Endeavour, the youngest of the shuttles with 123 million miles over 25 flights, is now bound for a museum in California.

Associated Press photoThe space shuttle Endeavour prepares to land after completing her final flight at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., Wednesday, June 1, 2011.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — Space shuttle Endeavour and its six astronauts returned to Earth early Wednesday, closing out the next-to-last mission in NASA's 30-year program with a safe middle-of-the-night landing.

Endeavour glided down onto the runway one final time under the cover of darkness, just as Atlantis, the last shuttle bound for space, arrived at the launch pad for the grand finale in five weeks.

Commander Mark Kelly — whose wife, wounded Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, remained behind at her rehab center in Houston — brought Endeavour to a stop before hundreds of onlookers that included the four Atlantis astronauts who will take flight in July.

Endeavour, the youngest of the shuttles with 123 million miles over 25 flights, is now bound for a museum in California, shipping out early next year.

"Your landing ends a vibrant legacy for this amazing vehicle that will long be remembered," Mission Control told Kelly and his crewmates, who wrapped up U.S. construction at the International Space Station during the mission.

"It's sad to see her land for the last time," Kelly replied, "but she really has a great legacy."

Thousands jammed Kennedy Space Center a few hours earlier to see Atlantis make its way to the launch pad, the last such trek ever by a shuttle. Employees and their families lined the route Tuesday night as Atlantis crept out of the Vehicle Assembly Building a little after sunset, bathed in xenon lights.

"The show pretty much tells itself," Atlantis' commander, Christopher Ferguson, said as he waved toward his ship. "We're going to look upon this final mission as a celebration of all that the space shuttle has accomplished over its 30-year life span."

Bright lights also illuminated the landing strip for Kelly, who made the 25th night landing out of a total of 134 shuttle flights.

The Endeavour astronauts — all experienced spacemen — departed the 220-mile-high orbiting outpost over the weekend. They installed a $2 billion cosmic ray detector, an extension beam and a platform full of spare parts, enough to keep the station operating in the shuttle-less decade ahead.

Their flight lasted 16 days and completed NASA's role in the space station construction effort that began more than 12 years ago.

The official tally for Endeavour, after 19 years of flight, was 170 crew members, 299 days in space, 4,671 orbits of Earth and 122,883,151 miles.

Kelly was the last astronaut to exit Endeavour. He and his crew posed for pictures and signed autographs on the runway. Astronaut Gregory Chamitoff was so wobbly from weightlessness that he had to be supported by two colleagues, but he was determined to join in the event.

As Kelly thanked his crewmates live on NASA TV for their flawless performance, co-pilot Gregory Johnson leaned over to shout into the mike, "And our commander, we want to thank him, too." Johnson and the rest of the crew were openly supportive, over the months, about Kelly's decision to stick with the flight, despite his wife's serious injury.

Giffords was shot in the head during a mass shooting in Tucson, Ariz., in January, but made a remarkable recovery and was able to attend the May 16 launch. The congresswoman did not travel to Florida for the landing because of the inconvenient hour, but Kelly's two teenage daughters were on hand, along with his twin brother, Scott, also an astronaut.

Giffords and Kelly will reunite in Houston on Thursday.

Endeavour, the second space shuttle to be retired, will head to the California Science Center in Los Angeles after months of decommissioning.

Built to replace the destroyed Challenger, Endeavour first soared in 1992 on a satellite-rescue mission that saw a record-setting three spacewalkers grab the wayward craft. Other highlights for the baby of the shuttle fleet: the first repair mission to the Hubble Space Telescope in 1993, to fix its blurred vision, and NASA's first flight to assemble the space station in 1998.

Its final journey featured four spacewalks, the last ones to be conducted by a shuttle crew. One of the spacewalking astronauts, Mike Fincke, set a U.S. career record of 382 days in space.

The flight also marked the first departure of a Russian Soyuz capsule during a shuttle visit to the space station, and the first call to space by a pope. Two Italians were aboard the shuttle-station complex when Pope Benedict XVI phoned from the Vatican on May 21.

Launch managers marveled Wednesday over how good Endeavour still looks.

"It looks like it's ready to go do another mission," Kelly noted.

Atlantis will remain at Kennedy Space Center as a tourist stop, following one last supply run to the space station. Liftoff is set for July 8.

Discovery, the fleet leader, returned from its final voyage in March. Its next stop is a Smithsonian Institution hangar outside Washington.

Moving Atlantis to the launch pad as Endeavour landed helped temper the sadness so many are feeling with one mission remaining, officials said. Thousands of more layoffs loom once the shuttle program ends.

"It's been a heck of a month in the last four hours," observed launch manager Mike Moses, "and I think we've used up our overtime budget for the entire month."

NASA is leaving the Earth-to-orbit business behind to focus on expeditions to asteroids and Mars. Private companies hope to pick up the slack for cargo and crew hauls to the space station. But it will be a while following Atlantis' upcoming flight — at least three years, by one business' estimate — before astronauts ride on American rockets again.

Until then, Americans will continue hitching rides aboard Russian Soyuz capsules at the cost of tens of millions of dollars a seat.

"We're in the process of transition now, and it's going to be awkward," Atlantis astronaut Rex Walheim said. "But we'll get to the other side and we'll have new vehicles.

"I really do have to say, though, it's going to be really hard to beat a vehicle that is so beautiful and majestic as that one is," he said as Atlantis rolled to the pad behind him. "I mean, how can you beat that? An airplane sitting on the side of a rocket. It's absolutely stunning."

The proposal, intended to prove that a bill to increase the borrowing cap with no spending cuts is dead on arrival, failed 318-97.

Associated Press photoPresident Obama, right, is seen with House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio, during a bipartisan meeting with House and Senate leadership in this file photo.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Republicans invited to a White House meeting with President Barack Obama on the troubling national debt are trying to build up pressure for trillions in spending cuts in exchange for any increase in the government's ability to borrow.

