Category Archives: Maine

Power companies spend millions to fight Maine’s proposed non-profit utility

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The US’s first state-run public power company could be created when Maine votes later this year – but utilities are fighting it

Residents in Maine are about to be bombarded with a multimillion-dollar public relations campaign aimed at saving the state’s two dominant electric utilities from being voted out of existence in November.

If Mainers vote yes, they will make history – endorsing a first-of-its-kind plan to create a state-level, public power company through a hostile takeover.

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At a glance: what you need to know about Canada wildfires and smoky US skies

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Hazy skies hung over north-eastern US a day after the midwest received a similar alert from the Environmental Protection Agency

Canada is dealing with a series of intense wildfires that have spread from the western provinces to Quebec, with hundreds of forest fires burning. Wind has carried smoke from the fires southward, triggering air-quality alerts throughout the United States.

The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Tuesday issued a poor air-quality alert for New England, a day after parts of Illinois, Wisconsin and Minnesota received a similar advisory. Last week, US officials as far south as Maryland, Virginia and Pennsylvania reported being affected by the wildfires.

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Mega Millions: ticket holder in Maine wins $1.35bn jackpot

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Prize was second largest in Mega Millions history and the fourth time the game has had a billion-dollar win

Friday the 13th proved lucky for one – someone who won the estimated $1.35bn lottery jackpot after a period of three months and 25 drawings that had seen no one across the US win the grand prize.

The winner, whose name is not yet known, overcame steep odds of 1 in 302.6 million and had bought their ticket in Maine, the first time the state has scored the Mega Millions lottery jackpot.

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Save whales or eat lobster? The battle reaches the White House

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Fishing gear used by Maine lobstermen is killing right whales. Will boosting a $1bn industry trump protecting an endangered species?

President Macron of France may not have realised it, but he walked into another fishing war earlier this month when he and 200 other guests were treated at the White House to butter-poached Maine lobster accented with American Osetra caviar and garnished with celery crisp.

At issue was the lobster, currently subject to a court ruling designed to prevent Maine’s lobstermen from trapping the crustacea in baited pots marked by lines that can fatally entangle feeding North Atlantic right whales. There are now just 340 such whales, with only about 100 breeding females, making the species one of the most endangered on the planet.

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Paul LePage: is Maine ready to welcome back the ‘Trump before Trump’?

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The Republican ex-governor was known for his offensive, belligerent attitude – but this time, he says he’s reformed

In the late summer of 2016, Drew Gattine received a surprising voicemail. The sender was Paul LePage, then the governor of Maine, and he called Gattine “a little son-of-a-bitch socialist cocksucker”.

Amid the inevitable media frenzy that followed, LePage lamented not having the opportunity to engage Gattine, a Democrat in the Maine house of representatives, in a duel. Rather than follow in the footsteps of Alexander Hamilton, who pointed his gun in the air when he dueled Aaron Burr in 1804, LePage told reporters, “I would point it right between his eyes, because he is a snot-nosed little runt.”.

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Metal object falling from airplane narrowly misses hitting Maine man

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The FAA was alerted and said the piece appeared to be a metal sleeve from a wing flap of a large passenger jet; no one was hurt

A metal object believed to have fallen from a trans-Atlantic jet came crashing down outside the Maine state house, landing with a loud bang just feet from a capitol police worker, officials said on Monday.

The Federal Aviation Administration was alerted on Friday and returned to the State House on Monday as it investigated the object, according to the capitol police chief Matthew Clancy.

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‘Bomb cyclone’ storm dumps snow across eastern US

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Powerful late-winter storm comes with predicted snowfall up to about 13in and potential to cause travel issues and outages

A powerful late-winter storm combining rivers of moisture and frigid temperatures – a phenomenon known to some as a “bomb cyclone” – was expected to dump snow from the US deep south all the way to the Canadian border over the weekend, forecasters said.

With forecast snowfall ranging from about 4in in northern Alabama and Mississippi to about 13in in northern Maine, forecasters expected travel problems and power outages across much of the eastern US.

The Associated Press contributed to this report

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Bisquey business: Maine politicians bemoan China lobster deal flop

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Senator Angus King urges US trade representative to press Beijing to live up to promise to increase spending on tasty crustaceans

China has failed to live up to its promise to buy more Maine lobster under a deal that opened the door to an easing of a trade war under Donald Trump, Maine’s congressional leaders say.

Maine’s lobster industry was hurt by retaliatory Chinese tariffs in 2018 but failed to see substantial export gains after China committed to buying an additional $200bn in US goods, the delegation contends.

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Maine family’s lost cat turns up after six years – in Florida

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Denis Cilley had given up her pet, Ashes, for dead but a microchip confirmed she had somehow made her way 1,500 miles away

A Maine family that long ago gave up on a lost family cat is being reunited – more than six years and 1,500 miles later.

Denise Cilley, of Chesterville, said she was shocked to get a voicemail last week announcing her cat, Ashes, had been located in Florida.

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Nor’easter lashes eastern US with snow and wind gusts near hurricane force

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  • Philadelphia, New York and Boston in path of storm
  • Flooding, high winds and cold weather expected

A nor’easter with hurricane-force wind gusts battered much of the US east coast on Saturday, flinging heavy snow that made travel treacherous or impossible, flooding coastlines and threatening to leave bitter cold in its wake.

