Drill baby Drill!!!

What has taken so long to try and get back to drilling for oil and gas in our area? I believe we have lots of it. Heck, my drinking water even tastes/smells like crude oil, so I know it's here. Britta loves me :-)

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Lifestar helicopter found

about 75 miles southeast of Erie. The National Transportation Safety Board was at the crash scene.

What a shame. You know these crashes, the "smaller ones" you don't really hear much about unless you're a blogger. I don't ever have the time or money to read the newspaper, so if nothing else, I learn about the names of the companies who service our area. I find it interesting the blogging I've been doing.

So anyway, I'm glad they found this wreckage. Good for the families so they can carry on and I'm sorry it happened.

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Search for emergency helicopter called off due to darkness

BRADFORD, Pa. (AP) _ Rescue and recovery crews ran out of daylight Saturday and called off their search for an emergency medical helicopter that went missing while on a five-minute refueling flight Friday night.

he search was called off shortly after 6 p.m. due to darkness and misty conditions near Bradford Regional Airport, where the LifeStar helicopter was last in radio contact with the ground at 11:41 p.m. Friday, said Richard L. Gibbons, chief executive officer of Erie-based Emergycare Inc., which owns the helicopter.

The LifeStar helicopter left Kane Community Hospital, about 75 miles southeast of Erie, with only the pilot on board at 11:36 p.m. Friday. The helicopter was to refuel at Bradford Regional Airport but never landed even though the pilot had radioed to say he was on his final approach.

Emergency crews on the ground and in the air were to resume their search Sunday morning, Gibbons said. Crews were searching Saturday in the area northeast of the airport, where air traffic controllers in Cleveland last had contact with the helicopter.

LifeStar helicopters fly out of St. Vincent Medical Center and Hamot Medical centers in Erie and serve several counties in northwestern Pennsylvania, southwestern New York and northeastern Ohio, Gibbons said.

source:

Failed to pay $300 million in taxes

The founder of Adelphia Communications Corp. and his son, both already convicted of a massive fraud at the bankrupt cable-television company, have been indicted on charges they and other family members failed to pay $300 million in taxes.

Former Chief Executive Officer John J. Rigas failed to report income of $143 million and his son Timothy J. Rigas, the company's former chief financial officer, failed to report income of $239 million, according to a federal grand jury indictment unsealed in Williamsport, Pa., yesterday.

"They are not above the law," said Peter S. Alvarado, special agent in charge of the Internal Revenue Service criminal investigation division.

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I have such mixed emotions about this whole Adelphia thing but 300 million. Wow, how can such an error be ignored. I just don't understand and must be they didn't either. The bad part is they brought other people down with them and that's what irks me.

Vic Vena Pharmacy helps fellow man

Olean group driving three new “homes” to hurricane victims in Louisiana, so
if you see a trailer home outside Vic Vena Pharmacy for the next few days, don’t hesitate to put socks and flashlights in it.

The trailer is one of three that Mr. Vena and a handful of volunteers plan to personally deliver, loaded with needed items, to a fellow pharmacist’s employees who lost their homes in the wake of Hurricane Rita.

“We have three camping trailers going down,” Mr. Vena said. “That’s what those folks will probably live in for the next year to 18 months, at least.”

The trailers, attained through the help of Don Laird at Lime Lake Marine and RV in Machias, will house some of the five families who currently share the same two-bedroom apartment in Louisiana.

Mr. Vena said he couldn’t get the welfare of his friend Michael Casso off his mind after hurricanes Katrina and Rita rolled through the Gulf Coast. Mr. Casso, a clinical nutritionist and intravenous chemotherapy specialist, owns two wellness store pharmacies in Metairie, La. The two men became friends after attending natural medicine conferences in Dallas, Texas and Biloxi, Miss.

He contacted Mr. Casso after Katrina hit to see if he needed any help. Mr. Casso thanked him for his generosity, but said he and his family were fine.

“I asked if there was anything we could do,” said Mr. Vena. “He said, ‘No, we can’t even get UPS.’ I kind of gave up on the idea, actually.”

During the following hurricane, Rita, Mr. Vena said he heard from news reports that Mr. Casso’s area had received a tremendous storm surge and was actually shut down.

When he finally reached Mr. Casso again, the news wasn’t so promising.

“He was OK and his family was OK, he just seemed like something was on his mind,” said Mr. Vena. “I said, ‘Well, what’s the matter?’ And he told me, ‘Vic, all these families that work for me are homeless and I can’t do anything for them.”

“I sat back and said, ‘Wow, if my employees were homeless, how could I keep their morale up?’ All they had with them was their luggage when they evacuated.”

Mr. Casso told him the families were all crammed into a tiny apartment and were unable to purchase reasonable trailer homes due to price gouging.

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