NBC 5 reporter Scott Gordon blogs on daily news events and other subjects.
OK, so we all blew the forecast on the ice hitting the Metroplex this morning. In defense of the meteorologists, it’s an inexact science. A degree or two swing can make all the difference.
Anyway, isn’t it better to predict it and have it not happen, than to miss the prediction and have a surprise major storm?
The weather folks do their best to predict what will happen, but sometimes Mother Nature throws everyone a surprise curve!
One of the most common comments I get from people who recognize me from TV is “you’re that guy who they always send out to cover the bad weather.” They usually say it as if it were a punishment.
Actually, the weather is fun. Hurricanes will get your adrenaline flowing like nothing else. Tornadoes are always an adventure. Even ice storms and thunderstorms can be exciting.
Weather is also serious business. It’s important to people. Nothing else is more important than knowing if a tornado is headed your way, or what the roads will be like for the morning commute.
Sometimes, covering the weather can be a challenge. The secret is being in the right spot at the right time.
As I write this, we’re gearing up to cover an ice storm. Photographer Linda Angelle and I just drove 90 miles to Eastland, but the rain is moving in slower than expected. Now, we’re heading back to Fort Worth. We’re thinking the rain should hit Fort Worth shortly before news time, so we’ll have to work fast.
For those of you following the UFO story, this afternoon’s announcement from the U.S. military is nothing short of a bombshell. A huge twist in a crazy story.
After denying time and again that any military planes were in the area of Stephenville, Texas, the night of January 8th, the Air Force says 10 F-16’s were there after all, training. And at exactly the time many people reported seeing strange lights in the sky. A spokesman, Maj. Karl Lewis, blames the mistake on “an internal communications error.”
Asked what took so long to correct the mistake, Maj. Lewis told me he has been “out of the office” and that “procedures had to be followed.” Interestingly, he wouldn’t describe what kind of training the F-16’s were doing, or if it was anything other than “routine.” He also refuses to do any on-camera interviews after saying earlier this afternoon he would possibly call a news conference to clear everything up.
I’m off to Stephenville to get reaction. Below is the complete e-mailed news release. The misspelling of “alleged” in the headline is as it was written in the release.
RELEASE NO. 001
January 23, 2008
F-16s found flying during alledged Stephenville UFO sighting
NAVAL AIR STATION JOINT RESERVE BASE FORT WORTH, Texas – In the interest of public awareness, Air Force Reserve Command Public Affairs realized an error was made regarding the reported training activity of military aircraft.
Ten F-16s from the 457th Fighter Squadron were performing training operations from 6 to 8 p.m., Tuesday January 8, 2008 in the Brownwood Miltary Operating Area (MOA), which includes the airspace above Erath county.
A MOA is airspace designated for military training.
If you have questions, contact Maj. Karl Lewis, Public Affairs Officer
Tonight NBC 5 broke the story about a major internet provider, Charter Communications, accidentally erasing 14,000 e-mail accounts of customers from around the country. It happened on January 21st when a technician apparently clicked the wrong button during “routine maintenance.”
Customers are logging on to find every single one of their e-mails gone. Permanently deleted. One victim from Hurst told us she lost nearly everything important to her that she had stored in her account: Bills, family photos, e-mails from her son in college that she had wanted to save forever.
Victims like her are finding their mailboxes empty, their stored (and in some cases unread) e-mail replaced with a single new e-mail from Charter, “welcoming” them as if they were new customers. Later, a second letter apologized and explained that their lost e-mail could not be recovered.
The woman we met tonight isn’t a happy customer, and you can bet the other 14,000 customers who also may have lost everything aren’t pleased either.
A Charter spokesman pointed out the 14,000 deleted accounts are only a fraction of the company’s 2.4 million Internet users. He added Charter had taken steps to make sure this never happens again.
In this age of Web-based e-mail, let this be a warning about backing up your important stuff, and placing too much trust in the Internet providers to never make a mistake.
Question: How should Charter compensate its customers for what is clearly its screwup? Doesn’t the company owe the victims at least a free month or two? I asked the spokesman that question on the phone. He answered that right now the company has no such plans and is still in the “apologizing” phase.
I never imagined that one day in my reporting career, I’d be on the UFO beat.
For four days last week, I covered the frenzy over the UFO sightings around the Stephenville area. It’s amazing that even now, a week after the first reports, the story is still the “most popular” on our website. And viewers who swear they’ve seen UFO’s continue flooding us with e-mails.
It’s been the talk of our newsroom, and a lot of other places, since the story exploded on the world stage last Tuesday. What did those people see? Are they for real? Everyone wants to know the inside scoop.
Well, for what it’s worth, here’s my take.
The first people I interviewed, including a county constable and his 8-year-old son, seemed totally credible. There was no doubt in my mind they had seen something. They definitely saw some strange lights in the sky the night of January 8th. What it was may never be known.
