if perhaps Murray was asking for help because he was tired, Muhammed said, "The way that he asked it is as if he didn't know CPR."

Jackson appeared to be dead at that time, with his "eyes open and his mouth open, just laying there," Muhammed said.

Prosecutor David Walgren earlier said that Murray used "ineffectual CPR with one hand while the patient was prone on a soft bed." Two hands with the patient prone on a hard surface is the proper method, he said.
Muhammed, the third witness on the opening day of the hearing, said he never saw

Murray performing CPR on Jackson before paramedics arrived and carried him to Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center.
Jackson's mother, Katherine, sister La Toya and brothers Randy and Jackie sat in the second row of the courtroom during Tuesday's opening session.
Jackson's two oldest children, Prince and Paris, were at their father's bedroom door as the drama unfolded just after noon on June 25, 2009, Muhammed said.

"Paris was on the floor on her hands and knees and she was just crying," he said.
The children would learn two hours later that their father had died when Murray and Jackson manager Frank Dileo talked to them in a hospital room.
"Frank blurted out and said, 'Your daddy had a heart attack and died,' " Jackson personal assistant Michael Williams testified.

At the start of the hearing Tuesday, the prosecutor said that Murray waited at least 21 minutes after he found Jackson unresponsive before calling for an ambulance.

"By all accounts, Michael Jackson was dead in the bedroom at 100 North Carolwood prior to the paramedics' arrival," Walgren said.
The coroner concluded Jackson died from "acute propofol intoxication" in combination with "the contributory effects of the benzodiazepines," Walgren said.
Propofol is a powerful anesthetic used to "put people under for surgery," and the benzodiazepines were sedatives Murray later acknowledged giving Jackson in the morning before his death, he said.

"Michael Jackson was preparing for one of the most important tours of his life" in the months before his death, Walgren said.
Murray's defense team has hinted it would argue that Jackson was under pressure from the concert promoter, which led him to demand treatments to help him sleep.
Kenny Ortega, who was directing what would have been Jackson's comeback concerts, was the first of about 30 witnesses the prosecution is calling.
Ortega described Jackson as "involved, active, participating" at his last rehearsal, which ended 12 or 14 hours before his death.
"He was in a delightful mood, and we had an absolutely fantastic day," Ortega testified.

But Ortega described a different, "scary" Jackson at the Staples Center rehearsal on June 19, six nights before his death.
"I just felt that he appeared, you know, really lost," Ortega said. "It was scary. I didn't know what was wrong. I couldn't put my finger on it."

READ THE FULL STORY AT CNN

Happy New Year!

2010-12-31T07:28:00.001-08:00

The old give way to the young. New thoughts sprout from fertile ground.

While the New Year beckons us with many promises, don't forget to give the old year its due.

Learn from past mistakes and carry the lessons of time with you.

This year resolve to laugh more, love more, forgive more, friend more and learn more.

May 2011 be your best year yet!

Clear Lake condos destroyed by fire

2010-12-13T11:26:00.000-08:00

EL LAGO, Texas—A two-alarm fire destroyed part of a Clear Lake-area condominium complex just hours before the owners were scheduled to appear in court Monday, according to investigators.

The fire broke out at The Landing condominiums, located on NASA Parkway at Kirby Blvd, around 12:15 a.m.

The Seabrook Fire Department arrived to find parts of the property fully engulfed in flames. They pulled a second alarm and immediately went on the defensive.
Nine departments battled the blaze, with firefighters even using water boats. Firefighters initially had water issues and had to string a long stretch of hose to get to the fire.

Three out of six buildings caught fire. One was completely destroyed and the other two sustained major damage.
Investigators said there are suspicious circumstances surrounding the fire.

Read the full story at KHOU

Discovery now postponed until February

2010-12-06T08:38:00.000-08:00

NASA managers have targeted space shuttle Discovery's launch for no earlier than Feb. 3 at 1:34 a.m. EST. Shuttle managers determined more tests and analysis are needed before proceeding with the launch of the STS-133 mission to the International Space Station.

The Program Requirements Control Board met Dec. 2 and reviewed engineering evaluations associated with cracks on two 21-foot-long, U-shaped aluminum brackets, called stringers, on the shuttle's external tank. NASA repaired the cracks and reapplied foam to the exterior of the stringers. Managers decided the analysis and tests required to launch Discovery safely are not complete. They are planning to conduct an instrumented test on the external fuel tank and structural evaluations on stringer test articles to determine whether the analysis is correct. Details and timelines for the tanking test are in work, but plans call for temperature and strain gauge measurements in the intertank region near the top of the tank during the test.

NASA will review and analyze the data from the tests before setting a launch date. Because of Discovery's delayed launch, the earliest opportunity for the liftoff of the final scheduled shuttle mission, STS-134 on Endeavour, is April 1.

Today at NASA's Johnson Space Center, the STS-133 crew is conducting an integrated entry simulation today in the motion base simulator and will review spacewalking procedures.

Space Shuttle Discovery flight rescheduled for Dec 3

2010-11-18T14:35:00.001-08:00

If all goes well, Discovery should be ready to launch on Dec. 3 at 2:52 a.m. EST (0752 GMT), NASA officials said in an update. A series of safety reviews is still ahead before the shuttle is completely cleared for flight, they added.

Discovery has been stuck on Earth since Nov. 5, when a potentially dangerous hydrogen gas leak on the shuttle's external tank forced NASA to stand down for repairs. Foul weather and other glitches thwarted several earlier launch attempts that week.

Since then, NASA engineers have replaced a misaligned seal to plug the hydrogen leak and are now working to reinforce metal ribs on the external tank where cracks were discovered while the leak repairs were being performed.

The cracks are on two of 108 metal ribs around the upper middle portion of the tank that provide structural support. There are two cracks on each of the ribs. NASA shuttle technicians are installing double-wide ribs – called doublers – to reinforce the cracked areas.

Another crack, this one in the exterior foam insulation on Discovery's fuel tank, will also be repaired.

While the fuel tank rib repairs are under way, NASA shuttle program managers plan to review their rationale for flying Discovery with the repairs. If during that meeting, slated for Nov. 24, shuttle officials agree that Discovery is ready to fly, the space agency will hold a final review on Nov. 29 to clear the shuttle for liftoff, NASA officials said.

NASA's upcoming STS-133 shuttle mission will be the final flight of shuttle Discovery before it is retired along with the rest of the U.S. orbiter fleet in 2011.

The 11-day mission will send a crew of six astronauts to the International Space Station to deliver a storage room for the orbiting lab, as well as a humanoid robot built designed to help astronauts with work in space. Two spacewalks are planned.

NASA's upcoming window to launch Discovery opens on Nov. 30 and will close around Dec. 6 to avoid heating concerns caused by unfavorable sun angles at the space station after that, agency officials have said. NASA's shuttle Endeavour is scheduled to fly to the station during the next available window, which opens in late February.

NASA is retiring the space shuttle fleet to make way for a new plan aimed at sending astronauts to visit an asteroid by 2025. After Discovery's flight, NASA has only one more mission – Endeavour's – scheduled before the fleet is retired.

READ MORE HERE

Dead deer found in Clear Lake

2010-11-18T10:13:00.000-08:00

by Hayley Kappes / The Daily News
khou.com
Posted on November 18, 2010 at 9:49 AM
Updated today at 11:00 AM

Related:
Galveston County Daily News website
KEMAH, Texas — John Blakeway often notices deer grazing in a field across from the boatyard where he works.

He said he never expected to see one floating in the water near the boat slips.

An employee on Monday told Blakeway, manager of South Texas Yacht Services, 1500 Marina Bay Drive in Kemah, that a boater had tied the body of an 8-point buck to pilings at the boat yard.

Blakeway said he called a Texas Parks and Wildlife Department game warden, who told him to dispose of the carcass in a Dumpster.

Workers at the boat yard had to use a crane to remove the animal from the water. The buck weighed about 170 pounds, said Blakeway, who hunts deer. There were no wounds on the animal.

Blakeway said he didn’t know who tied the deer to the boat slip.

It is breeding season for whitetail deer, and the animals move more frequently this time of year, Debbie Quebe with the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department said.

People should call the city or county animal control to remove the body of any dead animal on land or in the water, Quebe said.

This story was brought to you thanks to khou.com’s partnership with The Galveston County Daily News.

What's that smell?

2010-11-16T10:09:00.001-08:00

TEXAS CITY, Texas — A smell similar to rotten eggs enveloped Texas City about 5 p.m. Monday afternoon after a leak from a subunit at BP’s Texas City refinery.

Workers were doing maintenance work on a sour water compressor on the refinery’s Power 2 unit when workers noticed a smell after a piece of equipment failed, company spokesman Michael Marr said. The odor, which forced some businesses on Palmer Highway about 13 blocks from the refinery to shutter their doors and close windows, lasted more than an hour.

The smell is believed to come from liquid in the subunit that contained hydrogen sulfide, which is a hazardous chemical that has a strong smell of rotten eggs, Texas City Homeland Security Director Bruce Clawson said. The Texas City Fire Department and BP industrial hygienists conducted ground-level air monitoring and did not find any readings of hazardous chemicals in the air, Clawson said.

Between one and two barrels of sour water — which is waste water that contains hydrocarbons and is pumped to an enclosed sewer system for disposal — spilled, causing the offensive odor, officials said.

