Investigators are probing a fire that damaged an apartment building Tuesday morning on Versailles Avenue.
McKeesport firefighters said crews were dispatched to 3212 Versailles Ave. just before 7 a.m. after Allegheny County 9-1-1 reported receiving multiple calls about a fire in a second-floor apartment. The blaze at the corner of Versailles and Craig streets quickly went to two alarms.
The first floor of the building previously housed Omerta Ink, a tattoo parlor. According to a post on Facebook, Omerta Ink closed Sept. 26.
Firefighters said the upper floor of the building was not occupied as a residence at the present time and appeared to be a storage area.
Cooper the Emu and the Better Block Foundation will headline McKeesport’s 59th Salute to Santa parade on Saturday.
The annual event, kicking off the holiday season, begins at 11 a.m. on Fifth Avenue, Downtown. Parade units will begin lining up at 10 a.m. on Water Street near the Palisades Ballroom.
The reviewing stand is located at the corner of Fifth and Walnut streets. Weather-permitting, Tube City Community Media will carry live video on its YouTube channel.
The National Weather Service in Moon Twp. is predicting that rain showers will taper off before 10 a.m. Saturday, and temperatures in the city should be around 44 degrees.
This year’s parade is being held in conjunction with a pop-up holiday market inside the People’s Building and two vacant store fronts, the former D&K Stores and CVS Pharmacy. The holiday market — and a performance space in the Cox’s Corner parking lot — have been created by the Texas-based Better Block Foundation, in partnership with Penn State Greater Allegheny and the Richard King Mellon Foundation. Hours are 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday only.
A Beaver County man who asked a juvenile for help charging his cell phone forced his way into the family’s home in Highland Grove and assaulted a resident, then fled and threatened a neighbor with a knife, according to police.
Trey Fosnaught, 31, of Beaver Falls is being held in the Allegheny County Jail in lieu of $50,000 bond after McKeesport police arrested him on the night of Nov. 12 for allegedly breaking into a home on Highland Avenue, then attempting to enter another house in the 2100 block of Bowman Avenue.
According to a criminal complaint, police were called to the Highland Avenue residence after a man, identified by police as Fosnaught, knocked on the door and asked a child who answered if he could charge his cell phone.
A photo of the Eos Energy assembly line, from the company’s website. (Courtesy EOS Energy Enterprises)
Duquesne officials are hopeful that a battery technology company currently located in Turtle Creek will expand into the city’s industrial park.
The Duquesne planning commission was scheduled to meet this month to consider a proposal from Eos Energy Enterprises for a 185,000 square foot facility at RIDC’s Industrial Center of Duquesne, the former U.S. Steel Duquesne Plant.
An Edison, N.J., based company, EOS has two manufacturing hubs in Turtle Creek at another RIDC facility, Keystone Commons.
A fist-fight Sunday afternoon at a bus stop in Glassport ended with one young man dead and another in jail without bond.
James M. Mack Jr., 18, of Glassport was pronounced dead at the scene of multiple gunshot wounds, the Allegheny County Medical Examiner’s Office said.
James E. Martin, 17, of McKeesport is charged by Allegheny County police with homicide, unlawful possession of a firearm and carrying a firearm without a license. He is being held in the Allegheny County Jail pending a preliminary hearing Dec. 4 in Allegheny County Common Pleas Court.
South Allegheny School District announced Monday that grief counselors would be on hand to support any students who knew Mack and needed support.
A parent involved in the McKeesport Area High School Tiger Band’s booster program has been charged after more than $18,000 was reported missing from the volunteer group’s accounts.
Jennifer L. Martino, 49, of White Oak is charged by the Allegheny County District Attorney’s Office with theft by unlawful taking, access device fraud and misapplication of entrusted property.
Martino was charged Monday. She is currently free on her own recognizance pending a preliminary hearing Dec. 9 before Magisterial District Judge Thomas Miller Jr.
Azael Alvarez, project manager for the Better Block Foundation, helps to paint the Cox’s Corner parking lot on Monday. (Tube City Almanac photo)
City officials, Penn State Greater Allegheny and the Texas-based Better Block Foundation will use this weekend’s Salute to Santa parade to encourage economic and cultural investment in the Downtown business district.
The parade — still among the largest Christmas parades in Western Pennsylvania, outside of Pittsburgh — gets underway along Fifth Avenue between Market and Sinclair streets beginning at 11 a.m. Saturday (Nov. 23). Tube City Almanac will provide live-streamed video coverage, weather-permitting.
Better Block, with support from the Richard King Mellon Foundation, is transforming the Cox’s Corner lot — a parking area on the site of the former Cox’s Department Store at Fifth and Walnut streets — into a colorful temporary performance area.
A pop-up holiday market is being created for this Saturday only across the street in the People’s Building and the vacant D&K Stores and CVS Pharmacy. Hours are 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday.
The Allegheny County fire marshal’s office is investigating blazes this week that destroyed a vacant house on Jenny Lind Street and severely damaged two other homes on Packer Street.
The Jenny Lind Street fire is considered suspicious, McKeesport fire Chief Jeff Tomovcsik said.
The first fire was reported early Sunday morning in a home at 1803 Packer St. and quickly spread to a neighboring house at 1801. When crews arrived, the first house was heavily engulfed in fire and the second house was catching, and a second alarm was issued.
Both homes were wood-frame construction, according to Allegheny County property tax records. The houses were less than 10 feet apart.
Gayla and Guy Norelli of Glassport, Vince Klinkner of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and Jim Harrold of Seven Springs at an award ceremony celebrating Harrold’s rescue. (Submitted photo courtesy Guy Norelli)
“I just assumed I was going to drown.”
Jim Harrold of Seven Springs was fishing in the Youghiogheny River in Confluence, Somerset County, when the current pulled him under.
“As I was going down towards the bottom of the pool, which was about 20 feet, there was a light,” Harrold said recently. That's just about where Glassport resident Guy Norelli pulled Harrold out of the Youghiogheny River Lake outflow on Sept. 2, 2022.
Last month, Guy Norelli and his wife Gayla, who spotted the drowning man, were honored with a Public Service Commendation Medal by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
