Sternberg Museum of Natural History

Since its premiere in 1977, “Star Wars” has become a staple in many cultures.

It has connected people all over the world, making it one of the most successful franchises. Not only has it impacted our culture, but our science as well.

The connection between science fiction and actual science has not only helped people have a better understanding of science, but has given them an appreciation for it.

Sternberg outreach coordinator Ian Trevethan has found this connection to be a useful teaching tool to get people excited about science. This summer, Trevethan has been working on a project to show people the connections between “Star Wars” animals and real animals.

The project has led Trevethan to get creative. To help show off the marvelous animals of the “Star Wars” Universe, he has created a Vulptex (crystal fox), seen from “Episode VIII: The Last Jedi,” and a Taun-Taun, seen in “Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back.” The fox in the story lives on a mineralized planet.

“The minerals on this planet, the salt, basically crystalize on this animal’s fur, and you have a crystal critter,” Trevethan told Mike Koerner in a Discover Under the Dome video interview.

It took Trevethan six months of work using thousands of crystals to hand make the creature.

In June, Trevethan took his creations to Smallville Con 2019 in Hutchinson and participated in a Zoology of Star Wars panel.

His future plans for these fictional critters is to use them for his outreach programs this summer, teaching the public how to look for the correlations between them and the real animals that inspired them.

He wants people to start thinking critically, asking questions like, “How is the environment affecting the animal?” “Why did the fox get crystals on its fur?” “What helps the Taun-Taun move so quickly over the snow?”

By exercising this critical thinking skill, people can start to understand how to apply it to real animals and the environment we live in today. To see if Trevethan will be in a town near you, follow Sternberg social media or contact your local library to see if they will be hosting Ian Trevethan this summer.

By TIM POTTER
KDOT

On a summer day, the intersection of U.S. 50 and U.S. 281 looks and sounds like a busy place for a remote spot.

Just beyond the intersection, in Stafford County, it’s wide-open country – 3 miles south of St. John, 48 miles west of Hutchinson, 28 miles south of Great Bend. It’s a quilt of tree lines and crops, cattle and cattails. For stretches, the only movement on the hot pavement is tiny toads trying to hop from one side to another.

At the intersection of the two highways, traffic across a wide expanse of south-central Kansas converges, engines whirring, gears shifting. Big rigs rumble straight through without having to stop, blowing east and west on U.S. 50, while north and south traffic on U.S. 281 is signaled to stop before rolling on. At times, several vehicles line up before east-west traffic clears.

But everything about that key intersection is about to change in a big way: Around four weeks from now, the first key temporary change will be that traffic in all directions will have to stop before proceeding. That’s so construction can continue on a roundabout interchange.

The Kansas Department of Transportation is overseeing the project. Venture Corp., of Great Bend, is the primary contractor for the $5.2 million project.

The roundabout is designed to improve safety – with less chance of a high-speed, T-bone collision – and to ease the way for oversized trailers carrying, for example, huge wind-farm parts. Now, big loads have a hard time maneuvering through the square interchange.

Roundabouts help improve safety because they cause traffic to slow down, said James Middleton, a South Central Kansas Construction Engineer based in Pratt. The 15-year KDOT veteran is overseeing inspection of the interchange project. The project coordinator is Doug Coates, Engineering Technician Specialist has more than 30 years of field experience.

The roundabout will be composed of two spheres: a diamond-shaped outer road for the largest loads and a separate circular road inside the diamond for regular vehicles. Vehicles enter the circle by yielding to the left.

Crews are building legs of the diamond now. For a while, drivers will be using temporary roadway at the intersection. Traffic will be shifted around as the roundabout gets constructed in phases.

For visibility, the completed roundabout will be illuminated with 16 street lights – four at each approach.

The contractor’s schedule has a completion date of Dec. 13.

Check out our drone video of the project below:

Learn more about roundabouts and why KDOT uses them HERE.

PHILLIPSBURG — Hays Post will stream Goodland K-18 regional games this weekend.

Goodland starts regional play against Colby on Saturday. If they advance, they will play the winner of Norton and Phillipsburg on Sunday.

Check Hays Post for the live game video.

Click to expand

By BECKY KISER
Hays Post

High temperatures in Hays caused 22nd Street and the nearby sidewalk to buckle at the Canterbury Drive intersection late Tuesday afternoon, closing 22nd between Douglas and Canterbury Drive.

The official high in Hays yesterday was 97 degrees, according to the report from the K-State Agricultural Research Center.

City of Hays Public Works employees have done some temporary work on the road.

The city issued a notice Wednesday afternoon that pavement repairs will begin Monday, July 22 at 7 a.m., requiring East 22nd to be closed to through traffic at Canterbury Drive.

The work is expected to be completed by Friday, July 26 at the end of of the day.

RUSSELL COUNTY — One person was injured in an accident just after 6:30a.m. Wednesday in Russell County.

The Kansas Highway Patrol reported a 1999 GMC truck driven by Dennis Michael Butcher, 46, Pahrump, Nev., was eastbound on Interstate 70 just east of Dorrance.

The driver fell asleep and struck a guardrail. The truck then traveled back across eastbound lanes of I-70 and rolled.

Butcher was transported to the hospital in Russell. He was properly restrained at the time of the accident, according to the KHP.

By BECKY KISER
Hays Post

The proposed 2020 budget for the city of Hays includes an increase in the solid waste fee for Hays customers.