House Speaker John Boehner released a statement Wednesday morning, signed by more than 150 economists, which backs his call for spending cuts that would exceed any increase in the debt limit.

"Increasing the debt ceiling without significant spending cuts and budget reforms will send a message to American job creators that we still are not serious about ending Washington's spending addiction," Boehner said in the statement.

Boehner and House Republicans were set to meet with Obama at the White House later Wednesday. The session comes on the heels of a symbolic and lopsided vote the day before against a GOP proposal to raise the cap on the debt limit by $2.4 trillion. The proposal, intended to prove that a bill to increase the borrowing cap with no spending cuts is dead on arrival, failed badly Tuesday on a 318-97 vote.

Democrats said the lopsided tally was aimed more at giving tea party-backed Republicans an opportunity to broadcast a "nay" vote against the administration's position that any increase in U.S. borrowing authority should be done as a stand-alone measure uncomplicated by difficult spending cuts to programs like Medicare. A more painful vote to raise the debt ceiling looms for Republicans this summer.

In fact, Vice President Joe Biden is leading talks on attaching spending cuts to the debt measure in advance of an Aug. 2 deadline set by the Treasury Department.

Wednesday's meeting seems more of a listening session than earnest negotiations between Obama and the staunch conservatives who have taken back the House.

In Tuesday's vote, House Democrats accused the GOP of political demagoguery, while the Obama administration maneuvered to avoid taking sides — or giving offense to majority Republicans.

The debate was brief, occasionally impassioned and set a standard of sorts for public theater, particularly at a time when private negotiations continue among the administration and key lawmakers on the deficit cuts Republicans have demanded.

The bill "will and must fail," Rep. Dave Camp, R-Mich., the House Ways and Means Committee chairman, said before the vote, noting that he had helped write the very measure he was criticizing.

"I consider defeating an unconditional increase to be a success, because it sends a clear and critical message that the Congress has finally recognized we must immediately begin to rein in America's affection for deficit spending," he said.

But Rep. Sander Levin, D-Mich., accused Republicans of a "ploy so egregious that (they) have had to spend the last week pleading with Wall Street not to take it seriously and risk our economic recovery."

He and other Democrats added that Republicans were attempting to draw attention away from their controversial plan to turn Medicare into a program in which seniors purchase private insurance coverage.

Roughly two months remain before the date Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner has said the debt limit must be raised. If no action is taken by Aug. 2, he has warned, the government could default on its obligations and risk turmoil that might plunge the nation into another recession or even an economic depression.

The government already has reached the limit of its borrowing authority, $14.3 trillion, and the Treasury is using a series of extraordinary maneuvers to meet financial obligations.

By no longer making investments in two big pension funds for federal workers and beginning to withdraw current investments, for example, the Treasury created $214 billion in additional borrowing headroom.

Abby Tuominen and Shira Kaufman are raising money to build a library at a girls orphanage in Kenya. .

Photo by Diane Lederman/RepublicanAbby Tuominen, left, of Shutesbury, and Shira Kaufman, of Leverett, are deferring college to return to the Machakos Girls Rescue Center in Machakos, Kenya this summer.

AMHERST - Last summer, Abby Tuominen and Shira Kaufman spent six weeks working at the Machakos Girls Rescue Center in Machakos, Kenya. What happened there has changed their lives.

Tuominen and Kaufman, Amherst Regional High School graduating seniors, will be deferring college this fall so they can return to Kenya. But before they go they are hoping to raise money to create a library at the center. They have an exhibit at ETTA, 534 Main St., showcasing photos taken by the girls in the orphanage themselves with an opening reception Saturday from 4 to 8 p.m.

The two have been friends since seventh grade and say they're so close that one can start a sentence and the other will finish it. Both are equally in love with the girls at the rescue center. Last year, they wanted to do some kind of community service and were interested in travel. Kaufman, who lives in Leverett, wanted to go to Africa but they didn’t want to go as part of any organized group. “We wanted to do something so different than what we know,” said Tuominen, who lives in Shutesbury. They found the rescue center about 90 minutes from Nairobi.

And despite a world so unlike theirs here - no running water and a single socket for electricity in their room - it was virtually an instant connection.

Submitted photoLilian Wacheke, 10, lives at the rescue center.

“I never would have thought at our age we’d be responsible (for others,)” Tuominen said, adding that she’s working two jobs to meet the cost.

“We had such a deep connection with the girls,” Tuominen said. “We saw how eager they were to learn, so we chose them.”

“We loved them so much,” Kaufman said.

While they were there they taught art and traditional American songs. “It was such genuine fun,” Tuominen said. “We’re not relying on technology.”

“It was just utter happiness,” Kaufman said. “How they lived rubbed off on us. Everyday was so perfect in its own way.”

She said the only “time we were upset was leaving the rescue center.” That’s why they’re going back with a mission.

They saw how eager they girls were eager for stories but there was no bookstore in Machakos and only a small section of novels in a store in Nairobi. They were able to buy “Harry Potter” there but there is so much more they want to share. Since they’re returned home, they’ve been collecting books and are trying to raise the money to send them.

Additional money beyond the mailing will be used to build a bookcase and if they’re successful they’ll create libraries in other centers.

Anyone wishing to donate can send a check to the girls in care of ETTA, 534 Main St., Amherst, MA 01002.

The exhibit will be on display through June 11 from 4 to 8 p.m. and by appointment, but closed June 10.

The two return to Kenya in August but have been keeping up with the girls they're sponsoring by phone and on Skype, the online video and telephone service.

The defense witness list is nearly three times as long as the prosecution’s, but the lists include substantial overlap.

Greg Saulmon | The Republican05.27.2011 | BOSTON - Former Massachusetts House Speaker Salvatore F. DiMasi arrives last week at the John Joseph Moakley United States Courthouse accompanied by his wife, Deborah DiMasi.

