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Smoke from Canadian wildfires returns to Massachusetts, ‘Air Quality Alert’ issued for region

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:57:30 GMT

After smoke from the Canadian wildfires sparked hazy skies and a strong smell across the region last week, another round from that large plume of smoke will impact the Bay State on Tuesday.The air may have the smell of smoke at times on Tuesday, as Massachusetts environmental officials have issued an “Air Quality Alert” until midnight on Tuesday.“AIR QUALITY: Smoke from Canadian wildfires over our region will likely elevate fine particle levels into the Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups range over much of the State,” the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection’s forecast reads.“An Air Quality Alert will be posted for these elevated PM2.5 levels for the midnight to midnight period Tuesday,” MassDEP added.The significant smoke from the Canadian wildfires might lead to a hazy sun during the day.Related ArticlesLocal News | Massachusetts State Police investigating ‘several suspicious fires’ in Blue Hills Reservat...

Boston will spend $4M to connect 1,000 residents to life sciences jobs

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:57:30 GMT

Boston is now considered to be the world’s largest hub for biotechnology, but many residents still “feel deeply disconnected” from the opportunities created by this local life sciences sector, Mayor Michelle Wu said.The city, with the help of a $4 million grant, is looking to bridge that gap by establishing a new workforce initiative designed to train and get 1,000 Boston residents hired into the life sciences industry by 2025, Wu announced Monday at the outset of the BIO International Convention in Boston.“We are a city committed to innovation for community, for the good of our people and the good of the public,” Wu said. “We know that in the years ahead the regional life sciences industry will need thousands of new workers, and they continue to grow right here in Boston.“And as the world’s leading life sciences hub, Boston must be prepared to meet that demand by drawing on the talent that lives right here in our city today. “Standing alongside life science leaders in the Boston Co...

Ravens, Laquon Treadwell agree to 1-year deal, giving Baltimore 5 former first-round picks at wide receiver

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:57:30 GMT

The Ravens continue to add to their wide receiver depth.Free agent receiver Laquon Treadwell and Baltimore have agreed on a one-year deal, his agent confirmed on Monday.A first-round pick by the Minnesota Vikings in 2016, the 27-year-old played for the Seahawks last season. He appeared in six games and caught six passes for 42 yards in 138 offensive snaps; he also played 41 on special teams. He was on the New England Patriots’ and Arizona Cardinals’ practice squads last season before joining the Seahawks’ in November and being promoted to the active roster in December.Treadwell, who spent four years in Minnesota after being drafted out of Mississippi, had his most productive season in 2021 when he played for the Jacksonville Jaguars. In 12 games, including seven starts, he caught 33 passes for 434 yards and one touchdown.He also had 35 catches for 302 yards and a touchdown in 15 games, seven of them starts, for the Vikings in 2018.Treadwell joins a deep group of Ra...

‘Cheers’ bar sells for $675,000 

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:57:30 GMT

DALLAS — The bar from the television series “Cheers” sold for $675,000 at auction over the weekend, garnering the highest bid among the nearly 1,000 props, costumes and sets from classic TV shows offered up from a collection amassed by one man over more than three decades.Heritage Auctions said that the items sold during its three-day event that wrapped up Sunday in Dallas brought in over $5 million. James Comisar has said that after his dream of creating a museum to house his collection failed to come together, it was time for the pieces to go to fans to enjoy.“The auction’s success confirmed what I have always known: that television characters are cherished members of our extended family and that their stories and our own are inseparable,” Comisar said in a news release from the auction house.Among other items on the block, the Batman and Robin costumes worn by Adam West and Burt Ward in the 1960s television series went for $615,000, while the set whe...

Revenue rebounds after steep drop in April

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:57:30 GMT

State tax revenues surpassed expectations in May after a steep nosedive in April, yet the total haul remains hundreds of millions of dollars short of projections with the budget year drawing to a close, officials said Monday.The Department of Revenue announced that Massachusetts collected $2.706 billion in May 2023, an increase of $236 million or 9.5% over May 2022 and $169 million or 6.7% above the most recent benchmark projection for the month.That’s a bounceback after April, when tax collections dropped more than $2 billion from the prior year, causing both supporters and opponents of tax relief bills to suggests plans be reevaluated.Healey administration officials signaled at the time they were optimistic they would not need to cut government spending to make up the potential year-end revenue shortfall, particularly given the sizable amounts of money in state savings accounts.Massachusetts has collected about $35.026 billion in taxes through the first 11 months of fiscal 2...

