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THE ASTORIAN • TUESDAY, JUNE 4, 2019
Feds to probe spike in gray whale deaths
IN BRIEF
About 70 whales
found dead
What would you call
new elementary school?
Come the fall of 2020, two separate elementary
schools will be merged into one when Gearhart Elemen-
tary School students join students from The Heights Ele-
mentary School on the hill.
In preparation for the transition, the Bringing Our Ele-
mentary Schools Together, or BEST, committee wants
to guide the community through a process of selecting a
new name, mascot and school colors.
The purpose, committee member and Gearhart instruc-
tor Jessica Garrigues said during the Seaside School
Board’s meeting May 21, is to represent “a merge and true
new start.”
— The Astorian
Local sheriff’s deputies graduate
from corrections academy
Clatsop County Sheriff’s Offi ce deputies Daniel Raymer
and Ian McNabb were among the most recent crop of grad-
uates from the Oregon Public Safety Academy in Salem.
The two will be honored at 2 p.m. June 14 at the acad-
emy, 4190 Aumsville Highway S.E. in Salem, with a recep-
tion to follow. Lt. Joshua Aldrich, jail commander for the
Jackson County Sheriff’s Offi ce, will be the guest speaker.
— The Astorian
AARP offers retirement workshop
AARP is offering a free workshop, “Ready, Set, Retire,”
from 4 to 7 p.m. Thursday at Clatsop Community College.
The event offers an opportunity to help people get the
tools and information they need to make a smart decision
before they retire.
The topics covered include some basics of Social
Security, Medicare 101, tips on fraud prevention, getting
ahead with OregonSaves and how to open a small busi-
ness. A light meal and water will be served.
The workshop is free and open to the public, but pre-
registration is required. Go to bit.ly/2XgMoTD to register.
— The Astorian
Stimson Lumber to lay off
60 workers in Forest Grove
Stimson Lumber Co. announced Friday that it is cut-
ting 60 jobs at its Forest Grove location. That’s about 40%
of the mill’s workforce.
CEO Andrew Miller attributes the job losses to a
changing business environment in Oregon, specifi cally
rising costs of operation.
“It’s an overall, what I would call, regulatory and tax
creep,” he said, “and it’s been underway for many years.”
— Oregon Public Broadcasting
DEATHS
June 3, 2019
ALLISON, Carol R., 82, of Warrenton, died in War-
renton. Hughes-Ransom Mortuary in Astoria is in charge
of the arrangements.
May 30, 2019
PHILLIPS, William “Bill,” 67, of Seaside, died in
Seaside. Hughes-Ransom Mortuary is in charge of the
arrangements.
May 4, 2019
HESS, Dale Charles, 71, of Tucson, Arizona, for-
merly of Astoria, died in Tucson. Oasis Cremation and
Funeral Care of Tucson is in charge of the arrangements.
MEMORIAL
Wednesday, June 5
Thursday, June 6
RAMON GUZMAN, Magdalena Blandina —
Funeral at 11 a.m. Wednesday at St. Mary, Star of the Sea
Catholic Church, 1465 Grand Ave. Visitation is from 1 to
8 p.m. Wednesday, and from noon to 8 p.m. Thursday, at
Hughes-Ransom Mortuary, 576 12th St. Ramon Guzman,
63, of Seaview, Washington, died Thursday, May 30,
2019, in Portland. Burial will be held in Veracruz, Mexico.
PUBLIC MEETINGS
TUESDAY
Seaside Community
Center Commission,
10:30 a.m., Bob Chisholm
Center, 1225 Avenue A.
Port of Astoria Commis-
sion, 4 p.m. workshop, Port
offi ces, 10 Pier 1 Suite 209.
Clatsop Care Health Dis-
trict Board, 5 p.m., Clatsop
Care Health and Rehabilita-
tion, 646 16th St.
Miles Crossing Sanitary
Sewer District Board,
6 p.m., 34583 U.S. Highway
101 Business.
Seaside Planning Com-
Established July 1, 1873
(USPS 035-000)
Published Tuesday, Thursday
and Saturday by EO Media Group,
949 Exchange St., PO Box 210, Astoria, OR
97103 Telephone 503-325-3211,
800-781-3211 or Fax 503-325-6573.
POSTMASTER: Send address changes to
The Astorian, PO Box 210, Astoria, OR
97103-0210
DailyAstorian.com
mission, 7 p.m., City Hall,
989 Broadway.
WEDNESDAY
Warrenton Urban Renew-
al Advisory Committee,
3:30 p.m., City Hall, 225 S.
