Local Digest
Ferry is delayed after car goes off deck

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The man suffered minor injuries, but the Chelan was stalled for nearly two hours while divers assessed the risk posed by his submerged car, said spokeswoman Susan Harris-Huether of Washington State Ferries.

The Chelan, with an "extremely light" load, then moved slowly around the car and went back into service. That ferry and two others serving Anacortes and the islands will use other slips at Anacortes "until we can get that car out of there," Harris-Huether said.

When the driver hit the gas to debark, "he went backward instead of forward with enough speed that he broke through the chain in the back of the boat," Harris-Huether said. The car landed 40 to 50 yards from the vessel, she said. Washington State Patrol identified the driver as 38-year-old David J. Polson of New York City.

The ferry crew rescued him, and he was taken to Island Hospital in Anacortes. Harris-Huether said the man had a broken arm and suffered from hypothermia.

Maple Valley

Deputy seriously hurt in collision with truck

A King County sheriff's deputy was in serious condition yesterday after his patrol car was struck by a semi-truck just north of Maple Valley.

The 2 a.m. accident at Southeast 216th Way and the Maple Valley Highway caused the highway to be closed in both directions until about 8:30 yesterday morning, said Sgt. John Urquhart, spokesman for the Sheriff's Office.

The 32-year-old deputy, whose name was not released, was responding to a report of a man with a gun when the accident occurred. He was making a left turn onto southbound Maple Valley Highway when his patrol car was "T-boned" by the semi-truck, Urquhart said. The truck driver, whose identity was unknown, was not injured.

The intersection has a traffic light. There were no witnesses to the accident, according to Urquhart, so some details weren't immediately known, including whether the deputy was using his lights and siren, how fast the vehicles were going and who had the right-of-way.
 
The deputy was taken to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle, where he initially was listed in critical condition. His condition was upgraded to serious at 5 a.m.

Startup

Man presumed dead in rafting accident

An 18-year-old man was presumed drowned after he apparently went over a waterfall in a rubber raft Sunday on the Skykomish River near Startup, Snohomish County.

The man and his brother, who is 15 or 16, were trying out a raft they had bought at a garage sale earlier that day when the raft flipped over, said Snohomish County Sheriff's Office spokeswoman Jan Jorgensen. Their names were not released.

Both brothers clung to the raft as it headed for Canyon Falls, an approximately 50-foot waterfall surrounded by rocky cliffs. The younger boy made it to shore and said he saw the empty raft at the bottom of the falls. The older brother's body had not been found yesterday.

The two were not wearing life jackets, Jorgensen said.

Snohomish

Man marks 94 years with leap from plane

Once was not enough for Steven Eastman. After leaping out of an airplane with a parachute on his 94th birthday, he was ready to go skydiving again.

Clad in polyester pants and wingtip shoes, sporting a beret and braided beard, the retired Boeing worker from Renton realized a five-year dream when he took the plunge Sunday to the delight — and relief — of his watching children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

"I did it!" Eastman exclaimed. "I want to do it again."

Strapped to a skydiving instructor, Eastman jumped out of the plane 12,000 feet over Harvey Field, spent a minute in free fall, then popped the chute..

Making similar tandem jumps with him were his son and a granddaughter. He's the second-oldest person to skydive at Harvey Field. The oldest was a 98-year-old Snohomish man.

"Am I a daredevil?" said Eastman, who wears a heart pacemaker. "Nowadays it's a daredevil thing just to live every day."

Portland

NOAA backs plan to reduce dam spills

A federal agency is backing the Bonneville Power Administration's (BPA) plan to reduce the amount of water spilled over dams on the Columbia and Snake rivers this summer.

Water that's spilled bypasses the power generators at dams, but helps speed juvenile fish along their way downstream.

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Fisheries said reducing the spill should result in no net loss of fish because of other steps proposed by the BPA.

Under the plan, spills will stop a month early at Bonneville and The Dalles dams and six days early at the Ice Harbor Dam on the Snake River. As an offset, the BPA would buy water stored by Idaho Power. That water would be released to help threatened salmon move downstream.

BPA wants the changes in order to generate more electricity for sales to California utilities. A tribal confederation has said it will sue the BPA to prevent it from reducing the spills.

Times staff and news services