Category: kmiz-local-news

Haley Swaino

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (KMIZ)

Local Catholics began a nine-day mourning period Monday after the death of Pope Francis.

Francis died Easter Monday at the age of 88, the Vatican announced.

His death comes one day after blessing Catholics who gathered in St. Peter’s Square on Easter Sunday. In his last speech, the pope called for an end to the wars in Gaza, Ukraine and Sudan.

Catholics in the Diocese of Jefferson City began Novendiale on Monday, a nine-day mourning period that follows the death of a pope. This time of mourning is an ancient tradition of the Catholic Church.

The Diocese of Jefferson City serves 75,000 Catholics in 38 counties and is home to more than 90 Catholic parishes.

Bells will ring out 88 times Monday at all churches in the diocese, according to a news release. Each toll will represent one year of Pope Francis’ life.

Tuesday, a Rosary will be prayed for the pope at all diocesan Catholic schools, the release says. Schools are closed on Monday in observance of Easter.

Friday, a memorial mass will be held for Pope Francis at noon at the Cathedral of St. Joseph in Jefferson City. The release says that additional memorial masses will be held at other locations around the diocese. In the meantime, special accommodations will be made for people wanting to pray at churches.

Catholics will be invited to watch the funeral of Pope Francis together. More details and the location will be announced when available, the release states.

The Rev. Shawn McKnight, recently appointed archbishop-designate of the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas, said in a statement Monday that mourning should be used as a time for reflection.

“As we mourn, let us reflect on this remarkable chapter in the life of our Church — one embodied by a Pope who lived the Christian virtues of humility, authenticity, openness, and hope,” McKnight said in a statement.

After being appointed by Pope Francis, McKnight was ordained the fourth bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Jefferson City on Feb. 6, 2018. He said the pope modeled a life of compassion with an open heart and mind.

“He helped us see the universal nature of our Church, reminding us that we are one body in Christ, regardless of nationality or status,” McKnight said in a statement. “And at a time in history marked by growing division, Pope Francis showed us how we can seek to sow unity — by simply speaking with one another and listening with an open heart.”

John Frymire — an associate professor of history at the University of Missouri — said Pope Francis will be remembered for his morals.

“When he attempted to do diplomacy, he did it on the basis of his moral authority,” Frymire said. “So for example, he went to Africa in the midst of a civil war, risked death. It was a combat zone. He brought in Zelensky from Ukraine. He attempted to bring peace.”

Frymire worked at the Vatican from 1997-99. He said Francis’s pontification marked many firsts.

“The first thing that you should distinguish with Francis was the guy comes from South America, No. 1. No. 2, he’s a Jesuit. No. 3, he’s a missionary,” Frymire said. “He doesn’t look inward to Europe or the United States or the places we think most Catholics would be. He looks outward. He looks to Africa. He looks to South America, where the church’s population is growing. And his mission was always to speak to those people.”

Frymire said Jesuit popes are rare, as many are Franciscans or Dominicans.

“He was exactly the kind of pope we needed at this time,” Frymire said. “I would also say he’s exactly the kind of pope that certain people in power will ignore or acknowledge, depending on their perspective.”

Pope Francis met with Vice President JD Vance on Sunday, making Vance one of the last leaders to meet with him.

“The current political climate in the United States made him very uncomfortable,” Frymire said. “So the key moving forward will be to see what the College of Cardinals does. Are we going to get another Francis or somebody much more on the other side. Because the Catholic Church has both sides.”

Frymire added that Pope Francis was utterly humble and at the same time brilliant.

“One of his more famous statements is, ‘Who am I to judge,'” Frymire said. “The reference was to the question of homosexuality.”

Click here to follow the original article.

Marie Moyer

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

An EF-1 hit Columbia on Easter Sunday, the National Weather Service determined.

Weather service crews were in Columbia assessing damage Monday. The Boone County Office of Emergency Management said in a news release Monday afternoon that an EF-1 tornado was responsible for the damage, including at the city’s landfill and recycling center.

The release said the tornado touched down briefly.

Columbia’s city manager also signed an emergency declaration ahead of Monday night’s city council meeting.

City of Columbia utility workers were replacing 15 broken high-voltage poles along Paris Road, the utility said in a social media post Monday morning.

About 100 customers are affected, the utility said.

“The current estimate is it will take 72 hours to complete the repairs,” the post says.

