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THE ASTORIAN • SATURDAY, AUGUST 15, 2020
Columbia Memorial Hospital
settles negligence case
Columbia Memorial Hospital in Astoria reached a
settlement in a $4.6 million lawsuit alleging medical
negligence.
The lawsuit alleged that Betsy Christensen, a
Naselle, Washington, woman, went to the hospital in
April 2017 with symptoms consistent with a potential
stroke, but the hospital failed to perform an MRI before
she suffered a stroke that left her severely disabled.
James Thomas, Christensen’s son, who fi led the
lawsuit on her behalf in March 2019, claimed that a
doctor concluded a stroke could only be identifi ed by
an MRI, but that the diagnostic procedure would not be
available for two more days.
The hospital and Dr. Michael Mitchell were named
in the lawsuit. Claims against Mitchell were dismissed.
James Huegli, a Portland attorney represent-
ing Christensen, said the settlement agreement was
confi dential.
Columbia Memorial Hospital declined to comment.
Federal fi re grants
help local departments
The Astoria Fire Department recently received
nearly $160,000 for new breathing packs. Cannon
Beach Fire District got $47,600 for new hoses. And
more federal grant money could be on the way.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency’s
grants program helps fi re departments nationwide with
equipment, staffi ng and training.
Dan Crutchfi eld, the Astoria fi re chief, said the bot-
tles in the fi re department’s self-contained breathing
backpacks are 15 years old and need to be replaced.
“I guess, historically, the department over the last
few years has not been seeking grant funds, but I
believe in them,” he said. “And this will help the city
drastically. That’s $160,000 that we don’t have to take
out of an account that can go towards apparatus and
other things.”
Marc Reckmann, the chief of the Cannon Beach
Rural Fire Protection District, said his grant money will
replace nozzles and hoses that date back to the 1970s.
— The Astorian
Ocean Beach schools
to start remotely due to virus
LONG BEACH, Wash. — The Ocean Beach School
District’s Board of Directors voted unanimously on
Monday to begin the 2020-21 school year in a remote-
only model because of the coronavirus pandemic.
The decision came after recommendations from
the Pacifi c County Public Health and Human Services
Department and state offi cials, as well as Superinten-
dent Amy Huntley, who formally presented her recom-
mendation to the board at the special meeting.
“There’s no plan that’s going to meet everyone’s
opinions and needs,” conceded Huntley. “We’ve got to
do the best that we can, because really the board has to
do their best — and so do I — to deal with the respon-
sibility of educating our children, but also dealing with
their health and safety.”
— Chinook Observer
CORRECTION
Seaside couple bring passion
for biking to new bike store
By KATHERINE
LACAZE
For The Astorian
SEASIDE — Andy
Thornton is a familiar
face when it comes to bike
mechanics in Seaside, so
much so that he is known
around town as “Bike Shop
Andy.”
After spending more than
two decades in the indus-
try, he’s taken his trade to
the next level by opening A’s
Bike Shop on the corner of
S. Roosevelt Drive and Ave-
nue B.
“I’ve turned wrenches
here for a long time,” Thorn-
ton said. “It’s getting people
to know that I’m back.”
His past experience
includes more than 25 years
working at the Prom Bike
Shop before stepping away
from the industry for a few
years and pursuing other
jobs.
“Now that I’m a little bit
older and my kids are gone,
I needed to do what I wanted
to do,” he said.
While Thornton pri-
marily runs the shop, his
wife, Michelle, also pitches
in behind the scenes with
ordering parts, bookkeeping
and managing customers.
A’s Bike Shop, which
opened in January, is a
full-service bike shop that
sells bicycles, parts and
accessories in addition to
handling repairs. Thorn-
ton’s specialty service areas
include high-end and elec-
tric bicycles.
Both Thornton and his
wife are longtime residents
of Seaside. They feel their
knowledge of the local area
has made it easier to estab-
lish the business.
Katherine Lacaze/For The Astorian
Andy and Michelle Thornton opened a new bike shop in Seaside.
“If you do good work in a
small town, it comes back to
you,” Thornton said.