The last time the fee increased was in 2006 in anticipation of the move in 2007 to a new automated collection system using blue polycarts. The rate was set at $15.20 thirteen years ago and hasn’t changed since then.

“We’re at the point where we’re eating into our reserves every year and that’s not very good for sustainability,” says Toby Dougherty, Hays city manager, “so a rate increase is required.”

The city’s Solid Waste Fund is an enterprise fund, acting like a business.

“Expenses necessitated by the fund are covered by the rates,” Dougherty explained. “The Solid Waste Fund doesn’t get subsidized by the General Fund or any form of taxes. It is solely based off user fees. And right now user fees are not supportive of the overall cost of the fund.”

Dougherty attributes the need for a rate hike to the increase in the cost of living. “Fuel increases, higher hauling and sorting fees for recyclables, salaries, and higher tipping fees at the Ellis County landfill are all factors,” he said.

Revenues from the sale of paper/cardboard recyclables have also been declining, from $63,000 in 2011 to $5,000 in 2018. The city must to pay another entity to take the rest of the recyclables.

“That’s the state of the recycling market. We’re lucky it doesn’t go into a landfill. We’ve gone from getting $60- to $70-thousand dollars a year, to paying $18,000 a year to have our recycling hauled off.”

Paper/cardboard recycling from Hays goes to Tamko in Phillipsburg where it is used in the manufacturing of roof shingles. The rest of the co-mingled recyclables – glass, plastic and aluminum – go to Stutzman’s recycling facility near Hutchinson, where it is sorted and sold to other commercial recyclers.

During tomorrow’s work session, city commissioners will consider a recommended series of annual rate increases over five years rather than one large rate increase.

The recommended rate increases are 15% to $17.48 starting August 2019. Further smaller increases are recommended annually in 2021 through 2024 of 5%, 3%, 2%, and 2%.

Public Works Director Jesse Rohr will present several other options for the commission at their July 18 work session.

Solid Waste services include refuse collection, recycling collection, compost operations, annual alley cleanup, and tree disposal for customers.

Commissioners will also look again at the funding requests in the 2020 budget by outside agencies, including Fort Hays State University city scholarships, Grow Hays, Care Council and Downtown Hays Development Corporation.

The July 18 agenda is available here.

The work session begins at 6:30 p.m. Thursday in Hays City Hall, 1507 Main.

The National Weather Service in Dodge City has issued a heat advisory from 1 to 7 p.m. Wednesday for a swath of northwest Kansas, including Ellis County.

“The combination of hot temperatures and high humidity will combine to create a situation in which heat illnesses are possible. Drink plenty of fluids, stay in an air-conditioned room, stay out of the sun, and check up on relatives and neighbors,” the NWS advisory said.

Temperatures are expected to reach 103 degrees on Wednesday and Thursday, with a high of 102 projected Friday. The temperature will be in triple digits again Saturday, before a slight cool down Sunday, when the mercury is only expected to reach the low 90s.

HPL

A bookmobile is coming to Hays! With funding from the Dane G. Hansen Foundation and the Hays Public Library Foundation, the Hays Public Library is purchasing a bookmobile to expand outreach services.

The bookmobile will allow the library to move beyond the building to provide books and other resources at locations throughout the community. A Dane G. Hansen grant of $76,200 and a matching contribution from the Hays Public Library Foundation will pay for the $152,400 bookmobile.

The bookmobile, which is expected to be delivered early next year, will be equipped to provide a variety of library services. Making regular stops at popular locations around the community, patrons will be able to get a library card, browse the collection, and request alternative items for future stops. The bookmobile also will be a wi-fi hotspot for patrons who need access to the internet. Visits to senior living facilities and early childhood centers will be standard practice for the bookmobile.

“The Hays Public Library is so much more than a nice big building on Main Street full of books and computers,” said Hays Public Library Director Brandon Hines. “We know that to provide the level of excellence of service we strive for and to provide an optimal return of value to our community, we must get outside the walls of the library. We are already doing this in a number of ways. The acquisition of a bookmobile will greatly enhance our ability to be embedded throughout the various sectors of our community and provide services to those who can’t or don’t regularly come through the doors of the library.”

Adding a bookmobile to the library’s services has been a goal of Outreach Coordinator Vera Elwood, who conducted much of the research into vehicle specifications and funding opportunities. Unfortunately, Elwood is leaving the library later this month for a new position closer to her family, and so the library is currently advertising for a new Outreach Coordinator to oversee this project and outreach services.

The Hays Public Library Foundation is a volunteer group that helps address emergent and unexpected needs of the library through supplemental investments and funding, such as assisting with the purchase of the bookmobile. The Hays Public Library Foundation was established in 2001. For more information or to get involved, visit the library website.

The Dane G. Hansen Foundation was established as a charitable organization in 1965, with the primary goal of making the communities of Northwest Kansas better places to live. Established through a generous estate donation from Dane G. Hansen, the Foundation awards grants and scholarships every year to qualified recipients in Northwest Kansas who demonstrate a strong desire for community improvement.

“We can’t wait to deploy this incredible tool,” Hines continued, “and are immensely thankful to the Dane G. Hansen Foundation and Hays Public Library Foundation for making this possible.”

You can keep up to date on bookmobile project and find out more about other library programs by visiting hayslibrary.org or calling 785-625-9014.