But by Saturday, the number of people coming forward had grown, and frankly their stories were all over the map. Some said it was red. Others said blue. Some said it looked like a flying saucer. “Like two upside down plates,” one woman offered. Others insisted there was no saucer — just bright, flashing lights.
On Saturday afternoon, UFO buffs descended on Dublin, a town just south of Stephenville. Until now, Dublin’s claim to fame was selling small glass bottles of Dr Pepper, the kind with the real sugar. (It’s really good actually but not to digress.)
Anyway, an outfit called Mutual UFO Network called a meeting at the Dublin Rotary Club, and invited everyone who claimed they had witnessed the strange goings-on to share their stories. It turned into a bit of a circus. Two curious Fort Worth women brought their dogs dressed in aluminum foil.
The group’s “investigators” interviewed a number of people. And who knows? Maybe they will come up with some explanation for all this. First, they’ll need to sort through which accounts are credible. Clearly at least a few are the products of imaginations that are, well, out of this world.
In my reporting career, I’ve covered countless crimes, fires, and tornadoes. A little of everything. But I have to admit this UFO beat is brand new territory.
Such is the case about the rash of reports of a UFO in Stephenville. Dozens of credible people say they saw bright flashing lights shooting across the night sky last Tuesday.
I interviewed a county constable and his son who described it in detail. I’m convinced they and everyone else saw something. But what was it? I don’t have a clue.
Since I originally did the story yesterday, it’s gone global. All the cable news networks have been talking about it. It’s all over the Internet. A Google search of “Stephenville” and “UFO” will return more than 14,000 hits.
I’m headed back down to Stephenville to work on a follow-up report.
Somehow, though, I doubt we’ll find any answers. Sometimes, we are left to wonder.
Chances are you were like me this NFL Sunday. You wouldn’t have missed rooting on the Cowboys with family or friends in front of the biggest TV you could find. (Hopefully in HD!)
This wasn’t just any game. This was a divisional playoff game. It was do or die, and we fans were pumped. Our Boys were favored, and — despite the team’s pitiful post-season performance — we had confidence they would whip their New York rivals.
Tony Romeo had returned from his Mexico jaunt relaxed and ready to go. At least that’s what we were told. And the Jessica Simpson curse was over, right? The bad streak surely had ended.
As we sat in front of those screens eating wings and chili, we limped into halftime more or less upbeat. For the first time, Marion Barber started, and he seemed to shine. Even if T.O. wasn’t living up to his playmaker reputation.
With time ticking down to halftime, we were up by a touchdown.
The Giants rallied in the final seconds to tie the game, but we were still very much alive. Or so we thought.
What followed in the second half was a sad spectacle. We North Texans hung our heads lower and lower, as the Superbowl dream crumbled before our eyes. I’ll leave the blame game to the critics. There’s plenty of that to go around.
Love ‘em one week, hate ‘em the next, you have to admit they put on an entertaining show. This is, after all, just a game.
So, it’s the end of another season. And those of us who thought they just might go all the way this year will have to wait, at least until next.
Last Friday I profiled a very special woman named Lauren McCrary, an assistant gym teacher at Castleberry High School. Just before Thanksgiving, Lauren found out she has an aggresive form of leukemia and desperately needs a bone marrow transplant. Siblings are usually the best match.
Trouble is Lauren was adopted soon after she was born.
She and her twin brother, Ilya, were adopted in Mississippi by a family who moved to Granbury, Texas. Ilya is now getting tested to see if his bone marrow is a match. Doctors tell him the chances of a match are 25 percent.
To increase her odds, Lauren wanted to reach out to any other biological brothers or sisters, even though she has never met them. Incredibly, if they exist, they may not even know that Lauren exists.
The adoption agency in Mississippi basically told Lauren she would need a court order to open up her records. She worried she didn’t have the time to wait, or the money to pay for lawyers.
The response to the story was overwhelming. We were flooded with e-mails from people who wanted to help. Because of all that interest, I wanted to give you an update on the story.
Ilya called me Wednesday night with the news that the adoption agency had reversed course, and gave them the first name and phone number of a biological grandparent. Ilya said they were working to get in touch with the family they’ve never known, to ask if they will undergo testing. The odds of a match would go way up.
Meantime, they should find out early next week if Ilya’s bone marrow will work. Let’s hope it does. If not, then hopefully another biological sibling will be willing to get tested and will be a match. Lauren understands the urgency involved here.
A transplant would give Lauren a new life and, if successful, possibly a new blood type.
When I last saw Lauren last week in her room at Harris Methodist Hospital in Fort Worth, I told her I couldn’t wait to do a follow-up story when all goes well and she returns to work at the high school. That’s a promise I hope I can keep.
Want to know the inside scoop on your favorite restaurant or your kid’s daycare?
I just found out about a new website, run by the City of Fort Worth. The complete inspection reports are available online.
Click here for the Online Health Inspection Reports. Check it out. You can search by name, address, even zip code.
In this Internet age, it seems every governmental body should put this kind of information online for the citizens.
