Entire Echelon(click for street view)  9420 Research Blvd. building is on fire (Echelon I building) – entire front structure of the building is gone.  The building is a 7 story building. People have been evacuated and traffic has been re-routed. A Piper 150 Cherokee apparently hit the building. The location is across from the Best Buy/Container Store/Whole Foods etc in the Arboretum area.

Tucker Thurman was driving to work on the U.S. 183 flyover near MoPac Boulevard (Loop 1) when he said he saw a small plane, very low, flying over the highway. He said he saw it then bank heavily to the right before heading into the building.

“There was a huge fireball. It went right into the building,” Thurman said.

Live streaming cameras:

http://www.statesman.com/news/traffic-cameras-119369.html

Update: FBI has an office in the building according to @breakingnews (This is incorrect)

Update: Ustream link live

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/northwest-austin-plane-crash

Update: IRS may have a building in there

Update (10:48am) : Fox News Streaming Video:

http://www.myfoxaustin.com/generic/news/live_news/myfoxaustin_livestream_index

Update: The AFD is looking for victims -IRS, CIA have offices but FBI states they don’t believe they have an office in that building – but near the complex or buildings.

Update (1054am): Officials say Austin plane crash appears accidental; early reports are injuries, but no initial word of any fatalities.

Update: 10:59 more on location:

Update: 11:02 – eye witness states pilot dipped the left wing – was 100 yards or less away from the building – he noticed that the plane was too low – he was coming north to south and it was coming east to west. Still two people unaccounted for in the building.

Update:11:10: Fire Chief(Assistant Chief) 2 individuals have been transported and 1 is unaccounted for now- power is out so crews can work.  Crews are currently trying to put the fire out.  Heavy fire/destruction is on the 2nd floor – impact appears to be on the 2nd floor.  Police: streets in the area – jollyville, research closed. No electricity in immediate area.  Streets and power will be shut until they get more control. Police state there are Federal offices in the building hit – but are not confirming any.

Update: 11:17 the plane *could* be a private plane traveling from Waco. Plane appears to have come down from the north and was paralleling 183 and made erratic turns before going into the building.

Update 11:26: FoxNews: Pilot set fire to his home before crashing the plane into the office building.

National News picking up the story feed. The IRS has 199 employees in the building

Update: From the bad ad placement department CNN did this.  http://www.awholelotofnothin.com/?p=250

Update: Bad comments from chat channel: : Kevin Smith was on the plane. It was too heavy to pull up.

Update 12:49 – manifesto left by Joe Stack who flew the plane into the building. Here is the actual website that has the manifesto by Joe Stack.

Here isthe whois information for that site:

Registrant:
Embedded Art
925 E Hwy 80
287
San Marcos, TX 78666
US

Domain name: EMBEDDEDART.COM

Administrative Contact:
Stack, Joe  
925 E Hwy 80
287
San Marcos, TX 78666
US
1.3215649879
Technical Contact:
Stack, Joe  
925 E Hwy 80
287
San Marcos, TX 78666
US
1.3215649879

Registration Service Provider:
Everyones Internet, 

http://www.ev1servers.net

Registrar of Record: TUCOWS, INC.
Record last updated on 16-Sep-2006.
Record expires on 05-Jun-2010.
Record created on 05-Jun-2003.

Registrar Domain Name Help Center:

http://domainhelp.tucows.com

Domain servers in listed order:
NS1.T35.NET
NS2.T35.NET

Domain status: ok

Wow.

Update 1:15 his house was in Scofield Farms. Georgetown airport officials say federal officials have sealed the airport. A plane departed at 9:40am this morning from that airport.

Update: 2:15pm Some media is trying to pin this guy as a Tea-Party-Tea-Bag Right wing nut job.  If they bothered to read the manifesto they’ll see very anti-government and anti-religion hate speech and pro-communisit anti-capitolistic speech.  He was not some right-wing nut.

Update (2/19/10 8am) Reports coming in that everyone is accounted for now in the building.

