Author: KRDO

Josh Helmuth

FALCON, Colo. (KRDO) — A local high school golfer is putting up some seriously impressive numbers, already turning heads across Colorado.

Cayden Besler is just 15 years old, a sophomore at Falcon High School, and he’s already playing golf like a seasoned pro.

Cayden shot a nine-under-par 63 at the Palmer Invitational recently at Patty Jewett here in town. He also shot nine-under-par to win the CO-PGA JR tournament at Fox Hollow in Lakewood.

He’s currently ranked second in 4A in the state based on scoring average, and number two in the Colorado PGA Cup Series — an invitation-only series featuring junior golfers from across Colorado.

Cayden has won more than 40 junior tournaments since he was nine, already has four holes-in-one, and he’s driving the ball more than 300 yards.

He also recently won a national AJGA tournament in Montrose, finishing 18-under par — ahead of a kid who’s headed to CU this fall on a golf scholarship.

His grandpa is taking him to tournaments around the state — helping Cayden chase his dream of playing Division I golf and maybe even turning pro someday.

Is there someone or something remarkable at your school? Email Josh! SchoolBuzz@KRDO.com

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Scott Harrison

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) — The Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT) recently completed a project designed to improve traffic safety by reducing crashes at the junction of two state highways.

CDOT performed the upgrades on southbound Highway 83, slightly north of where it becomes Interquest Parkway, where North Powers Boulevard (Highway 21) ends.

KRDO 13’s The Road Warrior learned of the project from Gayle Sturdivant — the city’s deputy public works director — while interviewing her on another topic last week.

“If you go back and look over the last few months, there have been several major traffic crashes where people were going on southbound 83 and turning onto southbound Powers,” she explained.

CDOT’s solution was to add a second left-turn lane and a second left-turn signal on southbound 83; when those signals are green, they stop northbound 83 traffic to allow for safer turning onto Powers.

“There are a lot of people who make that left turn,” Sturdivant said. “Before, it was a permissive left turn, and it was just a signaling. And if it appeared clear, you could go. Now, they’ve got two lanes, and it’s protected.”

In the most recent crash at the interchange in the early evening hours of July 30, a woman and a male teen were killed when their car was broadsided by a pickup truck; such “T-bone” impacts are among the worst types of impacts.

Authorities ruled out speeding and alcohol as factors, and the accident remains under investigation.

The city’s connection to the project is that it’s working with CDOT to eventually redesign the interchange as part of the ongoing project to extend Powers north to I-25.

The Road Warrior will update the status of that effort in a report coming soon.

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Bradley Davis

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) – Artist Dornith Doherty traveled to the heart of the Arctic Circle in Norway to photograph humanity’s last resort in the event of ecological devastation: the Svalbard Global Seed Vault.

Part of Doherty’s “Archiving Eden” project is currently displayed inside the ENT Center for the Arts in Colorado Springs. It’s one of three surreal pieces in the gallery’s “Simulacra” exhibition.

Doherty took X-Ray photos of the seedlings and created a larger-than-life visual using lenticular prints, making the images change color and brightness from different angles.

Bill Viola’s 1979 visual piece “Moving Stillness” and Etsuko Ichikawa’s “Broken Poems of Fireflies” round out the exhibit.

Viola’s work shows a digital projection of Mt. Rainier above a pool of water that becomes distorted and abstracted when the water is disturbed.

Ichikawa’s piece is rooted in the Fukushima reactor meltdown disaster. She created blown glass orbs filled with uranium glass material to parallel the uranium used within the reactor before its catastrophic meltdown after the 2011 earthquake and tsunami.

The exhibit is open Thursday through Saturday from 1 p.m. to 6 p.m. It has extended hours leading up to curtain call during Theatreworks performances. You can also schedule an appointment outside of business hours. The exhibit is free to tour.

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Rob Namnoum

Top prep performances for the week of September 2nd.

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Michael Logerwell

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) — It was supposed to be a fun night.

Christopher Maiorana was just walking back to his car with his son after Sunday night’s Balloon Glow in Memorial Park. He had parked his car in the same spot he always does when going to the event, in a multi-use lot near the intersection of Pikes Peak Ave and Printers Parkway.

“It was a little bit of a shock,” Maiorana said.

Maiorana and several others came back to their cars to find busted-out windows and piles of broken glass.

“It’s disrespectful, and it’s like a violation of a person’s privacy, their property, and it just creates this kind of wave of uneasiness that comes along with it,” Maiorana said.

In total, KRDO13 found eight piles of broken glass in the same continuous parking lot.

“I hope that we can find the people that did this and get some justice,” Maiorana said.

The Colorado Springs Police Department told KRDO13 they were contacted about the break-ins and they are looking into it.

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Dylan Foreman

PUEBLO, Colo. (KRDO)–For more than a century, the Bell Game has been one of Colorado’s and the country’s most storied high school football rivalries. While players may not know exactly when it began, they all understand what it means. As Central and Centennial prepare for the 126th meeting, the battle for the Bell remains as important as ever.

Pueblo Central has won it a record seven times in a row since 2018.

“The alumni have a lot of expectations for us to live up to and honestly right now, we haven’t,” Centennial Head Coach Tracy Swearingen said.