About 4,000 customers were dark at the peak of the outages on Sunday. Boone Electric Cooperative also reported about 4,000 members without power, but power was restored to nearly all of them by early Monday.

Boone County Office of Emergency Management Deputy Director Jake Waller said in an email that Boone County’s Community Emergency Response Team deployed 12 volunteers to conduct preliminary damage assessment throughout the community.

The assessments, in partnership with Columbia-based Missouri Task Force 1, was ongoing Monday.

National Weather Service meteorologist Matt Beitscher said Monday afternoon that the assessment could take days or even weeks. He said no deaths were reported in the storms and just one injury — in New Bloomfield.

“We encourage anybody who has damage that they have not yet reported to either local law enforcement or the National Weather Service to do so,” Beitscher said. “The surveying process starts today, but it takes days, weeks, sometimes months to finalize, and any new information is very helpful. So any information they can provide about damage when it occurred, and pictures would be fantastic.”

The damage appears to be from a mix of straight-line and tornado winds, Beitscher said. Winds gusts of over 60 mph were recorded in Columbia on Sunday evening.

In a news release from the city, the Columbia Fire Department reported damage around Creasy Springs and Paris Road. CFD also responded to around 30 calls, including damage to about five homes and several city buildings.

Columbia Utilities also reported significant damage to the City of Columbia Material Recovery Facility. The city’s recycling has been suspended indefinitely. City spokeswoman Sydney Olsen said the biogas plant at the landfill — which harvests methane to generate electricity — was also damaged.

City of Columbia Communications and Outreach Supervisor Jason West says resident are urged to hold onto their recyclables for now as they work to figure out options to move forward.

“Make sure everything is properly vetted, hopefully thats just going to be a couple of days and we can start up some type of service but maybe a partial service,” West said.

The facility is located off Route B in northeast Columbia and has been in operation since 2022. It is a manual facility meaning employees sort materials by hand. However the city was already in the process of getting a new building.

“Recommendation was a brand new facility, it would probably be a different location on the landfill property itself,” West said. “It would be more automated, instead of a two stream it would be a single stream that does all of the sorting, that is something we are talking to the city council about,”

“This will probably expedite the process,” West said.

Olsen said Columbia residents will get details about the resumption of recycling as soon as possible.

According to West, about four employees were at the facility conducting service drop-offs and left at about 5:15 p.m., which was about 15 minutes before the tornado warning in Boone County.

Employees were told not to show up for work Monday. The city says it is working on a temporary placement for staff while clean-up is underway.

“Obviously we’ll have some clean-up out here that they could help with as well but then we’ll find another spot for them in the city as we’re working on the next step,”West said.

If you do have storm debris that you need to get rid of, West said it can be dropped off at the landfill or at any of the mulch sties in Columbia as those are still open.

The city is responsible for the clean-up as it is in the city limits but it hopes other agencies will step up to help out.

As for payments made to the city for recycling services, West said that’s still being worked out and he’s asking residents to be patient as they figure out next steps.

Columbia’s Public Works Street Division crews responded to downed trees, street debris and temporary street flooding. The department will continue monitoring conditions and cleaning up debris in the area as the week progresses.

Residents are asked by Columbia Utilities and the Columbia Fire Department to avoid any remaining downed power lines and to never attempt to move them.

If you see downed lines, stay at least 30 feet away. If you see a downed transmission line, stay 100 feet away. To report a downed line, Columbia Utilities can be reached at 573-875-2555.

Residents can report property damage to the Boone County Office of Emergency Management at EM@BooneCountyMo.org. The United Way of Mid-Missouri is also providing resources to residents impacted by the storm and can be reached at 800-427-4626.

Click here to follow the original article.

Lucas Geisler

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

Columbia has indefinitely suspended commercial and residential recycling pickup after the city’s recycling plant was damaged during a strong storm Sunday afternoon.

Columbia Utilities spokesman Jason West said this also applies to the public drop-off centers, saying they will be unavailable to the public. Recycling workers have been asked not to report for work on Monday.

The Material Recovery Facility at the Columbia Landfill in the northeast part of the city handles all recycling for the city. The city was already researching options on how to improve or replace the MRF. The building was nearing the end of “its useful life” due to aging equipment.

