Beat the Heat: Stay safe during extreme weatherLeaders discuss possibility of shutting down Caloosahatchee Bridge
SOUTHWEST FLORIDA Beat the Heat: Stay safe during extreme weather The Weather Authority has issued a heat advisory for portions of South, Southeast, and Southwest Florida from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Saturday.
FORT MYERS Leaders discuss possibility of shutting down Caloosahatchee Bridge Should residents endure two years of partial lane closures, or fully shut the Caloosahatchee bridge down for 10 weeks?
GAINESVILLE FGCU softball parents cherish NCAA Tournament experience The parents of the FGCU softball team are relishing seeing their daughters play in the NCAA Tournament.
SOUTHWEST FLORIDA The Weather Authority: Hot, hot, hot Heat advisory in place for Saturday from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.
FORT MYERS Fort Myers teen finds dead body in bed of his truck A 16-year-old in Fort Myers drove to school, drove home, drove to the barbershop and back home again. Then, he noticed a swarm of flies in the back of his truck.
Scottie Scheffler facing felony charges; local attorney reacts The attorney we spoke with told us that, at a minimum, we’d spend the night in jail before having our first appearance and getting bail.
GAINESVILLE FGCU softball falls to No. 4 Florida in NCAA Tournament The FGCU softball team couldn’t keep up with the No. 4 Florida Gators as the Eagles drop their first Regional game 6-0 to the Gators.
Summer Safety: Swim safety tips to know before the summer The pool is warming up to be the hot spot for kids and families this summer. It’s now also the number one leading cause of drowning deaths for children ages 1-4 in the state.
FORT MYERS BEACH ‘The Whale’ restaurant to break ground on new building The Whale is a place that has shown great strength and determination.
COLLIER COUNTY Endangered Florida panther deaths surpass 2023 total in 5 months It’s taken wildlife officials just over four and a half months to report finding more dead endangered Florida panthers than in all of 2023.
FORT MYERS FMPD honors 7 officers and 2 K-9s who died in the line of duty dating back to 1930 Nine lives were given, and all nine will remain remembered. A lifetime of gratitude for the fallen officers.
Firefighter recovering from heat exhaustion after battling flames in Collier County It happened at Progress Rail, a transit corporation on Mercantile Avenue just before 5am on Friday.
FORT MYERS How do SWFL graduation rates compare to the state average? How do graduation rates for Charlotte, Lee and Collier Counties stack up against the state? WINK News crunched the numbers.
FORT MYERS Community divisive over ‘justified’ officer-involved shooting of Christopher Jordan A detective who killed an unarmed black man in a controversial shooting will be back at work on Monday.
CAPE CORAL Family submits civil complaint against Cape Coral Police Department The family of a 13-year-old boy who was struck and killed while riding his scooter has officially filed a civil complaint.
SOUTHWEST FLORIDA Beat the Heat: Stay safe during extreme weather The Weather Authority has issued a heat advisory for portions of South, Southeast, and Southwest Florida from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Saturday.
FORT MYERS Leaders discuss possibility of shutting down Caloosahatchee Bridge Should residents endure two years of partial lane closures, or fully shut the Caloosahatchee bridge down for 10 weeks?
GAINESVILLE FGCU softball parents cherish NCAA Tournament experience The parents of the FGCU softball team are relishing seeing their daughters play in the NCAA Tournament.
SOUTHWEST FLORIDA The Weather Authority: Hot, hot, hot Heat advisory in place for Saturday from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.
FORT MYERS Fort Myers teen finds dead body in bed of his truck A 16-year-old in Fort Myers drove to school, drove home, drove to the barbershop and back home again. Then, he noticed a swarm of flies in the back of his truck.
Scottie Scheffler facing felony charges; local attorney reacts The attorney we spoke with told us that, at a minimum, we’d spend the night in jail before having our first appearance and getting bail.
GAINESVILLE FGCU softball falls to No. 4 Florida in NCAA Tournament The FGCU softball team couldn’t keep up with the No. 4 Florida Gators as the Eagles drop their first Regional game 6-0 to the Gators.
Summer Safety: Swim safety tips to know before the summer The pool is warming up to be the hot spot for kids and families this summer. It’s now also the number one leading cause of drowning deaths for children ages 1-4 in the state.
FORT MYERS BEACH ‘The Whale’ restaurant to break ground on new building The Whale is a place that has shown great strength and determination.
COLLIER COUNTY Endangered Florida panther deaths surpass 2023 total in 5 months It’s taken wildlife officials just over four and a half months to report finding more dead endangered Florida panthers than in all of 2023.
FORT MYERS FMPD honors 7 officers and 2 K-9s who died in the line of duty dating back to 1930 Nine lives were given, and all nine will remain remembered. A lifetime of gratitude for the fallen officers.
Firefighter recovering from heat exhaustion after battling flames in Collier County It happened at Progress Rail, a transit corporation on Mercantile Avenue just before 5am on Friday.
