It’s time to take a look at what’s happening around Wyoming for Thursday, October 30th. Bringing you headlines from the Cowboy State Daily news center, I’m Mac Watson. “Brought to you by the Wyoming Business Council. Wyoming youth are our future, but they're leaving the state at ALMOST TWICE the national average. What would bring them back home? Share your bold ideas with the Wyoming Business Council at wbc dot P U B forward slash story."
–
An investigation into the June shooting death of a Pine Bluffs crop duster and former university-level rodeo athlete is now closed. Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland reports that the Laramie County Sheriff’s Office announced Wednesday that Patrick Gross acted in self-defense.
“Laramie County Sheriff's Office released this statement describing the incident where Kevin Hefley charged Patrick Gross with his truck, and the trucks collided, and then Hefley gets out of his truck and attacks Gross in the driver's seat of his truck and is punching him. Gross shot Hefley during this time, and Hefley, while sustaining this gunshot injury for a short while, actually clung to the moving truck and continued the attack, according to the sheriff's department’s Wednesday release, and then he succumbed to his injury.”
Wyoming’s self-defense laws say a person has the right to use reasonable force, including deadly force, when facing an imminent threat of death or serious injury. The sheriff department said in a statement that “Gross believed he was in immediate danger and acted accordingly.”
Read the full story HERE.
–
The federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission has found that the Bill Gates-backed Kemmerer Natrium project poses no adverse impact to the environment. Cowboy State Daily’s Jackson Walker reports that this is a major step forward for the project.
“This distinction is a huge victory for Project organizers, due to the fact that this is the first such facility, commercial facility, to receive such a distinction. Now this is another crucial hurdle in the project step of being fully certified by the NRC, the final step of which is expected to be completed later this year, which is a safety review of the entire project.”
TerraPower President and CEO Chris Levesque is cheering the announcement. In an email to Cowboy State Daily, Levesque writes “TerraPower has been committed to bringing the next generation of nuclear power to fruition, and this announcement from the NRC is a testament to our team’s dedication and rigor in meeting all federal licensing requirements.”
Read the full story HERE.
–
Much to the relief of the people who live in Green River, the westbound Green River Tunnel reopened to traffic on Wednesday. It comes more than eight months after a fiery and fatal 26-vehicle crash burned and damaged it. But as Cowboy State Daily’s Scott Schwebke reports, not everyone is celebrating.
“There was a 21 year old woman who was seriously injured in the crash, and she's now suing three trucking companies all for negligence. I don't know the amount of the damage they're seeking. The attorneys wouldn't release that, but the case is pending in district court Sweetwater County.”
Back on Valentine’s Day of this year, a Toyota Tundra pickup lost control just as it exited the westbound tunnel on Interstate 80 outside of Green River. That sparked a 26-vehicle, triple-fatal pileup, according to the National Transportation Safety Board’s preliminary report.
Read the full story HERE.
–
The Laramie County Sheriff’s Office arrested a pair of undocumented truck drivers Tuesday for suspected immigration violations. Cowboy State Daily’s Jackson Walker reports that the sheriff’s office says they’re examples of the work being done by the department’s new immigration task force.
“Laramie County Sheriff Brian Kozak announced that his department on Tuesday, arrested two individuals suspected of being non citizens here in Wyoming, one individual was driving a truck from Colorado to Wyoming and attempting to escape detection at the port of entry when they were pulled over. It was discovered that this individual came from Venezuela and was operating the vehicle without required licenses, one of which was revoked due to a DUI…This individual is scheduled to be removed from the country back to their country of origin…The second individual, which Kozak said was arrested, was stopped for driving a dump truck that was overweight and did not comply with specific regulations from that vehicle. That individual allegedly hailed from Mexico and is also set to be deported.”
Sheriff Kozak is among 25 deputies in Laramie County that have been certified through a partnership with Immigration and Customs Enforcement in order to enforce immigration laws here in the state.
Read the full story HERE.
–
I’ll be back with more news, after this….
–
Wyoming hunters are saying it’s unfair when big game hunting tags in some areas all go to landowners. Cowboy State Daily’s Mark Heinz reports a legislative committee advanced a bill Wednesday that could cap landowner tag allocations at 40 percent under some circumstances.
