1420 KJCK AM / 107.9 FM and the Brookside 4-H Club collected donations of non-perishable food items for the Food Pantry of Geary County on Saturday morning at the Walmart Supercenter on East Chestnut Street. During that time employees of Walmart donated a shopping cart full of items, something that they do periodically.
Manhattan firefighters responded to the Hilton Garden Inn at 410 South 3rd Street in Manhattan at 6:39 a.m. on Saturday for the report of a structure fire.
The Manhattan Fire Department reported that upon arrival crews found a fire in the laundry room of the Hilton Garden Inn. Crews determined the sprinkler system to the building had contained the fire to a commercial dryer unit and quickly extinguished the remaining fire. A total of 16 firefighters responded on six fire trucks with the last units clearing the scene at about 8 a.m.
The loss was estimated at $40,000 to the contents and $10,000 to the structure. The fire cause was determined to be accidental.
MANHATTAN — Law enforcement authorities are investigating a hit and run accident and asking the public for help with information.
Just after 5p.m. Friday, the Riley County Police Department responded to a vehicle vs. pedestrian accident near the intersection of Hunting and Denison. according to a media release.
The pedestrian was seriously injured and the vehicle involved left the scene.
The vehicle is described as a small white 4-door car.
We need anyone with information to contact the Riley County Police Department at (785) 537-2112 or Crime Stoppers at (785) 539-7777. Using the Crime Stoppers service allows you to remain anonymous and could qualify you for a cash reward of up to $1,000.00.
The Junction City Blue Jays used an agressive, pressing defense enroute to an 87-71 season opening win over the Dodge City Red Demons on Friday night at the Shenk Gym.
The Blue Jays forced turnovers and showed an impressive game in the win. Four Junction City players scored in double figures including A.J. Dickerson with 21 points followed by Darrin Battiste with 16, Qua’vez Humphreys 14 and Aaron Hamilton with 11 points.
Blue Jay coach Nick Perez said the team played really well at times, but needs to get better defensively. “We’ve got to get better defensively but I thought for our first game we played pretty well.”
Perez added, “I was proud of our guys you know they pressed the whole game. For being the first one that’s pretty because you’re not in your basketball shape.” One concern for Junction City was the substantial number of fouls they committed in the game.
The Blue Jays play at Great Bend on Tuesday.
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The Junction City Lady Jays opened their season Friday night with a 55-22 loss to Dodge City at the Shenk Gym.
The inexperienced Lady Jay team trailed by 17 at halftime and did not score in the third quarter.
Lady Jay coach Derek Petty noted his team did not shoot the ball very well. “I think we started the game decently but then we kind of got a little tired. We didn’t play defense as well as we’re capable of playing. Ee gave up a lot of easy baskets, missed some easy shots, and that’s not a good formula to win a basketball game.”
The Lady Jays play at Great Bend on Tuesday.
MANHATTAN — Along with a warming climate and intensified human activities, recent water storage in global landlocked basins has undergone a widespread decline. A new study reveals this decline has aggravated local water stress and caused potential sea level rise.
The study, “Recent Global Decline in Endorheic Basin Water Storage,” was carried out by a team of scientists from six countries and appears in the current issue of Nature Geoscience.
“Water resources are extremely limited in the continental hinterlands where streamflow does not reach the ocean. Scientifically, these regions are called endorheic basins,” said Jida Wang, a Kansas State University geographer and the study’s lead author.
Using gravity observations from NASA/German Aerospace Center’s Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment, or GRACE, satellites, Wang and his colleagues quantified a net water loss in global endorheic basins of approximately 100 billion tons of water per year since the start of the current millennium. This means a water mass equivalent to five Great Salt Lakes or three Lake Meads is gone every year from the arid endorheic regions.
Surprisingly, this amount of endorheic water loss is double the rate of concurrent water changes across the remaining landmass except Greenland and Antarctica, Wang said. Opposite to endorheic basins, the remaining regions are exorheic, meaning streamflow originating from these basins drains to the ocean. Exorheic basins account for most of the continental surface and are home to many of the world’s greatest rivers, such as the Nile, Amazon, Yangtze and Mississippi.
Wang noted that the signature of water storage changes in exorheic basins resembles some prominent oscillations of the climate system, such as El Niño and La Niña in multiyear cycles. However, the water loss in endorheic basins appears less responsive to such short-term natural variability. This contrast may suggest a profound impact of longer-term climate conditions and direct human water management, such as river diversion, damming and groundwater withdrawal, on the water balance in the dry hinterlands.
This endorheic water loss has dual ramifications, according to the researchers. Not only does it aggravate water stress in the arid endorheic regions, but it could also contribute to a significant factor of global environmental concern: sea level rise. Sea level rise is a result of two main causes: thermal expansion of sea water as a result of increased global temperature, and additional water mass to the ocean.
Despite an observation period of 14 years, the endorheic water loss equals an additional sea level rise of 4 millimeters, the study found. The researchers said this impact is nontrivial. It accounts for approximately 10 percent of the observed sea level rise during the same period; compares to nearly half of the concurrent loss in mountain glaciers, excluding Greenland and Antarctica; and matches the entire contribution of global groundwater consumption.