By Kyle Cheney | STATE HOUSE NEWS SERVICE

BOSTON - A former spokesman to House Speaker Salvatore DiMasi, who prosecutors suggest will testify that DiMasi lied to him as scandal enveloped the speaker’s office in 2008, is expected to help close out prosecutors’ three-week argument Wednesday, with all the evidence against DiMasi and his two codefendants laid bare for the 16-member jury.

Along with the former spokesman, David Guarino, Wednesday’s witness lineup is expected to include Andrea Roller – a witness from the U.S. attorney’s office expected to describe various pieces of evidence – and Richard Caturano, the longtime accounting partner of DiMasi codefendant Richard Vitale.

Mary Feeley, another aide to the U.S. attorney’s office who helped compile records of phone conversations among the defendants, will also conclude her testimony.

If prosecutors call all of the remaining witnesses they indicated they would, the government will have called 24 of the 43 witnesses on its list, from Gov. Deval Patrick and his former top aides Leslie Kirwan, David Morales and David Simas, to former lawmakers Robert Coughlin and Lida Harkins.

Prosecutors also called a bevy of former officials from Cognos Corp., the Canadian software company for which DiMasi stands accused of using his office to rig two state contracts in exchange for kickbacks.

Among them: Joseph Lally, a former Cognos salesman who pled guilty in March to conspiring with DiMasi, Vitale and lobbyist Richard McDonough in the alleged scheme. Lally was the centerpiece of the prosecution’s case, putting DiMasi in the middle of the purported scheme and providing seamy anecdotes about the speaker’s thirst for more income and the paranoia the men suffered when questions about the Cognos deals made it into the Boston Globe.

Gov. Patrick, while not the all-encompassing witness Lally was, offered evidence that DiMasi pressed him and his aides to approve a pending software contract – which the administration later awarded to Cognos – and that he asked his budget chief, Kirwan, to do so “within the rules.”

Although most of the 18 witnesses prosecutors opted against calling were record-keepers for various entities – phone companies, banks, the Massachusetts Legislature, IBM, etc. – some of the more notable names who haven’t taken the stand as prosecutors finish up include: Doug Rubin, Gov. Deval Patrick’s former chief of staff; David Driscoll, the former state education commissioner; Louis Gutierrez, the Romney administration chief information officer; and Robert Ross, a top policy aide to Senate President Therese Murray.

All four of those men also appear on the defense witness list and could be called as they mount their argument over the next two to three weeks.

The defense witness list is nearly three times as long as the prosecution’s – there are 117 names on it – but the lists include substantial overlap.

Among the names on the defense list that have yet to be called: House Speaker Robert DeLeo; Senate President Therese Murray; Maryann Calia, former chief of staff to DiMasi; Jason Aluia, former deputy chief of staff to DiMasi; software lobbyist and former Patrick fundraiser Sean Curran; former Rep. Daniel Bosley (D-North Adams); House Speaker Pro Tempore Patricia Haddad (D-Somerset); education officials: commissioner Mitchell Chester, Secretary Paul Reville and deputy commissioner Jeffrey Nellhaus; former legislative IT chief Richard Arscott; former Patrick administration finance official Henry Dormitzer; celebrity chef Todd English; administration and finance official Matt Gorzkowicz; former state Sens. Robert Havern (D-Arlington) and Joan Menard (D-Fall River); lobbyists Arlene Isaacson, Matt Irish and Judy Meredith; House Clerk Steve James; former House counsel Lou Rizoli; state CIO Anne Margulies; former DiMasi and Patrick spokesman Kyle Sullivan; former legal counsel to DiMasi, Daniel Toscano; outgoing UMass chief Jack Wilson; and former administration and finance secretary Thomas Trimarco.

Through weeks of witnesses brought to the stand by prosecutors, DiMasi and his codefendants have consistently displayed confidence and ease in the courtroom, smiling and joking with family members during breaks in the proceedings. DiMasi, whose wife Deborah is on hand each day, typically embraces her in front of the courtroom at the end of each day’s testimony.

Police said the victim was assaulted in his West Street home on Wednesday.

WARE - Police arrested a 41-year-old West Street man Wednesday morning following a baseball bat attack that sent a 26-year-old neighbor to Baystate Mary Lane Hospital for treatment.

Officer Robert Lavallee said police were summoned to 58 West Street shortly before 7:40 a.m.

The caller said the suspect, Randy A. Reece, had come into the house and was swinging the bat at the victim, Lavallee said.

Reece of 56 West St., was charged with assault and battery with a dangerous weapon and breaking and entering into a building in the daytime with intent to commit a felony, Lavalle said.

The victim suffered severe lacerations, Lavallee said. Additional information was not available.

Listen to audio and watch video from the redistricting hearing. Watch video

S.P. Sullivan, MassLive.comState Sen. Stanley Rosenberg, D-Amherst, introduces his colleagues from the Special Joint Committee on Redistricting at a hearing in Greenfield.

Western Mass. residents and politicians again made the case for two Congressional districts in the region Tuesday, at a hearing held by the Special Joint Committee on Redistricting in Greenfield.

The Republican reports that many of those who testified did so to insist that the state's lost Congressional seat — the result of 2010 census figures showing slow population growth — shouldn't come from the Western part of the state.

Read full coverage from The Republican »

Here are some audio and video highlights of the hearing, held at Greenfield Community College. Full video of the hearing will be made available on the committee's website.

The Republican file photoU.S. Rep. John D. Olver, D-Amherst, was in Washington for a vote. A spokesperson read his testimony.

John Olver's testimony

Rep. John Olver, D-Amherst

Olver could not attend the Greenfield hearing because he was in Washington to vote on a House measure to raise the national debt ceiling (He voted for it, but it failed). Spokesman Jonathan Niedzielski read Olver's statement in absentia.

Echoing statements made by his colleague, Richard Neal, D-Springfield, during the first hearing in Springfield, Olver emphasized the political clout of the Commonwealth's delegation. He also defended his district, the 1st Congressional, which stretches from mostly-rural Franklin County into Central Mass., as a distinct community of interest. He said, in part:

With a multitude of small towns spread over a large area, some residents and local officials of the current 1st District have commented that this configuration has served people very well.