There was not a shelter in place order for the city, but Clawson issued a phone and e-mail alert to residents notifying them of the situation.

There was a brief shelter in place order within the refinery for areas downwind of the leak, Marr said. BP set up an incident command center and the leak was contained at about 9 p.m.

http://www.khou.com/news/local/BP-sends-stink-across-Texas-City-108436904.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

Space Shuttle Discovery flight rescheduled for Nov 30

2010-11-10T08:45:00.000-08:00

Repair Analysis Continues at the Launch Pad
Wed, 10 Nov 2010 07:56:10 AM CST

At NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, technicians at Launch Pad 39A began disconnecting space shuttle Discovery’s ground umbilical carrier plate last night by unhooking and lowering the hydrogen vent line that attaches to the plate on the external tank. As the disconnection process continues, they will take a careful step-by-step look and assess repair options. Today, crews will begin removing the seven-inch quick disconnect.

Teams also continue analyzing and inspecting the approximately 20-inch long crack in the external tank's foam. Tomorrow, technicians expect to begin using terahertz or backscatter scans to see beneath the foam, which will enable them to look for any other potential issues. Plans are still being worked out to reapply foam to the tank after the inspections are completed.

Shuttle managers continue evaluating the data to determine the best repair methods and next launch opportunity for Discovery’s STS-133 mission to the International Space Station, which currently is no earlier than Nov. 30 at 4:02 a.m. EST.

Today at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, STS-133 Mission Specialists Tim Kopra and Alvin Drew will practice inside the Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory for the mission's first spacewalk.

Houston murders may be work of a serial killer

2010-11-01T11:57:00.000-07:00

by Michelle Homer / khou.com
khou.com
Posted on November 1, 2010 at 1:38 PM
Updated today at 1:42 PM

HOUSTON – Police are looking into a possible link between the strangulation murders of at least three women since June.
The most recent cases involved homeless women. The body of Carol Flood, 62, was found on Oct. 10 in a stairwell behind the old YMCA building. She was partially nude. On Sept. 30, Retia LaFaye Long, 52, was found dead behind the Co-Cathedral of the Sacred Heart at 1700 San Jacinto.

Now police believe the same killer may have strangled Raquel Mundy last June 17, then dumped her body in a field in the 300 block of St. Charles.
Mundy, 24, was murdered after accepting a ride from a stranger when she was stranded downtown.

She had dropped her mom and two kids off at the Greyhound bus station downtown around 1:30 a.m. Thursday. She then discovered her car had been towed from a McDonald’s parking lot across the street.
Mundy tried to call friends and relatives, but couldn’t find anyone to give her a ride to the tow lot. Witnesses saw her get into a grey car with an unknown man, according to police.

Mundy later sent a text message to her mother saying she thought she was in danger and feared the man was going to hurt her.
Angela Collins was still on the bus to California with her two grandchildren when she got the disturbing message.

She tried frantically to reach Mundy. Collins then called several relatives and asked them to try to find Mundy.
By the time the bus arrived in California, there was still no sign of her daughter.
"Next call we got, they had found the body. It was my baby, Collins said as she choked back tears. "This man took away my baby."
An autopsy revealed Mundy had been strangled.

READ THE FULL STORY HERE AT KHOU

Shuttle rescheduled for Wednesday

2010-11-01T09:06:00.000-07:00

The Space Shuttle Program Mission Management Team voted unanimously to proceed toward Discovery’s targeted liftoff at 3:52 p.m. Wednesday. Mike Moses, chair of the Prelaunch Mission Management team, said there are no technical issues in work.

"The mission's in great shape," Moses said.

The weather forecast calls for a 70 percent chance of acceptable conditions at launch time. Those odds fall to 40 percent for Thursday. The launch window extends until Sunday. Discovery is headed to the International Space Station for an 11-day mission to deliver the Permanent Multipurpose Module and its host of supplies and equipment to the orbiting outpost.

At the launch pad at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, technicians will load super-cold oxygen and hydrogen into Discovery's onboard tanks this morning. The hyroden and oxygen are going into Discovery's power reactant storage and distribution system that supplies the shuttle with electrical power during the mission. The process is often abbreviated to "PRSD load."

Shuttle launch set for Monday/Crew on their way to Kennedy.

2010-10-28T09:54:00.000-07:00

STS-133 Astronauts to Come to Kennedy Today
Thu, 28 Oct 2010 07:28:37 AM CDT

Astronaut Steve Lindsey and his crew will fly to NASA's Kennedy Space Center this afternoon as the preparations for Monday's launch reach the home stretch. Flying from their training base at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, the crew will land on the three-mile-long runway at Kennedy's Shuttle Landing Facility. In medical quarantine to prevent getting sick right before the mission, the astronauts will spend the next several days going over mission details, enjoying some free time and keeping their skills sharp. For instance, Commander Lindsey and Pilot Eric Boe will make several simulated shuttle landings in the Shuttle Training Aircraft, or STA.

The countdown for Monday's launch of space shuttle Discovery begins tomorrow at 3 p.m. EDT. Technicians will spend the weekend putting the finishing touches on Discovery. Liftoff is scheduled for 4:40 p.m., the precise time that the shuttle's launch pad will be in the same plane as the International Space Station it will chase and dock with during the flight.

Breaking: 3 Alarm Fire in NW Houston

2010-10-13T15:59:00.001-07:00

HOUSTON – A three-alarm fire displaced at least 37 families Wednesday in northwest Houston.

The fire broke out at about 2:30 p.m. at the Driscoll Place Apartments in the 1300 block of Gears Road at Greensmark Drive.

Air 11 video showed thick black smoke stretched across the sky as firefighters battled the large flames that burned through the units.

At least one person was taken to the hospital with non-life threatening injuries, fire officials said.

At least 37 units were affected by the fire, according to a preliminary damage assessment by the Red Cross. Red Cross volunteers were assisting families with emergency-disaster relief.

There was no word on what started the fire. Arson investigators were on scene.

9-11 call - backfires because of open laptop.

2010-10-13T08:48:00.001-07:00

by Courtney Zubowski / 11 News
khou.com
Posted on October 12, 2010 at 11:37 PM
Updated today at 9:54 AM

HOUSTON -- A woman who called 911 to anonymously report a crime says she’s in fear for her life after the man she turned in called her just minutes after she placed the call.

According to the woman, who does not want to be identified, on Oct. 1, she was driving near Beltway 8 and Veterans Memorial Drive when she witnessed a man in the car next to her beating his passenger. She did not know either one of them.

“I saw him hitting her and he was taking his fist and he was just hitting her, aside her, just hitting her and I’m like this is crazy,” said the woman.

She placed the 911 call at 1:28 p.m. and thought that would be the end of her involvement, but 30 minutes later she learned it was just the beginning.

“About 1:54 p.m. my phone rang back and it was the suspect,” she said. “He was asking me ‘Who was this, who is this’ and I am like, ‘Who is this, you called my number,’ and then he hung up."

After that call came another, and this time it was a woman’s voice, she said.

“She called me just as he hung up and it was like, ‘Ma’am, are you the concerned lady that called about my welfare,’ and I am like,

‘Excuse me,’ and she said, ‘Well I’m OK,’ and I said, ‘Excuse me,’” said the woman.

She received another call the next morning from the Harris County Jail where the suspect was in custody. He was arrested for outstanding warrants, but never charged with assault.

“My phone rings again and it says, ‘You have a call from Harris County processing jail,’ and I immediately hung up,” she said.
“I will never, ever get involved with anything else again, not when it comes to me being fearful of the surroundings in my life.”

A spokesperson for the Harris County Sheriff’s Office says as far as she knows, this is the first time something like this has happened in their department.

HCSO spokesperson Christina Garza said the suspect was put in the back of a Harris County patrol car while the deputy talked to the woman he was accused of hitting. It was then he was able to read the woman’s phone number off of a laptop computer the deputy had left open in the front seat.

“It’s a very unique situation,” Garza said. “It’s never happened and we certainly don’t want this to discourage her, or anybody, from reporting crime to authorities.”

Garza said it’s common practice to keep laptops closed, but it’s not policy. In some situations, deputies are forced to rush out of cars quickly.

”If anyone is to blame in this situation, it’s the suspect who violated such important information and took it upon himself to do this,” said Garza.

Garza said the department is sending out e-mails to all deputies to remind them to keep their laptops closed.

The suspect is not facing charges for memorizing the information, or calling the woman. Garza said there is no proof that he ever threatened the woman.

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The 911 caller disagrees.

“I was threatened,” she said. “I was threatened when he received my information. My information should have been protected. I was threatened at that point, so what point of threat do they not understand?

13 Houston schools receive powder letters

2010-10-12T06:00:00.001-07:00

by khou.com staff
Posted on October 8, 2010 at 8:09 PM

HOUSTON – At least 13 HISD schools received envelopes Friday containing a white powdery substance, according to an HISD spokesperson.
A Houston Fire Department Hazmat team was sent to each school to collect the envelopes.
Preliminary testing showed the substance appeared to be non-hazardous. The powder was tested for radiation, explosives and volatile chemicals. Further tests are being conducted.

