Tag Archives: Seattle

Norovirus Outbreak Sickens 200 in Seattle

About a third of the 600 people who went to a catered event last week in a Seattle office building indicated they came down with norovirus, according to multiple published reports.

The Seattle Times reported that about 200 people who attended the party last Tuesday at Russell Investments Center in the city’s downtown area fell ill. A public health official told the newspaper that eight people were treated in emergency rooms and two were hospitalized.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the highly contagious norovirus is the top cause of foodborne-illness outbreaks in the United States, sickening 19-21 million people, hospitalizing 56,000-71,000 and killing 570-800 annually. The virus, which affects the stomach and intestines, causes stomach pain, nausea, diarrhea and vomiting. It’s acquired by eating tainted food or water, touching contaminated surfaces or interpersonally.

Al Jazeera reported crews worked to decontaminate the building over weekend and that food service remains closed by order of the health department. The news agency reported authorities were still trying to determine what exactly caused the outbreak, as a few cases of the illness had been reported before Tuesday’s party. The CDC said that norovirus can spread rapidly in closed environments, and this time of the year is generally when most United States outbreaks occur.

The CDC recommends washing hands, properly preparing food like fruit, vegetables and seafood and disinfecting any contaminated surfaces as three ways to combat the spread of norovirus.

Scientists Say Odds Good Seattle Will Be Destroyed By Earthquake

A group of scientists say that a long overdue earthquake for the Pacific Northwest will strike in the next 50 years and will completely wipe out the city of Seattle.

A new report in the New Yorker highlights the problems of the Cascadia subduction zone which runs for 700 miles off the coast of the Pacific Northwest from Cape Mendocino, California through Vancouver Island.  The zone is named after the Cascade Range of volcanic mountains that runs much of the same course about 100 miles inland.

The amount of time between quakes averages 243 years and because the last major quake took place in 1700, the fault is 72 years past the average date for a major quake.

Katheryn Schulz of the New Yorker spoke with Kenneth Murphy who oversees FEMA’s Region X which encompasses Alaska, Idaho, Oregon and Washington.  He said that when the “big one” hits…either a partial giving way of the southern part of the zone resulting in an 8.0-8.6 quake or a full-margin rupture between 8.7 and 9.2…there will no longer be a Pacific northwest.

“Our operating assumption is that everything west of Interstate 5 will be toast,” Murphy told the New Yorker.  FEMA estimates say that 13,000 people will die in the quake and resulting tsunami.  At least 27,000 will suffer some kind of major injury.

Cities that are west of Interstate 5 include Seattle, Tacoma, Portland, Eugene and the capitals of Oregon (Salem) and Washington (Olympia).

“This is one time that I’m hoping all the science is wrong, and it won’t happen for another thousand years,” Murphy says.

Chris Goldfinger, a paleoseismologist at Oregon State University and one of the world’s leading experts, says that the chance of the “big one” taking place in the next 50 years is 1 in 3.

Ice Cave Collapse Kills 1; Injures 5

An ice cave that is part of the Big Four Ice Caves at Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest east of Seattle partially collapsed, killing a 34-year-old woman.

Eight people were in the back of the cave when the collapse took place around 5 p.m. Tuesday.  The caves had large warning signs about instability but the caves were not blocked.

“It’s not illegal to go in the caves. However, we’ve been saying since mid-May, it’s extremely dangerous with all this hot weather,” Shari Ireton with the Snohomish County Sheriff’s Office told CNN before noting that hot weather weakens the caves.

“There was a large pile of ice and rock that came down,” she said. “So it wasn’t just one big slab. … It wasn’t a piece of a shelf coming off.”

“They’re essentially a frozen-over avalanche chute sitting over a waterfall, sitting below a giant rock shoot,” Ireton added. “It’s incredibly dangerous.”

A witness told ABC that she heard a pop before the ice gave way.

“Everybody was happy. It was really cool. … [Then] we heard a pop and I got really nervous and I just look up and there’s, I see there’s this sheet of ice coming down,” said Chloe Jakubowski, 18. “I crouched down as quickly as I could and I put my hands over my head.”

“It was really scary,” she said. “I just didn’t know if those were going to be my last few moments.”

A 25-year-old man hurt in the collapse remains in intensive care at Harborview Medical Center although his status was upgraded from critical to serious.

Satanists Outraged Over “In God We Trust” Sign

A group of Satanists are outraged that a county in Washington is hanging a sign in their public hearing room that has the national motto of “In God We Trust.”

The Satanic Temple of Seattle is saying the sign is advocating Christian “tyranny”.

“We see Satan as our symbol of the rebel against tyranny,” said Satanic Temple’s Lillith Starr, who founded the Seattle chapter in late 2014, according to KING 5 News.

The sign was donated to the county by a local non-profit group, so there is no taxpayer dollars going to the sign.

The Satanists are demanding that they be able to place a sign of their own with any message they choose to add.  They said most likely the sign would say “E Pluribus Unum” meaning “From the Many, One.”

Clark County’s manager said he doubted the council would welcome such a sign.

Mars Hill Church To Disband

The Seattle area megachurch founded by Mark Driscoll is disbanding at the end of the year.

The announcement last Friday sent shockwaves through the church’s multiple locations as they have only a few weeks to decide if they want to become an independent church, merge with another congregation or simply disappear.

The “Mars Hill” ministry itself will also cease to exist.  They will fire all of their existing staff.

The church has been struggling through transition after the resignation of founding pastor Mark Driscoll.

