From 27 News. Live from the capital of Kansas, this is 27 News at 6.
This morning's lightning leaves its mark on one junction city church and this is all that's left.
Nobody won last night's Powerball jackpot, which means the jackpot will now climb even higher.
And I'm Shereen Jones. Coming up in a live report, I'll tell you what popcorn and country music have to do with each other.
Good evening, I'm Amy Lee. And I'm Nate Hill. Thanks for joining us.
Fire destroyed a junction city church today. Lightning hit the Zion United Church of Christ about 2.30 this morning.
It hit so hard the church's pastor says he found pieces of the chimney 50 feet away from the building.
It's not something that we go through every day.
So we'll just trust the Spirit will lead us to what we need and trust that He'll provide the folks to help us with it.
For now, the church will hold services at a funeral home chapel.
Damages are estimated at about $150,000. Church members will soon decide if and where to rebuild.
If you'd like to help out the church, call Pastor Ken Barnhart at 238-4032.
Most area homes have their power turned back on tonight. Strong storms knocked out power last night to about 14,000 area KPL customers.
One KPL official says less than 100 homes are still without power right now.
And it really is amazing that there weren't more fires like the one in Junction City because that lightning was pretty brutal at times last night.
Yes, it was powerful and definitely lit up the sky. Let's check in with Steve Bailon in the First Warning Weather Center for the latest.
And boy, did it rain last night. We had some really heavy amounts across East Central Kansas.
More is on the way for tonight and into tomorrow as well. Roaming thunderstorms and with all the cloud cover, we're expecting to see a high of 81 for your Friday.
Look at these rain totals from our storm spotters. Officially at Topeka's Billard Airport, 3.64 inches.
Magetta came in with 3 and they were localized 4 inch amounts in around Shawnee County and up towards Jackson County as well.
High of 86 in Topeka, middle 90s up towards Barnes, Blue Rapids and Marysville.
And down to the south side, temperatures were in the 80s and 90s with a 91 in Emporia, 94 in Osage City.
And just short of 4 inches from Pat in Osage City, boy, did her rain gauge and her lawn get quite a tall glass of water.
Now, our future cast hit this right on the money last night and it's got more heavy amounts and I'll show you those to you coming up in a few minutes.
Alright, thanks Steve. Two Kansans are $100,000 richer tonight.
Not us. They won money in last night's huge Powerball drawing, but no one in the nation hit all six numbers for the jackpot.
That means the money jumps to about $280 million this weekend.
Though all the Powerball hype isn't over just yet, the highest the Powerball jackpot has ever reached is $295 million.
Bad news for drivers, it looks like gas prices have crept back up again.
Here in Topeka, prices are averaging $1.55 a gallon and experts say they'll continue to rise as Labor Day weekend approaches.
Gasoline fuel business is very volatile as you well know and anytime there is a disruption in supplies, that causes a problem and has it had this time.
When Chicago refinery has been temporarily shut down, Swift says he believes that's one reason the prices have gone up.
A Salina woman faces charges of fraud.
Prosecutors say Don Glasburn Hosely cheated a man she met on the internet out of almost $230,000.
She allegedly convinced him to invest in businesses, then refused to give his money back.
Geologists want to find out why part of a highway in Reno County is sinking.
They're studying US 50 this week, where it appears to be dropping at a rate of one inch per month.
A Lawrence man will build a statue of Dwight D. Eisenhower for the US Capitol.
After a nationwide search, a board picked Jim Brothers to make the statue.
He most recently sculpted the ten figures that portray soldiers in battle for the D-Day Memorial in Bedford, Virginia.
The Eisenhower project still needs to be approved by Congress.
Go to any grocery store and you'll find the necessities, food, medicine and toilet paper.
But what about country music? 27 Shireen Jones is live at Albertsons tonight. Shireen, what is the deal with country music?
A week or two ago, boxes of Pop Secret popcorn like this one began showing up on store shelves,
not only stuffed with popcorn, but also with CD-ROMs featuring Spica's very own Dixie Road.
In 1995, I called some friends and I said, let's get together and play some songs.
Six years and a few band changes later, Dixie Road is ready to go.
Lots of harmony vocals and high energy, kind of more of a contemporary sound.
We all get along well. We get on each other's nerves sometimes, but we know how to take each other. We don't have to punch each other out.
