Latest news with #spokesman.com
Yahoo
24-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Mary Walker School District tax levy fails for the second time
Apr. 23—SPRINGDALE, Wash. — Springdale-based school district Mary Walker won't see a renewal on its property tax levy, election night results indicate. The 560-pupil district in Stevens County failed, with 53.8% voting against on election night, the second failure for the district after a February attempt fared slightly worse. The levy would have collected $2.8 million over four years. Without it, Superintendent Todd Spear told The Spokesman-Review the district would have to cut five to seven certified teachers and at least 10 classified staff, which would mean larger class sizes and less individual attention for students. Athletic programs would also face significant cuts. Elena Perry can be reached at (509) 459-5270 or by email at elenap@ Elena Perry's work is funded in part by members of the Spokane community via the Community Journalism and Civic Engagement Fund. This story can be republished by other organizations for free under a Creative Commons license. For more information on this, please contact our newspaper's managing editor.
Yahoo
23-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Mary Walker School District tax levy fails a for the second time
Apr. 22—SPRINGDALE, Wash. — Springdale-based school district Mary Walker won't see a renewal on its property tax levy, election night results indicate. The 560-pupil district in Stevens County failed, with 53.8% voting against on election night, the second failure for the district after a February attempt fared slightly worse. The levy would have collected $2.8 million over four years. Without it, Superintendent Todd Spear told The Spokesman-Review the district would have to cut five to seven certified teachers and at least 10 classified staff, which would mean larger class sizes and less individual attention for students. Athletic programs would also face significant cuts. Elena Perry can be reached at (509) 459-5270 or by email at elenap@ Elena Perry's work is funded in part by members of the Spokane community via the Community Journalism and Civic Engagement Fund. This story can be republished by other organizations for free under a Creative Commons license. For more information on this, please contact our newspaper's managing editor.
Yahoo
15-04-2025
- Climate
- Yahoo
Sunny days in Spokane predicted for several days
Apr. 14—Break out the garden tools, hammock or a lawn chair — this week is shaping up to be a sunny, warm week in most of the Inland Northwest . The National Weather Service predicts the Spokane area will see temperature s as high as 70 degrees on Tuesday and Friday, with highs in the 60s on Wednesday and Thursday. Those two days are expected to be less warm, with possible precipitation in North Idaho. Don't celebrate too quickly, though — this week's temperatures are above average, said Spokane-area meteorologist Ken Daniel, so it's possible we could see cooler days during the rest of this month. The nights will remain chilly. The weather service reports lows will stoop to the 30s. Along with the higher temperatures also comes higher winds on Wednesday, according to the weather service forecast, leading to an increase risk in brush fires . Gusts could reach as fast as 30 mph in Eastern Washington and up to 40 mph in central Washington. Make sure to keep an eye on any open flames that could lead to a fire, Daniel said. Areas that have dry, dead foliage are most susceptible. Last time the temperature spiked into the 70s, multiple Spokane-area brush fires took off. Notably, one that swept 80 to 90 acres near Fairchild Airforce Base in late March. "When we go into warmer, drier weather it does increase the risk of fires spreading," Daniel said. "Most of the threats are lightning or human-caused. We encourage people to be careful." Warm weather also leads to a propensity to find a watering hole — and it's still too early in the season to jump into a river. "River and lakes are still very cold. Water temperatures are low. It can be quite the shock," Daniel said. "Just like we encourage people to be fire smart, be cold water smart as well." Alexandra Duggan can be reached at (509) 459-5469 or by email at alexandrad@
Yahoo
15-03-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Spokane astronaut Anne McClain, Crew-10 successfully launch to International Space Station
Mar. 14—Editor's note: Spokesman-Review reporter Nick Gibson is in Florida this week to report on Anne McClain's and NASA's SpaceX launch from the Kennedy Space Center. Follow along in print and online at CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Spokane, we have liftoff. U.S. Army Col. Anne McClain is on her way to the International Space Station, joined by fellow NASA astronaut Nichole Ayers, Roscosmos cosmonaut Kirill Peskov and Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Takuya Onishi. Crew-10's SpaceX Dragon Endurance capsule, and Falcon 9 rocket propelling it, successfully took off from launchpad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center around 4 p.m. Pacific Friday, hitting speeds higher than 17,500 mph. The launch site was calm, then in a matter of moments, bustling with action. White tendrils of smoke were the first to appear, bubbling into large spheres surrounding the rocket's base as the thrusters ignited. The