The storm thrashed parts of 10 states, with blizzard warnings from Virginia to Maine. Philadelphia and New York saw plenty of wind and snow, but Boston was in the crosshairs. The city could get more than 2ft of snow by early Sunday.

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Maine man carrying own severed arm saved by workers sanding sidewalks

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Public workers trained in use of tourniquets credited with saving life of man injured while operating band saw

A man who stumbled along a street in Maine carrying his own severed arm was saved by two public workers who saw him and happened to be trained in the use of tourniquets, authorities said.

“It had to be divine intervention because two of my best guys just happened to be there sanding sidewalks,” said Mary Ann Brenchick, director of Lewiston Public Works. “It couldn’t have been better guys for this kind of situation.”

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Maine bans toxic ‘forever chemicals’ under groundbreaking new law

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State is the first to enact a broad ban of PFAS compounds, which are found in everything from cosmetics to cookware

Maine has enacted a groundbreaking law that will ban the use of toxic PFAS compounds in all products by 2030, except in instances deemed “currently unavoidable”.

Though states and the federal government have passed piecemeal laws regulating the dangerous chemicals’ use, Maine is the nation’s first state and world’s first government to enact a broad prohibition on the class of about 9,000 compounds, which are dubbed “forever chemicals” because they don’t fully break down and accumulate in the environment and humans.

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Maine’s lobstermen and women hope Biden can boost fortunes

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Like the state, fishers for crustaceans are politically split but all crave stability: ‘Chaos is the enemy of the lobster industry’

This may be the week when most Americans are gobbling turkey at Thanksgiving, but Maine’s lobstermen and women are looking ahead to 2021 and figure they might get on a roll with Joe Biden.

Donald Trump positioned himself as a friend of New England’s lobster industry, campaigning hard in Maine, and even had lobsterman Jason Joyce speak at the Republican national convention.

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‘I hope it makes a difference’: voters on remote Maine island cast their ballot

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There are 70 active voters on Matinicus Island, 20 miles off the Maine coast. How are they feeling about the big day?

Located over 20 miles off the coast of Maine, Matinicus Island is often among the first communities in the state to report their official vote counts. It doesn’t take long, explains clerk and registrar of voters Eva Murray, because they have so few registered voters. “Out of the 70 active voters, I’ve already handed out 26 ballots,” she says.

In addition to running the election, Murray also runs the solid waste program, operates a bakery out of her house, works as a freelance writer and is a certified pilot and EMT. She knows most everyone on Matinicus, and most everyone knows her. There seems to be little confusion about how, logistically, to submit a ballot on the island. She predicts a “good turnout” this year.

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Polar vortex brings May snow and freeze warnings to New York and New England

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  • Unseasonable blast felt from Maine to Manhattan
  • Chill coincides with Vermont reopening outdoor pursuits

Mother’s Day weekend got off to an unseasonably snowy start in the US north-east on Saturday, thanks to the polar vortex bringing cold air down from the north.

Some higher elevation areas in northern New York state and New England reported snowfall accumulations of up to 10in, while traces of snow were seen along the coast from Maine to Boston and as far south as Manhattan.

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Woman’s ring lost 47 years ago in US is unearthed in a forest in Finland

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Debra McKenna, who misplaced the ring in Maine in 1973, received it in the post after it was dug up by a metal detectorist

An American woman’s high school class ring that was lost in Maine in 1973 has been found in a forest in Finland.

Debra McKenna, 63, lost the ring in Portland when she was a student at Morse high school, the Bangor Daily News reported. She said the ring was largely forgotten until a metal detectorist found it buried under 20cm (8in) of soil in a forested Finnish park 47 years later.

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The fight to stop Nestlé from taking America’s water to sell in plastic bottles

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Creek beds are bone dry and once-gushing springs are reduced to trickles as fights play out around the nation over control of nation’s freshwater supply

The network of clear streams comprising California’s Strawberry Creek run down the side of a steep, rocky mountain in a national forest two hours east of Los Angeles. Last year Nestlé siphoned 45m gallons of pristine spring water from the creek and bottled it under the Arrowhead Water label.

Though it’s on federal land, the Swiss bottled water giant paid the US Forest Service and state practically nothing, and it profited handsomely: Nestlé Waters’ 2018 worldwide sales exceeded $7.8bn.

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Coping with crisis: how scientists are making an invasive crab a delicacy

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The little green invader gobbling shellfish and destroying habitats in the Gulf of Maine could finally have a predator – humans

In the salt marshes and estuaries of New England, the most dominant and fearsome predator is a voracious invader that grows to just inches and lays waste to everything in its path.

The European green crab first arrived in the new world more than 200 years go, smuggling itself to American shores in the ballast holds of transatlantic ships.

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Food porn meets Hitchcock horror as seagull spies Maine chance

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Pepperdine professor photobombed by lobster mobster bird happy to see picture of roll reversal go viral

Alicia Jessop knew Friday was going to be memorable, but she didn’t realize it would be a day she would never forget.

Related: 'We live in a lobstocracy': Maine town is feeling the effects of climate change

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