FORT MYERS How do SWFL graduation rates compare to the state average? How do graduation rates for Charlotte, Lee and Collier Counties stack up against the state? WINK News crunched the numbers.
FORT MYERS Community divisive over ‘justified’ officer-involved shooting of Christopher Jordan A detective who killed an unarmed black man in a controversial shooting will be back at work on Monday.
CAPE CORAL Family submits civil complaint against Cape Coral Police Department The family of a 13-year-old boy who was struck and killed while riding his scooter has officially filed a civil complaint.
The fourth New Shepard crew (left to right): Gary Lai, Jim Kitchen, Marty Allen, Sharon Hagle, husband Marc Hagle and Gerald Nield. BLUE ORIGIN Jeff Bezos’ rocket company Blue Origin launched its fourth crewed New Shepard flight Thursday — a 10-minute thrill ride carrying five entrepreneur/adventurers and the spacecraft’s chief designer to the edge of space and back. Running two days late because of high winds at the company’s West Texas launch site, the stubby New Shepard rocket’s hydrogen-fueled main engine roared to life at 9:58 a.m. EDT, throttled up to full thrust and boosted the spacecraft away atop a jet of flaming exhaust. Gary Lai, one of Blue Origin’s first employees and the architect of the New Shepard program, was added to the crew in place of comedian Pete Davidson after a launch delay and schedule conflict forced the “Saturday Night Live” star to withdraw. But it appeared to be clear sailing Thursday as the reusable rocket and crew capsule raced straight up toward an altitude just above 62 miles, the internationally recognized “boundary” between the discernible atmosphere and space. Three minutes after liftoff, at an altitude of around 240,000 feet, or 45 miles, the computer-controlled New Shepard crew capsule separated from its booster and continued coasting upward. Now weightless, the passengers were able to unstrap and float about the cabin for three to four minutes as they arced over the top of the trajectory. Joining Lai for the sub-orbital flight were philanthropists and space enthusiasts Marc and Sharon Hagle; University of North Carolina professor and world traveler Jim Kitchen; George Nield, president of Commercial Space Technologies and a former manager with NASA and the FAA; and “angel investor” Marty Allen. Watch the launch in the player below or click here. The New Shepard capsule is equipped with the largest windows of any operational spacecraft in the world, giving the crew spectacular hemispheric views of the Earth below and the deep black of space above as it reached the top of its trajectory and began the long plunge back to the launch site. “Looking out the window and seeing the black sky and the curvature of the Earth is really going to be special,” Nield said before launch. Said Kitchen, who has visited every U.N.-recognized nation on Earth: “Having been to all 193 countries and to be able to go to space and see this borderless planet I think is so meaningful, especially given all that the world is going through right now.” The booster followed a similar trajectory as the capsule, maintaining its tail-down orientation as it homed in on its landing pad two miles from where it took off. Nearing the ground, the rocket’s BE-3 main engine re-ignited, four landing legs deployed and the booster settled to touchdown in a cloud of dust. The crew capsule followed two minutes later, descending under three large parachutes to a walking-pace landing cushioned by powerful air jets an instant before touchdown at 10:09 a.m. EDT. Mission duration: about 10 minutes. The launching marked Blue Origin’s 20th New Shepard flight, its fourth with passengers on board and the 24th non-government commercial spaceflight overall. The reusable New Shepard crew capsule is designed to carry passengers to an altitude of about 65 miles, three miles or so above the internationally recognized “boundary” of space, giving passengers three to four minutes of weightlessness before a parachute descent to touchdown.BLUE ORIGIN For Lai, riding into space on a rocket he helped design gave him a chance to personally evaluate “the safest human spaceflight vehicle ever designed or built or operated.” “We are going to ramp up operations,” Lai told CBS News before the first crewed flight of a New Shepard capsule in 2019. “We’re going to have dozens and eventually hundreds and thousands of astronauts, we hope, fly on New Shepard.” Blue Origin and its customers do not discuss the cost of a New Shepard seat, but prices are thought to be in the half-million-dollar range if not higher. Lai, as a company employee, presumably is flying at no charge but no details were provided. Thursday’s flight was Blue Origin’s first without one or more celebrities on board. Blue Origin launches its fourth crewed flight of a New Shepard spacecraft on March 31, 2022.BLUE ORIGIN/CBS NEWS Jeff Bezos, his brother Mark and aviation pioneer Wally Funk were on board for New Shepard’s first piloted mission last July 20; William Shatner of “Star Trek” fame was aboard for the second launch Oct. 13; and TV personality Michael Strahan and Laura Shepard Churchley, daughter of astronaut Alan Shepard, were aboard for the third on Dec. 11. Davidson, like Strahan, Churchley and Shatner before him, was invited to fly in what amounted to savvy marketing guaranteed to generate widespread media coverage in a high-stakes competition between Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic, owned by fellow billionaire and master marketeer Richard Branson. Virgin has launched four piloted flights of its winged spaceplane VSS Unity, most recently sending up Branson, two pilots and three company crewmates last July 11. Commercial operations are expected to start later this year.