Category: kifi-local-news

Seth Ratliff

IDAHO FALLS, Idaho (KIFI) — Tonight, Dec. 3rd, the 2025 Guns N’ Hoses hockey fundraiser hits the ice at the Mountain America Center in Idaho Falls, celebrating local first responders. The family-friendly fundraiser features youth hockey players who will suit up in police and firefighter-themed jerseys to honor our local first responders.

Tickets are available now for just $10 per person, and all proceeds directly benefit the Idaho Falls Youth Hockey Association and the Greater Idaho Falls Police Foundation. Doors open to the public tonight at 5:30 PM, with the official puck drop scheduled for 6:45 PM.

For more information or to purchase tickets, click HERE.

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Seth Ratliff

IDAHO FALLS, Idaho (KIFI) — Local law enforcement officers are kicking into high gear for a heartwarming holiday tradition. The Bonneville County Sheriff’s Office is calling on the community to join in a holiday fundraiser luncheon today, December 3rd, to support their annual Shop With a Cop event.

Happening today, from 11:30 AM to 1 PM, the Outback Steakhouse on Lindsay Blvd in Idaho Falls is hosting a special Build-Your-Own-Burger Bar. Each meal is $15, with all proceeds going directly to funding the local Shop With a Cop program.

The heartwarming tradition pairs local police and Sheriff’s deputies with children, ages 5 to 12, who could benefit from a positive experience with law enforcement. The goal of the program is to build or improve a positive relationship, as each child and officer spend the morning Christmas shopping for the child’s immediate family.

The main event kicks off this Saturday, December 6th, beginning at 7 AM at the Eagle’s Lodge on Hemmert Ave in Idaho Falls. At 8 AM, the children and officers will participate in a special parade of cop cars before heading to Target to begin their shopping trip.

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Megan Lavin

IDAHO FALLS, Idaho (KIFI) —  Mark Lach, Titanic explorer and the exhibition’s Creative Producer, visited live in studio to show us two of the Titanic’s artifacts.

We also learned the tragic story about a family who were on their way to Idaho.

Mike has first-hand experience visiting the wreck site in a submersible and shares what you can expect at the exhibit.

You can find more information and tickets for the Salt Lake exhibition at their website: https://thetitanicexhibition.com/salt-lake-city/

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Curtis Jackson

POCATELLO, Idaho (KIFI) – Voters have chosen Mark Dahlquist as the next mayor of Pocatello on Tuesday night.

Dahlquist won with 7,238 votes, or 62%, over Greg Cates 4,424 votes, or 38%.

In the November 4th election, Mark Dahlquist also led the field, cruising to a first-place finish with 5,135 votes. Not far behind, Greg Cates secured the second spot with 3,938 votes.

“I’m so humbled for people for their support and their trust and confidence with me,” Dahlquist said Tuesday night at a watch party held at the Portneuf Valley Brewery. “I think the mayor’s position, there is no higher way or no higher form to serve your city. It’s a big responsibility, but I’m so excited.”

“They (voters) wanted a new direction. They wanted to hit the reset button,” Dahlquist said. “I’ve got a lot of work to do and a lot of people have spoken with me and they’ve got good solid platforms or ways I want to move, so I’m ready to roll up my sleeves. I’m ready to give this my all.”

Cates held a watch party at the Purpose Building in Downtown Pocatello.

“This has been a great experience regardless of the outcome. I met a lot of people, and I’ve learned a lot about myself as a person,” Cates said before knowing what the final results were.

Dahlquist will be replacing the outgoing mayor, Brian Blad. Blad came in third during the November 4th election.

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Curtis Jackson

IDAHO FALLS, Idaho (KIFI) – Lisa Burtenshaws won the runoff election for Idaho Falls mayor.

The unofficial results show Burtenshaw received 6,435 votes, or 53.1%, of the votes over Jeff Alldridge 5,663 votes, or 46.8%.

That’s a change from the November 4th election where Jeff Alldridge took a narrow lead with 5,599 votes, while Lisa Burtenshaw secured 5,537 votes.