The National Weather Service will survey damage in Boone County on Monday. First responders kept busy throughout the city on Sunday with fallen trees and power lines. The Columbia Fire Department responded to 30 calls across the city, including five homes and several city-owned structures. No one was reported hurt in any of the calls.

“The majority of the damage appeared to be in the northeastern section of town, including the Creasy Springs and Paris Road areas,” a city news release said.

Columbia resident Brad Belcher has lived in a home on Bear Creek drive in Columbia for five years. Belcher said he was standing in the doorway of his home around 5 p.m. Sunday, when he heard a loud burst of wind and saw a tree coming toward his home.

“It’s totaled. Like you can see through my house…there’s trees in the living room, in the kitchen,” Belcher said. “It fell on my truck, too like so you gotta worry about cars, you gotta worry about your home.”

Belcher said he, and his two daughters who were in the basement when the tree fell onto the home all made it out safely.

Cara Joos lives next door to Belcher and said she heard a loud noise around the time the tree fell onto the home. Joos said it was hard to tell what was happening when she looked outside due to the heavy rainfall at the time.

She said it was the most she’s ever felt in danger during her years of living in Missouri.

“I’ve lived in this part of the world for a long time, so tornadoes aren’t anything new and everybody says it sounds like a train and it was like the closest… It was like a train that was far off but it was really loud,” Joos said.

The Columbia Utilities outage map reported more than 2,600 customers without power as of 7:50 p.m. It had reached a peak of nearly 4,000 customers after a strong storm went through the city just before 6 p.m. The Bradford Research Farm in Columbia recorded a 66 mph gust during that storm.

Boone County emergency management authorities reported power lines and trees down, along with flooded roads across the county.

A line of storms earlier in the day caused significant damage in part of Callaway County.

Nia Hinson

CALLAWAY COUNTY, Mo. (KMIZ)

Thousands of customers lost power across Mid-Missouri as severe storms moved through the area and set off multiple tornado warnings.

Nearly 4,000 Boone Electric Cooperative customers were without power as of 5:35 p.m. According to the outage map, the outages are happening near Hallsville and Columbia. Emergency managers also sent out public alerts about multiple storm damage reports.

According to the Ameren outage map, 1,870 customers are without service south of Columbia near Ashland, Jefferson City and the Lake of the Ozarks.

One person was injured in Callaway County following reports of a tornado in Callaway County earlier Sunday afternoon. A second line of storms later left behind damage in Columbia.

According to Lt. Curtis Hall, with the Callaway County Sheriff’s Office, deputies found damage to a home on County Road 362. One resident suffered minor injuries from the storm, Hall said.

An ABC 17 News reporter on scene saw a home with its roof partially missing, and several residents working to clean the area.

The National Weather Service report map shows two reports of high wind damage near Guthrie. The damage was reported near roads Y and J, with one roof partially peeled off a home.

Fulton’s tornado sirens experienced a “technical malfunction” and needed repairs after the first line of storms passed through, according to a news release from the Callaway County Office of Emergency Management.

The North Callaway Fire Protection District warned Sunday evening of trees and lines down across roads and water pooling over Interstate 70 between Boone County and mile marker 144. The Missouri State Highway Patrol reported a tree on Highway 54 near Auxvasse.

The same storm system had earlier set off tornado warnings in the Lake of the Ozarks area, including Camdenton.

The second round hit the Columbia area around 5 p.m. after crossing the Missouri River from Moniteau County, where a 61 mph storm gust was reported in California, according to the National Weather Service.

A 66 mph gust was recorded as the storm went over the Bradford Research Farm in Columbia. Just before 6 p.m. — about an hour after the storm hit Columbia — Columbia Water and Light reported about 4,000 customers without power. Boone Electric Cooperative reported that about 4,000 of its members were in the dark just after 6 p.m.

Boone County Emergency Management Director Chris Kelley said some trees had fallen into homes and there are multiple reports of trees and power lines on roads. The damage will take time to assess, he said.

Emergency dispatchers issued public alerts for lines down on Vandiver Drive, a sign on the road near the Range Line Street exit of Interstate 70 and a broken utility pole with lines down on Business Loop 70 W.

Alerts also said traffic lights were out along much of Range Line Street north of Business Loop 70.

Check back for updates to this developing story.

Marie Moyer

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

Some Boone County residents woke up to power outages Sunday morning.

Around 6 a.m. Sunday, Columbia Water and Light made a post on Facebook saying around 1,200 customers were without power due to an accident near Clark Lane. Power was restored less than an hour later, according to a Facebook post at 6:40 a.m. Sunday.