The schools were Alcott Elementary, Almeda Elementary, Anderson Elementary, Ashford Elementary, Attucks Middle School, Barrick Elementary, Bastian Elementary, Black Middle School, Blackshear Elementary and Browning Elementary.
Fonville Middle School, Briar Meadow Elementary School and Bellaire High School were added to the list Friday evening.
HISD said its top priority is making sure all schools are safe before students return on Monday.

"All of our school administrators are going through their mail and are trying to identify any envelopes that may look suspicious," said HISD Police Chief Jimmie Dotson.
The typewritten envelopes were addressed to the schools, not individuals, and contained no notes. Each contained about a teaspoon of white powder.
The FBI, U.S. Postal Service, HPD and HFD are assisting HISD with the investigation.

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No waiting: Houston ship channel back in business

2010-10-07T07:35:00.001-07:00

UPDATE 1-Coast Guard says no wait to exit Houston Channel

HOUSTON Oct 7 (Reuters) - The U.S. Coast Guard said no ships were waiting Thursday morning to leave the Houston Ship Channel, and 33 ships were lined up to enter the waterway to the busiest U.S petrochemical port after a three-day outage, which ended on Wednesday.

As many as 67 ships were waiting to enter or exit the waterway by the time early on Wednesday that workers had removed a leaning electrical highline tower that threatened to tumble into the waterway after being struck by a barge on Sunday morning.

Four Houston refineries were unable to receive crude oil by ship during the closure, but none said prodcution was cut during the wait that ended Wednesday when the first ships up the channel were crude tankers.

About 44 ships were waiting to enter the channel when it reopened on Wednesday morning and it might appear only 11 have moved up the channel, but the Coast Guard said several ships were added to the line waiting in the Gulf of Mexico on Wednesday.

"It's a consant flow," said a Coast Guard spokesman.

There are about 12 ships more than on a average day waiting to move into the channel, the spokesman said. (Reporting by Erwin Seba; Editing by John Picinich)

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Drug deal goes bad - two shot - one dead.

2010-10-07T07:26:00.001-07:00

khou.com
Posted on October 7, 2010 at 7:26 AM
Updated today at 8:45 AM

HOUSTON—A 24-year-old man was killed and his brother injured after the two were shot in what appears to be a drug deal gone bad Wednesday evening, according to HPD Homicide detectives.
Police officers responded to a home on Winter Briar at Winter Seasons in southwest Houston for reports of a drive-by shooting.

They arrived around 9 p.m. to find two brothers had been shot. They said the actual shooting took place at another location about a half-mile away, but the brothers somehow made it back home.
Police believe the brothers drove their Cadillac a few blocks from their home to meet a group of men and purchase drugs. Some sort of altercation occurred and one of the men opened fire on the brothers.

"The exact circumstances are unclear as to what transpired a t the two locations, but we have one dead," said Sgt. Thomas Biggs, HPD Homicide Division. "We believe we have all of the players in custody.

The bullet traveled completely through one of the brothers. Police said he was shot in the chest or the back, but it is unclear which point is the entry and exit.
The other brother was shot in the foot. He was taken to Southwest Memorial Hermann Hospital, where he was treated and released. He returned to the scene to talk to police.
Several suspects were taken in for questioning and police said they definitely know one of them is the shooter.

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Breaking: Houston Ship Channel Closed!

2010-10-04T12:18:00.001-07:00

HOUSTON, Texas

—A four-mile stretch of the Houston Ship Channel remained closed to marine traffic Monday after a barge slammed into a tower supporting a high-voltage electric transmission line, threatening to topple it into the channel.

Coast Guard officials said a towing vessel named Safety Quest was pushing three barges loaded with scrap metal about 6 a.m. Sunday when it smashed into a Baytown power line, which remained upright only with the support of one of the barges.
No injuries were reported, but the six-member boat crew moved to another vessel and to safety.
Officials said the section from Crystal Bay to the Blackwell Peninsula would remain closed until at least Tuesday night.

"The situation is a little bit unstable right now," said Capt. Marcus Woodring. "The lines are sagging and we cannot allow any vessels to pass underneath with the unstable situation and chance of those lines falling in the water."
Centerpoint Energy officials said the power had been shut off to the line because crews had previously been working on a nearby tower. They said no customers had lost electricity following the crash.
Eighteen inbound vessels attempted to get into the port early Tuesday afternoon, and many remained anchored off the coast of Galveston. Twelve outbound commercial ships were also stuck.
The 25-mile waterway is lined by the nation’s biggest complex of petrochemical plants. The Port of Houston ranks first in the nation in foreign waterborne tonnage and imports and second in U.S. export tonnage and total tonnage.

"Anytime you see something like this, you hate it, because it’s affecting people and how they make their money," said Richard Zeno, a tugboat captain who was not involved in the crash but watched the teetering tower as he was fishing with his family Sunday.

Coast Guard officials said the ship channel handles more than $320 million in cargo and crude daily, meaning the Port of Houston would lose about $1 billion if the waterway stayed closed until Tuesday night.

"Commerce, of course, is very, very important," said Chief Warrant Officer Lionel Bryant. "But we don’t want to put lives in jeopardy doing so."

"This is actually very difficult because the tower is actually sitting on the barge," Bryant said.
The Coast Guard said the boat’s owner is St. Louis-based AEP River Operations.

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NASA lay-offs loom.

2010-10-04T11:29:00.000-07:00

FOX 26
HOUSTON - Perhaps as many as one thousand people from the NASA community are being laid off Friday.

The cut-backs are among NASA contractors tied to the Space Shuttle Program that has just 3 launches remaining.

The United Space Alliance (USA) says it's letting go of 333 employees from its Houston office and nearly 900 employees in Florida.

"Today we say goodbye to a remarkable group of people," said USA's Chief Executive Officer Virginia Barnes Friday morning. Barnes statement continued, "Although our workforce has known for several years that the Space Shuttle Program was scheduled to end, layoffs are always difficult. The accomplishments of this team are unmatched in human spaceflight."

USA is providing severance pay to the laid off employees based on years of service. Minimum severance would be 4 weeks pay up to a maximum of 26 weeks. A spokeswoman with the company says some of them have spent their careers working on the Shuttle Program, and at least one employee began his work on NASA projects with the Apollo Program.

Some jobs were saved by the new NASA appropriations bill because it revived production of the Orion Space Capsule.

Lockheed Martin spokeswoman Linda Singleton tells FOX 26 that it is not laying off employees Friday "in light of the recent NASA Authorization Bill announcements." Singleton says Lockheed Martin has 3,100 employees working on Orion, with 600 in the Clear Lake area.

But Congress did cut the Constellation project, eliminating a manned mission to the moon.
Bob Mitchell of the Bay Area/Houston Economic Partnership says that gave Shuttle employees no where to go.

"There's probably about another 17 or 18 contractors involved, and the number could reach as high as 850 to 1000 today," Mitchell said Friday Morning.

Mitchell says a large number of those people are highly skilled, and the Bay Area hopes they won't have to move out of town or out of state to make a living.

Mitchell says he worked with Congress on the appropriations bill for 5 months, and the NASA community is having to the take the bad with the good.

"At least we have a direction," Mitchell said. "It may not be the perfect bill but we have a mission. We know we'll be able to maintain America's superiority in human space flight, and we were about to lose that with what the [Obama] administration was trying to do."

The Clear Lake area may also benefit from President Obama's effort to stimulate the commercial aeronautics industry.

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Mayor's golf cart stolen!

2010-09-28T09:13:00.000-07:00

LEAGUE CITY — Mayor Toni Randall’s pink E Z Go golf cart was stolen Friday night from the driveway of her Glen Cove neighborhood home.

One of Randall’s neighbors also reported a stolen golf cart Saturday morning, according to League City police reports.

Police did not return phone calls Monday regarding the thefts.

"I’ve lived in the same house for 27 years and never had a thing stolen," Randall said.

"I thought someone was playing a joke on me."

The golf cart cost between $4,000 and $8,000, Randall said.

The crawler makes last shuttle crawl ...

2010-09-28T06:55:00.001-07:00

For more than 40 years, the twin crawler-transporters at NASA's Kennedy Space Center have traveled the gravel track between the massive Vehicle Assembly Building and the two launch pads at Launch Complex 39. These mammoth beasts that first carried all the Apollo Saturn V rockets have since borne every space shuttle on the last Earth-bound leg of their journeys to space.

The technology used to build the huge, reliable crawlers capable of such Herculean tasks was deeply rooted in a region where giant machines excavated and extracted veins of coal. That technology helped the Marion Power Shovel Company of Marion, Ohio, win the contract to build the behemoths that would transport the moon-bound Apollo Saturn V rockets to their seaside launch pad.

Philip Koehring spent his life working for the companies that build these mechanical giants, and in the early 1960s, much of the burden of adapting this engineering know-how to NASA's needs fell on his shoulders.

"This was a machine that was built to last," said Phil Koehring, son of the crawlers' engineering designer, in marking the vehicle's 40th anniversary. "There were a lot of naysayers about this program in the early days, and all I can say is, 'We've shown them!'"

Adapting the sturdy technology to Space-Age needs brought many challenges. As with any major undertaking that is the first of its kind, the project hit a few snags along the way.

Following a July 1965 test at Kennedy, pieces of bronze and steel were found on the crawlerway's surface. It was determined the crawler's support bearings – about the size of frozen orange juice cans – could not handle the loads exerted during turns.