“I’m excited to get to work,” Burtenshaw told Local News 8 after learning of her win. “I have listened to people along the campaign trail, and I know we have work to do with the community. I’m excited because we have great city employees. We have great directors in the city, and I know that we can. Accomplish the things that the community is asking us to do,” Burternshaw said.

In the Idaho Falls City Council race for Seat 2, Brandon Lee took 59.5% of the vote over Teresa Dominick’s 40.5%

12,107 ballots were cast on Tuesday compared to 11, 868 ballots cast in the November 4th election.

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News Team

ORIGINAL:

FORT HALL, Idaho (KIFI) — Repairs are currently underway at the Shosone Bannock Jr./Sr. High School after the building’s heating system failed Tuesday night, Dec. 2nd. School will once again be closed Thursday, December 4, 2025.

UPDATE:

FORT HALL, Idaho (KIFI) — The Shosone Bannock Jr./Sr. High School will be closed tomorrow, Wednesday, December 3, 2025, due to the building’s heating system not functioning properly.

School Administration announced the closure on Facebook Tuesday night, apologizing for the inconvenience. The post did not indicate the cause of the problem or how long the issue would take to repair.

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Seth Ratliff

UPDATE:

MALAD CITY, Idaho (KIFI) — Power is back on in Malad City today, Dec. 3rd, after thousands spent the night in the dark. Rocky Mountain Power says an equipment failure knocked out power yesterday afternoon, and it took until this morning to get everything back on track.

The outage hit as temperatures dropped below freezing and light snow moved through the area. Oneida County acted quickly by opening the fairgrounds event center for anyone who needed a warm place to sleep.

ORIGINAL:

MALAD CITY, Idaho (KIFI) —  3,100 people in Malad are currently without power, after an equipment failure early Tuesday afternoon. In a press release, Rocky Mountain Power said “crews are in the field working to restore power as quickly and safely as possible,” but the repairs will take some time. The outage is expected to last until early tomorrow morning, Wednesday, December 3rd.

The outage comes as the National Weather Service forecasts temperatures in Malad will drop to 21 °F overnight while scattered snow showers continue.

In winter power outages, the Idaho Office of Emergency Management directs Idahoans to keep blankets, jackets/sweaters, hand warmers, gloves, and hats ready to stay warm. The Office of Emergency Management website also advises residents to use a safe, portable heater and generators to keep their homes warm, but it’s important to use them safely to prevent carbon monoxide poisoning and other hazards

Rocky Mountain Power is encouraging customers in Malad to follow any directives from local public safety officials and check the Rocky Mountain Power outage map for updates and estimated restoration times. For more information, click HERE.

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News Release

The following is a news release from Idaho Fish and Game:

CUSTER COUNTY, Idaho — Beginning in early December, Idaho Fish and Game staff will take to the air to get a closer look at deer numbers, including several low-level helicopter surveys planned in the Salmon and Challis areas. The purpose is to gather abundance and herd composition information that helps game managers understand population numbers and trends.

The flights will be completed in big game management units 21, 21A, 29, 37, 37A, and are expected to take a week if the weather permits. 

“People may see and hear low-flying helicopters near Salmon and Challis in the coming week,” said Fish and Game Wildlife Biologist Bret Stansberry of Salmon.  “While we understand that folks are still recreating, we will do our best to temporarily avoid areas where we observe people.”

Care is taken to minimize disturbance to the animals and prevent the expenditure of valuable energy reserves.  Generally, the information collected can be gathered within a few minutes or less of an animal being spotted. 

This information, together with abundance monitoring, survival monitoring and hunter harvest information, will be used to determine the overall health of Idaho’s big game herds, which plays a critical role in determining future hunting seasons.

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Curtis Jackson

IDAHO FALLS, Idaho (KIFI) – The Idaho National Lab is celebrating the arrival of a special kind of fuel called TRISO. TRISO stands for tri-structural isotropic particle fuel.

This fuel will power Project Pele, a first-of-its-kind mobile microreactor designed to give the military reliable energy anywhere, even if the grid goes down.

Think of the fuel as tiny, super-tough particles—about the size of poppy seeds—that can handle extreme heat and radiation. It’s made of uranium, carbon, and oxygen, and is formed into a small kernel. It’s then coated in multiple layers, including silicon carbide, which makes it extremely durable under high heat, radiation, and corrosive conditions.