Happened right in front of us.

I’m glad the conservatives are finally coming to political rally’s.  The funny thing now is – the liberals are calling the conservatives the “crazy wackos”.  I think its pretty obvious that after reading many parts of the health care bill people don’t want this type of government controlled health-care.

Also – from Michelle Malkins site. People in Philadelphia give Kathleen Sebelius and Arlen Spector an earful.  The question she asks is “How can you manage healthcare when you can’t even manage this cash for clunkers?”

This type of thing is happening in many parts of the country.  The politicians are voting on what they think is good for you – because you obviously don’t know well enough.

Yeah that’s right, a Cessna landed on 130 today.

Here is the information from KXAN’s site:

Right now no announcements for tomorrow.  Will update as information becomes available.  It will freeze tonight so I’m sure we’ll see some closings.

Update Wed 6am: Georgetown and Leander ISD’s will be running 2 hours behind, all Austin schools are
running on time.

Update Wed 7:45am: Accident on Parmer near McNeil heading towards mopac – car flipped over on the bridge.

Suck it. 3 bowl games in a row. UT brings it home.

ADDENDUM FROM FINLEY:

Damn. 3 in a row, Ohio State.

I mean, bad enough that you lose the two national championship games in a row. But to lose on a last minute drive, AGAIN?

Wow.

Now, this is not to disrespect the Horns winning in such an awesome manner. Good work, boys. You earn this Tiger fan’s begrudging respect and a throwing up of the Hook-em Horns.

Out.

Wetwired is not a finalist in the 2008 Blog Awards. Which means… we’ll have to work double hard in 2009 to improve the site.   Part of that I think will come with getting some help on the coding side to make sure that the site actually does work on every browser correctly.

In retrospect I think I need to go back to the drawing board on the site and come up with something truly unique and graphically pleasing. But As I have discussed with others, what good is a great design if you don’t have great content so we’ll also have to double our efforts in the content side of Wetwired.   The design of the site has been with a central theme for the past couple of years and we all agree that the theme is pretty unique.   I think its most likely usability.

2008 Wetwired in Review

This year has been an interesting year.  Considering the previous year was a do-nothing year.  Meaning we really didn’t do a damn thing.  I didn’t update the site, we hardly posted, we kind of took the year off.  2008 on the other hand had major changes.

We switched from Movable Type to Wordpress.

We switched hosts to go-daddy (saving a ton of money at the sacrifice of speed).

We contracted a new artist to re-do the artwork that had previously got us into the finals of best blog design of 2005.

We finalized the new design(mostly).  Aside from the footer part taking until November to get complete…

We started, for the fist time in the 8 year history of Wetwired, to put up advertisements.  Google Adsense, and a few products that we’ve tested ourselves.  While stylistically it goes against everything  I hate; it made sense.  Believe it or not Wetwired is just about paying for itself (cost of domain and monthly hosting).   That in itself is something I really didn’t expect.

Wetwired has seen the most traffic it has ever seen this year.  And we’ve doubled our daily traffic from last year.

We have had a semi-regular podcast for the first time ever and it has been fairly successful.  Including being on itunes.

We’ve had the re-appearance of Beerslinger from his 2 year hiatus.  And we’ve had a couple new writers come on board (prax and larkynm) who unfortunately post infrequently, but are a welcome addition none the less.

We have been interviewed by the Daily Texan (UT paper) and we recorded the interview and offered it up as a podcast.

And lastly I think I’ve updated wordpress versions 6 times this year with some major changes on the back end.  It’s been a pretty good year for them as they (wordpress) have added some great functionality and some great user options in an overhaul of the administration side.

Wetwired in 2009

I think 2009 will be a continued rebuilding year as we look for more local Austin writers who are interested in contributing (for free).   When I look at the amount of money pumped into the site it will be a while before we regain it through advertisement etc but I do see the site fully paying for itself, the operating costs so to speak, and I think we can look forward to having some surprises for our few loyal readers with anything we have left over.