The clientele he’s cul-
tivated so far is a blend of
recreational riders and daily
commuters. Recreation is
multifaceted as well, since
some people prefer riding
on the Promenade and side-
walks in town while others
take to logging roads and
mountain trails and the Ore-
gon Coast Bike Route on
U.S. Highway 101.
At the end of the day,
Thornton said, “I don’t care
what you’re riding, I just
want you to get out and have
a good time.”
His No. 1 priority is cus-
tomer service and doing
what he can to ensure cus-
tomers leave satisfi ed. He’s
happy to offer advice to nov-
ice riders, but he also doesn’t
let a sales perspective dictate
his interaction with clients.
“The biggest part of cus-
tomer service is listening to
the needs of the people,” he
said.
After suffering an injury,
he’s not able to mountain
bike on the trails like he
used to. Now, he’s channel-
ing his passion “through my
tools and keeping everyone
else going.”
He’s also a big supporter
of the North Coast Trail Alli-
ance, an organization dedi-
cated to improving and sus-
taining mountain biking
opportunities on the North
Coast for residents and vis-
itors alike.
Michelle
Thornton
doesn’t come from the
industry — in fact, she’s
still working full time at the
Mo’s restaurant in Seaside.
However, she is a long time
bicycle rider, and she says,
“I’m learning more about it
as we’re going along.”
While A’s Bike Shop was
able to remain open as an
essential business through-
out the coronavirus pan-
demic, Thornton is facing
other challenges. The com-
pany experienced growth up
until last month when they
Facebook abandons broken drilling equipment
Project at
Tierra Del Mar
By KALE WILLIAMS
The Oregonian
First name incorrect — Sam Garber is the owner
Correction
of Dock 420 B&B. He was incorrectly identifi ed as
Ben in an A1 story Thursday.
ON THE RECORD
Strangulation
Thursday on 20th and
On
the
• Matthew
Tyler Record
Kuen- Exchange streets in Asto-
stler, 30, of Grants Pass,
was indicted Wednesday
for strangulation, coer-
cion, assault in the fourth
degree and menacing.
Weapons charges
• Dion Earl Weeks,
19, of Beaverton, was
indicted Thursday for
unlawful use of a weapon,
unlawful possession of a
fi rearm, resisting arrest
and disorderly conduct in
the second degree.
Disorderly conduct
• Bradley Joel Crup-
per, 58, was arrested
ria for disorderly conduct
in the second degree.
Reckless endangerment
• Brandy Lorenzo
Birge, 38, of Clackamas,
was arrested Thursday
near state Highway 53
and U.S. Highway 26 for
reckless endangering of
highway workers.
DUII
• Anthony Guy Bell-
ingham, 34, of Birken-
feld, was arrested Thurs-
day on state Highway
202 for driving under the
infl uence of intoxicants.
PUBLIC MEETINGS
MONDAY
Jewell School Board, 6 p.m., (electronic meeting).
Astoria City Council, 7 p.m., City Hall, 1095 Duane St.
TUESDAY
Sunset Empire Park and Recreation District Board of
Directors, 5:15 p.m., 1225 Avenue A, Seaside.
Seaside Planning Commission, 6 p.m., work session, City
Hall, 698 Pacifi c Way.
Shoreline Sanitary District Board, 7 p.m., Gearhart Her-
tig Station, 33496 West Lake Lane, Warrenton.
PUBLIC MEETINGS
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Lynnae Ruttledge was
worried when she heard
Facebook planned to build a
landing spot for an undersea
fi ber-optic cable near her
Oregon Coast home.
Tierra Del Mar, where
the 70-year-old retired gov-
ernment worker lives part
time, is a tiny community
north of Pacifi c City with no
stoplights and no cell phone
service. The enclave, all
zoned residential, consists
of about a dozen mostly
gravel streets running per-
pendicular to an idyllic
stretch of beach, each lined
with single-family homes.
Ruttledge and many of
her neighbors worried about
heavy equipment on fragile
roads built over sand dunes.
