Fire trucks have rushed back to the 17th SW house that burned this morning. More to come. 12:03 AM UPDATE: At the scene. Flareup out. Most trucks dismissed. House doesn’t look much worse than the gutted condition in which this morning’s fire left it. 12:33 AM UPDATE: Per the scanner, an engine will be staying there TFN on “fire watch.”
First thing this morning, volunteers were at work in the Fauntleroy Church parking lot, one of the venues for the annual Fauntleroy Fall Festival tomorrow (Sunday) afternoon. So far, the forecast looks perfect – brisk fall sunshine. The festival happens at multiple spots around the church/co-located YMCA (WSB sponsor) and the Fauntleroy Schoolhouse across the street, 2 pm-5:30 pm, with a long list of activities – we published the full schedule a week ago (you can see it here). There’s environmental learning for kids and adults, music and dancing, food (bring $) from purveyors including Tuxedos and Tennis Shoes Catering and Events (WSB sponsor), tours of the renovated church, pony rides for the youngest kids, a climbing wall for the older ones – even a chance to see the West Seattle Hi-Yu Festival 2010 float up close and personal. Again, the list’s here; the addresses are 9131 and 9140 California SW – here’s a map – but at this point, California is more like a bend in SW Barton, headed downhill from 35th SW toward the Endolyne business district, and the ferry dock.
Saturday night in The Junction, and the nightlife is usually centered around the restaurants and bars – but this evening, Click! Design That Fits (WSB sponsor) was the place to be. Two weeks after opening for business in their new, larger Junction store, proprietors John and Frances Smersh threw their official grand-opening party. The top photo was taken from the “mezzanine” overlooking the store’s main floor – it’s mostly administrative/storage space, but tonight it was DJ Cotton Candy‘s perch too:
Back down among the partygoers and merchandise, two young shoppers found a place to sit:
This is the seventh year in business in West Seattle for Click! – their sixth anniversary was October 1st, the day the new store at 4540 California SW opened its doors. T-shirts, anyone?
As WestSide Baby‘s car-seat-collection drive was wrapping up at 2 this afternoon, that dumpster was packed full of car seats for recycling – about 400 collected today and at a Ballard dropoff last Saturday. The dropoffs today also included about 50 reusable car seats:
Today’s drive is in an expansion facility that WestSide Baby is finally ready to start talking about in a big way – it’s a former auto shop right behind their 15th SW headquarters in White Center, but it fronts on 14th SW, and gives them lots more room to accept donations for local families, and for volunteers to work on sorting those donations, starting in early November. WestSide Baby’s Nancy Woodland explains that it means not only can they accept more items to distribute to local families in need, they also can separate the pickup and dropoff areas, making it easier for people on both ends of the equation to deal with WS Baby. The expansion building – which is being remodeled with donated materials and labors by many businesses, groups and individuals (including WSB sponsor West Seattle Design Build) – is at 10027 14th SW; it’s also where the diapers collected in last July’s Stuff the Bus were taken for storage (here’s our report with video). If you missed today’s car-seat event, by the way, no worries, Nancy says they hope to have more!
(Tailgating in the chilly sunshine before the game)
This weekend’s final local high-school football game is over – at West Seattle Stadium, it was Orcas Island 28, Seattle Lutheran High School 20. This was homecoming for the Saints, so lots of ceremony. ADDED SATURDAY NIGHT: Video (including the guest band from Chief Sealth) and more details after the jump:Read More
ORIGINAL 12:41 PM REPORT: Thanks to JayDee for the tip, confirmed by King County Department of Transportation: The West Seattle Water Taxi isn’t running right now, because of “mechanical problems.” KCDOT’s Rochelle Ogershok says there’s no word yet how soon they’ll be able to resume service. The West Seattle Water Taxi has been running on weekends with the Melissa Ann, which serves Vashon on weekdays, since the crash that idled its regular vessel Rachel Marie three weeks ago, while Argosy’s Sightseer has handled weekday runs. We’ll be monitoring this, but if you want to directly check the Melissa Ann’s status, you can use this “live” map with marine-traffic ID, which currently shows it still docked at Pier 50 downtown.
2:24 PM UPDATE: KCDOT has just announced that the West Seattle Water Taxi is canceled for the rest of today/tonight. They’re still saying “mechanical problems.”
10:24 PM UPDATE: In case you’re wondering, the county still has not announced whether there will or won’t be Water Taxi service tomorrow (keep an eye on this page).
