1 dead after head-on crash on I-75 According to the Florida Highway Patrol, a crash left one dead on I-75.
FORT MYERS BEACH Final day of Island Hopper Fest held despite effects from Helene The last day of the 10th annual Island Hopper Songwriter Festival was held on Fort Myers Beach Sunday afternoon.
FORT MYERS BEACH Sen. Rick Scott visits Fort Myers Beach in the wake of Helene Sen. Rick Scott traveled to Fort Myers Beach to survey the damage following Helene.
Distribution center provides aid for those affected by Helene Charlotte County received a bit of relief Sunday after being hit by Helene.
Death toll rises from Helene while supplies are rushed to North Carolina and Florida digs out The U.S. Southeast grappled Sunday with rising death tolls, a lack of vital supplies in isolated, flood-stricken areas and the widespread loss of homes and property while the devastating toll of Hurricane Helene became more clear and officials warned of a lengthy and difficult rebuild.
FEMA assistance available for some affected by Hurricane Helene Florida homeowners and renters in counties with uninsured damage or losses caused by Hurricane Helene may be eligible for FEMA disaster assistance.
SANIBEL Sanibel Fire & Rescue District traveling to assist with Helene relief The Sanibel Fire & Rescue District sent a crew to Perry, FL, early Sunday morning to assist with disaster relief following Hurricane Helene.
FORT MYERS Man accused of filming woman in Target dressing room A man is being accused of videotaping a woman while she was trying on clothes at a Fort Myers Target on Friday.
BONITA SPRINGS Man arrested in Bonita Springs for stabbing A man has been arrested in Bonita Springs after allegedly stabbing someone.
southwest florida WINK Neighborhood Watch: Animal abuse, grand theft auto and spousal murder This week’s segment of WINK Neighborhood Watch features animal abuse, grand theft auto and a man murdering his wife.
President Biden approves Florida disaster declaration President Biden approved a Florida disaster declaration after Hurricane Helene left a wake of destruction.
NAPLES Crash in Collier County leaves car in canal and driver dead A traffic crash occurred in Naples on 12th Avenue Northeast near Wilson Boulevard.
SANIBEL Sanibel couple remaining hopeful following damage from Helene A Sanibel couple is remaining hopeful after flooding impacted their home during Helene Thursday night.
SANIBEL Sanibel residents recovering from Helene two years after Ian Due to Helene, The City of Sanibel has postponed a two-year Ian celebration and turned the event into a cleanup.
FORT MYERS BEACH Fort Myers Beach seeking to avoid unnecessary traffic after Helene The town of Fort Myers Beach is asking some people not to visit the island.
1 dead after head-on crash on I-75 According to the Florida Highway Patrol, a crash left one dead on I-75.
FORT MYERS BEACH Final day of Island Hopper Fest held despite effects from Helene The last day of the 10th annual Island Hopper Songwriter Festival was held on Fort Myers Beach Sunday afternoon.
FORT MYERS BEACH Sen. Rick Scott visits Fort Myers Beach in the wake of Helene Sen. Rick Scott traveled to Fort Myers Beach to survey the damage following Helene.
Distribution center provides aid for those affected by Helene Charlotte County received a bit of relief Sunday after being hit by Helene.
Death toll rises from Helene while supplies are rushed to North Carolina and Florida digs out The U.S. Southeast grappled Sunday with rising death tolls, a lack of vital supplies in isolated, flood-stricken areas and the widespread loss of homes and property while the devastating toll of Hurricane Helene became more clear and officials warned of a lengthy and difficult rebuild.
FEMA assistance available for some affected by Hurricane Helene Florida homeowners and renters in counties with uninsured damage or losses caused by Hurricane Helene may be eligible for FEMA disaster assistance.
SANIBEL Sanibel Fire & Rescue District traveling to assist with Helene relief The Sanibel Fire & Rescue District sent a crew to Perry, FL, early Sunday morning to assist with disaster relief following Hurricane Helene.