There are many shared interests amongst communities along Route 2's northern tier, and within the hilltowns between the Connecticut and Housatonic rivers. Some of these interests are: appropriate rural transportation, community health centers, expanded broadband and an ethic that promotes environmental protection and tourism. It is often necessary to bring or link small communities together to effectively address the challenges they face.

Bishop Neal Boyd and Dave Gaby

Bishop Neal Boyd of the Springfield-based, non-denominational Endtime Revival Holiness Church was among those to criticize a proposal put forth by Fair Districts Massachusetts, a redistricting advocacy group chaired by Republican Jack E. Robinson.

That group's proposal includes two maps, both of which eliminate one of Western Mass.' Congressional seats. Boyd's group, Universal Community Voices, says it doesn't have to be that way.

"A numerically functional map can be developed that preserves those districts," said Boyd's associate, Dave Gaby.

Boyd cited a recent Business Insider story that listed Springfield as the nation's 12th-most violent city as proof that Western Mass. needs more representation, not less.

Gaby said in an e-mail after the hearing that their map "does pretty much prove that it is not 'Nearly impossible' to address the concerns of Western Mass," referring to comments made by Robinson. Click here to download the map as a PDF »

S.P. Sullivan, MassLive.comPeter Wagner, executive director of the Prison Policy Institute.

Peter Wagner's testimony

Peter Wagner, Prison Policy Institute

Peter Wagner, executive director of the Prison Policy Initiative, told the committee that Massachusetts needs to rethink how it counts prisoners, to avoid “prison-based gerrymandering,” a system in which representation in districts with large prison population is diluted because the federal census counts prisoners as residents of the district in which they are incarcerated.

Wagner argued that prisoners should be counted in the city in which they resided prior to incarceration. In his submitted testimony, he used the example of the state's 12th Hampden House district, one of the largest in the state. He said:

But as this district includes Springfield which has one of the highest rates of incarceration in the state, a large number of people in prison are residents of this district, and the actual population was likely out of the permissible range.

As I explained above, using incarcerated people to pad the legislative districts that contain the prisons dilutes the votes of all residents who live in other districts, but the communities that are denied their true populations pay an additionally high price.

Although the state's constitution uses specific language to mandate that the committee use the federal census to draw districts, Wagner testified that the Legislature could request a change and that the U.S. Census Bureau would likely be receptive.

Rep. Michael Moran, the House chair of the committee, told Wagner that the committee may consult him in making recommendations for future redistricting efforts.

"We will not be publicly commenting on the case other than to say we continue to investigate the matter," First Assistant Northwestern District Attorney Steven Gagne said.

Tyler McNeill

BELCHERTOWN - In a statement issued Wednesday morning, First Assistant Northwestern District Attorney Steven E. Gagne said the death of 15-year-old Tyler McNeill is not suspicious.

“We will not be publicly commenting on the case other than to say we continue to investigate the matter," Gagne wrote, citing the victim's age and the fact that the death took place in a private residence.

Gagne added: "Additional information may be available once the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner issues its findings and conclusions.”

Police Chief Francis R. Fox on Tuesday said the Belchertown High School freshman's death was the subject of an “active criminal investigation” but declined to provide further details.

Fox said police received the call about the death around 2:45 p.m. Monday.

On Tyler’s Facebook’s page, a woman who identified herself as the teen’s mother described his death as a suicide. While declining comment to The Republican, Melanie McNeill confirmed she was actively posting to the site via Tyler's profile.

In a plea to Tyler's friends, she wrote, “If anyone could tell me anything that would help to understand why my son would do something this horrible I would like you to call me. I can’t understand why a boy so beautiful, so confident and so smart would take himself from me.”

She added: "I'm beside myself with this tragedy."

Proposed fee hikes mean more than an $800 increase for most students.

The Republican / John Suchocki

AMHERST - In-state Students attending the University of Massachusetts here should expect to pay on average $880 more for tuition and fees for the 2011-2012 academic year provided the full UMass Board of Trustees agrees to the recommended 7.5 percent hike.

The UMass Board of Trustees Committee on Administration and Finance today approved a 7.5 fee increase. The full board will vote on the proposal at its meeting June 8.

Trustee Victor Woolridge, chairman of the Committee on Administration and Finance, in a statement said “If the University of Massachusetts is to maintain, let alone expand, its reputation for excellence in teaching, research and service, it must have the necessary revenue to do so."

“With an anticipated reduction in state funding for the next fiscal year, the University is left with little choice other than to increase mandatory tuition and fees by 7.5 percent and ask the campuses to make further budget cuts,” said the Springfield trustee.

The increase was proposed by President Jack M. Wilson and was developed in collaboration with the campus chancellors, according to the press release. University officials have been working to close a fiscal 2012 $54 million budget gap, mainly due to the ending of the federal stimulus funds program.

This year that provided about $38 million to the system.

Two years ago, trustees approved a $1,500 hike, but about $1,100 was returned to students based on a sliding scale. Last year, the full hike was imposed.

“With this fee increase, we will be addressing our budget shortfall with equal amounts of new fee revenue and budget cuts. We are charting a balanced and responsible course,” said UMass President Jack M. Wilson in a statement. He said that 29 percent of the money to be generated by the fee increase would be funneled into financial aid.

“Financial aid is the key to maintaining affordability and is keeping the doors of opportunity open for our students,” he said in the release.

Out-of-state students will pay an additional $1,772, in fees according to a fact sheet.

Room and board costs are also up for in-state students here rising from $8,814 to $9,512 or $698, if approved.

Overall, the cost of attending UMass-Amherst and living on campus is up $1,578 on average from $20,546 to $22,124, according to the fact sheet.

Police also arrested 32-year-old Sean Harmon after raiding their Indian Orchard home.