Koehring recalled his father's return from that trip to Florida. "I remember him coming back late one night from a trip carrying a small, canvas bag of bearing bits. I remember actually holding some of those in my hand. Not his happiest time."

The problems were replaced with pride as the two crawlers went into service, but it's doubtful that the crawlers' designers could ever have imagined their creation would still be moving launch vehicles into the 21st century as the Space Shuttle Program draws to a close.

"When they built the crawler, they overbuilt it, and that's a great thing because it's able to last all these years. I think it's a great machine that could last another 50 years if it needed to," says Bob Myers, who serves as system engineer for the crawler today.

Even though Myers began working on the crawler in 1983, its ability still amazes him. "It's capable of moving a shuttle and all of its parts and the mobile launcher platform. I mean, we're talking about 12 million pounds, the vehicle itself being 6 million. You have about 18 million pounds rolling down the road."

Crawler Stats
Height: 20-26 feet
Size: 31feet long, 113 feet wide
Weight: 5.5 million pounds
Fuel Capacity: 5,000 gallons
Fuel Consumption: 42 feet per gallon, 125.7 gallons per mile
Maximum speed: 2 mph
Tred-belt shoes: 456
Tred-belt shoe size: 7.5 ft long, 1.5 feet wide, 2,200 pounds each
Builder: Marion Power Shovel Company

The critical nature of the long rollout to the launch pad is not lost on crawler manager Ray Trapp. "Probably other than launch and landing, one of the most critical times for the vehicle is between the VAB and the pad," explains Trapp. "There's no weather protection, there's no lightning protection, so it's very important that all of our systems function properly and safely from the time we leave the safety of the Vehicle Assembly Building until we get out to the launch pad. During that six hours or so while we're out on the crawlerway, it's my team and the crawler getting the vehicle out to the pad, and it's a critical time."

So with all that weight in motion, what's it like to drive a crawler? "One of the things about driving the crawler is you have to plan ahead, because obviously it doesn't turn on a dime," says Trapp. "So you have to really be on your game and be thinking ahead about where you want to be, one, two, three minutes ahead of time."

"The crawler is like a locomotive. It's diesel-electric -- there's two diesel engines, which produce DC current -- which is what makes us move," he explains. "The steering and the jacking and elevation of the crawler, the chassis and the mobile launcher, it's all done by hydraulics. All of that basically is drive-by-wire, so there's a steering wheel in the cab."

"The steering wheel's about the size of a go-cart racer," adds Myers, "but that steering wheel turns some big cylinders."

And while soon there will be no more shuttles to ferry to the launch pad, the trusty crawlers seem fully capable of moving future launch vehicles. "Seeing the shuttle program come to an end really will be a sad day for us, no doubt about it. The crawler actually has gone through Apollo and Shuttle, so it's been around a long time. We'd like to see it carry on to another program," says Myers. "The crawler's ready to go. It can take on whatever you throw at it."

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9/11 contrail explained.

2010-09-15T19:17:00.001-07:00

No - it wasn't aliens - or "chemtrails" or fighters on patrol on the anniversary of 9/11 - but rather a NASA high altitude research aircraft that caused the "mysterious" contrails over the Houston area Saturday.

Houston Airport Systems spokeswoman Marlene McClinton told Local 2 that NASA's WB-57 is a high-altitude aircraft, operating out of Ellington Field.
"It is taking air samples between 45,000 and 51,000 feet," said McClinton.

According to McClinton, it was a normal operation, but due to atmospheric conditions, the contrails were extremely visible.

Many callers said the plane looked like a big commercial passenger plane with the NASA oogo on it.
"It was just circling," said Cindy Hamilton who lives in Friendswood.
She saw the plane around 6:30 p.m. on Saturday.

"It would go north and just circle back to the south. I was just concerned because of what day it is. Seeing the plane brought back memories," Hamilton said.
Karon Wisdom saw the plane in Channelview circling for hours.

"Because its 9/11, everyone's keeping their eye on the sky," she said. "I thought either someone was watching out for us on the Gulf Coast, or something weird was happening."

NASA officials said the aircraft was testing out a new instrument and that "they have made several flights this week. It's unfortunate for the atmospheric conditions that made it very visible on 9/11."
Officials said it was nothing to be alarmed about.

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Breaking: Fire destroys Houston complex

2010-09-15T12:41:00.000-07:00

by khou.com staff
khou.com
Posted on September 15, 2010 at 11:20 AM

HOUSTON—Eight units were completely destroyed and several families were displaced after a two-alarm fire damaged part of a southwest Houston apartment complex Wednesday morning.
Fire officials rushed to the burning apartments on Wilcrest at South Drive around 6:45 a.m.
HFD said they had a slight water pressure issue in the beginning, but managed to quickly get the fire under control. No firefighters were injured and all of the families got out safely.
One child standing outside was checked for smoke inhalation at the scene. He was determined to be OK.

Arson investigators do not know how the fire started at this time.

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DPS Trooper, clerk charged with conspiracy to commit ID fraud

2010-09-03T07:34:00.000-07:00

by khou.com staff
Posted on September 1, 2010 at 10:05 AM
HOUSTON – Two Department of Public Safety employees, and an alleged middle man, accused of selling Texas driver’s licenses to unqualified people have been charged with conspiracy to commit fraud, United States Attorney José Angel Moreno said.

DPS Trooper Mark DeArza, 39, Lidia Gutierrez, 37, a DPS clerk, and Maen Bittar, 46, the alleged middle man of the scheme and manager of a gasoline station located on Almeda-Geneo, were arrested and released on $50,000 bond pending trial. DeArza and Bittar reside in Houston. Gutierrez resides in Galena Park, Texas.

According to allegations in the indictment, between March through Aug. 25, Bittar collected fees from individuals, including undocumented immigrants, in the amount of $3000 or more for assistance in obtaining Texas driver’s licenses.

Bittar would direct the individual to the DPS Office located across from Ellington Field on old Galveston Road near Clear Lake and at the DPS office, DeArza and Gutierrez would assist the unqualified individual with the processing of an application for a Texas driver’s license, according to the indictment.

Conspiracy to commit fraud relating to identification documents carries a maximum term of prison of 15 years and a $250,0000 fine.

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Hawaii beats Pearland for Little League World Series title shot.

2010-08-28T16:46:00.001-07:00

South Williamsport, PA (Sports Network) - Noah Shackles went 2-for-2 with a homer, two RBI and three runs scored to back Ezra Heleski's two-hitter, and the Waipahu, Hawaii little league team beat Pearland, Texas, 10-0, in the United States championship game of the Little League World Series.

In the international title game, Ryota Norimatsu tied the game with an RBI single in the sixth, and Ryo Motegi's run-scoring single in the seventh won it, leading Japan to a 3-2 victory over Chinese Taipei.

In addition to striking out six over five shutout innings, Heleski went 2- for-3 with two RBI and two runs scored, while Kahoea Akau added three hits in the resounding win, helping Waipahu win its second U.S. title in three years. In 2008, this same Little League squad beat Matamoros, Mexico to win the championship.

Mason Van Noort had one of the two hits for Pearland, which came back against Georgia to reach this U.S. title game.

With two runners on and one out in the opening inning, Kaimana Bartolome opened the scoring with a two-run double. Shackles homered later in the inning to plate Bartolome for a 4-0 advantage.

Shackles scored in the third on a wild pitch, and Heleski's RBI single later in the same at-bat made it a 6-0 game. Akau's run-scoring double provided a seven-run cushion.

Three more runs from Hawaii ended the game in the fifth due to the 10-run rule. Shackles walked and scored on Cody Maltezo's triple, and Heleski followed with another RBI single. A wild pitch later scored Heleski to end the game.

Japan trailed, 2-1, heading to the bottom of the sixth, but Koutaro Kamikura singled to left to lead off the inning. Following a strikeout, Kamikura advanced to second on an error by the catcher before Norimatsu's hit tied the game.

Kamikura stayed on to pitch a scoreless seventh -- striking out two -- before Masaya Ishii singled with one down in the home half to start the winning rally. A wild pitch sent Ishii to second, and Motegi's two-out single to center won the game.

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Houston man charged in cold case murders.

2010-08-25T13:59:00.000-07:00

by khou.com staff
khou.com
Posted on August 25, 2010 at 10:22 AM
Updated today at 10:54 AM
HOUSTON – A man long-suspected of killing a Houston woman and an infant in 1984 was finally arrested and charged this week.

Charles Leon Smith, 56, is charged with capital murder in the slayings of 23-year-old Pamela Clarence and 1-month-old Tashona Clarence.

Twenty-six years have passed since the young mother and her baby were killed in their home in the 4300 block of Rogers, but even after the case went cold, investigators never gave up.

The murders occurred on August 2, 1984. Police said Smith and Clarence were in a relationship at the time and had recently had a child together.
But that night, when Smith went to visit his girlfriend, investigators believe Pamela Clarence confronted Smith about another relationship.
Police said Clarence had discovered Smith had another girlfriend, who’d just given birth to Smith’s son.

When Clarence told Smith they should end their relationship, police believe he snapped.
Investigators said Smith strangled Pamela Clarence with an electrical cord and then smothered Tashona with a pillow.