FORT MYERS Man accused of filming woman in Target dressing room A man is being accused of videotaping a woman while she was trying on clothes at a Fort Myers Target on Friday.
BONITA SPRINGS Man arrested in Bonita Springs for stabbing A man has been arrested in Bonita Springs after allegedly stabbing someone.
southwest florida WINK Neighborhood Watch: Animal abuse, grand theft auto and spousal murder This week’s segment of WINK Neighborhood Watch features animal abuse, grand theft auto and a man murdering his wife.
President Biden approves Florida disaster declaration President Biden approved a Florida disaster declaration after Hurricane Helene left a wake of destruction.
NAPLES Crash in Collier County leaves car in canal and driver dead A traffic crash occurred in Naples on 12th Avenue Northeast near Wilson Boulevard.
SANIBEL Sanibel couple remaining hopeful following damage from Helene A Sanibel couple is remaining hopeful after flooding impacted their home during Helene Thursday night.
SANIBEL Sanibel residents recovering from Helene two years after Ian Due to Helene, The City of Sanibel has postponed a two-year Ian celebration and turned the event into a cleanup.
FORT MYERS BEACH Fort Myers Beach seeking to avoid unnecessary traffic after Helene The town of Fort Myers Beach is asking some people not to visit the island.
Federal authorities expressed increased alarm Thursday about an intrusion into U.S. and other computer systems around the globe that officials suspect was carried out by Russian hackers. The nation’s cybersecurity agency warned of a “grave” risk to government and private networks. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency said in its most detailed comments yet that the intrusion had compromised federal agencies as well as “critical infrastructure” in a sophisticated attack that was hard to detect and will be difficult to undo. CISA did not say which agencies or infrastructure had been breached or what information taken in an attack that it previously said appeared to have begun in March. “This threat actor has demonstrated sophistication and complex tradecraft in these intrusions,” the agency said in its unusual alert. “CISA expects that removing the threat actor from compromised environments will be highly complex and challenging.” The hack, if authorities can indeed prove it was carried out by a nation such as Russia as experts believe, creates a fresh foreign policy problem for President Donald Trump in his final days in office. Trump, whose administration has been criticized for eliminating a White House cybersecurity adviser and downplaying Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, has made no public statements about the breach. President-elect Joe Biden said he would make cybersecurity a top priority of his administration, but that stronger defenses are not enough. “We need to disrupt and deter our adversaries from undertaking significant cyberattacks in the first place,” he said. “We will do that by, among other things, imposing substantial costs on those responsible for such malicious attacks, including in coordination with our allies and partners.” The cybersecurity agency previously said the perpetrators had used network management software from Texas-based SolarWinds t o infiltrate computer networks. Its new alert said the attackers may have used other methods, as well. Over the weekend, amid reports that the Treasury and Commerce departments were breached, CISA directed all civilian agencies of the federal government to remove SolarWinds from their servers. The cybersecurity agencies of Britain and Ireland issued similar alerts. A U.S. official previously told The Associated Press that Russia-based hackers were suspected, but neither CISA nor the FBI has publicly said who is believed be responsible. Asked whether Russia was behind the attack, the official said: “We believe so. We haven’t said that publicly yet because it isn’t 100% confirmed.” Another U.S. official, speaking Thursday on condition of anonymity to discuss a matter that is under investigation, said the hack was severe and extremely damaging although the administration was not yet ready to publicly blame anyone for it. “This is looking like it’s the worst hacking case in the history of America,” the official said. “They got into everything.” The official said the administration is working on the assumption that most, if not all, government agencies were compromised but the extent of the damage was not yet known. The intentions of the perpetrators appear to be espionage and gathering valuable information rather than destruction, according to security experts and former government officials . If so, they are now remarkably well situated. Thomas Bossert, a former Trump Homeland Security adviser, said in an opinion article in The New York Times that the U.S. should now act as if the Russian government had gained control of the networks it has penetrated. “The actual and perceived control of so many important networks could easily be used to undermine public and consumer trust in data, written communications and services,” he wrote.” Members of Congress said they feared that taxpayers’ personal information could have been exposed