Health officials urge patients to get vaccinated, plus younger patients may be able to be vaccinated

JOPLIN, MO – Local health officials are hoping to see more patients getting proactive in the fight against COVID-19.

Freeman Health System has 57 hospitalized COVID-19 patients.

It’s a total that matches some of the highest numbers they’ve seen in the hospital during the pandemic.

“Go from no COVID units up to now recently three COVID units, about 20% of our beds are, are now being utilized, almost exclusively for COVID care.” Says Dr. Rob McNab, Freeman COVID-19 Svcs.

And the average age of those patients is dropping.

“Two-thirds of all the inpatients are in their middle 60s and younger than that and that is a very different population than what we’ve really been experiencing for the past year and a half, it’s a much younger, much healthier population that are now getting much sicker.” Dr. McNab says.

They’re urging more patients to get vaccinated, adding that children ages 6 to 11 may be eligible to get the shot as early as September.

That would still be after the return to school, which may see some pandemic protocols reinstated.

“A lot of schools will be requiring masks during the school day, which I personally think is a very good idea. It’s just a protection for the children in that environment where it’s a little more difficult for them to maintain appropriate distances.” Says Paula Baker, Freeman Pres.

They are emphasizing that the vaccine is a tool they didn’t have last year, adding the goal is still to achieve herd immunity.

The Arma community is getting together for the Jefferson Highway Market

ARMA, KS – In today’s dose of good news… The Arma community is kicking off a new tradition Friday evening.

The inaugural Jefferson Highway Market started at 6:00p.m. in Arma Park.

The market originally started as an idea on Facebook only a couple of weeks ago to help supports local vendors.

Community members loved the idea and it quickly developed.

Now it features over 40 vendors, food trucks, live music, and a vaccine clinic.

“This is a free market, we are not charging anything for booth space, we’re just trying to help people recoup some of what they lost last year due to COVID.” Says Lissa Rhodes, Arma Economic Development.

The market will continue until 9:00p.m. tonight.

Organizers hope to bring back the event four times a year.

The next market is planned to occur in October.

Local middle school students recently celebrated completing a summer enrichment program

JOPLIN, MO – Local middle school students got the chance to celebrate an enriched summer experience.

Friday afternoon marked the completion of the 3rd summer enrichment program from the Compass Academy Network.

The program took place over the past month on the Thomas Jefferson campus in Joplin.

Area students from 6th to 8th grade focused on developing their social and academic skills.

“The aim is really to have a toolbox that we’re consistently adding tools to, when students come to a normal school setting, they’re really are able to face each challenge with more confidence and efficacy.” Says Clayton Carnahan, CAN Program Director.

Students received a $45 certificate to use on school supplies for the upcoming year as a reward for completing the program.

Miami is hosting their Summer Food Service Program before the school year starts

MIAMI, OK – School doesn’t start until September in Miami, but the district is still making sure kids are not hungry.

Starting August 4th, Miami Public Schools will host their Summer Food Service Program.

Through August 30th, the program will take place every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at Will Rogers Middle School from 11:00a.m. to 12:00n. and provide kids from birth to 18 years with breakfast and lunch to go.

If you would like a meal, it’s asked to call 918-542-9760 by 9:00a.m. on the days of the program.

The inaugural Oklahoma Route 66 Heritage Fest is occurring this weekend

MIAMI, OK – From traditional demonstrations with Native American Tribes to live concerts, a new festival is kicking off tonight in downtown Miami.

The Oklahoma Route 66 Heritage Fest.

A two day festival will include traditional demonstrations from local Native American Tribes, 8 different live concerts, 15 food trucks, 60 vendors, a corn hole tournament, and a car and bike show.

Something Miami residents, Melissa Caughman says she can’t wait to see.

“Better for our community, it’s exciting to see new things happening, hopefully it continues to happen, continues to grow our community and things of that nature.” Caughman says.

Being the inaugural year for the festival, visit Miami Oklahoma Executive Director, Amanda Davis says, this is their way of observing what Miami has to offer.

“This is a way for us to celebrate who we are. This is a way for us to come together, its been a very trying year, we’re still getting through, you know the days ahead are still unsure and this is just a way that we can come together as a city, come together as the county, come together as the four states.” Davis says.

But it’s more than just a music festival, it’s creating revenue that the city needs.

“Bringing tourism dollars into the city helps us do other things, and build things back better. So yeah, it’s just an exciting time for us to be able to showcase our city and showcase what we have to offer, so people are more inclined to visit us, ’cause we are on Route 66 and we are an important part of that.” Says Brian Estep, Miami Councilman.

“I’m just ready to see people. So, I know we’re still in a time where we’ve got to be cautious, we’ve had a lot of questions about the pandemic. We will have sanitation stations set up all along downtown.” Davis says.

