September 5, 2007

• It sorta snowballed.

  I had been thinking for a couple of days that I need to post an update on Joshua Wade.  Last weekend, he was captured in Anchorage, following a brief standoff with police after some friends turned him in.  He has been arraigned and is being held on federal bank fraud charges for using the ATM card of missing nurse Mindy Schloss, who used to be Wade’s next door neighbor.

  Today on a public radio talk show, the mayor of Anchorage explained that city police had called in the feds when the state had been slow in coming to their assistance.  Lacking any evidence of kidnapping or murder, unless and until a body turns up or other evidence or testimony becomes available, bank fraud charges are the only thing keeping Joshua Wade off the street.

  While I was looking at adn.com for info on the Mindy Schloss disappearance, I couldn’t help noticing another story.
  

  Body found in duct at elementary school

  Maintenance employees at Russian Jack Elementary School found a body lodged in a large heating exhaust pipe this morning, according to the Anchorage Police Department.

  Investigators have so far been unable to gauge the age, sex or identity of the body, which remains stuck in the vent. However, it is not that of any Russian Jack student attending today, said Heidi Embley, Anchorage School District spokeswoman. School will continue as usual, she said.

  The large pipe where the body was found is accessible from the roof. It leads to a boiler below.

  Staff in the building had been reporting a bad smell since last week, according to John Goetz, the first police officer on the scene. Maintenance people were investigating the smell this morning and had begun taking the system apart, he said. They thought it was a chemical leak, but then they found clothing.

  An update at adn.com disclosed that it was an adult male, and an alcohol container was found near the body.
  

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  Pavlov Volcano image courtesy of AVO/USGS
  

  The Alaska Volcano Observatory placed a webcam at the FAA facility at Cold Bay, aimed toward the Pavlov Volcano.  You would need to hit a confluence of clear weather and visible activity to see anything but fog or clouds, but maybe it’s worth a look.  I look several times a day, and also at the images from the Umnak Island webcam pointed toward the Cleveland Volcano.

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  Doug and I did a mini water run today.  We didn’t load up the whole hatch, just a few jugs and a couple of buckets to get us by until I’m feeling stronger.  I wasn’t up to pulling the full containers up out of that hole, so Doug did all the work himself and I took a few pictures.

  

  The slope of the bluff east of the spring has big thickets of rosebushes and they are all thick with ripe hips.  I picked a few, and their absence is hardly noticeable.

  

  Across the highway some bicycle tourists were taking a break.  Along the highway between home and the spring, we passed some State Troopers trying to manage traffic where a trailer had apparently lost a wheel, or broken free from the vehicle towing it, or both.

  

  The seasonal shift is apparent in the stream that flows south from the spring toward Sheep Creek.

  I had been thinking about blogging about my dreams, but now I can’t recall the details, and this blog sorta wandered out of bounds and snowballed out of control as it is.

  

  • 9:21 pm
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