The bodies were later found by concerned family members.
From the beginning of the investigation, police said they thought Clarence knew her killer, and they originally identified Smith as one of two suspects in the murders.
But investigators were unable to collect enough evidence to charge either suspect, and case went cold, lost among more than 700 other killings in Houston that year.

Then, when HPD cold case investigators reviewed the murders this year and again identified Smith as a suspect, things changed.
Police said Smith was taken into custody on August 23 and confessed to his role in the crimes.
He was scheduled to appear in court Wednesday morning, and was behind held in the Harris County Jail without bond.

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Houston stripmall destroyed in blaze.

2010-08-25T13:49:00.000-07:00

by Lisa Chavarria / 11 News
khou.com
Posted on August 25, 2010 at 8:23 AM
Updated today at 9:21 AM

HOUSTON—A three-alarm fire swept through parts of a southwest Houston strip mall, destroying several businesses in its path early Wednesday.
Houston Fire Department officials said the fire began inside the M. Trading Wholesale Shop on Fondren at Harwin just before 5 a.m.

The business houses wholesale supplies sold to dollar stores. HFD said there may have been hair products or chemicals on the racks that helped fuel the flames.
Two more businesses next door to the wholesale shop, Jessie’s Nail Salon and Sloreria Lee’s flower shop, were also destroyed.

The owner of Star Korean Karaoke Bar said he was inside his business when a man riding a bicycle knocked on his door and alerted him to the fire. He was able to get out safely and call 911. His business was not damaged by the flames, but may have smoke damage.

One firefighter was injured battling the blaze. He was treated at the scene for a laceration on his hand.

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NW Houston toddler found in hot car dead

2010-08-20T16:40:00.001-07:00

by Courtney Zubowski / 11 News
Posted on August 19, 2010 at 7:32 PM
HOUSTON – A 2-year-old boy has died after being found locked in a hot car in northwest Houston, according to authorities.

The incident happened Thursday around 2:30 p.m. at 13813 Dentwood.
According to police, parents were arriving home from the grocery store when their 7-year-old child, who is autistic, began having seizures. While the parents went inside their home to tend to the 7-year-old, the 2-year-old boy was left locked inside the vehicle.

After going inside to help the 7-year-old , the parents realized their younger child was missing and eventually found him in the back seat of their SUV. Police said the boy was trapped inside the vehicle for about two hours.

One of the parents called 911 when they saw the toddler was not breathing. The boy was taken to a nearby hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
Investigators said the temperature inside the vehicle was 122 degrees when the toddler was found.
Neighbors of the victim’s family said it was an unfortunate incident that happened to good people.

"This is a good family, their children comes first with them," said Michael Carey. "I know for a fact that it was not intentional."

Investigators said the parents will probably not face charges, but the case will go to a grand jury.

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Houston Area Forecast: 100% Chance of Meteors

2010-08-12T07:01:00.001-07:00

After a week-ling lead-up, tonight, August 12/13, 2010, is finally the peak of the Perseid Meteor Shower. Wit this event, meteor season 2010 will kick off in a big way.

Every August, Earth passes through the stretch of space junk shed by comet Swift-Tuttle, reaching the deepest concentration of debris tonight. According to some estimates, under ideal conditions (dark country skies), one can expect to see 60 meteors per hour. The reason the meteors are called Perseids is because the meteors seem to radiate from the constellation Perseus. The best time to view the shower is in the pre-dawn hours, with 3-5am being best.

Don't want to stay up that late? Don't worry, Perseus rises in the Northeast around midnight and will climb higher as the night progresses. However, unless one lives out in the country, the early post-midnight hours will probably involve Perseus being low in a light pollution dome. To improve odds of seeing meteors, travel out of light-polluted Cleveland and to the suburbs or, even better, the country if you can. In the suburbs, just going from the front to back yard can make a dramatic difference as this will eliminate glare from those pesky street/house lights to a large extent.

Two things can ruin the meteor shower: clouds and the Moon. The clouds? Well, that's a regional thing. Check your local Clear Sky Clock to see what the clouds have in store for your location tonight. For us Northeast Ohioans, tonight is looking good. As for the Moon, that's an Earth-wide issue. The good news is that, this year, the Moon is just a few days past new, which means that there will be no Moon up during the time of the meteor shower. There will be a slight lunar glow in the South (opposite Perseus), but this will disappear about midnight, which is about the time Perseus clears the Northeast horizon.

So how about viewing tips?

First, plan to stay out awhile, as it takes the human eye about 15 minutes to get optimal night vision capability. The bad news is that, even one bright flash of white light will wipe out night vision, requiring you to start the process all over again. Next, grab a lawn chair or, even better, a lounge-type chair. Trying to lean back with a straight-back lawn chair can be a pain in the neck, literally! Eyes ready for dark and with something to sit/lay on, settle in for a night of hopeful meteor watching (or at the very least, stargazing), just try not to fall asleep and don't forget the bug spray!

Besides meteors, tonight can be a great time for binocular viewing, owing to your use of a chair. Under suburban (maybe) or rural skies (definitely), a pair of medium power (10x50) binoculars can yield some stunning wide-angle sights. For someone truly dedicated, why not try and keep a tally of how many meteors you see for every complete hour? Really ambitious? Why not try photographing the meteors?

Whatever you plan to do tonight, good luck and clear skies!

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Man charged in traffic death of off-duty Houston firefighter

2010-08-04T13:52:00.000-07:00

By MIKE GLENN
HOUSTON CHRONICLE

An off-duty Houston firefighter died after his motorcycle was struck in San Leon by a driver who was later charged with intoxication manslaughter, authorities said Monday.
Johnnie Williams, 49, was hit by a Ford pickup truck about 3:45 p.m. Sunday on FM 517 near 27th Street, said officials with the Texas Department of Public Safety.

The driver of the pickup, identified by DPS officials as Shane Holton, 39, failed to yield the right-of-way to Williams. Holton appeared intoxicated at the scene and was taken to an area hospital for a mandatory blood draw, officials said.

Williams, who had been assigned to HFD's Fire Station 71 in Clear Lake, was taken to Ben Taub General Hospital where he died later Sunday night, officials said.

Holton was charged with intoxication manslaughter and driving with an expired license. He is at the Galveston County Jail with bail set at $50,000 for the manslaughter charge and $5,000 for the expired license, officials said.

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Police: Friendswood teen carjacked, kidnapped in front of his house

2010-08-02T07:56:00.001-07:00

Police: Friendswood teen carjacked, kidnapped in front of his house
by khou.com staff
khou.com

FRIENDSWOOD, Texas – A 16-year-old Friendswood boy was carjacked and kidnapped in front of his home Wednesday night, police said.
The victim flagged down a Harris County deputy in the 2100 block of El Dorado Blvd. around 12:15 a.m.

The deputy called Friendswood police.

The teen told officers he had just returned to his home in the 700 block of Pine Hollow Drive around midnight when two unknown men rushed at him.

The teen said the men ordered him into the backseat of his truck at gunpoint and started driving.
When they reached El Dorado, the suspects told the teen to get out, and then fled in the victim’s truck.

Police believe the suspects may have followed the teen home from the Clear Lake area.
He was not physically injured.

Clear Creek Swim League finished its latest season today

2010-07-12T08:19:00.001-07:00

The Clear Creek Swim League finished its latest season today, with the annual Reserve/Champ Meet championship. The season started on May 29th, and the final regular season meet was on June 5th. Swimmers from twenty one teams competed in pools from Baytown to Dickinson. The championships were held at the Texas City indoor pool - with hundreds of young swimmers competing.

One of oldest teams in the League is the Clear Lake City Stars. The Stars team was forming in 1965 and since then has been training swimmers, forming life-long friendships, and providing lots of exercise to young people.

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Tar balls found on Texas beach

2010-07-06T06:39:00.000-07:00

(CNN) -- Texas authorities have traced a small number of tar balls found near Galveston to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, Coast Guard and state officials said Monday.
The tar balls collected from beaches in Galveston County over the weekend could fit in a five-gallon bucket, but have been confirmed to have originated from the ruptured BP well off Louisiana, said Jim Suydan of the Texas General Land Office.

Galveston is about 400 miles west of the site of the worst oil spill in U.S. history, which began in late April with the sinking of the offshore drill rig Deepwater Horizon. Coast Guard Capt. Marcus Woodring said authorities weren't sure how the tar balls made it that far, but tests confirmed that at least the first batch collected Saturday came from the Deepwater Horizon spill off Louisiana, he said.
None were found Monday, and the area's beaches and waterways remained open.
"Until we see a greater sum of oil, I can be cautiously optimistic that maybe this is something that will pass," Galveston Mayor Joe Jaworski told reporters.

Tar balls occasionally strike the Texas coast, in part because of seepage from undersea oil deposits or from sunken vessels, Woodring said. "Seventeen or 18" cases of tar balls unrelated to the

Deepwater Horizon disaster have been reported to Woodring's Houston-Galveston Coast Guard sector since the spill erupted in April he said.

And though the ones found Saturday and Sunday were confirmed to have come from the ruptured well off Louisiana, they were less weathered than officials would have expected -- leading the Coast

Guard to suspect the oil was either stuck to the side of a ship's hull or mixed in with ballast water from a passing vessel, he said.

Ships passing through the spill are are supposed to be decontaminated before they head into port, he said.