The festival will conclude Saturday night with a live performance from Thompson Square.

Communities around the area are changing their recommendations to battle COVID

CRAWFORD COUNTY, KS – COVID-19 case numbers continue to grow at a rapid rate across the country.

As a result, many communities are starting to change their recommendations to battle the virus, once again.

“Nobody wants to wear a mask, it’s not fun, it sucks, you can’t talk, you can’t breathe, you’re hot but it’s a small price to pay to keep people out of the hospital.” Says Heather Horton, TOAST Co-Owner.

Right now, healthcare workers are seeing COVID-19 cases continue to rise due to the Delta Variant.

The big issue is its ability to spread more easily, sometimes finding a way to transmit through vaccinated individuals.

“While this new spike that we’re seeing in the region is largely affecting the unvaccinated, we still have 10% to 20% breakthrough rate in the vaccine, and they’re still able if they’re infected to transmit.” Says Dr. Timothy Stebbins, Crawford County Health Officer.

Healthcare officials now suggest the return of wearing masks for indoor settings, regardless of vaccination status.

“The challenges in the mixed setting where you don’t know the risk of the groups that you’re in, in that setting, masking is recommended for everyone.” Dr. Stebbins says.

Some businesses across the area have even started to slowly enact the recommendations.

Places like TOAST in Pittsburg require their employees to wear masks.

“We’ve gone back to wearing masks. For us, I mean obviously it’s our number one priority to keep our employees safe, but also our patrons, so if our employees are sick, we can’t be open.” Horton says.

“We have a personal responsibility in beating this virus, either through vaccination, or if you are opposed to vaccination, through appropriate mitigations so we can stop the spread of COVID-19.” Dr. Stebbins says.

A topping out ceremony was held today in Downtown Joplin

JOPLIN, MO – An area construction project has hit a milestone.

A topping out ceremony was held today on the Harry M. Cornell Arts and Entertainment Complex Construction Site in Downtown Joplin.

The ceremony is a construction tradition.

Connect To Culture’s Clifford Wert says in this case means 30% of the project is now complete, and he hopes everything will be finished in about a year from now.

“It is where the final beam is placed into the structure and we have a unique opportunity to even be signing and dating that final beam.” Says Clifford Wert, President, C.F.O., Connect To Culture.

Wert says all but about $500,000 have been raised for the $17,500,000 project.

If you’d like to make a donation, click here.

The history behind the naming of the city of Joplin

JOPLIN, MO – In a couple of years, the city of Joplin will be celebrating its 150th anniversary.

But how did it get its name?

That’s the subject of tonight’s segment of “What’s in a Name.”

The founding fathers of Joplin had a couple of options when it came to selecting a permanent name for the town where there was a huge lead strike

“Our community at one point in town could have been Murphysburg or Joplin City.” Says Brad Belk, MSSU Community Historian.

Where did those two titles come from?

They were the names of property on both sides of the creek.

On the west, the area was Murphysburg, and on the east was Joplin City.

The one that eventually prevailed was in honor of a Methodist Minister from Springfield that came to the region in 1839 to spread the gospel.

Reverend Harris G. Joplin was one of the community’s first settlers, who leased land from John C. Cox.

Somewhere on Joplin’s 80 acres was a water source, which was called Joplin’s Stream, which flowed into Joplin Creek.

“Built a house here on this lot here, held services on Sunday and uh was a traveling, sort of itinerant minister and then vacated in 1845, returned to Greene County, where he’s from uh died in a couple years, 26 years later, a community of Joplin bares his name.” Belk says.

Belk says it’s not clear why one named prevailed over the other.

What is known is that Cox thought highly of the man of God, even though Joplin spent just a handful of years here.

And to this day, the property on this side of Joplin Creek is still referred to some as East Town.

The Arma community is getting together for the Jefferson Highway Market

ARMA, KS – The Arma community is kicking off a new tradition Friday evening.

The inaugural Jefferson Highway Market started at 6:00p.m. in Arma Park.

The market originally started as an idea on Facebook only a couple of weeks ago to help supports local vendors.

Community members loved the idea and it quickly developed.

Now it features over 40 vendors, food trucks, live music, and a vaccine clinic.

“This is a free market, we are not charging anything for booth space, we’re just trying to help people recoup some of what they lost last year due to COVID.” Says Lissa Rhodes, Arma Economic Development.

The market will continue until 9:00p.m. tonight.

Organizers hope to bring back the event four times a year.

The next market is planned to occur in October.

Latest blog – Weekend starts hot & humid before relief rolls in – Nick

Good late Friday evening, everyone. No matter what our weather is up to, it’s always nice to get a new weekend underway. However, we started this weekend out like we did the previous weekend. We stayed hot and humid once again this afternoon in Joplin and across the area. After highs topped out near 95 on Thursday, we started out in the lower 70s this morning before we bounced back to about 96 for our Friday afternoon. With the humidity still fairly high, it felt like the triple digits once again across the area for the afternoon.