When it comes to traffic, we’ll be working hard to continue to optimize wetwired and post more original content and/or commentary that is of interest and that continues to add readership.  I suspect that if we actually get on the ball this year we could potentially finally break out of the small blog arena.  You would think that after 8 years of being a website/blog that we’d have more traffic.. but Finley, Beerslinger and I all atribute the slowness to 3 potential things.  1. Laziness.  2. Alcohol.  3. Waking up in the morning in the front yard and realizing that those are not our flamingos…

Lastly, Austin has a booming local blogging scene.  With freaking monthly meet-ups!  I’ve personally been in Austin since late 2000 and never been to one, yet we’ve been posting here for quite some time.  I have met (albeit briefly) one other local austin blogger.  She was doing an imprav with Cold-Towne Theatre.   So at some point I suspect that we’ll come out of our holes and make an appearance at one of the local Austin meetings.

As the 2009 looks fairly bleak when it comes to the economy, I think Wetwired will do just fine.

Postscript

If you are interested in contributing articles to wetwired or interested in just getting involved in a project let us know by commenting.  We’ll be on the lookout for new talent, and/or we wouldn’t mind showing someone the administration side if you just want to learn.

In December of 2001 I bought my first premium only car.  A Subaru WRX.  911 had happened, the dotcom burst had come and gone and gas prices had been at record lows.  I was able to buy a gallon of gas for the first time in 10 years give or take for under a dollar.  Not only that I was buying premium gas for around .94 cents a gallon. Gas continued to stay low all the way through late 2003 peaking slightly to $1.50 a gallon until 2004 when we started the real upward push of the cost of gas.

In late 2004 I remeber filling up at a Randals and paying just under $2 a gallon and telling my room mate at the time that I couldn’t beleive we’d get much more above $2 gasoline.  Not only that I hated the fact then that it was so high and that I was having to put in premium because of my turbo engine.

Fast forward to October 2006 I decided that I wanted to trade in my Subaru WRX for something a bit larger that still got good gas milage.  I bought my VW Passat.. which… unfortunatly also takes premium.  I will preface the rest by stating the Passat gets much better milage than the Subaru.  The Passat gets about 31MPG on the hwy and 22MPG in town.  The WRX got about 28hwy and 18 city – most of it cause I drove it like it was stolen.

Gas prices were around $2.25 a gallon at that point and I was pretty certain there was no way it was going to get worse.

February 2007 hit and I was paying $3 a gallon.  All the way through 2007 I continued to get stuck with $3+ gasoline and then when I thought I wasn’t going to get screwed any more with having a premium only car, July 2008 came about and I paid $4.25 a gallon.  $70 bucks to fill up my tank.

This week marks the first week that I’ve managed to fill up my car for less than $30, not only that its the first in 5 years that I’ve paid for gas so cheap.  So in thinking about this crazy run over the past 5 years, we’re pulling out of Iraq, things are stablizing, the economy is shot, and crude oil is now at $33 dollars a barrel.  I suspect that if we break the $30 dollar mark we might just see gas prices drop down much closer to a dollar a gallon.  And that my friends is something that I sure as heck didn’t see coming.

11:30pm here and I managed to get a couple night shots – 2 sec exposure.

Shot from Balcony of Apt.

One of the Neighbors sticking her tongue out trying to catch acid rain snow.

Another shot from the Balcony

Yep, that’s right.  First snow storm of the season.  Ok who am I kidding? It’s the only snow storm we’ll see this season.  It doesn’t snow here.  Actually it’s not even a snow storm.  It’s God’s joke on us Texans – “Look you can see it as snow in the air but as soon as it hits the ground its rain.  Suckers.”

Ah well. Enjoy the winter slushyland while you can folks, cause its so damn rare around here.