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Freedom Over Texas Fireworks Show!

2010-07-01T08:43:00.000-07:00

Houston will set the stage for an extraordinary patriotic celebration at Mayor Annise Parker’s official Fourth of July event, Freedom Over Texas with Fireworks Presented by Shell. Texas singer-songwriter Pat Green will headline the annual event held from 4 to 10 p.m. on Sunday, July 4, with his performance culminating in the nation’s largest land-based fireworks show, presented by Shell Oil Company. Admission to the event is FREE with the donation of one canned item per person to the Houston Food Bank.

"As Americans, I believe it is our civic duty to celebrate the birth of our nation and reflect upon those brave men and women who have made great sacrifices for us to live in a free country," said Mayor Annise Parker. "I invite fellow Texans to join us in honoring our country, respecting the values of the founding fathers and instilling pride in our diverse community.”

Headlining the evening’s celebration on the Freedom Stage is Pat Green (with Cowboy Mouth and Little Big Town), an artist who has blazed his own trail and recorded a total of 10 studio albums. Fifteen of his singles have charted on the Billboard Hot Country Songs charts, of which the highest-peaking is the #3 "Wave on Wave" from his gold-certified album. Green has toured with many popular country music artists including Keith Urban, Gretchen Wilson, Kenny Chesney, and many more. At this year’s event, Green will be presented by the Texas Music Charts with an award recognizing him as the “Most Played Texas Artist” of the last decade.

When the concert comes to a close at 9:30 p.m., eyes will turn skyward for an extraordinary fireworks spectacular perfectly set to a selection of America’s favorite tunes, from patriotic songs to rock ‘n’ roll hits to classic bestsellers. Shell Oil Company is the underwriter of the 2010 fireworks show for the fifth consecutive year, and with their contribution, the city’s official fireworks show will enliven Houston’s skyline. Producing the show will be world-renowned fireworks artists from Pyro Spectaculars North by Souza.

"For more than 80 years, Shell has been a strong supporter of the Houston community and our nation. As a country, we have much to celebrate, and we at Shell are thrilled to participate in the festivities this year,” said Ben Dillon, Vice President Corporate Affairs, Shell Oil Company.

In addition to this year’s entertainment headliner, the festival will also spotlight a top-notch selection of local and regional music. Throughout the day, four stages will keep toes tapping with music ranging from country western and rock 'n' roll to Latin, R&B, and oldies.

Booth exhibits and family friendly patriotic activities will encompass Buffalo Bayou and Eleanor Tinsley Park:

KBR Liberty Park

Encompassing more than three football fields in length, KBR Liberty Park will showcase military artifacts and vehicles including representation from all five military branches and more. The branches and the Houston Police Department will offer recruiting on site.
The U.S. Army will showcase an Apache Helicopter flight simulator and a 55-ton M-60 Battle Tank.
The Museum of Printing History and the Military Museum of Houston will exhibit historical items that have helped shape our nation’s history in this area.
Bud Light Zone

Cool off with a cold one at the Budweiser Beer Garden, and enjoy a prime view of the sixth annual Bud Light Texas Volleyball Championship Series Finals.
Make a rest stop at the Bud Light Build-A-Bar, which will offer a shaded sitting area equipped with plasma TV screens. Also, don’t miss a sneak peak of an event performer during their official Bud Light Sound Check.

Be sure to stop by the Budweiser Good Sport’s Booth and learn how you can save lives by being a designated driver.

Walmart All American Kids Zone

More than 30,000 square feet of free educational programming and entertainment await children.
Houston Public Library’s HPL Mobile Express computer lab, will teach child how to use a computer.
Houston Fire Department’s Smokehouse will teach kids the importance of fire safety.
Historical costumed characters will talk with children about the documents that defined our government.

Juno Baby will have sing-a-long activities for children and little aspiring stars are invited to perform in the Rising Stars Search contest for a chance to win an all-expense paid trip to San Francisco and be featured in the next Juno Baby production.
Free games, rides, face painting and interactive activities will be open to children of all ages.
Additional activities:

Gexa Energy will be giving US Flag hand fans to the first 30,000 people who enter the gates. Booths will be setup for families to take fun photos with Shrek The Musical characters, enter for a chance to win a trip for two to Hawaii or Cancun, and also for a chance to win a Home Theater System, which includes a Sony Bravia 40’ LCD TV.
Visit KBR’s five primary beneficiaries on site: Career and Recovery Resources, Goodwill Industries, Houston Community College, Soldier’s Angels and Wreaths Across America-Houston.
The 2010 Land Rover models will be on display including the all new 2010 Land Rover LR4 and award winning Range Rover and Range Rover Sport.
Freedom Over Texas with Fireworks Presented by Shell will be simulcast on ABC-13/KTRK-TV from 7-10 p.m. on Sunday, July 4, and will be syndicated statewide from 8-10 p.m. In addition, KILT 100.3 FM will simulcast the music medley specially choreographed for the fireworks spectacular.

With the donation of one canned item per person to the Houston Food Bank, admission for the event is FREE. Without the donation, tickets will be $8 per person. Children two years and under will be admitted free. In keeping with last year’s theme, Freedom Over Texas with Fireworks Presented by Shell will expand its offering of recycling receptacles, encouraging all patrons to recycle.

Freedom Over Texas with Fireworks Presented by Shell sponsors include: Fireworks sponsor: Shell; Anchor Sponsors: Gexa Energy, Bud Light/Silver Eagle Distributors, KBR, Houston Area Land Rover Centres, and Walmart; Co-producers: City of Houston/Mayor’s Office of Special Events; Additional sponsors include Doubletree Hotel Houston Downtown; Houston Chronicle; 100.3 KILT; HOT 95-7; Mix 96-5; SportsRadio 610 and Mega 101 FM; Texas Lottery; Juno Baby; Enterprise Rent-A-Car; Texas Southern University and LifeGift. In-kind sponsors include Houston Dynamo, Houston Rockets, Houston Astros, Houston Aero and Metro. The event benefits Houston Central Improvement, Inc.

For more information, call 832.393.0868 or visit the Freedom Over Texas with Fireworks Presented by Shell Web site at www.freedomovertexas.org or www.houstonspecialevents.org.

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Teachers prevail in grading law suit

2010-06-30T08:04:00.001-07:00

AUSTIN — Texas school districts no longer can force teachers to give students higher grades than they earned on class assignments or on their report cards, a Travis County judge ruled Monday.
Eleven districts — mostly in the Houston area — had sued Texas Education Commissioner Robert Scott over his interpretation of the so-called truth-in-grading law that was passed last year. They argued it applied only to assignments and exams and were fighting to keep their policies that ban cumulative report card grades lower than a certain number, typically a 50.

The school districts suing were Aldine, Alief, Clear Creek, Deer Park, Dickinson, Fort Bend, Humble, Klein, Anahuac, Eanes and Livingston.

The superintendents say their minimum-grade policies help discourage students from dropping out by giving them a mathematical chance at passing a class, even if they blow one grading period. But teacher groups and the bill’s author, Sen. Jane Nelson, R-Flower Mound, counter that such policies are dishonest and don’t prepare students for college or the work force.
State District Judge Gisela Triana-Doyal ruled against the districts’ reading of the law, which effectively means that schools across Texas must abolish minimum-grading policies unless the decision is appealed and overturned. The state does not track how many districts have such policies.

May appeal
Richard Morris, the attorney for the school districts that filed the lawsuit, said he would consult with the superintendents about pursuing an appeal or trying to lobby the Legislature for a change.
The judge said the statute was “not ambiguous,” even though it didn’t specifically mention that it applied to cumulative six- or nine-week grades that appear on report cards. But Triana-Doyal emphasized she wasn’t opining whether the law was good or bad education policy, noting that both sides made valid points.

“People have different opinions about what’s in the best interest of kids,” she said.
Nelson, a former teacher, said the ruling was “a victory for Texas teachers, students and parents because now all grades — on class assignments and report cards — will accurately reflect how well students have mastered their course work.”

She said she doubted her colleagues would retreat from the law next session after unanimously passing her bill last year.
Dropout strategy

Clear Creek ISD Superintendent Greg Smith, the only school chief to testify, said the district’s minimum-grading policy has been an effective dropout strategy over the last 13 years. At one high school last year, he said, more than 30 students benefited from the policy and were able to pass.

Without the policy, he said, “I think you close the light at the end of the tunnel for some students.”
For example, if a student earned a 20 grade during one six weeks, he still would fail the semester if he earned a 90 the next two grading periods.

The Texas chapter of the American Federation of Teachers, which intervened in the case on the side of the Texas Education Agency, argued that minimum-grading policies take important authority away from teachers and are “not in the best interest of students in the long run.”
“I feel like it’s unethical,” Mary Roberts, a teacher in Humble ISD, testified about her district’s policy, which bans report card graders lower than a 50.
ericka.mellon@chron.com

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Hurricane seminar tonight!

2010-06-30T07:46:00.001-07:00

A NEWS RELEASE FROM THE CITY OF KEMAH

Please mark your calendars to attend the City of Kemah Hurricane Awareness Program.

DATE: Wednesday, June 30

TIME: 7:00 P.M.

LOCATION: Kemah City Hall, 1401 Hwy 146, Kemah

This program will be presented by Mr. Gene Hafele, Chief Meteorologist in charge of the Houston-Galveston Area National Weather Service Office in Dickinson, Texas.