Boone County Joint Communications also announced wires were down that closed a portion of Highway 63 at Clark Road around 5 a.m. The wires were repaired, and crews reopened the road at 9:49 a.m, BCJC says.

It is unclear if the two outages were connected.

According to Ameren’s outage map, 264 customers are without service in Missouri as of 11 a.m. Sunday.

ABC 17 News is working to learn the cause of the outages, and has reached out to the City of Columbia and Ameren for more details.

Mid-Missouri was hit with intense rain and winds early Sunday morning in the first half of what is expected to be a day full of extreme weather. The ABC 17 Stormtrack Weather Team has issued a Weather Alert Day for severe storms and tornadoes possible on Easter Sunday.

Marie Moyer

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

The Boone County Office of Emergency Management is reminding residents about extreme weather safety as Mid-Missouri is forecasted to be hit with high winds, heavy rain, and risks for hail and tornadoes on Easter weekend.

In a Facebook post Friday, the BCOEM reminds drivers to avoid driving through moving and high water.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency also advises people not to walk or swim through flood waters and to stay off bridges with fast-moving water in case of flooding.

According to FEMA’s National Flood Hazard Layer Viewer, the City of Columbia has risks of flooding around many creeks and streams in the area, like Hinkson and Bear Creek.

The National Weather Service has a flood warning in effect for Hinkson Creek, Petite Saline Creek and Moreau River.

FEMA also reminds people to have an emergency shelter plan, ideally located in a windowless basement or at the lowest level of a building. The shelter should be stocked with food, water and medical supplies.

If a tornado touches down, people should seek shelter immediately. Drivers should exit their vehicles and find a place low or dug into the ground to lie in. It’s also recommended to avoid bridges and underpasses during a tornado.

Haley Swaino

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

A Sedalia man suffered moderate injuries in a crash on Friday in Morgan County, according to a crash report from the Missouri State Highway Patrol. The crash happened at 10 p.m. on Highway 50 near Route 135.

The report says that a 2016 Ford Mustang – driven by a 23-year-old man from Sedalia, Missouri – was heading westbound when the driver crossed the center of the roadway and struck a 2016 Peterbilt 579 heading eastbound, driven by a 36-year-old man from Carson, California.

The Mustang rotated and stopped facing east off the north side of the roadway, the report says. The driver was taken by ambulance to Bothwell Regional Health Center with moderate injuries. The semi-truck driver was not injured.

The driver of the car was not wearing a seatbelt, the driver of the semi-truck was, according to the report. The car was totaled and the semi had extensive damage.

Euphenie Andre

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

The University of Missouri and the City of Columbia are stepping up efforts to keep students and community members safe following a violent weekend where five people were shot.

Both MU and the Columbia Police Department said they’re working together to increase patrols in, and around downtown in response to growing safety concerns.

An ABC 17 News reporter observed CPD officers making rounds downtown and MU police officers patrolling near campus on Saturday night.

For many students, weekends downtown are typically a time to relax and connect with friends.

“It’s a very great nightlife, though. There’s a lot of things to do a lot of like kind of walking around, meeting with a bunch of different friend groups, that sort of thing,” MU student Connor Stuart said.

However, last week’s shooting— that left two men injured has made some students think twice before heading out.

“There is normally a lot of cops out, so I would feel safe. But with all the shootings happening, I’m kind of like reluctant to go out. Like, we have started to Uber more just because of it, instead of walking around,” MU student Madison Holmes said.

Columbia Mayor Barbara Buffaloe told ABC 17 News previously that she met with the Columbia Police Department and the University of Missouri to discuss long-term safety strategies.

One of the steps being taken is increasing the number of patrols downtown.

“I live right here on Broadway, and so it’s definitely a little scary kind of (shootings) being right outside my door,” Stuart said. “But, I do feel a lot more comfortable with a lot more cops kind of starting the patrol especially when it gets dark out in the night.”

But not everything aimed at safety is bringing peace of mind. Some students said MU’s alert system sent to students warning of potential crimes can sometimes create more panic, than clarity.

MU sent out alerts over the weekend of the shootings and the initial one had an error and did not have the location. University of Missouri President Mun Choi said during a press conference earlier this week that the university is re-evaluating how it sends out campus alerts.