Another Typical Akron Tuesday

A week after the elections and already the news hounds are bored; how the last five hours provided the spice of life for the ink-and-electron stained wretches doing your news for you. Too bad we don't get paid by the hot story.

First things first the big wreck on I-77 at South Arlington that basically left the world south of downtown a parking lot for four hours. NewsChannel 5 reports the driver of a pickup truck was critically injured.

Then there was the electrical vault fire that spewed black smoke over downtown and spoiled the late afternoon for the lizards still pumping down a drink or two near Canal Park (OMG, how did the late crowd at Brico wet their whistle?) but worse yet knocked out power to just about all of the business district of America's 74th largest radio market -- including the corporate headquarters for FirstEnergy, parent company of Ohio Edison. Power may not be fully restored until Wednesday.

The resulting scramble was such a mess the Akron PD begged people to avoid downtown at all costs since it was pure gridlock. Our partners at WKYC had Akron-Canton anchor Eric Mansfield standing in the dark on their 6p broadcast and their 630p cablecast news; usually his perch beside the ballpark is a fine location to show off the lights downtown but not this evening.

Oh, by the way down the pike today the auction began on the guts of Hoover. The once-mighty worldwide sign of northeast Ohio corporate and industrial dominance has been reduced to people coming from around the country to cart off machines and whatever else is ready to go from the North Canton location where Boss Hoover once ruled a worldwide empire made possible by machines that sucked -- literally. How the King of Vacuum has been reduced to this still makes me shake my head but now even the marble topped fireplace facade in the private office where Boss used to do his business is up to the highest bidder. Hell, even the room where the Boss really did his private business is up for grabs; as of this writing I hadn't heard if anyone was able to cart off the tile floor, sink or commode in Mr. Hoover's private bathroom.

Before I wrap up: Akron Council President Marco Sommerville and a handful of other members of Council were taking their annual junket to the National League of Cities meeting in New Orleans when they ran into a snag; seems Marco forgot to pull his piece out of his carry-on. The TSA at CAK felt and FYI was DOA and arrested city government's second most powerful politician for packing heat in his bag. WKYC's coverage was anchored by Bill Safos but Eric Mansfield tells me the law enforcement community, as a whole, as unavailable to comment on this bust but the Barberton prosecutor has the case since Akron-Canton Airport is in the Barberton Municipal Court district. Early word suggests Sommerville will face charges since the feds have a well-deserved reputation for not thinking too kindly of people smuggling weapons onto planes, whether they just forgot or not. I'm guessing here that Marco has a legit reason for a concealed carry permit but that doesn't mean squat on a plane. Our efforts to get a call on the cell returned failed but we'll try again tomorrow.

I think this Friday night's NewsNight Akron program on PBS 45/49 should be interesting...