Mr. Hafele has a wealth of experience, starting his career with the National Weather Service at the Fort Worth Office in July of 1974. In 1984 Mr. Hafele took his skills to the Spaceflight Meteorologist Group at the Johnson Space Center and served as the Lead Forecaster for nine space shuttle missions.

Mr. Hafele received his Bachelor of Science degree in Meteorology from Texas A&M University in 1974 and a Masters Degree in Public Administration in 1988 from the University of Houston, Clear Lake.

In addition, your local emergency coordinator and other elected officials will be on hand to answer any questions. Refreshments will be served.

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Recovery Effort in Gulf Expected to Continue Despite Storm

2010-06-28T14:34:00.001-07:00

By JOSEPH BERGER

A tropical storm moving across the western Gulf of Mexico that is likely to strengthen into a hurricane is not expected to seriously disrupt efforts to capture oil gushing from the stricken BP well, officials of the Coast Guard and BP said Monday.

Adm. Thad W. Allen, of the Coast Guard, who is commanding the federal response to the disaster, said at an afternoon press conference that high seas produced by Tropical Storm Alex should not force the evacuation of rigs and other equipment from the blowout site, which is 50 miles off the Louisiana coast. Should an evacuation take place, he said, it could halt the work of collecting oil and drill relief wells for about 14 days.

“As it stands right now, absent the intervention of a hurricane, we’re still looking at mid-August," to have relief wells shut off the gusher entirely, Admiral Allen said.

However, BP officials said that what could be delayed, even by current wave heights, is an effort to prepare what is known as a “floating riser system” that will help raise the daily total of collected oil from, about 25,000 barrels to as much as 50,000 barrels. At a briefing Monday morning, Kent Wells, a senior vice president of BP who is overseeing BP’s efforts, said the storm is expected to follow a track that will take it well west of the blowout site, but it may produce waves of 10 to 12 feet, which Mr. Wells said was too high for the “very precise work” on the surface needed to prepare the floating riser system.

Mr. Wells said the containment cap and a second system that are collecting 25,000 barrels of oil a day would not need to be disconnected and the drilling of two relief wells should continue on schedule. The first relief well is supposed to pump in heavy mud and shut off the gusher sometime in August.

Tropical Storm Alex is on a course heading for northeastern Mexico and a stretch of Texas. Meteorologists at Accuweather.com said they are anticipating a landfall between Tampico, Mexico and Brownsville, Tex. Wednesday night or early Thursday.

Meanwhile Associated Press reported that BP had filed documents with the Securities and Exchange Commission that indicate the cost of capping and cleaning the spill have reached $2.65 billion. BP has lost more than $100 billion in market value since the drilling platform the company was operating blew up April 20. The costs include spill response, containment, relief well drilling, grants to gulf states, claims paid, and federal costs, but not a $20 billion fund for damages the company created this month.

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Alex may effect Gulf oil production ..

2010-06-28T14:23:00.001-07:00

HOUSTON (Dow Jones)--Tropical Storm Alex, expected to become a hurricane Tuesday, seems to be headed on a path away from the bulk of the U.S. Gulf of Mexico's oil and gas production and refining infrastructure. But some production impact will be felt as one of the largest energy producers in the Gulf said Monday it was shutting down several platforms as a precaution.

Royal Dutch Shell PLC (RDSA) said it had pulled 700 workers from its Gulf operations, and some 835 workers remained offshore. The company is shutting in production from its Western and Central Gulf of Mexico assets to prepare for the potential full evacuation of personnel Tuesday. The company started pulling workers from the Gulf over the weekend. The company didn't specify how much production would be shut or how many platforms were being evacuated.

At 11 a.m. EDT, Alex was located about 85 miles west-northwest of Campeche, Mexico, in the western Gulf of Mexico, and was heading towards southern Texas and northern Mexico. Most U.S. offshore oil and gas platforms are located in the eastern part of the Gulf, far from Alex's forecast path.

Alex "is not likely to have a major impact on production or refining in the U.S.," Doug MacIntyre, senior analyst at the Energy Information Administration, told Dow Jones Newswires Monday. "Alex's current path appears to avoid most of the oil and gas production platforms and any of the major refining centers."

Energy markets Monday seemed to take the storm in stride. Light, sweet crude for August delivery ended 61 cents lower at $78.25 a barrel a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Natural gas for July delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange settled 2.96% lower at $4.717 million British thermal units.

Gulf producers Apache Corp. (APA), Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM), and Anadarko Petroleum Corp. (APC) also said Monday they have started evacuating non-essential workers from the offshore facilities expected to be in the path of the storm but none have so far reported any impact to their production.

BP PLC (BP, BP.LN) said Monday it pulled non-essential personnel from three offshore facilities in the the Gulf, and that production was not affected. The company evacuated workers from Atlantis, Mad Dog and Holstein platforms.

Alex may delay BP PLC's plans to increase the amount of oil collected from a leaking well in the Gulf by a week, a company official said Monday.

While the storm's winds are expected to stay far to the west of the Deepwater Horizon spill, high seas are likely to become an issue this week, said Kent Wells, a senior vice president with BP, in a press briefing. Waves up to between 10 feet and 12 feet would prevent BP from hooking a third rig up to an underwater containment system, a process that needs three days of good weather, Wells said.

Two rigs, the Discoverer Enterprise and Q4000, are already collecting between 20,000 and 25,000 barrels of oil a day from the well, which has gushed ever since a rig working at the site caught fire and sank in April.

Chevron Corp. (CVX) and ConocoPhillips (COP) said that they have not evacuated workers, but that they are closely monitoring the forecast for Alex.

A hurricane watch was issued for parts of the south Texas Gulf coastline area and parts of northern Mexico, the National Hurricane Center reported Monday on its website.

The NHC, in its advisory, also said Alex likely will become a hurricane Tuesday and has increased in strength, now with winds of 60 miles per hour.

The watch area for the U.S. extends from south of Baffin Bay to the mouth of the Rio Grande in Texas, with Mexico issuing a hurricane watch from the Rio Grande to La Cruz.

-By Isabel Ordonez, Dow Jones Newswires; 713-547-9207; isabel.ordonez@dowjones.com

(Brian Baskin and Angel Gonzalez contributed to this article

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Lockheed Martin is trimming its Orion spacecraft workforce by 20%

2010-06-21T11:02:00.000-07:00

Lockheed Martin is trimming its Orion spacecraft workforce by 20% as it works with NASA to redefine the vehicle as a crew rescue capsule for International Space Station crews.

The cuts amount to 300 Lockheed Martin employees and 300 subcontractor personnel. While the company is working to find new positions for the displaced staff within the company, “layoff notices are probably inevitable, and that will happen shortly,” according to Linda Karanian, Lockheed’s Washington-based director of human space flight programs.

Orion, like the U.S. space program as a whole, remains in limbo following the Obama administration’s announcement that it wants to cancel the George W. Bush administration’s Constellation Moon-Mars program in favor of myriad technology development efforts and human missions to alternate destinations such as asteroids.

Lockheed Martin anticipates little difficulty in transitioning Orion from a full-up spacecraft intended for missions beyond low Earth orbit to a crew rescue vehicle. “Our current Orion requirements as a crew exploration vehicle encompass any requirements we foresee that would be imposed … on a lifeboat,” Karanian says, noting that the company is convinced it can provide a vehicle that would involve only “marginal delta cost” to NASA beyond the current program.

“We’re looking at various things to use—test vehicles, perhaps, that we’re already on contract for,” Karanian says. “When we’ve completed tests, we [could] provide those to NASA to launch to the space station to serve as lifeboats.” If a decision is made quickly, and appropriate funding provided, the company believes it could have an Orion lifeboat ready for launch to the station by 2013.

Both Lockheed Martin and NASA are in the awkward position of still being legally bound to continue developing Orion as a full-up crew exploration vehicle, since NASA’s Fiscal 2010 appropriation bill forbids the agency from canceling any element of Constellation.

And Congress—which has mounted stiff, bipartisan opposition to Obama’s space plan—is watching both customer and contractor carefully. Some Senate lawmakers recently raised alarms when they received word from Orion subcontractor Alliant Techsystems that no more funding would be forthcoming for Orion’s Launch Abort System (LAS)—a costly safety measure that would not be needed on a scaled-back Orion lifeboat. NASA, they assert, is either violating the law or doing whatever it can to circumvent it (Aerospace DAILY, April 23).

Following a successful pad abort test of the LAS system at White Sands Missile Range, N.M., on May 6, Lockheed Martin believes it can legally “pause” work on the LAS “until NASA decides the direction forward, without impacting launch availability,” Karanian says.

The program has passed a number of other recent milestones, including a preliminary design review in August 2009 and a software PDR in April of this year. The program’s critical design review will begin in September and is likely to extend into 2011.

Orion photo: Guy Norris

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Crew Busy With Science and Maintenance; New Crew Prepares for Launch

2010-06-14T07:36:00.000-07:00

Flight Engineer Tracy Caldwell Dyson was in the Destiny laboratory working on the Oxygen Generation System. While the advanced life-support system has been experiencing problems, the station continues generating oxygen with backup generators. Caldwell Dyson changed out a pump then plugged and unplugged connectors with no resolution or source of the problem revealed. Ground controllers continue troubleshooting the system.