Historic day for Bishop Feehan girls golf

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:57:30 GMT

LONGMEADOW — When Carol Pignato and her friends won the South sectional girls golf title just last week, it was a dream scenario. In Bishop Feehan’s inaugural spring season as a program, the Shamrocks had already made history on a grand level.Now, she and her teammates can add one more piece of hardware to the trophy case at 70 Holcott Drive — a state championship. The senior led the way by shooting a 78 on the day (6-over-par), as the Shamrocks simply followed things up by winning it all in convincing fashion at Longmeadow Country Club.“It feels great,” said Pignato. “Kind of unreal at the moment, but we are all super excited. We put up some great scores today.”You can say that again. In addition to Pignato, the Shamrocks had two other individuals finish with scores under 90, with Nora Charnley (83) and Hanley Correia (84) also having sustained success. This all came in spite of the dramatic dips and dives that are generally associated with playing at Longmeadow.“Just (about) keepi...

Lawyer: Suspect in Natalee Holloway disappearance to challenge extradition from Peru to US

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:57:30 GMT

LIMA, Peru (AP) — The lawyer for the main suspect in the unsolved 2005 disappearance of American student Natalee Holloway on Monday said his client has changed his mind and plans to challenge his extradition to the United States.Defense attorney Máximo Altéz announced the decision of Dutchman Joran van der Sloot just hours after the Peruvian government confirmed the extradition would take place Thursday. Altéz said van der Sloot reversed course following a meeting with Dutch diplomats.“He does not want to be extradited to the United States of America,” Altéz said, adding that he intended to file a writ of habeas corpus. “He was visited today by his embassy (representatives) who made him see the mistake he was making by being extradited without due process.”The attorney said van der Sloot was never notified of an open extradition process, and as a result, was not able to challenge it. Less than a week ago, Altéz had said his client explained in a letter he did not plan to challenge t...

Chinese ex-official’s wife says alleged repatriation pressure turned her life in US ‘upside-down’

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:57:30 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — A former Chinese official and his wife had left their homeland and kept their U.S. address private. Yet eight years later, two strangers were banging on their New Jersey front door and twisting the handle, the wife testified in a U.S. court Monday.When the men left and Liu Fang opened the door, she found an ominous note telling her husband that if he returned to China and served 10 years in prison, his wife and children would be OK.If the lock hadn’t held, “what happens if they were able to come in?” she wondered aloud, through a court interpreter, at the criminal trial of a man who helped post the note and two co-defendants. The co-defendants are charged with playing other roles in an alleged campaign to hound ex-official Xu Jin into returning to China. Prosecutors say the defendants and others subjected the couple, their adult daughter and various relatives to a spate of intimidating overtures at Beijing’s behest, as part of a repatriation initiative ca...

Permit-to-purchase: Oregon’s tough new gun law faces federal court test

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:57:30 GMT

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — A federal trial over Oregon’s voter-approved gun control measure opened Monday in Portland, marking a critical next step for one of the toughest gun control laws in the nation after months of being tied up in the courts.The trial, which is being held before a judge and not a jury, will determine whether the law violates the U.S. Constitution. It comes after a landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision on the Second Amendment that has upended gun laws across the country, dividing judges and sowing confusion over what firearm restrictions can remain on the books. It changed the test that lower courts had long used for evaluating challenges to firearm restrictions, telling judges that gun laws must be consistent with the “historical tradition of firearm regulation.”The Oregon measure’s fate is being carefully watched as one of the first new gun restrictions passed since the Supreme Court ruling last June.The legal battle over in Oregon could well last beyond the trial. ...

Loss of oxygen in cabin may have led to Virginia plane crash, experts say

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:57:30 GMT

RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — A loss of oxygen is a leading theory for why an unresponsive business jet flew off course and over the nation’s capital Sunday before it crashed in rural Virginia. But federal investigators are just beginning to look for answers, and experts cautioned against jumping to conclusions. The Cessna Citation took off from Elizabethton, Tennessee, headed for Long Island’s MacArthur Airport. Once over Long Island, it inexplicably turned around and headed south, flying straight over Washington, D.C. before crashing in Virginia, k illing the pilot and three passengers.“By far the most likely suspect is some sort of a pressurization issue,” said William Waldock, a professor of safety science who teaches aircraft accident investigation at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Prescott, Arizona. “It went up to 34,000 feet and basically stayed there — all the way up, all the way back,” Waldock said. “The turn (away from New York and back south) is a little perplexing....