Main Ave.
Seaside Improvement
Commission, 6 p.m., City
Hall, 989 Broadway.
Gearhart City Council,
7 p.m., City Hall, 698 Pacifi c
Way.
THURSDAY
Seaside Parks Advisory
Committee, 7 p.m., City
Hall, 989 Broadway.
By GENE JOHNSON
Associated Press
SEATTLE — U.S. sci-
entists will investigate why
an unusual number of gray
whales are washing up dead
on West Coast beaches.
About 70 whales have
been found dead so far this
year on the coasts of Califor-
nia, Oregon, Washington state
and Alaska, the most since
2000. About fi ve more have
been discovered on British
Columbia beaches. That’s a
very small fraction of the total
number of whales believed to
have died, because most sim-
ply sink and others wash up
in such remote areas they’re
not recorded.
NOAA Fisheries on
Friday declared the die-
off an “unusual mortal-
ity event,” providing addi-
tional resources to respond to
the deaths and triggering the
investigation.
“Many of the whales have
been skinny and malnour-
ished, and that suggests they
may not have gotten enough
to eat during their last feeding
season in the Arctic,” agency
spokesman Michael Milstein
told reporters during a confer-
ence call.
The eastern North Pacifi c
gray whales were removed
from the endangered species
list in 1994, after recovering
from the whaling era.
The population has grown
signifi cantly in the last
decade and is now estimated
AP Photo/Gene Johnson
Teachers and students from Northwest Montessori School in
Seattle examine the carcass of a gray whale after it washed up
on the coast of Washington’s Olympic Peninsula, just north of
Kalaloch Campground in Olympic National Park, in May.
at 27,000 — the highest since
surveys began in 1967. That
has raised questions about
whether their population has
reached the limit of what
the environment can sustain.
Another theory suggests that
the loss of Arctic sea ice due
to global warming is a culprit.
The whales spend their
summers feeding in the Arc-
tic before migrating 10,000
miles to winter off Mexico.
Though they eat all along
their route, they are typically
thinning by the time they
return north along the West
Coast each spring.
They eat many things, but
especially amphipods, tiny
shrimp-like creatures that live
in sediment on the ocean fl oor
in the Arctic. For many years,
researchers noted that fewer
calves tended to be born fol-
lowing years when the ice
in the Chukchi Sea, north of
the Bering Strait between
Alaska and Russia, was late
Grain ship runs aground in Columbia River
The Astorian
A grain ship ran aground
on a sandbar east of Tongue
Point on Sunday before free-
ing itself during high tide
Monday.
The Gorgoypikoos, out-
bound on the Columbia
River with a load of grain,
grounded out on the Miller
Sands north of Knappa
because of a steering mal-
function. The vessel also
carried 21 crew members
and more than 300,000 gal-
lons of fuel. The stern of the
ship poked into the main
channel of the Columbia
River, partially obstructing
the shipping channel.
The Coast Guard dis-
patched an investigator on
Coast Guard
The grain ship Gorgoypikoos ran aground in the Miller Sands on Sunday before the ship’s crew
refl oated Monday morning.
a 47-foot motor lifeboat
from Station Cape Disap-
pointment to ensure the ship
wasn’t leaking, along with
an MH-60 Jayhawk helicop-
ter from Air Station Astoria.
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Three tugboats arrived
to assist the Gorgoypikoos,
but the crew piloted the ves-
sel off the sandbar Mon-
day morning without pol-
lution or any injuries. The
investigator stayed on board
the Gorgoypikoos, which
was ordered back to its last
port of call in Longview,
Washington, to ensure its
seaworthiness.
Bill would open door for electric co-ops to receive aid
By GEORGE PLAVEN
Capital Press
An Oregon congressman
is urging lawmakers to pass
a bill that would allow rural
electric co-ops to receive
government grants for disas-
ter relief and broadband inter-
net service, without losing
tax-exempt status.
In a letter sent Thursday
to members of the House
Ways and Means and Sen-
ate Finance committees, U.S.
Rep. Grag Walden expressed
his support for the Revital-
izing Underdeveloped Rural
Areas and Lands Act of 2019.
The bill aims to fi x what
the National Rural Elec-
tric Cooperative Association
described as an unintended
consequence of the sweeping
GOP tax reforms in 2017.