By synergizing multi-mission satellite observations and hydrological modeling, Wang and his colleagues attributed this global endorheic water loss to comparable contributions from the surface — such as lakes, reservoirs and glaciers — as well as soil moisture and aquifers.
“Such comparable losses are, however, an aggregation of distinct regional variations,” Wang said. “In endorheic Central Eurasia, for instance, about half of the water loss came from the surface, particularly large terminal lakes such as the Aral Sea, the Caspian Sea and Lake Urmia, and retreating glaciers in High Mountain Asia.”
While glacial retreat was a response to warming temperature, water losses in the terminal lakes were a combined result of meteorological droughts and long-term water diversions from the feeding rivers.
The net water loss in endorheic Sahara and Arabia, on the other hand, was dominated by unsustainable groundwater withdrawal, according to the researchers. In endorheic North America, including the Great Basin of the U.S., a drought-induced soil moisture loss was likely responsible for most of the regional water loss. Despite a lesser extent, the surface water loss in the Great Salt Lake and the Salton Sea was at a substantial rate of 300 million tons per year, which was partially induced by mineral mining and diversion-based irrigation.
Read more about the research and see the full list of collaborators.
This research was supported by the Kansas State University faculty start-up fund, NASA Surface Water and Ocean Topography, or SWOT, Grant; China’s Thousand Young Talents Program; and the NASA Sea Level Change team. A portion of this research was conducted at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under contract with NASA.
The ribbon cutting for the new I.C.A.R.E. multigenerational exercise equipment in the 5th Street Park in Junction City on Saturday has been cancelled due to inclement weather..
This equipment will allow adults to use the exercise equipment while their children are also exercising and playing in the park.
I.C.A.R.E. works to connect generations in meaningful activities and to enable youth and older adults to learn from each other.
K-Staters have helped put 10,000 official K-State license plates on the road.
The University confirmed that since the official K-State license plate program began 22 years ago, the tax-deductible royalties paid on the license plates have raised more than $4.2 million for student scholarships and recognition of achievements.
As part of their search for a new Superintendent of Schools, USD 475 officials have scheduled three meet and greet events which will be open to the public. They are scheduled next Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday evenings ( Dec. 4-6 ) at Junction City Middle School. Members of the Geary County Schools workforce and the community at large are invited to attend each night, and participate in the question and answer sessions.
The first candidate will be available on Tuesday from 5:30 – 6:30 p.m., the second candidate on Wednesday from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. and the third candidate on Thursday from 5:30 – 6:30 p.m.
The school district plans to release the names of each candidate the day before their respective meet and greet event.
In addition to those community events, each candidate will also tour three district schools during the day and interview with the Geary USD 475 Board of Education on their respective evening. The interviews will be held during an executive session beginning at 6:45 p.m. each night. Those interviews will be held at the Mary Devin Center for Educational Support.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has notified Manhattan City officials that $18,494,400 will be awarded to fund improvements to Manhattan’s levee system in fiscal year 2019. The total cost of the project will be nearly $26 million, and City officials have several options to cover the remaining $7.5 million.
“We would especially like to thank Senator Moran’s office for working with us to achieve this funding award. The Manhattan community will be stronger and more protected because of this effort,” said City Manager Ron Fehr.
The Manhattan levee system provides fortification to 1,600 acres of land, 7,600 residents and protects a total economic impact estimated at $1.2 billion.
The intent of the project is to raise the levee along the Big Blue River from the intersection of Casement Road and Hayes Drive, south to the confluence of the Kansas River and Big Blue River, and wrap around upstream to just west of the Wastewater Treatment Plant facility.
When completed, the levee project will increase the level of protection from flooding events along both the Blue and Kansas rivers, as well as replace several structures and equipment along the levee that were installed with the original project in the early 1960’s.
Construction of the project could begin as soon as 2020 and is estimated to be completed by 2025. Linear Trail will remain on top of the levee and access to certain portions of the trail will be restricted during the construction phase.
“The USACE project will increase the reliability of the levee system to protect our only water and wastewater treatment plant facilities. Those facilities service not only the City of Manhattan but many other customers in Riley and Pottawatomie Counties. Updating and replacing gate well structures, increasing levee height, adding new relief wells and reinforcement berms only adds to the level of protection for future events that would threaten Manhattan,” says Manhattan Public Works Director Robert Ott.
A study conducted by USACE in 2014 confirmed the need for improvements to the levee system in order to provide protection for a 100-year flood event.
The Geary County Sheriff’s Department has reported that Deputies responded to a two-vehicle injury accident in the 7000 block of Old Highway 77 at 5:39 p.m. Thursday. Haile Mccumber, Milford was traveling south bound in a 2016 Chrysler 200 and struck the rear of a 2006 Nissan Xterra driven by Brandon Muhammad, Junction City. Minor injuries were reported to a juvenile passenger in the Chrysler.
Just three minutes after the first accident Deputies also responded to a two-vehicle non-injury accident in the 700 block of Old Highway 77. Tanner Inglis, Fort Riley, was traveling south bound in a 2014 Dodge Ram and struck the rear of a 2018 Volkswagen Atlas driven by Kristen Grijalva, Fort Riley who was stopped in traffic.
