LEHIGH ACRES Flames shoot through roof of house in Lehigh Acres Lehigh Acres Fire Control and Rescue District said the people inside the house got out okay and no one was injured.
FORT MYERS Lee County making changes to fix bus issues In the past, the Lee County School District struggled to find enough bus drivers.
NAPLES Naples man gets original Bob Ross paintings appraised Bob Ross took this blank canvas in a small studio in Muncie, Indiana, and transformed it into a beautiful masterpiece.
Lee Schools board considers full-day phone bans The biggest talking point in a Lee County School District safety presentation wasn’t about violence or drugs, it was about phones
PORT CHARLOTTE Fallen officer ceremony in Charlotte County commemorates those who lost lives in line of duty The emotional ceremony was held at the William R. Gains Veterans Memorial Park in Port Charlotte.
SAN CARLOS PARK Lee County couple suspected of drugging and sexually abusing child Neighbors say a home in San Carlos Park was just another house before Tuesday.
PINE ISLAND FDOT asking you if bike and pedestrian lanes should be added to busy road The Florida Department of Transportation is asking you if bike and pedestrian lanes should be added to the busy road.
Food drive for mental health awareness While someone may look healthy, they may be fighting a real inner battle.
FORT MYERS Overbilled for overflow of water; Residents stuck with hefty water bill The Moore’s make ends meet living at The Cove for almost a year.
ESTERO Scoreless Eagle up for award at NIL Summit FGCU’s Brandon Dwyer is one of the big time performers in NIL despite having never scored a single point in his entire Eagle career.
What happens after a nuisance alligator is captured? For alligators, the month of May means we are in the heart of mating season in the Sunshine State.
Exclusive: Interview with woman who shares hope of recovery on National Fentanyl Awareness Day Lee County Sheriff’s Office said that in 2020 they seized nearly two thousand grams of fentanyl. In 2023, that number jumped to over 8,000.
ESTERO FGCU star in the circle reflects on historical senior season The Eagles’ ace told WINK News she is focused on making every moment count before she hangs up her cleats for the last time.
NAPLES Pastrami Dan’s reopens in Naples after SUV crash Pastrami Dan’s in Naples welcomed customers once again, with people waiting at the door.
FGCU Two FGCU softball players playing for those who impacted their lives Two FGCU softball players, Riley Oakes and Olivia Black, are playing for friends who impacted their lives in a major way.
LEHIGH ACRES Flames shoot through roof of house in Lehigh Acres Lehigh Acres Fire Control and Rescue District said the people inside the house got out okay and no one was injured.
FORT MYERS Lee County making changes to fix bus issues In the past, the Lee County School District struggled to find enough bus drivers.
NAPLES Naples man gets original Bob Ross paintings appraised Bob Ross took this blank canvas in a small studio in Muncie, Indiana, and transformed it into a beautiful masterpiece.
Lee Schools board considers full-day phone bans The biggest talking point in a Lee County School District safety presentation wasn’t about violence or drugs, it was about phones
PORT CHARLOTTE Fallen officer ceremony in Charlotte County commemorates those who lost lives in line of duty The emotional ceremony was held at the William R. Gains Veterans Memorial Park in Port Charlotte.
SAN CARLOS PARK Lee County couple suspected of drugging and sexually abusing child Neighbors say a home in San Carlos Park was just another house before Tuesday.
PINE ISLAND FDOT asking you if bike and pedestrian lanes should be added to busy road The Florida Department of Transportation is asking you if bike and pedestrian lanes should be added to the busy road.
Food drive for mental health awareness While someone may look healthy, they may be fighting a real inner battle.
FORT MYERS Overbilled for overflow of water; Residents stuck with hefty water bill The Moore’s make ends meet living at The Cove for almost a year.
ESTERO Scoreless Eagle up for award at NIL Summit FGCU’s Brandon Dwyer is one of the big time performers in NIL despite having never scored a single point in his entire Eagle career.
What happens after a nuisance alligator is captured? For alligators, the month of May means we are in the heart of mating season in the Sunshine State.
Exclusive: Interview with woman who shares hope of recovery on National Fentanyl Awareness Day Lee County Sheriff’s Office said that in 2020 they seized nearly two thousand grams of fentanyl. In 2023, that number jumped to over 8,000.
ESTERO FGCU star in the circle reflects on historical senior season The Eagles’ ace told WINK News she is focused on making every moment count before she hangs up her cleats for the last time.
NAPLES Pastrami Dan’s reopens in Naples after SUV crash Pastrami Dan’s in Naples welcomed customers once again, with people waiting at the door.
FGCU Two FGCU softball players playing for those who impacted their lives Two FGCU softball players, Riley Oakes and Olivia Black, are playing for friends who impacted their lives in a major way.
DURHAM, N.H. (AP) – For the past 25 years, researcher Stephen Jones has tried to understand the threat that bacteria may pose to oysters in New Hampshire’s Great Bay estuary. He often couldn’t get funding to study the problem. But that is beginning to change as scientists notice “something is going on.” Scientists are recognizing that a waterborne disease sickening tens of thousands of people each year is associated with warmer waters of the Gulf of Mexico moving northward, partly due to climate change. The problem is extremely rare in New Hampshire and neighboring Maine, but scientists have seen cases elsewhere in New England and expect it to become a bigger problem. “We have this situation in the northern part of the United States and other cooler climates where people haven’t thought this had been a problem,” said Jones, of the Northeast Center for Vibrio Disease and Ecology at the University of New Hampshire. “In the last 10 or 20 years, it’s become very apparent that there is something going on.” In a paper in the science journal PLOS One, Jones and other scientists reported their findings that illnesses from vibrio bacteria have jumped significantly in New England – from five cases in 2000 to 147 in 2013. Disease-causing bacteria can contaminate oysters, leading to infections such as diarrhea, vomiting and abdominal pain. Jones and his colleague, Cheryl Whistler, concluded that warmer waters in the Great Bay, higher salinity and the presence of chlorophyll all contributed to higher concentrations of one of the more common vibrio species that makes people sick – vibrio parahaemolyticus. The researchers are hoping their findings will serve as the foundation of an early warning system for the region’s booming oyster industry. Currently, all experts can do is monitor the waters and rapidly cool harvested oyster to halt bacteria growth. “Eventually, we would want shellfish managers to have access to these models that would allow them to communicate to the growers that conditions have changed and that we now need this to manage the potential risk to reduce whether there will be exposures,” Whistler said. The bacteria fueled by warmer temperatures are also a stark reflection of the impact that climate change is having on the world’s oceans, experts say. An August report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found that warming waters were linked to waterborne food poisoning, especially from eating raw oysters. “There is similar reporting in Alaska where it has been found that increased cases have been occurring where it has not been reported before because of the temperature rise,” said the study’s lead author, Rita Colwell, of the University of Maryland. The industry has welcomed Jones and Whistler’s work, noting that outbreaks like the one that occurred last month in Massachusetts need to be avoided. Nearly 75 people were sickened. “When you are involved with a recall because people have gotten sick, you are a losing tremendous amount of money and a tremendous amount of credibility,” said Tom Howell, president of Spinney Creek Shellfish Inc., in Eliot, Maine, which harvests oysters from the Great Bay. A predictive model would allow the industry to move more aggressively to avoid an outbreak, he said. But Howell and Chris Nash, New Hampshire’s shellfish program manager, said that day could be far off. “We are still learning what seems to trigger these pathogenic strains to multiply … We don’t have that knowledge yet and it may be that we never do,” Nash said. “We are talking about biological organisms … They react to their environment different, the same way humans do.”