“The issues that came up today is in certain hunt areas, it has happened, it's kind of a weird confluence of circumstances, but it has happened in some small hunt areas where all the tags have gone to landowners and none have been left over for the general public to draw from so game and fish that you know, and other people kind of want to keep that from happening without being punitive toward landowners, and so they, they've come up with this idea of maybe have, like, a percentage cap, like an extreme example, when you have a huge like, winter comes along and kills a whole bunch of big game animals, the number of hunting tags in that area is going to have to be cut.”
The Legislature’s Joint Agriculture, State, and Public Lands and Water Resources voted to forward a draft bill to potentially cap the number of landowner tags under such circumstances. An identical draft bill is up for consideration next month before the Joint Travel, Recreation, Wildlife, and Cultural Resources Committee.
Read the full story HERE.
–A wildlife photographer said she was mesmerized watching Yellowstone’s Wapiti wolf pack devour an elk near a road. Cowboy State Daily’s Andrew Rossi reports that at one point, a rack of ribs tried to make a getaway down the Yellowstone River, but one persistent wolf went in after it.
“As they tore the carcass apart, parts of it fell apart, and then a rack of ribs and a few other bones got carried away by the current of the Yellowstone River, and much like a dog trying to retrieve its tennis ball from the middle of the pool, this wolf waited out there and tried to grab it. The thing is, though wolves have sharp teeth, so once the wolf grabbed onto the carcass, it pulled away the flesh that it was using to try to drag it back to shore. So fortunately, it continued down river, but eventually made landfall again, and the wolves finished what they started in terms of getting all the meat off of that carcass. So just a rare and really unique thing to experience in Yellowstone, especially at this time of year, wolves tend to stay pretty far away from people during most of the season, but in this case, they happen to make a kill right by the Yellowstone River, right by the road, around mud volcano.”
Gardiner, Montana, resident and wildlife photographer April Mead tells Cowboy State Daily that her capturing this moment in nature is “a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”
Read the full story HERE.
–
Kai Montoya is a 2-year-old Laramie boy who loves Halloween. But Kai is fed through a tube after heart surgery at birth, which means he doesn’t want candy. Cowboy State Daily’s Dale Killingbeck reports that Kai loves different kinds of treats, just not the sugary kind.
“He had a heart heart defect when he was born, and so at 21 days, they put a feeding tube into him. He had open heart surgery at four days. And so his mom told me that since then, when they did the surgery, they had to move his vocal cords to be able to do whatever they had to do in the heart, and that affected his left vocal cord. So he, when he initially tried, they tried feeding in. Normally, he would just aspirate everything. And so they put a feeding tube in, and since then, he has not eaten orally, hardly at all…but skeletons and pumpkins and all the things about Halloween turn him on.”
Now mom tells Cowboy State Daily that Kai continues to get therapy related to eating and is trying to learn and understand the mechanics of chewing and swallowing but he’s not quite there. But he’s a typical 2-year-old boy who is excited about Halloween.
Read the full story HERE.
–
Some places in Wyoming usually get more snow on Halloween than on Christmas, but not this year. Cowboy State Daily’s Andrew Rossi reports that the not-so-frightening forecast for All Hallows' Eve calls for almost balmy temperatures, no precipitation, and no howling winds.
“Halloween and Wyoming really is a trick or treat. If you look through the historical record, some Halloweens are warm, with temperatures in the 60s. Other places in Wyoming are more prone to get more snow on Halloween than they are on Christmas. So it's really a mixed bag in terms of what you get, but this year's is going to be pretty mild, not too hot, not too cold, just right? So I guess it'd be the Tootsie Rolls of Halloweens. It's not the most exciting candy, but at least it's not an apple or box of raisins. It's going to be pretty mild, pretty safe, nothing to worry about, so everyone can have a scary good time without having to worry about a blizzard coming up behind them.”
Molly Gerhard with the National Weather Service Office in Riverton tells Cowboy State Daily that this Halloween season is drier than average. That's a stark difference from last year, when much of Wyoming already saw a few inches of snow.
Read the full story HERE.
–
And that’s today’s news. Get your free digital subscription to Wyoming's only statewide newspaper by hitting the Daily Newsletter button on Cowboy State Daily Dot Com - and you can watch this newscast every day by clicking Subscribe on our YouTube channel, or listen to us on your favorite podcast app. Thanks for watching - I’m Mac Watson, for Cowboy State Daily.