Caldwell Dyson also worked with the SPHERES experiment which studies a trio of autonomous, basketball-sized satellites and how they interact with each other. Ongoing since 2006 inside the International Space Station, SPHERES tests techniques for automated rendezvous and flying in formation in microgravity.

Commander Alexander Skvortsov and Flight Engineer Mikhail Kornienko were in the station’s Russian segment inventorying gear and supplies. They also relocated items from the Zarya control module to the new Russian Rassvet Mini-Research Module. The cosmonauts tagged up with specialists on the ground for those activities and other maintenance tasks.

At the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, the Expedition 24 crew members conducted a fit check inside the Soyuz TMA-19 spacecraft. The spacecraft will be mated to its booster rocket on Saturday and rolled out to the launch pad on Sunday. Lift-off to the International Space Station is scheduled for Tuesday at 5:35 p.m. EDT. Flight Engineers Doug Wheelock, Shannon Walker and Fyodor Yurchikhin will dock to the Zvezda service module Thursday at 6:25 p.m. They will join their new crewmates after hatch opening a couple of hours later

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Man accuse of stealing astronaut sapce suit

2010-06-02T09:15:00.000-07:00

by Tiffany Craig / 11 News
khou.com

CLEAR LAKE, Texas -- A Clear Lake man is accused of stealing the original space suit belonging to Sally Ride. The daughter of Calvin Smith, the man accused with the crime, said her dad had a crush on America’s first female in space.
For most of us, peering through plexiglass is the closest we will get to a space suit. Paul Spana at Space Center Houston showed 11 News many of the suits on public display.

“Here you see it at your scale, the human scale,” said Spana.

Spana said one of the most popular suits belong to the first female in space, Sally Ride. In 1983, Ride was the first woman to blast into space aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger.

“That was early on in the shuttle program,” said Spana “It was a big deal back then.”

That moment in history has become a big deal again, thanks to Calvin Smith.

According to court documents, Smith worked for Boeing’s Flight Group Processing Office. That office handles the maintenance of NASA flight suits.

The one thing court records don’t explain is how Smith managed to walk out of a secured area with the suit, a watch and other space items totaling $10,000 dollars.

Smith’s family said he has mental problems and had spent time in the Harris County Jail for domestic violence. When he got out, he gave his mother a list of things to pick up at his home.

According to Smith’s daughter, one item was a suitcase wrapped in duct tape. Curious about the contents, she opened the case and found the suit and a rejection letter from the Smithsonian Institution. Smith’s daughter said he was trying to sell the suit.

Court documents show that Smith's wife said she was already suspicious of her husband’s behavior after past visits to NASA and Space Center Houston. She said Smith would laugh as they passed suits with Ride’s name on it and make comments about knowing where Sally Ride’s original flight suit was. He told her he was very secretive about how he knew.

Smith’s wife turned him in to authorities. He now could face up to ten years in federal prison if convicted.

Spana said you just can’t swipe space stuff and get away with it.

“It’s not something you can hang on the wall and show off because everyone is going to know,” he said.

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Texas Gulf Waits & Worries

2010-05-28T06:19:00.001-07:00

LAPORTE -- Richard Arnhart spends much of his days monitoring wind trajectories, scientific bulletins and TV newscasts.

Parts of an oily blob three times the size of Rhode Island -- and growing -- are believed by many experts to be lumbering closer to the Texas Gulf, and Arnhart is part of the first line of defense.
As a regional director for the Oil Spill Prevention and Response Program in the Texas General Land Office, Arnhart is paid by the state to fight oil spills, and he's heavily involved in state and federal contingency planning for any possible impact on Texas from the massive oil spill lurking in the Gulf of Mexico.

Communities all along the Texas coast are making similar preparations as they join the rest of the world in tracking daily developments in one of the worst oil spill disasters in history.
No one knows for sure if remnants of the spill, which was about 160 miles east of the Lone Star State late last week, will reach Texas waters. The consensus seems to be that if there is an impact it will be in the form of tar balls or a frothy substance resembling chocolate mousse. Experts don't expect any residue to hit this far west for several weeks.

Beyond that, just what threat the spill poses for a region of the state whose economy and culture is tied to the gulf is difficult to gauge. Environmentalists warn of possibly irreversible damage to the state's fragile ecosystems and endangered wildlife. Others worry about potential losses to fishing and tourism, though local officials say they have yet to see any signs of an economic backlash.
"It's going to have an impact one way or another," said state Rep. Aaron Pena, D-Edinburg, chairman of the state House Select Committee on Emergency Preparedness, which has scheduled a Monday hearing in McAllen to examine Texas preparations for the spill. "We swim in that ocean. We eat the food that comes out of that ocean. It's part of our [committee's] charge to be prepared for emergencies, and this is certainly an emergency that Texas should be prepared for."
'No news is good news'

Texas Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson, whose office would be in charge of fighting residue from the spill and enforcing the cleanup, took steps late last week to calm fears about the oil slick.

"We're watching and waiting, but it's just not time to go to general quarters," said Patterson, who is scheduled to testify at Monday's hearing. "No news is good news."

Patterson sought to dispel TV reports that tar balls from the spill are already showing up on Texas beaches. Although tar balls occasionally wash ashore along the Texas Gulf, they may be decades old and could come from natural seepage or earlier spills, the land office said. An analysis on tar balls collected from Jamaica Beach on Galveston Island last week proved conclusively that the substance did not come from the oil slick in the gulf, said Cmdr. David Berliner of the Coast Guard.
Nevertheless, an out-of-control underwater gusher dumping more than thousands of barrels of oil into the gulf each day is impossible for Texans to ignore. Houston area residents watching TV last week, for example, might have seen ads aired by attorney Jim Adler offering his service to victims of the spill.

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Messaging System Links Texas Residents and Officials During Emergencies

2010-05-26T07:45:00.000-07:00

The Alvin, Texas, public library was to be the voting site for a city election on April 28, but a two-alarm fire earlier in the morning forced officials to move voting to City Hall. The transition went smoothly, thanks to the city's community notification system that was already in place.
"The particular area where the early voting was talking place suffered smoke damage, so we had to move the early voting to City Hall," said Capt. Terry Lucas, the city's emergency management coordinator. The fire and resulting movement of voting demonstrated one of many uses for the notification system.

Alvin has had the system, known as Connect-CTY from Blackboard Connect, in place for two and a half years. The first major use of the system came as Hurricane Ike approached. During the response to the hurricane, Lucas sent 50 messages warning residents of the storm's approach and informing them of the city's preparations. Once Ike made landfall, Lucas sent messages letting residents know where and when they could pick up emergency supplies and meet with FEMA representatives.

In addition to notifications during emergencies, the city uses the system to inform residents of public hearings, street closures, city events and missing children.

Read more about Alvin's Emergency Management System here.

Atlantis lands - for the last time.

2010-05-26T06:56:00.000-07:00

Kennedy Space Center, Florida (CNN) -- Space shuttle Atlantis landed here Wednesday, concluding the final mission of its 25-year career.
Fresh off a 12-day mission to the international space station, the shuttle landed as scheduled at 8:48 a.m. ET to end its 32nd flight.

Atlantis is the first shuttle to be retired. Two other missions are planned before the space shuttle program ends -- one for Discovery in September and one for Endeavour in November.
Atlantis, which lifted off Friday afternoon from Kennedy Space Center, made its maiden voyage in 1985 and has since logged about 121 million miles in space.

During its career, it carried into orbit the Magellan spacecraft, which went on to map 98 percent of the planet Venus. It also sent the Galileo spacecraft on its way to collect data about Jupiter and its moons for eight years.
President Obama has called for a new strategy that ends current programs while funding new initiatives intended to propel humankind farther into the solar system.
In an April speech, Obama outlined his proposal to pump an additional $6 billion into NASA's budget over the next five years while halting a project to resume lunar missions.

Oil spill threatens already weakened wetlands

2010-05-17T20:00:00.001-07:00

by Brad Woodard / 11 News
khou.com

Crews depart with giant box to help Gulf oil leak
With millions of gallons of oil already in the gulf and massive underwater plumes that could poison and suffocate sea life across the food chain, experts say the damage from the spill could endure for a decade or more. For Galveston, however, the picture isn't quite as bleak.

"There may be some kind of effect coming this way, some little tarballs, but we'd be talking about almost three weeks into the future, which gives it more time to break up. More time to sink," said Peter Davis, chief of the Island's Beach Patrol.

If Davis doesn't seem overly concerned, it's because he's seen it all before.

"I've worked here for almost 30 years, and before that I was on the beach all the time," says Davis. "I remember in the 80s when there was less regulation; there was tar around a lot more."

Long before the Deepwater Horizon explosion, in fact, long before offshore drilling, tarballs were washing up on Texas beaches. The state estimates as much as a million barrels of crude oil leaked into the gulf through natural seepage in just the last year.

Although the coast is clear in Galveston, at least for the moment, some business owners along the seawall worry all the news surrounding the spill with scare off tourists.

"They don't know if there is oil or no oil," says Izzy Wolraich, the owner of four businesses on the Island. "And we know there's no oil.

There're afraid about poisoned fish and dirty water, but there's not a panic yet."

And that's what he fears the most.

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