They worried about noise
and vibrations from the
drill needed to punch a hole
under the seafl oor thou-
sands of feet out into the
ocean. They worried about
threatened bird species, like
the snowy plover and mar-
bled murrelet, that could be
affected.
Despite their concerns,
and a vocal campaign to
stop the project, construc-
tion began earlier this year.
Then, on April 28, the
drilling crew hit an unex-
pected area of hard rock.
The drill bit became lodged
and the drill pipe snapped
Corps of Engineers said the
company’s new plan is to
return in early 2021 to drill
a new hole, leaving the lost
equipment under the sea-
fl oor indefi nitely.
A Facebook spokes-
woman confi rmed the drill-
ing equipment remains
below the seafl oor just
off the coast but disputed
the timeline of when the
state was notifi ed. She said
the company was aware
the May 5 letter had been
passed to state offi cials by
a resident and followed up
with a phone call with the
Department of State Lands
two days later.
She also said the com-
pany had performed an
environmental assessment
and “determined that there
is no negative environmen-
tal or public health impact
from the drill head remain-
ing at the site.”
“While marine retrieval
of the remaining equip-
ment and drilling mud may
Andre
8 month old Pit Terrier/
Coonhound Blend
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recycled paper
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50 feet below the sea-
fl oor. The crew was able to
recover some of the equip-
ment, but they left the rest
where it lay.
Today, about 1,100 feet
of pipe, a drill tip, various
other tools and 6,500 gallons
of drilling fl uid sit under the
seafl oor just off the coast.
Facebook has no plans to
retrieve the equipment.
Edge Cable Holdings,
a Facebook subsidiary
responsible for the project,
notifi ed Tillamook C ounty
of the accident on May 5,
but it did not explicitly men-
tion the abandoned equip-
ment. That information
didn’t emerge until a meet-
ing with state offi cials June
17, nearly two months after
the malfunction, said Ali
Hansen, a Department of
State Lands spokeswoman.
“The delay in notifi cation
eliminated any potential
options for recovery of the
equipment,” Hansen said
in an email. The U.S. Army
PICK OF THE WEEK
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Out of County Rates available at 800-781-3214
An aerial photo shows the lot where Facebook was drilling
earlier this year to connect a high-speed fi ber-optic cable to
the Asian continent.
be possible,” she said in an
email, “such an effort is not
guaranteed to succeed and
it is not an environmentally
prudent option.”
On Thursday, the Depart-
ment of State Lands noti-
fi ed the company that it
was in default of its per-
mits because it was using
the area to “store” the aban-
doned equipment, which
was unauthorized. The
agency told Facebook it had
30 days to reach an agree-
ment with the state on dam-
ages to be paid for violat-
ing the permit and amend
the agreement to address
any “current and future
risks and liabilities that may
arise from the abandoned”
equipment.
The default also gave
Facebook 180 days to
“remove the abandoned
pipe, equipment, tools and
drilling mud in consultation
with the (state) and without
causing damage to the envi-
ronment” or apply for a new
permit to leave the equip-
ment where it is.
The accident and its
aftermath, fi rst reported by
the Tillamook Headlight
Herald, is beyond any initial
fear Ruttledge had.
“I actually believed that
they would make life mis-
erable during the time they
were here, but fi nish by
April and then be gone,”
she told The Oregonian . “I
could never have imagined
that their pipe would break
and they would abandon it
with no plan to remove it
from under the sea bed.”
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leveled off, he said, as it’s
become diffi cult to fi nd the
specialty products he needs
for repairs, as well as new
bikes.
“I can’t get inventory
because the bike world is
ravished,” he said. “The
whole country is unable to
get what they need.”
Since the issue trickles
back to manufacturing and
the delay in getting products
from overseas, there isn’t
much business owners can
do individually except wait
for more product. Thorn-
ton is doing what he can in
the meantime with common
repair parts or putting off
certain projects until he can
get the items he needs.
A’s Bike Shop has also
seen an increase in demand
for labor to repair older
models that people are pull-
ing from storage and bring-
ing in to make due for now.
“We’ve stayed steady
with repairs,” Michelle
Thornton said, adding, the
rest of it “is a waiting game.”
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