Things get boring. I kind of look at Jim because I always look for Jim to do something funny.
A connection with Speedway International lands the band its first big break.
We were fortunate enough to get on 1.7 million CD-ROMs that are in every Winston Cup program, race in the country.
Well, that kind of blossomed.
Now, 6 million more CD-ROMs sit on store shelves across the country.
Having this many CDs out with our song, obviously it's a goal of any band because you want to be heard.
Dixie Road isn't alone. It shares the spotlight with Ricochet, a band that's taken the Topeka group under its wings.
We aspire to be like those guys on and off the stage. They're fantastic musicians, but they're terrific guys.
Now, these guys are going to be here at our stand until 8 o'clock signing autographs and I'm sure singing a prompter song or two.
And Amy, just think about it. A year from now, we can say we knew these guys back when.
Just let them keep going. Don't stop them. That was good.
Good music and popcorn.
Very impressive. Yeah, I like that little bop bop.
Well, flying on airplanes alone can be nerve-racking.
Especially if you're a kid. Up next, what you can do to make the trip easier. And Miss Kansas will be flying high soon, all for a good cause.
Details are straight ahead.
This is 27 News at 6, coverage you can count on.
Judged best newscast by the Kansas Association of Broadcasters for three consecutive years.
With Amy Leitz, Nate Hill, meteorologist Bruce Jones, and Jared Smalley with sports.
You're watching 27 News at 6 on KSNT.
Now, it's Connecting with Kids, brought to you by the NOLA dealerships of Topeka.
Twice in recent weeks, airlines have misplaced a child who flew alone.
And this has many parents on edge. Connecting with Kids takes a look at what to do, what you can do to put yourself and your child at ease when flying solo.
Ten-year-old Taylor Ennis has spent the entire summer away from mom.
This is the first time that she's actually traveled alone, unaccompanied.
At first I was scared, but then when I got on it, it was kind of fun.
Mom was scared as well when Taylor boarded the plane two months ago.
Is she going to be okay? Are they really going to keep an eye on her?
In fact, the airlines almost never misplace a child. Still, lots of other things can go wrong.
Delays do happen, diversions happen, cancellations happen, so this is part of flying today.
An estimated seven million kids, some as young as five, fly unaccompanied every year.
Experts say parents should reassure and empower their children.
Provide the child with emergency telephone numbers to travel with and also the itinerary, the travel itinerary, for the child to have on that person.
Also consider book a flight during the day, book a nonstop flight, and in an aisle seat close to the flight crew.
But above all, ask yourself, is your child mature enough to handle the trip?
So I'm a lot more comfortable with her flying at this age, and I think, I know I may have been very hesitant if she was six or she was seven.
Taylor was. She's just not so sure she wants to do it again anytime soon.
I might not want to leave my mother for this long again.
There's nothing like it to be reunited again. Wonderful.
I'm Stacey Dewitt, Connecting with Kids.
And for more advice, go to ksnt.com and click the Connecting with Kids icon.
Miss Kansas is setting her sights high to help one local foundation.
Kimberly Grice came to Topeka to announce her plans to jump from an airplane.
She'll get donations towards her jump and give the money to the Transplant Assistance Fund.
Even though she's afraid of heights, she's focused on helping the organization.
Getting ready to go to Miss America and support organ tissue donation.
And I have a personal relationship with that. My brother was a donor and passed away probably about eight months ago.
And so it's a very personal issue for me and a passion of mine.
If you'd like to donate toward Kimberly's jump, contact the Topeka Community Foundation,
and she tells us that she will not be jumping until after the Miss America pageant.
That's probably a good idea.
That would be a good idea.
Wow.
The Kansas City Chiefs get ready for a tough matchup tonight.
Jared has details and the Hayden Wildcats prepare for the upcoming season.
Our first high school football preview is coming up in sports. But first...
Our KSNT allergy report is brought to you by Jayhawk Pharmacy Custom Prescription Center,
your natural hormone replacement therapy specialist.
Altenary and ragweed on the high side of the mold spores are moderate,
and our soggy futurecast forecast is coming up right after this break.
The Tw...
Well, just like last night, we're expecting to see more heavy rains for northeast Kansas for tonight.
I guess you could say the weather will be for the ducks the next few days.
I guess it's appropriate that this Saturday is the Great Topeka Duck Race.