Several former Mars Hill leaders expressed optimism that this news could end up bringing benefit to the Seattle area.

“God makes good out of bad:  New local ‘Mars Hill’ churches: Redemption Church, Redeemer Church, A Seattle Church, Downtown Cornerstone, Reach; all these seeds have fallen from the dying Mars Hill tree.  God is very much alive in Seattle,” former Mars Hill deacon Mike O’Neil wrote.

Seattle Church Converting Strip Club To Church

A Seattle strip club that was once a center for prostitution and routinely the subject of FBI stings is being born again.

Bethany Community Church bought Sugars, the infamous strip club, and is turning it into their central offices and a coffee shop.

“When we first entered the building it had a very dark feeling; smoke filled carpets, black painted ceilings and walls, and mirrors everywhere,” associate pastor Scott Sund told The Christian Post. “Before we started demolition, we met on Easter weekend and prayed and sang in the space to usher in the new story God was going to write through this place. It’s God’s story, we just get to play a small part.”

The church had been initially looking for a permanent location for services because they meet in a gym for weekly services.  Then the children’s director, who serves children in the neighborhood of the club, approached the leadership about buying the building.

The church’s volunteers have stripped the inside of the club by getting rid of the carpets and wall mirrors that defined the club.  The church hopes to have their community center open in the fall.

Seattle Pacific University Hero: “God’s Grace” Saved Lives

The 22-year-old engineering student who disarmed a gunman bent on mass killing at Seattle Pacific University has broken his silence after the event, saying that God’s grace is what saved the lives of others.

Jon Meis, a building monitor at the Christian university, pepper-sprayed and then tackled 26-year-old Aaron Ybarra as he was reloading.  Other students then held down Ybarra, who was not a student at the school, until police arrived on the scene.  Police said that the gunman had a significant amount of ammunition on him and likely would have killed and wounded dozens more without Meis’ heroic actions.

“He was hellbent on killing a lot of people today,” an officer told the Seattle Times.

Meis, who had been avoiding the spotlight after the incident, finally released a statement to the press.

“I know that I am being hailed as a hero, and as many people have suggested, I find this hard to accept,” Meis wrote. “I am indeed a quiet and private individual; while I have imagined what it would be like to save a life, I never believed I would be put in such a situation. It has been deeply touching to read the comments online and realize that my actions have had such a strikingly widespread effect.”

“[W]hat I find most difficult about this situation is the devastating reality that a hero cannot come without tragedy,” Meis continued. “In the midst of this attention, we cannot ignore that a life was taken from us, ruthlessly and without justification or cause. Others were badly injured, and many more will carry this event with them the rest of their lives.”

Police say the gunman Ybarra has a history of mental illness and has been on suicide watch since the incident.  Meis has called for the community to respond to the gunman in a spirit of love.

“When I came face to face with the attacker, God gave me the eyes to see that he was not a faceless monster, but a very sad and troubled young man. While I cannot at this time find it within me to forgive his crime, I truly desire that he will find the grace of God and the forgiveness of our community.”

Seattle Pacific Professor: “This Is Not God’s Will”

A professor at Seattle Pacific University told students Thursday night that the campus shooting that left a student dead and two others seriously injured was not God’s will for their school.

“There’s no explaining it,” Professor of Biblical Studies Frank Spina told students. “‘This is not God’s plan. This is not God’s will. This is not God’s way of teaching us a lesson. Any lesson we could have learned out of this could have been learned otherwise.”

Police say the shooting would have been significantly worse if not for the heroic efforts of a student who pepper sprayed the shooter then disarmed him as he tried to reload.

Jon Meis, a 22-year-old Christian engineering student and teaching assistant, noticed the gunman reloading and made his move.  Friends say that Meis has always been “quiet and religious” and that his actions to stop the gunman showed in action his beliefs in being a “selfless, courageous man.”

Meis was taken the hospital for minor injuries after the altercation and has not spoken to the press.  His family’s answering machine has a message asking those who call to pray for the victims and their families.

Seattle Police System Can Track Citizens Without Their Knowledge

Police in Seattle are claiming to have deactivated a “mesh network” that was installed in the city to allow officers to send large amounts of data between each other while in the field.

The reason? The system also contacts every wireless device in its radius like a cellphone or wireless internet modem allowing police to track civilians without their knowledge.

The network could also collect a series of data from the devices of citizens.

The SPD said they had “no bad intentions” when they installed the network and that they were going to disable the system until a policy was adopted by the city for what they consider proper use for the network.

However, residents told an alternative newspaper that their phones were still showing the internet boxes as connecting to their devices when they were within range of one of the system’s white boxes. Police later admitted the system was still on but not being used by police personnel.

Seattle Star Quarterback: Jesus Came To Me In A Dream

The Bible is filled with examples of the Lord coming to people in dreams to give them guidance, correction and wisdom. Now a National Football League star is telling the story of how Jesus came to him in a dream and changed his life.

Russell Wilson, star quarterback for the Seattle Seahawks, tells in the new documentary “The Making of a Champion” that when he was 14, Jesus came to him in a dream.

“I had a dream that my dad passed away and that Jesus came into the room and he was basically knocking on my door, saying, ‘Hey, you need to find out more about me,’” Wilson said. “So that Sunday morning I ended up going to church and that’s when I got saved.”

Wilson talks about how he was a “bad kid” and that seeking Christ helped him to mature. He credits God for the talent that has allowed him to become a top player in the NFL.

“No one can stop what God has for you,” Wilson said.