A single cask can hold more than one-fourth of the TRISO fuel needed to fuel Project Pele.

Tuesday’s delivery is a huge milestone, showing years of work by top scientists and partners like the Department of Energy and the Army.

“This milestone reflects years of dedicated effort by the Office of Nuclear Energy’s Advanced Gas Reactor TRISO Fuel Qualification Program to fabricate and qualify TRISO fuel using world-class capabilities at INL’s Advanced Test Reactor and Materials and Fuels Complex, and Oak Ridge National Laboratory — capabilities that exist nowhere else in the world,” said John Wagner, INL director. “That investment is now enabling Project Pele to move forward with the speed and confidence our national security demands to accelerate American innovation and demonstrate the leadership that will define this era of nuclear energy.”

They say it’s a big step toward next-generation nuclear power and keeping critical operations running no matter what.

A GEO basket, the inner container of the shipping package, is removed from the
containment vessel’s transport cask.

“This is the first TRISO microreactor fuel delivered at its final destination,” added Jeff Waksman, principal deputy assistant secretary of the Army for Installations, Energy and Environment. “Project Pele is a transformational leap toward Gen-IV nuclear power, and the Army’s Janus Program will follow on to deliver affordable, reliable, commercial nuclear power to ensure that our critical infrastructure has power even if the electric grid is disrupted.”

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Maile Sipraseuth

IDAHO FALLS, Idaho (KIFI) — A Brigham Young University-Idaho student has been charged with kidnapping a four-week-old infant after allegedly taking a shopping cart containing the baby from a Costco store last month.

Michael Garrison Raine, 24, faces one count of second-degree kidnapping. The arrest followed an investigation prompted by a mother’s quick response after she discovered her shopping cart containing her child was missing.

Shopping Cart and Infant Vanish

According to court documents, the alarming incident took place on Thursday, November 20, while a local mother was shopping with her four-week-old daughter, who was secured in a car seat placed in the main basket of the shopping cart.

The mother told police she was in the book section, with her cart within arm’s reach, when she noticed a man lingering nearby. As she began reading the back of a book, she said she had a “weird feeling,” and when she looked up, the cart and her baby were completely gone.

She immediately searched for her daughter and found her a few aisles over in the snack section. There, she spotted the same man pushing the cart away from her. The mother quickly grabbed the cart back. The man, later identified as Raine, immediately began apologizing repeatedly, saying, “I’ll never do that again, I promise.”

Surveillance Video and Conflicting Accounts

Investigators later obtained Costco security video, which reportedly captured Raine taking the cart and the following confrontation with the mother. The video also showed Raine using a self-checkout under the membership of fellow BYU-I student Benjamin Jensen, before eating at the food court.

Detectives eventually identified Raine as Jensen’s roommate through his BYU-Idaho and Facebook profiles, which matched the surveillance footage and the mother’s description.

Raine was ultimately detained on November 26 at a Marine Corps Recruiting station in Idaho Falls, where he had been speaking with a military recruiter. Court documents reveal that Raine had visited the same Recruiting Station earlier that week but failed out of the Military Entrance Processing Station due to psychological reasons.

When brought in for questioning, Raine initially denied that anything unusual had happened, only acknowledging that he had visited Costco that day. When confronted with the fact that a child was taken that day, he appeared surprised. According to court docs, when investigators clarified that he had been the individual who took the child, Raine responded, “Oh! That! I’m so sorry. I remember that now.”

Raine claimed he was “completely mistaken” and had “grabbed the wrong cart.” He told the arresting officer he apologized to the mother, but that she simply walked away, and he then grabbed his own cart and went to checkout. When officers showed him the surveillance video, Raine responded, “I was just so oblivious.”

Raine ultimately denied taking the child on purpose, stating it was an accident. However, the arresting officer noted in court documents that the video evidence “does not appear to support this claim.”

After downloading his phone with written consent to search it, Raine was transported to the Bonneville County Jail and booked on the kidnapping charge. He is set to appear in court next week, on December 10th, at 1:00 PM for a preliminary hearing before Judge Tawnya Rawlings.

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