See how Mother Nature plans all that out just perfectly?
This Saturday at Lake Shawnee, race time is at 2.30, and all the money raised
is providing money for the Big Brothers and Big Sisters and Sertoma sponsorships.
All you gotta do is pick up the phone, call 23 ducks, you can make a big difference in a child's life.
That's the Capital Federal Saving Sky Cam, partly cloudy skies and a bird's eye view from our KSNT tower.
85 degrees, the current temperature. We had a lot of thick cloud cover early this morning,
but then the sun started to peak out during the afternoon,
and now it's starting to develop some thunderstorms as we go towards this evening.
Out at Topeka's Billard Airport, 85 degrees, the current temperature.
Humidity is sky high, dew point at 73, winds are now to the northeast at 9 miles an hour.
We've got 80s and a few 90s across northeast Kansas, 86 in Lawrence and Emporia,
up to 92 in Salina and just to the west of Salina.
The thunderstorms are really getting going with the heating of the day and the humidity.
Thunderstorms are firing in north central Kansas.
On our digital Doppler radar, you can see the line of strong thunderstorms
rolling on through, heading towards Concordia and Salina.
Just a little thundershower activity towards Burlingame and Eskridge,
but the big activity is out to the west where the Storms Prediction Center has issued
a severe thunderstorm watchbox till 10 o'clock, so anywhere basically the west of Manhattan.
You may have some rough weather as we go to the evening hours.
Otherwise, later on for tonight, beyond 10 o'clock,
everybody northeast Kansas could see lots of heavy rains just like last night.
Here is the setup. We've got a front stalled out across eastern Kansas
and a tremendous moisture supply coming up on these southerly winds
just to the south of this front.
It's hitting the front and as low pressure swings out of the Rockies where those storms are now,
we will see lots of heavy rains and even another batch of rain coming in for Friday night.
Otherwise, we've got to wait till Saturday afternoon before this cool front zips through northeast Kansas,
clearing out the skies and giving us some very comfortable weather
as we go towards the second half of this weekend.
But in the meanwhile, umbrellas up in your futurecasts.
We'll be here on 27 News.
While the showers and thunderstorms beyond 10 o'clock will probably be south of I-70 along that front,
and here we are right around nine o'clock tomorrow morning.
You can see the wet weather diminishing a little bit, kind of like this morning.
The showers and thunderstorms went away for a good majority of the day,
but refire in the afternoon at around five o'clock with a drive time home for tomorrow.
As we head to the weekend, we will see showers and thunderstorms redevelop
and go into Friday night into early Saturday morning as well.
But as we go towards Saturday around seven o'clock,
a lot of the rain moves off towards Missouri and we begin to clear the skies out
as that front pushes through by midday Saturday.
So how much rain are we going to get? A lot, especially down to the south.
Here's our futurecast, which was right on top of the storm last night,
pinpointing two to three inches of rain along the I-35 corridor and down to the southeast,
one to two inches from Topeka down towards Emporia,
and probably closer to a half an inch of rain up to the north of I-70.
Scattered storms for tonight, heavy rains are possible,
especially around and after midnight with a low of 69 degrees, 81 tomorrow's high.
Late thunder is possible, otherwise mostly cloudy skies,
and for tomorrow night, 69, another soaker is on top with some fog patches scattered around northeast Kansas.
Five-day forecast shows we're going to be clearing out quite nicely as we go towards Saturday afternoon
in towards Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, and highs will be in the mid-80s,
but we'll keep a sharp eye on these storms as they roll on in as we go towards tonight.
A good soaking and then a lot of sun. That's right.
All right, thanks a lot, Steve. All right, Chief's Game tonight.
Sure, big one. They've been waiting a while for this one because it's the first one not at home.
Oh, really? That's always a little bit tougher.
Straight ahead, the Chiefs are minutes away from their most challenging preseason game to date,
and tonight we start our Topeka High School football previews.
Take a look at the Hayden Wildcats coming up next in sports.
The weather brought to you by Alliance Bank.
It's the 2001...
For our first high school football preview, it makes sense that we profile the team that comes to mind first
when you think prep football in the city. Hayden has a winning tradition that few schools can match,
but can the new-look Wildcats keep it going this season?
Here's our Jay Catlin.
Graduating players from high school can be a problem for most programs,
but the term rebuilding doesn't get used at Hayden High School.