Doris Pessolano

SPRINGFIELD – Police said they arrested a pregnant 31-year-old Indian Orchard woman for dealing crack cocaine and other charges after raiding her Darling Street home Tuesday night.

“For the past several months, the narcotics investigators developed a case against drug dealing taking place at 60 Darling St. by an obviously pregnant Doris Pessolano,” said Sgt. John M. Delaney. “The detectives watched for weeks as the future mom made drug sales.”

Detectives held the pregnant woman under surveillance Tuesday as she sat in front of her house with her children taking cell phone calls, Delaney, aide to Police Commissioner William J. Fitchet said.

Police then followed Pessolano as she drove to the Lowe’s store parking lot on Boston Road where they allegedly saw her make a drug deal to a person waiting in a car. They then followed her to the corner of Dubois and Farnham streets where she allegedly sold cocaine to a woman that pulled up in a Nissan Pathfinder, Delaney said.

After Pessolano, of 60 Darling St., pulled away, some of the detectives moved in to arrest the woman in the Pathfinder. That woman, Celine Jimenez, 28, of 560 Tremont St., Chicopee, was found to be in possession of a bag of cocaine, Delaney said.

Others followed Pessolano back to her Darling Street home, Delaney said.

Police applied for and received a district court search warrant for 60 Darling St. and raided the home at about 6:10 p.m. Police arrested Pessolano and Sean Harmon, 32, of that address who yelled to warn her that the police were coming, Delaney said.

Sean Harmon

Susan North received the Pioneer Valley Excellence in Teaching Award two years ago for her work at Old Mill Pond.

Susan A. North

PALMER – Old Mill Pond Elementary School first grade teacher Susan A. North has been named Converse Middle School’s new assistant principal.

Superintendent Gerald A. Fournier said North will bring “strong educational abilities and leadership skills” to the position. He called her “enthusiastic, confident, determined” and said she has an outstanding work ethic and excellent organizational skills.

The appointment is effective July 1.

North, 43, replaces Jacqueline A. Haley, who is the new principal of Old Mill Pond Elementary School.

North began working at Old Mill Pond 17 years ago, and also taught third and fourth grades. She loves being a classroom teacher, but she said she is ready for a new challenge.

“I’m very lucky to have the opportunity to do it,” North said on Tuesday.

She said is in the process of obtaining her master’s degree from the University of New England in leadership and administration.

North, who said she is very active in the community, said that will help her in her dealings with students. She has been involved with the elementary and middle school parent-teacher-organizations, and also is the president of the private Palmer Stripers Swim Team.

Along with Palmer school district nurse supervisor Mary Ellen Blanchette, North was instrumental in keeping the high school pool open; they led a fundraising effort to spare it from a budget cut.

Two years ago, North also received a Pioneer Valley Excellence in Teaching Award.

Said Fournier, “She has a focus on the needs of learning for all students, the ability to see the big picture and achieve consensus. Her background and eagerness will serve Converse Middle School and the Palmer Public Schools very well.”

North, who is married to Police Sgt. Rodney A. North, has two children – Brittany, a sixth-grader at the middle school, and Nicholas, a high school senior.

She said she will miss the staff and students at Old Mill Pond Elementary School.

Fournier said there were 12 applicants for the position, and six people were interviewed.

Data shows that the U.S. economy is recovering at a slower pace than before.

• Federal gov't losing $14 billion of auto bailout funds [BostonHerald.com]


• Federal regulators suspends Sky Express bus company after fatal crash [NYTimes.com]


• Gay couple crowned prom king and queen at Maine high school (video) [NECN.com]


• General Motors' U.S. sales drop 1.2 percent in May [MSNBC.com]


AP file photoThe General Motors headquarters in Detroit, Mich.
• Data shows U.S. economic recovery is slowing down [WashingtonPost.com]


• Cape Cod explosives range to be cleaned up [NECN.com]


• Apple CEO Steve Jobs introduces iCloud, iPad upgrades [Boston.com]


AP file photoApple Inc. Chairman and CEO Steve Jobs.
• Twitter posts tagged #westernma in Western Mass. [MassLive.com]


• Read more News Links »


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The derailment caused heavy damage to the tracks.

Michael S. Gordon | The Republican06.012011 | AMHERST - Crews from R J Corman Derailment Services, LLC work to remove derailed freight cars at the intersection with Station Rd. Wednesday.

AMHERST - Station Road remains closed today as crews work to clear the scene of a train derailment that happened around 2 p.m. Tuesday.

No injuries were reported in the incident, which saw six to eight freight cars spill across the road and into the surrounding woods.

The train was owned by New England Central Railroad, the St. Albans, Vt. company that operates on the 400 miles of track between the Vermont and Quebec borders and New London, Conn.

W. David Ziomek, who is acting as town manager while John P. Musante is away, said Tuesday that it could take days to clear the scene.

While the incident was not considered a hazardous materials emergency, the derailment caused heavy damage to the tracks.

A body could be seen on the sidewalk outside a home shortly after 1:30 p.m.

Mark M. Murray / The Republican06.01.2011 | SPRINGFIELD - Police Detectives gather at the scene of a shooting on Norwood Street in the South End Wednesday afternoon.

SPRINGFIELD - A domestic disturbance on Norwood Street ended with a gunshot Wednesday afternoon.

A body could be seen on the sidewalk outside a two-family home on the South End street shortly after 1:30 p.m. A heavy police presence was reported in the area as streams of caution and crime scene tape blocked off the street.

Jose Bernal, who lives in the house next door, said he was inside when he heard an argument erupt between a man and a woman outside.

"I kept hearing a woman scream 'Get off my property, get off my property'," Bernal said.

The man appeared to back off, Bernal said, but then he returned. "He went after her," Bernal said. "After that I heard a loud gunshot."

Carmine Orsini, another neighbor in the row of three two-family homes, said the man -- the apparent victim in the shooting -- has been a frequent visitor to the home, and that the woman always asks him to leave her property.

"He always comes to harass her," Orsini said, noting that in the past she has heard him say things like "No, you are mine."