because the IRS is part of Treasury, which used SolarWinds software. Tom Kellermann, cybersecurity strategy chief of the software company VMware, said the hackers are now “omniscient to the operations” of federal agencies they’ve infiltrated “and there is viable concern that they might leverage destructive attacks within these agencies” in reaction to U.S. response. CISA officials did not respond to questions and so it was unclear what it meant by a “grave threat” or by critical infrastructure. The Department of Homeland Security, its parent agency, defines such infrastructure as any “vital” assets to the U.S. or its economy, a broad category that could include power plants and financial institutions. Among the business sectors scrambling to protect their systems and assess potential theft of information are defense contractors, technology companies and providers of telecommunications and the electric grid. A group led by CEOs in the electric power industry said it held a “situational awareness call” earlier this week to help electric companies and public power utilities identify whether the compromise posed a threat to their networks. And dozens of smaller institutions that seemed to have little data of interest to foreign spies were nonetheless forced to respond to the hack. The Helix Water District, which provides drinking water to the suburbs of San Diego, California, said it provided a patch to its SolarWinds software after it got an advisory the IT company sent out about the hack to about 33,000 customers Sunday. “While we do utilize SolarWinds, we are not aware of any district impacts from the security breach,” said Michelle Curtis, a spokesperson for the water district.
President-elect Joe Biden on Thursday offered the leadership of the Environmental Protection Agency to Michael S. Regan, a North Carolina regulator who has made a name pursuing cleanups of industrial toxins and helping low-income and minority communities hit hardest by pollution. Biden’s selection of Regan, who leads his state’s environmental agency, was confirmed by two people familiar with the selection process. They were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly before the official announcement and spoke on condition of anonymity. Regan became environmental chief in North Carolina in 2017. North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper, who hired Regan then, told The Associated Press this week that Regan was “a consensus builder and a fierce protector of the environment.” In North Carolina, Regan led the negotiations that resulted in the clean-up of the Cape Fear River, which has been dangerously contaminated by PFAS industrial compounds from a chemical plant. He negotiated what North Carolina says was the largest cleanup agreement for toxic coal ash, with Duke Energy. Regan also created North Carolina’s Environmental Justice and Equity Advisory Board, to help the low-income and minority communities that suffer disproportionate exposure to harmful pollutants from refineries, factories and freeways. Regan previously spent almost a decade at the federal EPA, including managing a national program for air-pollution issues. His past jobs included serving as an associate vice president for climate and energy issues at the Environmental Defense Fund advocacy group and as head of his own environmental and energy consulting firm. California clean-air regulator Mary Nichols, who earlier had been considered the front-runner for the job, had faced increasing objections from progressive groups. They said Nichols had not done enough to address the disproportionate harm low-income and minority communities face from living next to oil and gas installations, factories and freeways. Regan, who is Black, has a bachelor’s degree from the North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, a historically Black university, and a master’s from George Washington University.
A Port Charlotte man was arrested Wednesday on charges related to child pornography. Brendon John Boule, 39, was identified as a suspect after numerous Cyber-Tips were reported to the National Center of Missing and Exploited Children between Aug. 4 through Nov. 2 regarding child pornography files being uploaded using a web-based chat platform called FreeChatNow. The activity was traced to an apartment at 191 Date Street in Port Charlotte. Members of the FBI Child Exploitation and Human Trafficking Task Force, Charlotte County Sheriff’s Office and Florida Department of Law Enforcement searched the apartment Wednesday and contacted Boule. Evidence was located on a cellphone on which over 400 images and over 40 videos of child pornography were stored. Boule was arrested on charges of possession of child pornography, transmission of child pornography and violation of probation stemming from a 2002 arrest also related to crimes against children. He was transported to the Charlotte County Jail and is being held with no bond. If you believe you have information related to a child being abused or neglected, you can do so anonymously online or over the phone by calling the CCSO at (941) 639-0013 or the Department of Children and Families at (239) 332-2822. You can also contact C.A.R.E. at (941) 627-6000.
