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LAKEPORT, Calif. – A crash the blocked Highway 29 in Lakeport early Wednesday afternoon resulted in minor injuries for some of those involved.
The California Highway Patrol reported that the crash occurred just before 1 p.m. at the intersection of Highway 29 and Highway 175 at the Hopland Grade.
The roadway was blocked for just over a half hour as the CHP and firefighters worked at the scene.
The CHP said minor injuries resulted, but more specific information was not immediately available.
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EUREKA, Calif. – U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) scientists will present their initial results of a groundwater study based on 58 wells sampled from June through November 2009 in portions of Mendocino, Lake, Napa, Del Norte, and Humboldt counties at a meeting in Eureka this week.
The meeting is set for Thursday, January 27, from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. at the Humboldt Bay Municipal Water District, 828 Seventh St. in Eureka, according to a Tuesday statement from the agency.
The study was part of the USGS’s National Water Quality Assessment (NAWQA) program and the State Water Resources Control Board’s Groundwater Ambient Monitoring and Assessment (GAMA) Program.
A nationwide program, NAWQA tracks the status and trends in the quality of freshwater streams and aquifers to provide a sound understanding of the natural and human factors that affect the quality of these resources (http://ca.water.usgs.gov/nawqa.html).
The Northern Coast Ranges study fits into a regional assessment NAWQA is doing of coastal groundwater basins throughout California (http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/2005/3013/).
The GAMA Program’s Priority Basin Project (http://www.waterboards.ca.gov/gama/) has sought to improve comprehensive statewide groundwater monitoring and to increase the availability of groundwater-quality information to the public.
The USGS is the technical lead for the GAMA Priority Basin project, which monitors and assesses the quality of groundwater used for public supply (http://ca.water.usgs.gov/gama/ ).
With the voluntary cooperation of local water agencies and well owners, USGS is testing untreated groundwater in over 2,000 wells in California from 2004 through 2011.
The Northern Coast Ranges study unit includes several California Department of Water Resources-defined groundwater basins in Mendocino, Lake, Napa, Colusa, Glenn, Del Norte, Trinity and Humboldt counties, including the Smith River Plain, Mad River Valley, Eureka Plain, Fort Bragg Terrace, Ukiah Valley, and Big Valley.
While scientists have not completed their full report, they will discuss some of their initial findings at the meeting.
Their completed report is expected to be available in the Spring of 2011.
The GAMA Program Priority Basin Project is characterizing raw water quality in groundwater basins and aquifers. GAMA does not evaluate the quality of water delivered to consumers, since public water systems typically treat (or mix) it to meet drinking water standards.
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LOWER LAKE, Calif. – An elderly Lower Lake woman who was the subject of a search that launched followed her disappearance late Tuesday has been found alive.
Donalda Thompson, 85, was located by a Mendocino County Search and Rescue team assisting in the search effort just after 11 a.m. Wednesday, according to Capt. James Bauman of the Lake County Sheriff's Office.
Thompson, who suffers from dementia, was reported missing Tuesday night from her May Hollow Road home in Lower Lake by her daughter. Bauman said Thompson's daughter had last seen her mother Tuesday morning when she left for work, but when she returned that evening Thompson was gone.
A search and rescue operation subsequently was activated at about 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Bauman said.
Bauman said that throughout Tuesday night and into Wednesday morning volunteers from Lake County Search and Rescue and the Kelseyville K-Corps searched the area of Thompson’s 12-acre property and the general Lower Lake area with negative results.
He said Search and Rescue coordinators also arranged for additional resources to respond from outside the county and deploy this morning.
By 9 a.m. Wednesday Search and Rescue teams from Sacramento, Colusa, Glenn, Napa, Sonoma and Mendocino counties had responded to render mutual aid, Bauman said.
Additional resources joining the search included Search and Rescue Explorers from the East Bay area, a blood hound team from the Placerville Police Department and local California Highway Patrol officers, he reported. Search and Rescue teams from Alameda County also were committed to respond if the search was to extend to a second day.
The Sheriff’s Mobile Command Center was brought in and set up on Ployez Winery property near Highway 29, said Bauman, who added that Search and Rescue teams from Contra Costa County were still en-route and a CHP helicopter was about to go airborne when Thompson was located.
At about 11:05 a.m. Wednesday, one of the vehicle teams from Mendocino County Search and Rescue found Thompson sitting on the ground near a dirt road in the hills, about one mile northwest of her home, Bauman said.
Thompson was incoherent and had some superficial injuries, but Bauman said she was otherwise relatively unharmed given her ordeal.
She was initially assessed and transported to the command center where medics from Lake County Fire were waiting. Bauman said she was ultimately transported to Saint Helena Hospital Clearlake for further evaluation.
Bauman said Thompson was unable to speak to her ordeal.
He said the Lake County Sheriff’s Office offered its deepest gratitude to the men and women of local Search and Rescue teams, the Kelseyville K-Corps, local assisting agencies, and particularly those SAR teams and SAR Explorers responding from outside the county, who contributed to an efficient and successful operation.