This is a developing story. Details will be added as they become available. George Graham contributed reporting from the scene.

Gerald Steinberg and others speak before a wall display of their family members

Republican photo by DAVE ROBACKGerald Steinberg speaks at the dedication of the Hativah Holocaust Memorial wall in the lobby of the Jewish Community Center in Springfield on Tuesday evening.

During a moving dedication of the Hatikvah Holocaust Memorial in the lobby of the Springfield Jewish Community Center on May 31, several area survivors spoke emotionally of what they saw and experienced during World War II when six million Jews – nearly two out of every three European Jews – were murdered by Nazi Germany and its collaborators.

Survivors Gerald Steinberg, Curt Warner, Nicole Illouz and George Torrey shared their memories, sometimes in voices breaking with the pain of what was endured and of what was lost, to a gathering that included other survivors and their family members as well as board members and founders of the former Hatikvah Holocaust Education Center that closed last fall on the JCC campus.

Hatikvah, which means hope, was the name of a club early Holocaust survivors to the area formed.

With her mom seated in a wheelchair and her father standing at her side, Springfield resident Shirley Graziani read what each of her parents had written for the dedication. Graziani came to this country with them when she was 2.

Her father, Samuel Horowitz, recalled the Nazi bombing of Warsaw in 1939 that targeted Jewish neighborhoods and later the sight of enslaved Jewish workers being flung against walls by Nazi soldiers for sport.

Her mother, Faye Majerczyk Horowitz, recalled covering with her collar the yellow star Jews were forced to wear as Jews in order to get passed Nazi guards to buy food for the family as a young girl. Before one such occasion, Horowitz kissed her mother good-bye, an act that got her beaten by the guards and that also turned out be the last time she was to see her family.

Republican photo by DAVE ROBACKCarl Karolinski of Feeding Hills shows his mom Bernice Rosentzwieg- Karolinski a family photo which is displayed at the dedication of the Hativah Holocaust Memorial wall in the lobby of the Jewish Community Center in Springfield on Tuesday evening.

The histories were told before the wall memorial which displays for public viewing photographs from 43 survivor families. An accompanying book contains their stories for visitors to read.

Curt Warner, born in 1921 in Aschaffenburg, Germany, pointed out his parents on the memorial. His mother was gassed by the Germans in 1942 at the age of 42; his father, a store owner made destitute by the Nazi-enforced boycott of Jewish businesses, died in 1937 as the result of being unable to get proper medical treatment for an illness.

Warner told of hiding inside a sleeper sofa in Frankfurt during Kristallnacht or what is known as “the Night of Broken Glass” on Nov. 9, 1938 when Storm Troopers and other Nazis arrested 30,000 Jewish males, sending most of them to concentration camps, destroyed nearly 300 synagogues and more than 7,000 Jewish properties and whose actions resulted in the rapes and deaths of a number of Jews throughout Germany, annexed Austria and the areas of the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia.

Nicole Szyrman Illouz, who was born in Paris, spoke of her father Pinchas Szyrman being arrested and among those first to be murdered at the Nazi death camp of Auschwitz-Birenau when it opened in 1942 near Krakow. A child at the time like all of the survivors, she walked holding the hand of her mother, Nelly Specht Szyrman, 20 miles along train tracks to escape to the south of France not occupied by the Nazis.

George Torrey, born in Lodz, Poland, spoke of the hunger, disease and dead bodies he saw in the concentration camps. Although two of his uncles are immortalized on the board “in the bloom of their lives,” he said all six of his uncles perished in the Holocaust.

He called the wall a “significant” memorial to the six million who died.

Republican photo by DAVE ROBACKSpringfield Mayor Domenic J. Sarno speaks at the dedication of the Hativah Holocaust Memorial wall in the lobby of the Jewish Community Center in Springfield on Tuesday evening.

Gerald Steinberg, too, called the wall “the gravestone” to those murdered.

“Men, women and children were brutally killed and buried in unmarked graves or cremated. Their existence obliterated for posterity. This wall is their gravestone, their memorial,” said Steinberg who was among the founders of the Hatikvah center.

Steinberg said he and his parents, from the village of Mlynov in eastern Poland, survived thanks to the efforts of farmers who hid them for two years in a hole underneath their barns.

“We are very grateful to two Polish farmers and one Ukrainian farmer whose friendships my father trusted and who saved us,” Steinberg said.

Of the 1.5 million Jewish children who died in the Holocaust, Steinberg said, “Imagine what they might have contributed to humanity.”

Steinberg said his seventh grandchildren is named after Faiga Steinberg, his father’s sister who died in the Holocaust and who is immortalized on the wall, and added one of his grandchildren attends preschool.

Steinberg came with his parents to Springfield because his mother had relatives here and went on to become a pharmacist. He attended the dedication with his wife, Barbara, of 47 years, and called their married sons and grandchildren “part of the miracle” of being a survivor.

Former Hatikvah board member Elizabeth K. Rome organized the dedication and welcomed people to the evening.

Other speakers included Diane Troderman, who first chaired the Hatikvah board, Michael Paysnick, executive director of the Jewish Community Center, and Guy McLain, director of the Lyman & Merrie Wood Museum of Springfield History.

When the Hatikvah center closed, some of its material, specifically the panels and most of the artifacts from its permanent exhibit of area family stories, “A Living Memorial: Holocaust Survivor Families,” were donated to the museum for future exhibition.

McLain, who in the 1990s was the library archivist for Texas’ Holocaust Museum Houston, talked about how the Springfield museum will work with volunteers and docents this summer to develop a teaching curriculum around the donated materials.

“A Reason to Remember: Roth Germany, 1933-1942,” the center’s other exhibit, is part of the recently opponent Institute for Holocaust and Genocide Studies at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst.

Springfield Mayor Domenic J. Sarno told those present his parents, who eventually emigrated from Italy to Springfield, “had survived underground” from the Nazis. After Italy surrender to the Nazis in 1943, Germany occupied northern and central Italy.