Update(12-10-08): Here are some extra pictures shared by Paul taken in Leander/Cedar Park area of the storm last night:

My best friend came into town this weekend and we decided to go somewhere special. Last time she was here we did some shopping and grabbed some Chai from a little tea room. Going over there menu we saw a pretty neat brunch menu that we wanted to check out. So when looking fora place to kick back and celebrate her birthday in more girlie style we picked The Steeping Room.

It turned out to be a little more fun, down to earth and delicious then girlie – but wow!

I know… All us tried and true Austinites, those “Keeping it Weird” are suppose to hate “The Domain”. I would like to but there are a few problems. I really like the jean store in there and, well, the Apple Store is pretty sacred. So I made exceptions for those places.

This weekend, however, I ended up doing brunch there. Looking at the prices it seemed a tad out of my general price range. Nine-ish bucks for french toast seemed a lot, so do did close to $3.00 for a single scone. But it was a special occasion and I figured I would just roll with it.

Once the food arrived and I totally got over myself. That scone? That single scone might have been the best tasting food I have had in ages. It had multiple flavors and smelled so good that I would buy that perfume if they ever offered it. It had chunks of sweet ginger in it, all the spices that seem to occur specifically for Christmas and was exactly sweet enough. Ok, note to self, if breakfast had one of these in it each day, I’d never skip it again.

The french toast – was chai flavored on challah bread and was delicious. Slices of fresh pear, green apple, blueberries, strawberries and kiwi accompanied the toast which didn’t need the maple syrup. I used it anyway though. My brunch mates’ dishes had them making yum yum noises too.

So, the food is terrific. However, that wasn’t even the best part. The owner is the best part. We had questions on the teas. I mean, what made a tea “tippy” and what did “tippy” taste like? It was our first real visit there and we had so many choices that we appreciated having a little direction. She was the sommelier of teas. I bet there is a special term for that but I have no idea what it might be. After all the attention, amazingly great food and information suddenly the price didn’t seem all that high.

We asked if she was considering doing a tea sampler or something similar and there is a possible food/tea pairing menu in the future. In the meantime she told us Tuesday nights there were little classes on teas. I am so entirely going to go to as many of those as I can manage.

After that we decided to get some tea to take home. We were faced with about a hundred choices. Fortunately, their amazing service stepped up again and the guy running the front registere walked us through picking. He asked great questions, found out what we liked and didn’t and made suggestions that were spot on.

I can’t wait to go back.

From News8 - also on Fox News

Police are on the hunt for two more suspects following an officer-involved shooting Thursday morning.

The Austin Police Department has one suspect and a person of interest in custody, but two more remain on the loose.

Police urge residents living within a quarter-of-a-mile from the Randalls near 290 East and Berkman Dr. to stay in their homes. They also cautioned drivers to avoid the the area.

Due to the situation, seven campuses remain closed.

School closures include:

		Reagan High School
		Andrews Elementary
		Pickle Elementary
		Blanton Elementary
		Harris Elementary
		Clifton Career Development Center
		Pearce Middle School

After an altercation, in which two individuals were shot at a home, police were called to the scene at around 4 a.m. Thursday.

When police arrived, five suspects fled in a pickup truck. About a mile-and-a-half from the scene, the suspects found themselves in a standoff with police at an area Food Mart.

Police said one man fired an AK-47, prompting police to respond with gunfire, shooting and killing the man. No officers were injured.

The other four suspects fled on foot, armed and dangerous, according to police.

With cooperation from the public, Police Chief Art Acevedo said they have apprehended a second suspect and another person of interest.

APD has had the SWAT Team, K-9 units and a search helicopter on the scene to secure a perimeter near the Randalls, where they believe they the suspects are contained.

Police later determined the man police shot and killed was wearing a bullet-proof vest, indicating the suspects had likely prepared for a violent altercation.

Acevedo said the two individuals, who were shot at the scene of the crime, are in stable condition.

Investigators said if you see anyone suspicious, do not approach them, but do call 911.

“People have spotted them,” Acevedo said. “So again if you’re listening to us, stay in your home.”