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LOWER LAKE, Calif. – The Lake County Sheriff's Office issued an alert for a missing Lower Lake woman late Tuesday night.
Officials are looking for 85-year-old Donalda Thompson, who is reported to suffer from dementia.
Thompson was last seen at about 7 a.m. Tuesday, according to the report.
She is 4 feet, 6 inches tall, weights 110 pounds, has gray hair and blue eyes.
Thompson may be wearing a long beige coat and in possession of a brown purse.
Anyone who sees her or locates her is asked to contact the Lake County Sheriff's Office at 707-263-2690.
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UKIAH, Calif. – A local man was the victim of an early morning stabbing on Monday, and Mendocino County officials are trying to locate a suspect in the case.
Mendocino County Sheriff's Capt. Kurt Smallcomb said 34-year-old James Blesio of Nice was the victim of the alleged attack.
Smallcomb said that around 1 a.m. Monday Mendocino County Sheriff's deputies were dispatched to Ukiah Valley Medical Center regarding a stabbing victim.
When the deputies arrived at the hospital they contacted Blesio in the emergency room. Smallcomb said medical personnel were attending to a stab wound to the center of Blesio's chest.
Blesio told deputies that he was at the dam area of Lake Mendocino talking with two friends at around midnight on Monday morning when he saw a Hispanic male subject walking near the bathrooms of the dam. Smallcomb said Blesio recounted calling out to the subject, who he thought he knew.
The suspect allegedly approached Blesio and stabbed him in the chest. Smallcomb said Blesio fell to the ground and the Hispanic male left the area. Afterward, Blesio's two friends took him to the Ukiah Valley Medical Center emergency room.
Smallcomb said Blesio became uncooperative during the interview and it is unknown exactly where the crime occurred. Both the north and south side of Lake Mendocino were searched for evidence, but nothing was located.
The suspect was not identified or located, Smallcomb added.
Blesio later was transported to Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital for further treatment of his injuries, Smallcomb said.
Anyone with any information on the stabbing is requested to contact Deputy Troy Furman of the Mendocino County Sheriff's Office at 707-463-4086.
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SACRAMENTO – The California Department of Water Resources, which is preparing to conduct its second snow survey of the year later this week, said that while it's been a dry January the state's critical snowpack remains above average.
DWR will conduct its second manual snow survey of the winter on the morning of Friday, Jan. 28, at Phillips Station on Highway 50 near Lake Tahoe.
Electronic readings indicate that snowpack water content has changed little this month, so far gaining only about an inch since Jan. 1, the agency said.
The water content is 79 percent of the April 1 seasonal average, which DWR said compares to an average reading of 55 percent taken on Tuesday.
January has been unusually dry after the heavy storms of October, November and December, recording only about 13 percent of average precipitation for the month, DWR reported.
“Our always-changing weather reminds us that we must always practice conservation,” said DWR Director Mark Cowin.
“We’re still optimistic we will have a good water supply year, but we’re only halfway through the winter and still face uncertainty about delivery restrictions as well as the weather,” Cowin added.
DWR estimated it will be able to deliver 60 percent of requested State Water Project (SWP) water this year. The estimate will be adjusted as hydrologic and regulatory conditions continue to develop.
In 2010, the SWP delivered 50 percent of a requested 4,172,126 acre-feet, up from a record-low initial projection of 5 percent due to lingering effects of the 2007-2009 drought. Deliveries were 60 percent of requests in 2007, 35 percent in 2008, and 40 percent in 2009.
The last 100 percent allocation – difficult to achieve even in wet years due to pumping restrictions to protect threatened and endangered fish – was in 2006, the agency reported.
The SWP delivers water to more than 25 million Californians and nearly a million acres of irrigated farmland.
DWR said the mountain snowpack provides approximately one-third of the water for California’s households, industry and farms as it slowly melts into streams and reservoirs.
Manual surveys are conducted up and down the state’s mountain ranges on or about the first of January, February, March, April and May. The manual surveys supplement and provide accuracy checks to real-time electronic readings as the snowpack builds, then melts in early spring and summer. April 1 is when snowpack water content normally is at its peak before the spring runoff.
California’s reservoirs are fed both by rain and snowpack runoff.
Most of the state’s major reservoirs are above normal storage levels for the date, the agency said.
Lake Oroville in Butte County, the SWP’s principal reservoir, is 102 percent of average for the date, which DWR said puts the reservoir at 67 percent of capacity. Remaining winter weather will determine whether it fills to its 3.5 million acre-foot capacity.
Lake Shasta north of Redding, the federal Central Valley Project’s largest reservoir with a capacity of 4.5 million acre-feet, is at 112 percent of average, or 76 percent of capacity, DWR said.
Statewide snowpack readings are available on the Internet at http://cdec.water.ca.gov/cgi-progs/snow/DLYSWEQElectronic . Reservoir level readings may be found at http://cdec.water.ca.gov/cdecapp/resapp/getResGraphsMain.action .
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