RODEO YOUTH LEARN THE ROPES
The
PAGE A10
Blue Mountain
EAGLE
Grant County’s newspaper since 1868
W EDNESDAY , A UGUST 2, 2017
• N O . 31
• 18 P AGES
• $1.00
www.MyEagleNews.com
Eclipse
traffi c
casts
shades of
worries
By Phil Wright
EO Media Group
CORROSIVE
CLARITY
Eagle photos/Rylan Boggs
Local artist Mytchell Mead’s
reflection in one of his pieces
inside his home in John Day.
Mead uses chemical reactions to create art
By Rylan Boggs
Blue Mountain Eagle
F
Local artist Mytchell Mead reviews
his sketchbook in his workshop in
John Day.
rom heavy pieces of steel, ancient boards and
corrosive acid, Mytchell Mead creates art.
He describes his work as abstract steel
and wood wall art, and most of his pieces
are designs corroded and etched into steel with a metal
frame backed by aged wood. While he often works from
a sketchbook, his art isn’t limited by what he initially
draws.
“I follow the piece,” Mead said. “The piece tells me
where it wants to go.”
When working with steel he uses a variety of chem-
icals that eliminate or stimulate rust when painted on to
metal. Through trial and error, he has learned how to ma-
nipulate reactions to produce different colors and effects.
He works with custom brushes, as the acid he uses
quickly destroys normal ones, and said factors as small
as changing air pressure from a coming storm can affect
the reactions.
See ARTIST, Page A18
“Curiosity Tree”
by Mytchell Mead
Eastern Oregon emergency
workers anticipate a fl ood of
tourists seeking to witness the
Aug. 21 total solar eclipse.
Two paths to experience
the path of totality in our re-
gion are Highway 26 and
Highway 395, which wind
through rural counties. Tom
Strandberg with the Oregon
Department of Transporta-
tion said the focus is on a safe
fl ow of traffi c over the narrow
roads.
“Our two-lane highways
can only accommodate so
many vehicles per hour safe-
ly,” he said — a rate of about
1,200-1,500 vehicles.
But if 40,000 or more
drivers decide to leave Grant
County at once, Strandberg
said traffi c will bog down and
one crash or stalled car would
make for even longer delays.
To counter some of that,
he said ODOT maintenance
workers are undertaking
“push, pull and drag” training.
“If it’s a stalled or stranded
vehicle that is blocking traffi c,
our crews are getting trained
on how to move those vehicles
to a safer spot to keep traffi c
moving,” he said. But if roads
are clogged, it will take crews
awhile to reach the scene.
While no one has fi rm
numbers for how many peo-
ple are coming to Oregon to
see the fi rst total solar eclipse
in the state in 38 years, the
Oregon Offi ce of Emergen-
cy Management is planning
on at least a million visitors.
Strandberg said the transpor-
tation department is working
on getting a “ballpark esti-
mate of how many visitors are
in an area.”
Permanent recorders on se-
lect sections of highways 26
and 395 allow the department
to collect traffi c data, he said.
ODOT is using those recorders
to see how many vehicles are
entering and leaving eclipse
See ECLIPSE, Page A18
Fiber line would triple
average internet speeds
New network
may service
entire county
By Rylan Boggs
Blue Mountain Eagle
Grant County residents
could see internet speeds
three- to 20-times faster in the
near future.
The city of John Day plans
to leverage recently received
state funding on additional
grants to construct a fi ber op-
tic line from Burns to John
Day and to deliver access
Nick
Green
State Sen.
Ted Ferrioli
to residents throughout the
county, boosting capacity and
data transmission speeds.
John Day City Manager
Nick Green said the average
download speed in the coun-
ty is about 10 megabits per
second, though some areas
are worse. He said he expects
30 megabits or faster from the
new network. Fiber optic ac-
cess is currently available to
some businesses in the coun-
ty, Green said, but is not a via-
ble option for residents.
Residents could have fi ber
optic access as early as next
summer, he said, though ser-
vices will be entirely optional.
Green said better internet
access could bring new jobs to
the area, not only to help run
the service, but by removing a
barrier for digital commuters
who need high-speed internet
to work from home.
See NETWORK, Page A18
Emry sentenced to
30 months in prison for
unregistered .50-caliber
By Sean Hart
Blue Mountain Eagle
The man arrested in John
Day with an unregistered
fully automatic .50-caliber
machine gun will serve 30
months in federal prison.
July 26, U.S. District
Court Judge Ann Aiken sen-
tenced Michael Ray Emry,
55, to 30 months in federal
prison and three years of
supervised release, accord-
ing to a press release from
the U.S. Attorney’s Offi ce.
Emry pleaded guilty to un-
lawfully possessing a ful-
ly automatic machine gun
that was not
registered to
him Jan. 23.
E m r y
had
been
residing at
the Grant
Michael
County Fair-
Emry
grounds and
RV Park and
was arrested by FBI agents
in May 2016.
According to court docu-
ments and statements made
in court, on May 6, 2016,
federal agents executed a
search warrant on Emry’s
See EMRY, Page A18