Two Port Charlotte men were arrested on drug charges Monday, according to the Charlotte County Sheriff’s Office. A search of a home on Middletown Street turned up drugs and paraphernalia, deputies say, including? 0.1 grams of Fentanyl in a plastic bag inside a black safe; A black digital scale in a black safe; 3.1 grams of methamphetamine; 18.6 grams of cannabis; 6 smoking pipes; An unidentified partial pill inside in a baggie inside of a black safe; and 2 clear plastic baggies with methamphetamine residue. Arrested were William Clayton Denney, 58, and Marshall Joseph Eskew, 42. Denney faces charges of possession of a controlled substance, possession of cannabis and possession of drug paraphernalia. Eskew faces charges of possession of a controlled substance, possession of cannabis and possession of drug paraphernalia. Both have since bonded out of jail.
A fire early Thursday killed as many as 240,000 chickens at a Florida farm operated by one of the nation’s largest egg producers. The Pasco County fire department reports that three barns each containing up to 80,000 chickens each caught fire at the plant operated by Mississippi-based Cal-Maine. It was reported at about 1 a.m. The company says on its website that it is the largest producer and distributor of shell eggs in the United States. It sells under brands including Egg-Land’s Best and Land O’ Lakes. The farm, one of many Cal-Maine operates, is about 40 miles north of Tampa. The company has more than 50 million chickens nationally and sells over a billion eggs annually, about 20% of the country’s production. The cause of the fire is under investigation.
There are key differences between the COVID-19 vaccines from Moderna and Pfizer. The primary difference is how they are stored: The Pfizer vaccine needs to be kept at temperatures around minus 80 degrees Fahrenheit. Moderna’s vaccine only needs about minus 10 degrees. As far as effectiveness, however, Pfizer’s and Moderna’s vaccines were very close, testing at 95% and 94%, respectively. The only unique side effect of the Pfizer vaccine was a headache; both had instances of fatigue, joint pain and injection site reactions, and in both the side effects were more noticeable after the second round. For now, doctors just want to make sure as many people as possible get the vaccine. “Now is the time to say we believe in it,” said Dr. Alejandro Perez-Trepichio of Millenium Physician Group. “I will get it myself, I will give it to my family. At that point, don’t get hung up on the differences.” The trial size for each vaccine was different, too, but Perez-Tripichio says it doesn’t matter much how many people were tested as long as the test group looks like the people that will be getting the vaccine. “The best vaccine is the one that goes into your arm as fast and quickly as possible” Perez-Tripichio said. “The second-best vaccine is the continuation of the medication aspects… the masks, washing hands and social distancing.”
A three-vehicle crash in Fort Myers sent a woman to the hospital Thursday morning. The Florida Highway Patrol says a 40-year-old Cape Coral woman in a Ford Focus was headed south on Metro Parkway when she swerved to avoid a tractor-trailer that was backing into a business. Her car traveled into the path of an SUV and then collided with the trailer, with the SUV running into the rear of her car, forcing the front of it to be wedged under the rear of the trailer. The crash happened at around 6:15 a.m. between Arc Way and Crystal Drive. All lanes have since reopened. The Florida Highway Patrol no longer releases the names of those involved in crashes, citing Marsy’s Law.
SpaceX is now targeting Friday at 9 a.m. EST for launch of the NROL-108 mission from Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) at Kennedy Space Center on Cape Canaveral. The launch was put into a hold Thursday at T-00:45 and the decision was later made to delay it to Friday. There is a three-hour launch window opening Friday at 9 a.m. EST, or 14:00 UTC. Falcon 9’s first stage booster previously supported launch of SpaceX’s 19th and 20th cargo resupply missions to the International Space Station, a Starlink mission, and the SAOCOM 1B mission. Following stage separation, SpaceX will land Falcon 9’s first stage on Landing Zone 1 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.