With it being rivalry week, both sides have began the competitive chatter. For Central senior Jakob Serena, he wants the game to be the final word.

“There has been a little bit of chatter. But honestly, I think we have to let the pads and just let the game itself talk,” he said.

Yet the Bell Game’s impact extends well beyond the field. Every year, it serves as a reunion for families, friends, and an entire community.

“I’ll try to find my mom, my family,” Centennial senior Danny Cruz said. “Sometimes it’s hard to see everybody because everybody’s there.”

The Bell Game kicks off at 7 p.m. from Dutch Clark Stadium.

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Scott Harrison

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) — A big crowd arrived early on Monday morning for the final day of the annual Labor Day Lift-Off balloon festival, but many left disappointed when the balloons didn’t launch as scheduled.

KRDO13 is reviewing highlights of the event over the holiday weekend.

On Sunday evening, side streets were so filled with parked vehicles that it was difficult for anyone to drive through; many drivers had to back up so that other traffic could pass.

Many spectators had to walk half a mile or more to reach the park.

The manager of a nearby fast-food restaurant complained about spectators parking in the lot, taking away spaces reserved for customers.

Reviewing the festival over the weekend, all of the estimated 70 balloons lifted on Saturday, but windy conditions on Sunday limited the number of launches to ten.

At 7 a.m. Monday — the scheduled launch time — organizers announced that lift-offs were on hold because of gusty winds aloft, and at 7:30 a.m., the balloons were grounded.

Organizers told pilots that they could inflate their balloons for the public to see, until around 8:30 a.m.

Gerry Graff, a pilot from Albuquerque, registered in Colorado Springs for the 26th time, and compared the Lift-Off to The International Balloon Fiesta in his city, which has more than 500 balloons annually.

“Albuquerque, from my point of view, is too big,” he observed. “70 balloons here is good. We’ll be in Pueblo in two weeks. And that’s about 22 balloons. So, smaller events are good. They have a little more to offer; a little more camaraderie.”

Colorado Springs has had some type of balloon event every Labor Day weekend since the first launch in Black Forest in 1976.

The start of the 2000 COVID pandemic led organizers to spread balloon launchers to various locations across town instead of a single mass event.

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Michael Logerwell

UPDATE: The Pueblo County Coroner has identified the deceased as 27-year-old Elijah Fowlkes.

PUEBLO, Colo. (KRDO) – The Pueblo Police Department says that just before 8:00 p.m. on Saturday night, some of its officers were flagged down to report a domestic violence incident involving weapons. It ended with one man shot dead, and the circumstances surrounding the shooting are under investigation.

PPD says its officers were told that the male suspect was armed with a handgun, was threatening to use it against the woman inside the house, and was making additional threats to shoot anyone who came too close.

When more officers arrived on scene, they set up a perimeter around the block. Officers say they then learned about an active restraining order in place protecting the woman and their infant child from the male suspect.

After the perimeter was set up, PPD says they saw the man leave the home and try to run away from officers while carrying the child.

Police say he made it to W. 10th Street and Grand Avenue when he stopped in a parking lot and started digging around in a backpack he brought.

PPD says its officers gave him multiple commands to stop reaching into the backpack and put the infant down. PPD says the man did follow one of the commands; he put the infant in a nearby stroller, but then kept digging around in the backpack.

That’s when the department says an officer fired their gun at the man, hitting him.

PPD says officers then went to check on the infant and rendered medical aid to the man who was shot. The man was transported to a local hospital, where he later died. The Pueblo County Coroner has identified the man as 27-year-old Elijah Fowlkes.

Neither the woman in the home nor the infant was physically injured.

The 10th Judicial District Critical Incident Response Team is investigating the officer-involved shooting. All officers involved in the shooting are placed on leave while the investigation plays out.

Stay up to date with the latest local news, sports, and investigations by downloading the KRDO13 app. Click here to download it from the Apple App Store. Android users can download it from Google Play here.

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Michael Logerwell

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) – Saturday morning, Colorado Springs firefighters responded to a car crash that didn’t happen on the road.

Just after 11:30 a.m. this morning, the Colorado Springs Fire Department announced that their firefighters were at the scene of a car crashing into a building in the 5600 block of N Academy Blvd. There are at least two strip malls in that block of N Academy Blvd.

Thankfully, the fire department says the business was closed when the car came flying inside. No injuries were reported.

First responders have not released a cause for the crash. It’s not clear if the driver was arrested or cited.

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Michael Logerwell

PUEBLO, Colo. (KRDO) – Saturday afternoon, a large plume of black smoke could be seen all around Pueblo. The fuel for the large blaze? A pile of railroad ties, according to the fire department.

A quarter after 1:00 p.m., the Pueblo Fire Department announced on social media that aid from other fire departments in the county had been sent to the fire. The fire is located in the midtown area of Pueblo.

PFD says there are no evacuation orders, or pre-evacuation orders, and no structures are actively threatened by the fire. However, they are recommending that people with respiratory issues take steps to avoid the plume of smoke, such as:

Turn off all outside air handling units Close windows and doors Leave the area if the smoke settles in your area

KRDO13 is sending a crew to the scene of the fire to learn more.

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