The Stranger’s morning news round-up.

by Nathalie Graham

Biden comes to town: Joe Biden is making a stop in the Emerald City this weekend and he’ll be flying in and out of SeaTac International Airport. If you’ll be in the airport on Friday or Saturday, expect delays. All traffic on the runway will stop until AirForce One has landed and is parked. So, what’s Biden here for anyway? Raising money for his campaign, duh. Still, it’s unclear where Biden is going or what he’ll be up to for his political cash grab. Traveling on major freeways could be a doozy this weekend depending on where the presidential motorcade goes. 

Babe, butchered: Patty and Betty, two pet pigs in Port Orchard, were killed recently when a mobile butcher service went to the wrong address. The butchers didn’t even knock on the door before they killed the pigs. A lawsuit is brewing. 

Gig workers minimum wage bill updates: Yesterday, a Seattle City Council committee voted on a modified version of the gig workers pay standards bill which hasn’t even been in effect for six months. The new version of the bills cuts down delivery drivers’ guaranteed pay and strips them of payment for orders canceled by customers. The bill isn’t law yet, though. The full council still needs to vote on it. I’m sure The Stranger‘s Hannah Krieg will have more to say about it today: 

The council passes amended repeal bill. Kettle, Rivera, Saka, and Nelson vote yes and Hollingsworth abstains

— Hannah Krieg (@hannahkrieg) May 9, 2024

ICYMI: My newest exploration into Seattle’s subcultures came out and this time I hung out with some bees. And, it looks like KING5 totally ripped off my story without any credit. 

Some weather: Sun, glorious sun. I’m going to bake today and you should, too! Wear sunscreen. 

Happy Friday (and National Washington Day)! Another warm and clear day on tap with highs in the 70’s and 80’s. Skies remain mostly clear tonight for the impeding G4 geomagnetic storm, which should provide a good aurora borealis show (if you’re away from the city lights).#wawx pic.twitter.com/od62QNmlmP

— NWS Seattle (@NWSSeattle) May 10, 2024

Wanna see the Aurora Borealis? I bet you do, you sicko, you lover of natural phenomena. You’re in luck. Thanks to a severe geomagnetic storm and little to no cloud cover, the Northern Lights should be visible in Seattle Friday and Saturday night. Midnight and 3 am should be the best times to spy them since that’s the darkest time of night. Try to get away from city lights. You can download an app, too, which will alert you if the night starts to come alive. 

Grand gun theft auto: People keep stealing guns from cars. Gun thefts from cars are three times higher than they were 10 years ago. Cars are the largest source of stolen guns in the country. Stolen guns from cars spiked during the coronavirus pandemic, but so did gun ownership. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives advised people to securely store their guns to reduce this kind of gun theft. I think they should tell people to have fewer guns, but that’s just me. 

Cruise ship carries whale carcass: A cruise ship approaching New York carried a 44-foot-long sei whale, dead and draped across its bow. The ship’s crew discovered the whale’s body as they approached the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal. The sei whale prefers deep water and swimming far from coastlines. Scientists from the Atlantic Marine Conservation Society say the whale was “pretty decomposed” by the time they started the necropsy and found “broken bones in the whale’s right flipper; tissue trauma along its right shoulder blade; a full stomach and decent layer of blubber” which all points to a healthy whale killed by a big boat. At least the whale wasn’t killed by the Creed Cruise. 

When will Sound Transit connect Seattle and the Eastside via light rail? Well, it should be in 2025, but according to the Urbanist, for that timeline to become reality “everything needs to go right from this moment forward.” Right now, the completed 2 line should open by November 2025—however, that’s already a month later than previous projections. Fingers crossed they get their shit together over there so we don’t have to wait until 2026 for a more complete transit landscape. 

Vermont wants fossil fuel companies to pay up: In a first-of-its-kind move, Vermont is considering a bill that will force fossil fuel companies in the state to be liable for climate change-related damages. The bill will function similarly to the Environmental Protection Agency’s superfund program where polluting companies must foot the bill to clean up any toxic waste they caused. If passed—and if it withstands the long road of legal battles that likely lies ahead—the bill will be a model for other states considering similar legislation. 

Don’t have plans tonight? Join me at Benaroya Hall for the Thunderpussy concert! 

I’m sorry—did we talk about the brainworm yet? I know this news is a bit stale by now, but I just need to make sure we all talked about how, years ago, a worm crawled inside presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy’s brain, nibbled away at part of it, then died. But the worm—whose carcass is likely still in Kennedy’s noodle—won’t affect his ability to serve as president, his campaign said. Also, according to this story, Kennedy suffered mercury poisoning from eating too much tuna. “I loved tuna fish sandwiches,” he said. “I ate them all the time.” So, which cognitively addled ancient man will you be voting for to run our country next?

NYPD’s protest bill: According to Gothamist, the New York Police Department has spent a whopping $53 million on overtime pay for protest response since October 7. 

Record-breaking increase in atmospheric CO2: According to the researchers monitoring our atmosphere’s carbon dioxide levels, the amount of CO2* up there saw a record-breaking jump between this year and last year. The cause? The increase in warming due to the periodic El Niño weather pattern and CO2 spewing from fossil fuels and deforestation. Not only is the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere a record, but so is the pace at which it is accumulating and rising.  “In order to stabilize the climate, you need CO2 level to be falling,” Ralph Keeling, director of the CO2 Program at UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography told The Guardian. “Clearly, that isn’t happening. Human activity has caused CO2 to rocket upwards. It makes me sad more than anything. It’s sad what we are doing.”

The climate situation is so bleak that “a fifth of female climate scientists said they have opted to have no or fewer children,” according to The Guardian. 

A song for your Friday: Macklemore is relevant again. 

*You’ll have to use your imagination and pretend all those 2s are subscript because Slog isn’t allowing subscript right now. Dumb Slog.

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