The week before Christmas is the busiest of the year for the U.S. Postal Service. Many of your mail carriers are running two routes a day to make sure all of your packages are delivered on time, often arriving to load up their trucks at 5 a.m. and not returning until 8 p.m. “Nothing can be sent back, nothing can be left behind,” said postal worker William Delgado. “We prioritize and take out the things that are closest to the office, get it all ready, go out, do waves and then come back and assist other carriers who need extra help.” Delgado may not come down the chimney, but his priorities are the same as Santa Clause’s: getting your presents under the tree before Christmas Day. “I’ve been known to get some goodies and some cookies, it’s part of the tradition,” Delgado said. But his favorite tradition is the USPS’s dedication to serving the community. “It’s still a tradition that is upheld here in the United States, so it’s something that gives us something to look forward to,” Delgado said. “No matter what, every day you will see your mailman out there on the street delivering your mail.” Even though the streets aren’t as busy during the pandemic, Delgado insists “the feeling is still out there.” It’s your joy and gratitude that keeps the U.S. Army veteran smiling through the long days. “I love what I do, it’s a lot of fun,” Delgado said. “Keep shipping stuff to the post office and we’ll keep delivering it.” If you have any items that still need to be shipped before Christmas, there are three dates you need to be aware of: Friday is the last day for first class shipping Saturday is the deadline for priority mail And if you want to wait until the last minute, you can ship next-day express on Dec. 23 However, your local post office says the sooner you get your packages in the mail, the better. You can also submit a request to have packages picked up from your doorstep.
NOTE: No COVID-19 vaccine is currently available to the general public on request. Gov. Ron DeSantis announced Florida’s initial distribution plan for the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine Wednesday night. Florida is preparing to receive 367,000 doses of the Moderna vaccine after Sunday, pending Emergency Use Authorization by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Doses of the vaccine will be distributed to 173 hospital locations spanning 43 counties that did not receive doses in the first allocation of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine. The state is able to distribute the Moderna vaccine to a large number of hospitals because it does not require ultra-cold storage. Upon Moderna’s approval, four Southwest Florida hospitals will receive the vaccine: Englewood Community Hospital, 700 Medical Blvd, Englewood, FL 34223 Fawcett Memorial Hospital, 21298 Olean Blvd, Port Charlotte, FL 33952 NCH North Naples, 11190 Health Park Blvd, Naples, FL 34110 Park Royal Mental Health Hospital, 9241 Park Royal Dr, Fort Myers, FL 33908 Park Royal says its doses will be used for vaccinating its staff. Floridians can receive updates about the COVID-19 vaccine by texting FLCOVID19 to 888777. NCH release the following statement on the COVID-19 vaccine coming to NCH: The Moderna COVID-19 vaccine is being reviewed today by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for Emergency Use Authorization (EUA). Pending approval, the State of Florida is preparing to receive 367,000 doses of the vaccine. Both NCH North Naples Hospital and NCH Baker Hospital have been selected among the 173 hospital locations to receive a shipment of the vaccine. Vaccine may arrive at NCH as early as the first half of next week. The vaccine allocation coming to NCH is unknown at this time, however, we anticipate initial supply to be limited. Limited supply means that distribution programs, which are regulated at the state level, must initially focus on specific high-risk groups as required and defined by the Florida Department of Health (FL DOH). High risk includes front line clinical staff with the greatest risk of COVID-19 exposure. Upon receipt of the vaccine, NCH will begin vaccinating those healthcare workers identified at high occupational risk at both the Baker and North Naples campus. NCH does not yet have authorization to vaccinate patients or the general public, but recommendations for target groups are likely to change as vaccine becomes readily available. As a vaccine administrator, NCH is required to enter vaccination information into the Florida SHOTS program. Compliance with these requirements is mandatory in order to insure receiving future vaccine allocations. Compliance means that we are administering the vaccine to the priority population group identified by the state. More information regarding the state vaccine distribution plan can be found here: https://floridahealthcovid19.gov/covid-19-vaccines-in-florida/. We will continue to provide updates as we receive them. Members of the community can also speak with their primary care physician about any questions they may have surrounding the vaccine.