scaffolding fell away as the Falcon 9 lurched upward, slowly, then all at once. The thundering roar of liftoff trailed the sight of the thrusters by about 30 seconds. In less than a minute, McClain's ride was nothing more than a beaming orange dot in the dusk sky. Then it disappeared entirely. The reusable Falcon 9 came tumbling back to Earth in a rapid free fall 7 1/2 minutes after takeoff. To the naked eye, it was a line less than a pin points length in the southeast sky. The thrusters to right it, and slow its descent, kicked on, sending a loud sonic boom across the space coast that was greeted by applause in the media viewing section. The aquatic birds that call the Kennedy Space Center and neighboring Canaveral National Seashore home returned about 10 minutes after takeoff, seemingly perturbed by their noisy neighbors. Within 12 minutes of the launch, McClain radioed from the SpaceX Dragon. "Thank you to all of the teams from across the world who contributed to the launch today. Space flight is tough, but humans are tougher," McClain said. "Days like today are made possible only when people choose to do the harder right over the easier wrong. Build relationships, choose cooperation and believe in the inherit goodness of people all across the world. "To my family and friends: Without you I would not be here. Explore boldly. Live gratefully. Go Crew 10." It will take another 28 hours for the crew to reach the ISS around 8:30 p.m. Pacific on Saturday. McClain's mother Charlotte Lamp said her daughter told her the ride aboard the Endurance should be much smoother than her last voyage to the space station aboard a Russian Soyuz capsule. The latter can rattle and shake a bit more than the SpaceX craft, but passengers experience intense G-forces in each. McClain and company will hit a peak near 4.5Gs as the second stage of the Falcon 9's propellants, liquid oxygen and rocket-grade kerosene, combust and momentum builds. "There's one point along the route, she was showing me, where they actually throttle down and slow it down a little bit so that they can take the G forces," Lamp said. "That's pretty amazing, that they have it all figured out. It's so well nuanced." The capsule is designed to dock autonomously, but mission pilot Ayers can take control if need be. The other three trained pilots on board are there to gladly lend a helping hand, Ayers said in a press conference last week. Once aboard, Crew-10 will be greeted by the seven members of Expedition 72 already aboard the football field-sized laboratory. There'll be some familiar faces waiting for McClain: NASA astronaut Nick Hague is from the same astronaut class and joined her for her mission in 2018-19, and she and NASA astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore "go way back," she said last week. "Honestly, I'm kind of most looking forward to breaking bread with those guys, talking to them, giving them big hugs," McClain said. Crew-9, composed of Hague, Williams, Wilmore and Roscosmos cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov will undock from the space station and return to Earth following two full days of handover, when they'll bring McClain and the team up to speed on ongoing operations, research and maintenance. They'll splash down somewhere off the coast of Florida. Williams and Wilmore have been aboard the station since last June, after a test flight of the Boeing Starliner that transported them ended with the ship returning to Earth empty over concerns about the craft's safety during re-entry. Williams said she looks forward to coming home to her family, although she'll miss some aspects of life aboard the craft. "We have had some amazing aurora while we've been up here," Williams said. "The sun's been really active. It really puts you sort of in your place, and you recognize that the universe is extremely powerful, and what little part we are of it." Lamp said she looks forward to seeing McClain when she returns, but as of Friday, she's just excited about her daughter getting another opportunity to participate in the important work conducted aboard the space station: the research that has advanced human space flight, as well as life back on Earth. It's also personally rewarding for McClain. "She loves it up there," Lamp said. "She loves floating." Ahead of the launch Friday, Lamp reflected on her daughter's last stint in space. She and her husband had just returned to Spokane from Kazakhstan where McClain was launched, and they got a message from the ISS around 5:30 a.m. on a chilly December morning. "She sent a text, and said, 'Be outside in 5 minutes,'" Lamp said. "So we woke up, threw on our bathrobes and ran out the door." McClain was over Alaska at that point, and would be passing over Spokane in short order. "We stood out in the driveway talking to her on the phone as she flew over, and thank goodness it was one of those beautiful, clear winter nights," Lamp said. "We saw the space station come over as we're talking to her." After their phone call ended, another notification popped up on Lamp's phone. It was a photo of Spokane, at night, taken from the space station. You could see "every light, all the buildings, all the streets," Lamp said. "It's amazing," Lamp said. "I have it blown up and on the wall in our living room, to remind us that she's not that far away." "She was closer than Seattle, just 250 miles over our heads, for a few minutes."