To be considered tax-ex-
empt, rural electric co-ops
— many of which serve
farm and ranch communities
— cannot receive more than
15% of income from non-
member sources. However,
the tax law contains a provi-
sion that counts federal, state
FACEBOOK.COM/DAILYASTORIAN
and local grants as income
rather than capital.
That means if a utility
applies for money from the
Federal Emergency Manage-
ment Agency to restore power
following a natural disaster, it
might exceed the threshold
for tax exemption and result
in higher rates for consumers.
The RURAL Act calls for
changing the code, allowing
co-ops to receive emergency
aid and funding for rural
broadband without counting
toward income.
Walden, a Republican
Astoria Vacation Bible School
“SHIPWRECKED: Rescued by Jesus”
Monday – Thursday, June 24th – 28th
10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.
A cooperative effort of several downtown churches
Register at www.fpcastoria.org
Deadline to register online is June 14th
Registration in person will be allowed June 24th
Friday Beach party June 28th at 5:00 p.m.
whose district covers nearly
all of c entral and Eastern
Oregon, is co-sponsoring the
legislation.
“Rural electric cooper-
atives and other consum-
er-owned utilities are at the
center of efforts to grow
Oregon’s communities and
rebuilding when disaster
strikes,” Walden wrote. “The
utilities and their members
should not be penalized with
long-term tax costs for keep-
ing the lights and keeping
power affordable for rural
Oregonians.”
Police suspect suicide after vehicle
abandoned on Astoria Bridge
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to melt. The whales had less
time to feast because they
couldn’t access the feeding
area, and thus had less blub-
ber to sustain them on their
next migration.
Last year, though, the Arc-
tic was unusually warm. The
whales weren’t blocked from
the feeding area, and yet are
still struggling this year. That
has scientists wondering if
the loss of sea ice has led to
a loss of algae that feed the
amphipods. Surveys show
the amphipod beds moving
farther north, said Sue Moore,
a biological oceanographer at
the University of Washington.
“The sea ice has been
changing very quickly over
the last decade or so,” she
said. “The whales may have
to shift to other prey, such as
krill or other things they eat.”
In an average year, about
35 whales wash up in the U.S.
In 2000, more than 100
did, prompting NOAA to
declare an “unusual mor-
tality event” then as well.
The resulting investigation
failed to identify a cause.
The die-off followed strong
changes in ocean conditions
in the mid-1990s, suggesting
that warmer water patterns
affected the availability of
prey, but scientists were often
unable to perform necropsies,
Moore said.
“It’s sometimes very diffi -
cult to get to these whales in
a timely fashion,” she said.
“You can’t always get the
kind of samples you would
need for diagnostic reasons.”
Since then, researchers
have built up an improved
network of volunteers and
have better educated the pub-
lic to help report and respond
to whale deaths, said Debo-
rah Fauquier, veterinary med-
ical offi cer at NOAA’s Offi ce
of Protected Resources. This
time around, scientists have
been able to perform necrop-
sies on 20 of the whales, she
said.
John Calambokidis, a
research biologist with the
Cascadia Research Collec-
tive, noted that as the whales
search farther afi eld for food,
they’ve entered areas where
they’re not normally seen so
often, including San Fran-
cisco Bay and Puget Sound.
That puts them at higher risk
of being struck by ships or
entangled in fi shing gear.
Four of the 10 gray whales
found dead near San Fran-
cisco this year were struck by
ships, and a number of ship-
ping companies have slowed
their vessels in the area to
avoid collisions.
Police believe the driver
who abandoned a vehicle on
the Astoria Bridge on Friday
committed suicide.
Capt. Timothy Fox, a
spokesman for the Oregon
State Police, said authori-
ties identifi ed the driver of
the vehicle but have been
unable to locate him. Police
declined to publicly name
the driver, who was not the
owner of the vehicle. The
vehicle was not stolen.
“It appears to be a suicide
however no body has been
recovered and it was not wit-
nessed,” Fox said.
Astoria dispatch received
a report of the abandoned
vehicle near the center span
about 3 p.m. Friday. Author-
ities checked above and
below the bridge but found
no body. The vehicle was
operable .
Authorities ask anyone
who saw the vehicle between
2:30 p.m. and 3 p.m. to con-
tact the Oregon State Police
at 503-325-2231.
The apparent suicide
comes a week after a War-
renton man jumped off the
bridge after parking his car
near the center span.
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