NJN/am for Wednesday, August 1

 

It’s Wednesday, and time to grunt our way over the proverbial hump…

Weather: Drying out. The storms that seemingly would never stop finally did, and after they dumped about four inches of rain on northern Jefferson County and blew down a few trees, we return to the normal summer deal of hot days and scattered storms. Highs are back in the middle 90s, with nighttime lows in the lower to middle 70s. There’s a 20 percent chance of isolated storms each day.

Gardendale Police close out two cases. The department arrested two people Monday. One is a woman who is charged with finding a customer’s credit card on the floor of the store where she worked and fraudulently using it, while the other is a man charged in a series of vehicle robberies.

Hayden man indicted. Jason Allen McCay, arrested a couple of weeks ago on federal charges for allegedly shooting at a vintage airplane flying over his house near the private Campbell’s Field airstrip, was formally indicted by a federal grand jury Tuesday. He faces a charge of attempted interference with an aircraft.

Sports: The greatest Olympian. Michael Phelps made history in the pool Tuesday, as he won his 16th and 19th Olympic medals — the latter one gold in the 4-by-200-meter freestyle relay — breaking a record held by gymnast Larisa Latynina of the old Soviet Union. Of those medals, 15 are gold, but one that wasn’t came earlier in the day when he lost his best event, the 200-meter butterfly. He was out-touched at the wall by Chad Le Clos of South Africa. Meanwhile, the U.S. women’s gymnastics team claimed the gold for the first time since 1996, roaring past Russia by more than five points — a rout by the standards of the new Olympic scoring system. And in men’s basketball, the American men walloped Tunisia 110-63, with six players in double figures…. Baseball: Atlanta won its seventh straight, knocking down Miami 7-1. Juan Francisco is on a tear lately, and had three hits against the Marlins. The Braves are 2½ games behind Washington in the National League East.