Jay Rock Tetuan moves in. He'll be a junior at quarterback, and Joe Weicker will move in where Jesse was.
Reloading is a word that best describes these Wildcats.
We reloaded with Jared Tetuan, and we got some nice backs back there and a good line.
We're just going to run all over everybody.
The new kids in this year's offense are Jared Tetuan and Joe Leiker.
Both will be the key players in Hayden's high-scoring running attack.
We feel confident in those young men. They worked hard to move up the ladder,
and they've done really well early in practice, and we're just hoping that they can contribute like those other guys did.
Contribute to a team that has high goals again this year.
Objection is to get better every day.
Win the district.
Go get off.
Our goal is to win the state championship.
But to achieve those goals, they'll have to beat the team that gave them their only loss last year.
It took a while to get over.
Hayden came into the last game of the regular season against Holton with a berth in the state playoffs on the line.
That was a great high school football game. The atmosphere was awesome.
We came away from there without the win.
This season looks like it could play out in similar fashion.
Our coach has always told us to look one game at a time, but yeah, I got it in the back of my mind.
I've always had Holton in the back of my mind.
But to be king of the jungle at the end of the year, these cats will have to claw their way one game at a time.
There's a bunch of kids that I feel like, a lot of people don't know about yet,
but we hopefully that as the season progresses, they'll see them do some really neat things out there.
Hayden, like a machine, has interchangeable parts, and if working properly,
this machine might produce a state championship trophy.
Jake Atley, 27 Sports, Topeka.
All right, thank you, Jake.
Now you can read more about Hayden in tomorrow morning's Capital Journal.
And to keep up with Hayden all season long, go to 27 Sports Zone at ksnt.com and click on the prep zone.
Now as for the professional guys, the Chiefs are undefeated in games that don't mean anything,
but maybe tonight's game will have a little added importance.
The Chiefs face their toughest opponents so far in the preseason as they travel to Jacksonville.
The game kicks off in a few minutes.
Coach Dick Romiles says how some players perform in this game may decide their future with the team.
Sometimes it goes down to the final game.
Sometimes it goes down to the final game on their ability to learn, on their ability to stay healthy,
on their ability to work, on their ability to fit the Chief profile of what we're looking for as an athlete and a person.
And so it can be very competitive.
And the Royals finish up their series with the White Sox this evening.
They played a marathon game last night, ended in a 13-12 White Sox win.
We'll also try to tie the series tonight at 7.05.
And we've got a little boxing going on tonight over at Remington's, the Rumble at Remington's,
with a bunch of Seaman High School fighters.
You know anything about them, Amy?
Any Seaman High School?
I might know somebody from Seaman High School that's fighting only dangerous Daemon, is that right?
Mm-hmm, seven big fights tonight.
Dangerous Daemon, I guess, yeah.
Going after it.
Steve will tell us how much more rain we can expect after the break.
Stay with us.
Young couples need life and sh-
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Hundreds of Topekans plan to knock down a few pins.
Volunteers met at the Downtown Ramada Inn today for a kickoff luncheon.
They're organizing the 17th annual Junior Achievement Bowling Classic.
The event will raise money to teach students about the realities of business.
There's a lot of planning to do before the bowling classic starts in October.
Volunteers hope to raise more than $60,000 during the event.
And I am proud to be on the board of directors for Junior Achievement this year.
So, I'm pretty excited about that.
You're going to bowl and strike and all that?
Oh, yeah.
We can get out there and knock down some pins.
We have a wonderful forum.
We reported Sarah Glenn as our representative, so she's helping put the teams together.
We already have three teams already put together for this, so.
Uh-oh.
You guys better put your bowling shirts on.
Chaos.
It's time.
All right.
Want us to check the weather?
Well, everything's pretty quiet in Northeast Kansas as of right now,
but there is a new tornado warning out in Lincoln County.
That's the county just to the west of Ottawa County.
Otherwise, we'll have some rain for tonight, and it'll linger all the way into Saturday morning.
Look at that.
Five-day forecast.
Pretty wet.
Thanks a lot, Steve.
Thanks so much for joining us.
We'll see you right back here tonight at 10.
Have a great night.
Thanks for making 27 News your number one choice for new sports and weather information.
This is the Kansas Association of Broadcasters, station of the year.