Yahoo
13-03-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
'You've completed my childhood dream': Kids' letters addressed to Anne McClain reflect hopes, fears, jokes from Spokane and beyond
Mar. 9—Spokesman-Review reporter Nick Gibson is in Orlando, Florida, to report on Anne McClain's and NASA's Space X launch from the Kennedy Space Center. Follow along in print and online at Are you scared to go to space? What does zero gravity feel like? Can you help me understand science? Would you be on my YouTube channel? Thousands of queries addressed to Army Col. Anne McClain, Spokane born and bred and soon bound for the International Space Station, poured in from Spokane and beyond in a letter writing campaign organized by McClain's high school math teacher. Shari Manikowski is perhaps McClain's biggest Earthside cheerleader, though a mass of inquisitive and encouraging kids are giving her a run for her money. Manikowski coordinated the campaign from school kids sharing praise, testimonies of alien encounters and asking questions of the astronaut, scheduled to launch into space her second time on Wednesday. Manikowski rallied her network of former pupils over her 24 years teaching at Gonzaga Prep who have gone on to work at schools around Spokane, as well as Montana and California, who then spread the word at their respective schools. "Some of these kids that had their kids write letters, they were sitting in my class the last time Anne was in space, and now they're teachers," Manikowski said, beaming as she sifted through manila folders overflowing with messages from students. On McClain's first mission to the ISS in 2018, Manikowski was a dedicated observer from the planet below, running outside to catch a glimpse of the ISS each time it was expected to twinkle over Spokane. Her students at the time would keep track of McClain's time in space, marking each of McClain's 204 days aboard the ISS. "We counted the number of days until she went to space on the board, and then once she was in space," Manikowski said. "I was able to keep in contact with her, so I would send emails and stuff with questions." Now, a new generation of space fans is doing the same. A seemingly endless stream of letters were still pouring in the week of McClain's launch, from local schools, including Adams, Hamblin and Roosevelt Elementary, Yasuhara Middle School, Assumption Parish School, Cataldo and All Saints Catholic Schools. Letters came in from as far as Pretty Eagle Catholic Academy on the Crow Reservation in Montana and St. Paul High School, southeast of Los Angeles. Manikowski has connections at each school where students jumped at the chance to write a letter or color a picture for an astronaut. "What I'm touched by in the letters is the number of kids that say, 'I love you,' " Manikowski said. "We can hate people without ever meeting them — these kids love somebody, they feel connected." Greeting cards in envelopes addressed "to space," folded up notebook paper and construction paper artwork fill Manikowski's living room as she continued to collect notes for McClain. She's already sent photos and manila envelopes full of messages to the astronaut and will leave more with her mother while McClain is in space. From silly to encouraging to inquisitive, kids didn't shy away from pouring their hearts and minds out to McClain. "Anne are you scared to go to space? Anne are you planning to go to the moon?" Amara from Adams wrote in loopy pencil script. "I love that your a astronaut and your a girl." "Your the brightest star of all!" Hugo Smith from Hamblen wrote. "I am proud of you and your so sigma," Abdul, from Yasuhara, wrote using internet slang that means "extremely good and also widely used as a nonsense term and meme online," according to Merriam Webster. Many were eager to share their own cosmic discoveries with the astronaut: "I'll get proof aliens are real! I have seen a UFO before ya know! It had aliens!!!" One used the opportunity to invite McClain to be featured on their social media accounts: "Please download and play Brawl Stars on the space station while recording it and send it," a student requested along with detailed instructions for the U.S. Army Colonel and flight engineer to record, download and play the video game from space. Questions largely centered around how typical Earth behaviors may be different on the space station, from sleeping to walking to using the restroom to vomiting. Some asked the astronaut for homework help. Some asked what spacewalks feel like, if she ever gets bored or how it feels to see Earth, "knowing it's so big yet it looks small out there," Los Angeles sixth-grader Indy asked. Some hoped for McClain's reassurance facing their existential concerns. "What can you predict in the future for our planet?" Olivia from California asked. "What happens when our planet dies? Is there any other planet out there that can sustain life as well as Earth can? I think that's pretty unsettling," asked a Yasahura pupil, writing their I's with a heart and signing the letter "from a random flabbergasted kid." Some shared personal fears and experiences in school: bullies, feeling unintelligent or ostracized from their peers. "I love being me, but others stop me from doing that, what advice do you have?" a California sixth-grader asked. Many kids see themselves in McClain, hailing from Spokane with the same lifelong fantasies of space travel. "You've completed my childhood dream, thank you," one letter reads. "You should know that you are helping kids pursue their dreams while you are pursuing your own dreams," Yasuhara's Isabella Turner wrote. "I just want you to know you have made the biggest impact on showing young women and girls they can make their dreams come true," Abbigail White wrote from Yasuhara. Even those outside of Washington feel her inspiration as a female astronaut. "The thought of becoming a professional scientist has always appeared as an unrealistic dream, but after constantly watching and reading about the steps you took and the obstacles you overcame have shown me that an unrealistic dream can become a guaranteed career with a determined mindset like yours," wrote Valentina, a sixth-grader from Mark Twain Middle School in California. "Now, every challenge that I encounter appears as another opportunity to be more like you." The letters included a chorus of support and appeals to safety. Kids sent prayers, reminders to stay smart and sane. Resoundingly, a sense of pride emanated from letters, Yasahura students giddy at the thought that someone who went to school right across the street from them at Gonzaga prep is headed to space for the second time. "Know that everyone at Yasuhara and everyone in Spokane is cheering for you all the way," wrote Elsie King in red colored pencil with a drawing of a NASA spacecraft. "Have fun and return back safe." Elena Perry's work is funded in part by members of the Spokane community via the Community Journalism and Civic Engagement Fund. This story can be republished by other organizations for free under a Creative Commons license. For more information on this, please contact our newspaper's managing editor.