Sarno said the story of the Holocaust “needs to be continually told” and thanked the survivors for sharing theirs.

“Thank you for making America your home and thank you for what you did for our country,” said Sarno, who also paid tribute to retired Judge Sidney M. Cooley, of Longmeadow, who was a U.S. Army officer with the 63rd Infantry Division in Europe.

Cooley helped help set up camp in Bayreuth, Germany for survivors of the Nazi death camps and also had the authority to take back from the Nazis property then had confiscated from Jews and others they deemed undesirable.

Other presents included David Cohen, one of the Allied soldiers who liberated the Ohrdruf and Buchenwald concentration camps in Germany, Ellen Perell, administrative assistant at the former center, and Martin J. Pion, director of the Institution for Theology and Pastoral Studies and professor of religious studies at the Elms College in Chicopee.

Rabbi Dovid Edelman, the dean of Lubavitcher Yeshiva Academy in Longmeadow, closed the dedication, reminding those present to not only to “not forget” the Holocaust but to “come together” in knowledge that the Holocaust is “part of us” along with the miracle of survival.

Rabbi Max Davis of Congregation B’nai Torah in Longmeadow opened the ceremonies, reading the following quote from Martin Niemoller, a minister and German nationalist who came to opposed Hitler and spent seven years in concentration camps.

First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out -—
Because I was not a Socialist.

Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out -—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out —
Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me — and there was no one left to speak for me.


Editor’s note: This is the story of the George and Paula Steinberg, one of the 43 survivor families featured in the new wall exhibit, “Hatikvah Holocaust Memorial: Remembering local survivors and their families,” at the Springfield Jewish Community Center.

Republican photo by DAVE ROBACKElizabeth Rome, a board member of the former Hatikvah Holocaust Education Center, speaks at the dedication of the Hativah Holocaust Memorial wall in the lobby of the Jewish Community Center in Springfield on Tuesday evening.

Getzel (George) Steinberg was born in Mlynow, Poland in 1902. His wife, Pessia (Paula),was born in Mlynow on January 5, 1907. They owned and operated a small farm.

Pessia’s family owned a flourmill. Their son Zelig (Gerald), was born in Mlynow on Dec, 8, 1939, before Poland was invaded and occupied by the Nazis.

In the fall of 1941 all of the Jewish inhabitants of Mlynow, including the Steinberg family, were forced from their homes and moved into a ghetto.

The Steinberg family remained in the ghetto for almost a year.

In 1942, the Nazis issued orders to the Jews of Mlynow to dig ditches for storing potatoes. George Steinberg, suspicious of these orders, contacted some Christian farmers with whom he had a relationship and arranged for himself and his family to be smuggled out of the ghetto and into hiding.

The majority of Mlynow’s Jews were murdered and buried in the ditches they had dug. The Steinberg family hid for approximately two and one-half years in the barns of three different Christian families.

The hiding places were holes dug in the barns. The family was cramped together and only able to squat or lie down.

Food was scarce and George would sometimes have to venture out of the hiding place to forage for food by sifting through the garbage that farmers left for their pigs.

Sometimes George would encounter another Jew who was hiding in the forest and they would exchange news and information. As payment for hiding the family, the Christian families were given the Steinberg family farm.

George, Paula, and Gerald Steinberg all survived but the majority of their extended family perished in the Holocaust. Before leaving Mlynow, George Steinberg searched for and found the daughter of a friend who had been hidden with a Christian family.

Her parents and the rest of her family had not survived. The girl, Aviva Feldman, was taken in by George and Paula Steinberg and raised as their own child.

The Steinberg family immigrated to the United States on July 2, 1949 and settled in Springfield.

Obituaries from The Republican

Alphonse C. Roszko

Alphonse S. "Al" Roszko, 83, of Palmer died on Monday, May 30. Born in Worcester, Roszko lived in the Three Rivers section of Palmer for most of his life. He joined the Merchant Marines at a young age, and then went on to work at the former Springfield Foundry. He was an avid sports fan and Little League coach for many years. Roszko was also a member of the American Legion Post 130 in Palmer.

Obituaries from The Republican

Comcast will expand its Amherst office at 160 Old Farm Road on Route 9 to accommodate any additional business there.

AP file photo – Comcast is closing its Bradford Street office in Northampton.

NORTHAMPTON – Comcast customers who have struggled to find the company’s Bradford Street office will soon have to trek to Amherst for personal service. Or, like a growing number of customers, they can get more tech savvy.

Comcast will close the Bradford Street service center on June 24 and expand its Amherst office at 160 Old Farm Road on Route 9 to accommodate any additional business there. Age and location of the Bradford Street building were among the factors prompting the move, according to Teri A. Anderson, Northampton’s Community and Economic Development Coordinator.

“The building is in bad shape,” she said, “and it’s so far off the beaten path that it’s hard for customers to find.”

Laura A. Brubaker, Comcast’s Director of Public Relations, said an even more significant reason is that fewer and fewer customers are seeking person-to-person service.

“More than ever, customers are choosing to interact with us and access and pay for our products and services in ways that are more convenient for them, including over the phone and online, mailed payments, self-installation kits and professional technician visits,” she said. “This move reflects their overwhelming preference.”

Brubaker also noted that Comcast will continue to operate customers service centers in Springfield, Westfield and Greenfield.

The company offers telephone and cable television services as well as Internet service.

Customers use the Bradford Street office mainly to pay bills, but with rising gas prices, the cost of driving there exceeds the cost of a postage stamp. Customers can also pay their bills for no additional cost on the Internet.

The warning includes Amherst and Northampton; residents are advised to take cover immediately.