I know this has become a broken record that everyone is tired of hearing, but excessive heat warnings and heat advisories will remain in place for Saturday. Once they expire at 9 PM, though, we’ll see two fronts and a change in our weather setup that will get these out of here as we kick off August next week.

Looking at the overall weather setup, we actually have our first frontal boundary draped across Missouri from northwest to southeast into the Bootheel. Any t-storms that develop throughout the night to our north and northeast will stay along the front and away from our area. That trailing cold front and the second cold front in the Northern Plains both come into play starting late Saturday afternoon.

Upstairs at the jet stream level, our stubborn upper-level ridge that kept us hot and humid since last weekend will remain in control for one more day. Once we get into Saturday night and certainly into Sunday, the ridge will start to retreat back to the west and give us a much-needed break from the heat and humidity.

For the rest of the night and into Saturday morning, any t-storms along the warm front will stay to our north and east. While we may see some passing cloud cover at times from those t-storms, we’ll stay dry and warm as lows plan on dropping back into the middle 70s.

Our Saturday morning will stay dry and so will much of our Saturday afternoon. While the first cold front will start working in from the north by late afternoon, most of us will still end up hot and humid for the afternoon. With partly sunny skies, we’ll have highs topping out around 96 once again for Saturday afternoon. While the Future Track does show a few isolated t-storms trying to pop up in our far northern counties, most of the area will stay dry throughout the afternoon.

Now, the thermometer will say 96° once again as we hit the peak heating of the afternoon. When you factor in the high dew points that will still be in play (into the 70s), it will make the temperatures feel as hot as 102° to 109° across the region.

If you recall from the prior Future Track, a few isolated t-storms will try to develop in our far northern counties as early as 4 o’clock in the afternoon. As the first cold front rolls on in from the north, it will start to introduce more scattered t-storms to start Saturday evening out. You can see how the scattered t-storms caused by the first front will still be around as we head toward 10 o’clock Saturday night. However, it doesn’t quite cool us down yet as temperatures will still be near 80 by the 10 o’clock hour.

As the second front rolls in overnight and into Sunday morning, that will bring in some more scattered t-storms across parts of the region. These t-storm chances for Saturday evening through Sunday morning could be on the strong side with pockets of heavy rain, some wind gusts and some possible small hail. While we aren’t expecting these t-storms to turn severe, we’ll still keep an eye on things as these t-storm chances roll on through.

Fortunately, our rain chances for Sunday will just be limited to the morning hours. Once we get past the morning, we’ll dry out for the afternoon. Not only that, we’ll have lower humidity and highs in the middle 80s to enjoy as we wrap up the weekend.

In terms of the rain chances and possible amounts, the rain tracker is suggesting that most spots across the area will pick up between a tenth and half an inch on average from Saturday evening’s and Sunday morning’s rain and t-storms. However, any heavier pockets of rain could push some areas between half an inch and possibly up to 2 inches. That’s something we’ll keep an eye on as well before we dry out Sunday afternoon.

After the weekend is all said and done, look at the upper-level setup for Monday down below. The digging upper-level trough and lows digging across the eastern half of the Lower 48 will push the ridge back to the west. This will lead to lows in the lower 60s and highs in the lower 80s for a beautiful Monday. As this setup holds through Wednesday, this will keep lows in the lower 60s and highs in the lower to middle 80s. Couple that with lower humidity, we’re definitely going to enjoy that.

By the end of next week, though, the upper-level trough to the east will want to start working to the east. As it does, that will give the upper-level ridge a chance to start building back in. While any weak waves around the returning ridge could try to bring some isolated t-storm chances back in by Thursday and Friday, this will ultimately push highs back into the upper 80s and possibly near 90 by the start of next weekend.

Don’t forget that Doug has your long range forecast through August and into early September down below.

Have a good night and enjoy your weekend!

Nick

Next Saturday:  We’ll stay in the upper 80s to near 90 with some t-storm chances possible.

August 8th-14th:  The first half of the week will be hot with the second half warm with mainly 80s.  However, scattered thunderstorm chances each day.

August 15th-21st:  A warm start to the week and then a hot finish.  Isolated storms on Sunday and Monday, then again by Saturday.

August 22nd-28th:  Mainly a warm week with isolated storms Tuesday through Thursday.

August 29th-September 4th:  A warm work week but hot into the weekend.  Thunderstorm chances Sunday, Monday and Thursday.

September 5th-11th:  A hot start then back to warm the second half of the week.  Scattered storms Tuesday through Saturday.