(Scroll down for newest information – investigators have figured out how the fire started)
(Video substituted at 12:14 pm for previously published photo) ORIGINAL 11:12 AM REPORT: On our way to check out the house-fire call (7900 block of 17th SW – map). 11:23 AM UPDATE: We are at the scene, significant fire, front of house charred, smoke still coming out. No word yet if anyone is hurt. 11:34 AM UPDATE: Incident commander tells us everyone got out OK but a few firefighters are being checked out for possible minor injuries. It’s easy to see inside the front of the house from the street, and it appears gutted. It’ll be a while before investigators can say how it started. 12:16 PM NOTE: In comments, Mookie mentioned “decon” for firefighters on scene. Here’s what that consisted of:
We’ll update whenever the information’s available about the fire’s cause. 1:29 PM UPDATE:SFD confirms via Twitter that two firefighters had to be treated for “minor injuries.” 2:51 PM UPDATE: Update from SFD: The fire was accidental, started when someone tried to get a fire going in the fireplace and nearby “combustible materials” caught fire in the process. The house is considered “pretty much a total loss,” according to SFD’s Helen Fitzpatrick, with damage to home and contents estimated at $150,000. She also explains that the two firefighters who were hurt suffered ankle injuries from stepping out the back door into a “short drop” that had no stairs. 12:29 AM SUNDAY: Firefighters went back late Saturday night for a flare-up. It appeared to be out by the time we got there, with most of the dispatched trucks having been sent back.
Cindi Barker and Sharonn Meeks are two of the volunteers at the Fauntleroy Emergency Communications Hub (explained here), one of three hubs, along with Highland Park and Admiral, that are part of an earthquake drill this morning. It’s a followup to a May drill – meant to simulate what the hubs might deal with in the not-as-immediate aftermath of The Big One. The scenario given to volunteers is that it’s about 30 hours after a major quake hit the region, affecting power and transportation, and breaking or overloading major communications systems, so Community Hubs are up and running, and ham-radio teams are in action. Today’s participants are acting as if they are relieving the first group that’s been working since just after the quake, and have to deal with “a large amount of message traffic” – note the radio and the bulletin board in the photo. The volunteers will be attempting to relay those messages, among other parts of the drill. (This is the same one for which we put out a call for “actors.”) What can you do? Know where your nearest Emergency Communication Hub is – that’s where you would go to find out information and how to get help when the conventional ways of doing so have failed. Also, don’t just think of a disaster kit as “we’ll get around to it” – be ready now – weather disasters may be partly predictable, but earthquakes still aren’t. Find tips on the excellent, volunteer-created West Seattle Be Prepared website.
That’s Katie Salinas from Waste Management, photographed a week ago when we got full details about the car-seat collection events in which WM is partnering with WestSide Baby. Today is the big collection event for West Seattle/White Center and vicinity; between 10 am and 2 pm, take your no-longer-need car seat/booster seat to 10027 14th SW in White Center (that’s a block from WS Baby’s current location – here’s a map). If it’s in good-enough shape to reuse, that’ll happen; if not, it’ll be recycled. More details on the WS Baby website – which says the collection event in Ballard last weekend netted 50 reusable seats and almost 200 recyclable ones. Can West Seattle/White Center top that? Just hours to go.
Right about now, the Alaskan Way Viaduct should be shutting down for Day 1 of its two-day semi-annual inspection – 6 am to 6 pm, today and tomorrow. And as announced last night, the Spokane Street Viaduct‘s westbound lanes will close overnight tonight, 10 pm-5 am. But its eastbound lanes aren’t affected – and during the AWV closure, the new 4th Avenue offramp on that side should help you get downtown without having to go all the way to I-5.
News just down the block from WSB HQ right now. Somebody made a deafening racket crashing a VW Jetta through the DO NOT ENTER sign at California/Thistle (map), heading southbound on California (the dead-end direction in which you’re not supposed to enter), and ending up against the front steps of a house at California/Sullivan. Nobody hurt, but the driver, according to neighbors, took off, apparently northbound on California; the only description is male, in a white shirt. Police have been called. The car is still there in the stairs, DO NOT ENTER sign against its hood, smoking; chunks of debris, including the concrete that held the sign, litter the street. 3:48 AM NOTE: An officer arrived within minutes of a neighbor’s call; another one headed out in search of the runaway driver. First question some (including us) had – was it a stolen car? Responding officer checked and says it’s not reported as such.
4:51 AM UPDATE: Police found the suspect, brought him back to the scene for witness ID (we weren’t the witnesses, we only heard the crash; the driver had bolted before we went out to see what had happened), and took him away. The car’s being towed, and SDOT has arrived to clean up the street debris and mark the suddenly signless “wrong way” street end; the car pushed/dragged the DO NOT ENTER sign more than 100 feet.
ORIGINAL 12:41 PM REPORT: Thanks to JayDee for the tip, confirmed by King County Department of Transportation: The 
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