Check out Chillville this morning at 101x.com From what I understand there is some new Enigma to check out today so keep your ears pealed.

You can check out the playlist/show notes here.

Tomorrow night Davis, Larkynn, and myself are heading down to the Paramount theatre to see Kevin Smith Premier Zack and Miri Make a Porno.

http://www.austintheatre.org/site/Calendar/1032804605?view=Detail&id=18161

Lifelong platonic friends Zack (Seth Rogen) and Miri (Elizabeth Banks) look to solve their respective cash-flow problems by making an adult film together. As the cameras roll, however, the duo begins to sense that they may have more feelings for each other than they previously thought.

Director Kevin Smith will be live in person to introduce the screening and answer questions after the film.

Following the event, attendees are invited to stay and enjoy the Air Sex World Championships, presented by Fantastic Fest & the Alamo Drafthouse. Think “air guitar” with more sizzle.

We will be taking pictures and hopefully get some audio or video of the premier.

Update (9/18/08): Check out our live blog updates here.

I think all bands suffer from little issues when they do their first album.  Second Day Red is no different in that aspect.  Forgetting about Momo’s sound engineers issues last night, and the fact that the CD distributer botched up a batch of CD’s for them, and the fact that every time I tried to get a decent picture some ass-hat walked in front of my picture….the party went really well.  What does make them different is their unique sound, and great collaboration. 

All people who showed up at Momo’s for the party received a free CD and the band Second Day Red hopped up on stage and played through their songs.  Unfortunatly the sound engineer seemed to have some issues, but, even with that,  Second Day Red did not disappoint. 

Stephen’s vocals are fairly wide, while he’s got a great low-end, he works a lot in the the higher register which will remind you of Billy Corgan, but not as grainy, and because he has a wide range you don’t get the feeling like he’s whineing like most of the Smashing Pumpkin Songs..so yes, considerably more unique. 

Drew’s violin drops in key points in the songs and brings the quality of their music up a notch that they just wouldn’t have with out him. 

Todd who is the keyboardist has some great melodies and helps drive the songs along, I actually wish in some of the songs I would have heard more harmony or a reiteration of the melody.  Some of the songs that use an organ sound remind me very much of U2.

Frank aka (motorboat) never looses a beat, and if you listen you’ll hear some great cymbal work as some of the songs crescendo to a point – vocals, meet cybals, meet, fast violin, very cool. 

And without Roel, we wouldn’t have the thump thump of the bass guitar and the subtle rhythms.

Notable songs – I’ve been out, Dark Green Light, Wake Up, Giving me away (I think they noted on stage that they liked this one), and Phoenix Tonight.  

Influences: Better Than Ezra, Billy Corgan (vocals), U2, Dave Matthew’s Band, Blue October

Gallery of Strangers Album is available for purchase here. Or you can download it (.99 cents song) here.

Second Day Red CD Release

Second Day Red is releasing their first ever CD tonight at Momo’s (which is the same location of Katz’s on 6th).  Never heard of them? Me either, maybe it’s because they used to be called the “Stephen Clarke Band”.  But if you have not heard of them either, their music (which is original and not cover band crap) can be compared to U2, Dave Matthews,   or maybe even Blue October (who had similarly humble beginings here in Texas).

What do I like about them? I like the fact that they are true muscians.  While austin has a ton of artists and the same can be said for much of Austin, I want to point out that the industry is full of people who are not true musicians.  When you have a band that has to have studio musicians come in to make them sound better, or a band that has to have a producer that alters their voices in post production just to make sure that they remain in key when they are singing, that’s not a true musician.

Here, with Second Day Red(and many other local Austin artists), we have true professionals that actually can read sheet music as opposed to certain American Idol winners that can’t even read.  Anyway off of my soapbox.

Tonight 11pm (Get there earlier).  I’ll be there with my camera and will do a follow up review of the party with some pictures.  Side note: I also checked out the Austinist to see if this made the weekely “IST” list.  And it didn’t which was sad to see.