The National Weather Service has issued a tornado warning for parts of Hampden, Hampshire and Franklin counties, including Amherst and Northampton. Residents are warned to take cover immediately. Here is the NWS warning:

Tornado Warning

TORNADO WARNING

MAC011-013-015-012000-

/O.NEW.KBOX.TO.W.0002.110601T1928Z-110601T2000Z/

BULLETIN - EAS ACTIVATION REQUESTED

TORNADO WARNING

NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE TAUNTON MA

328 PM EDT WED JUN 1 2011

THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN TAUNTON HAS ISSUED A

* TORNADO WARNING FOR...

SOUTH CENTRAL FRANKLIN COUNTY IN WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS...

NORTHWESTERN HAMPDEN COUNTY IN WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS...

WESTERN HAMPSHIRE COUNTY IN WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS...

THIS INCLUDES THE CITIES OF...NORTHAMPTON...AMHERST...

* UNTIL 400 PM EDT

* AT 327 PM EDT...NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE DOPPLER RADAR INDICATED A

SEVERE THUNDERSTORM CAPABLE OF PRODUCING A TORNADO NEAR CHESTER...

OR 11 MILES WEST OF NORTHAMPTON...MOVING EAST AT 40 MPH.

* SOME LOCATIONS IN THE WARNING INCLUDE...CHESTERFIELD...GOSHEN...

WESTHAMPTON...SOUTHAMPTON...WILLIAMSBURG...EASTHAMPTON...

HATFIELD...WHATELY...HADLEY...SOUTH HADLEY AND GRANBY.

WHEN A TORNADO WARNING IS ISSUED BASED ON DOPPLER RADAR...IT MEANS A

TORNADO MAY ALREADY BE ON THE GROUND OR IS EXPECTED TO DEVELOP

SHORTLY. TAKE COVER NOW! MOVE TO AN INTERIOR ROOM ON THE LOWEST FLOOR

OF A STURDY BUILDING. AVOID WINDOWS. IF IN A MOBILE HOME...A VEHICLE

OR OUTDOORS...MOVE TO THE CLOSEST SUBSTANTIAL SHELTER AND PROTECT

YOURSELF FROM FLYING DEBRIS.

A TORNADO WATCH REMAINS IN EFFECT UNTIL 800 PM EDT WEDNESDAY EVENING

FOR NORTHERN CONNECTICUT AND MASSACHUSETTS AND SOUTHERN NEW HAMPSHIRE

AND CENTRAL RHODE ISLAND.

Update, 4:37 p.m.: Police are reporting a tornado over Interstate 91 in Springfield. A woman calling The Republican newsroom said a tornado was seen from the Century Shopping Plaza in West Springfield. The National Weather Service has issued a second tornado warning for the area, covering extreme southeastern Franklin County, east-central Hampden County and southeastern Hampshire. The tornado warning is...

Update, 4:37 p.m.: Police are reporting a tornado over Interstate 91 in Springfield. A woman calling The Republican newsroom said a tornado was seen from the Century Shopping Plaza in West Springfield.

The National Weather Service has issued a second tornado warning for the area, covering extreme southeastern Franklin County, east-central Hampden County and southeastern Hampshire.

The tornado warning is in effect until 4:45 p.m.

There is an unconfirmed report of a tornado on the ground in Westfield. Power in parts of Westfield is out.

The seek shelter system at the University of Massachusetts was activated twice.

Intense lighting was reported over the Three County Fairgrounds in Northampton.

We'll continue to update this story as more information becomes available.

Here is the warning statement from the National Weather Service:

Tornado Warning

TORNADO WARNING
MAC011-013-015-027-012045-
/O.NEW.KBOX.TO.W.0003.110601T2005Z-110601T2045Z/

BULLETIN - EAS ACTIVATION REQUESTED
TORNADO WARNING
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE TAUNTON MA
405 PM EDT WED JUN 1 2011

THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN TAUNTON HAS ISSUED A

* TORNADO WARNING FOR...
WEST CENTRAL WORCESTER COUNTY IN CENTRAL MASSACHUSETTS...
EXTREME SOUTHEASTERN FRANKLIN COUNTY IN WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS...
EAST CENTRAL HAMPDEN COUNTY IN WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS...
SOUTHEASTERN HAMPSHIRE COUNTY IN WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS...

* UNTIL 445 PM EDT

* AT 359 PM EDT...NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE DOPPLER RADAR INDICATED A
SEVERE THUNDERSTORM CAPABLE OF PRODUCING A TORNADO NEAR GRANBY...OR
6 MILES SOUTH OF AMHERST...MOVING EAST AT 35 MPH.

* THIS STORM HAS A HISTORY OF PRODUCING GOLF BALL SIZED HAIL.

* SOME LOCATIONS IN THE WARNING INCLUDE...BELCHERTOWN...WARE...
HARDWICK...WARREN...WEST BROOKFIELD...NEW BRAINTREE...BROOKFIELD...
NORTH BROOKFIELD...OAKHAM AND EAST BROOKFIELD.

WHEN A TORNADO WARNING IS ISSUED BASED ON DOPPLER RADAR...IT MEANS A
TORNADO MAY ALREADY BE ON THE GROUND OR IS EXPECTED TO DEVELOP
SHORTLY. TAKE COVER NOW! MOVE TO AN INTERIOR ROOM ON THE LOWEST FLOOR
OF A STURDY BUILDING. AVOID WINDOWS. IF IN A MOBILE HOME...A VEHICLE
OR OUTDOORS...MOVE TO THE CLOSEST SUBSTANTIAL SHELTER AND PROTECT
YOURSELF FROM FLYING DEBRIS.

A TORNADO WATCH REMAINS IN EFFECT UNTIL 800 PM EDT WEDNESDAY EVENING
FOR NORTHERN CONNECTICUT AND MASSACHUSETTS AND SOUTHERN NEW HAMPSHIRE
AND CENTRAL RHODE ISLAND.

Police are asking everyone to stay home.

The tornado has have been spotted in Springfield, Westfield, Agawam, Wilbraham, Monson and West Springfield. The Republican will continually update on the damage the storm is causing.

4:35 p.m.Springfield Republican reporter saw and head a funnel cloud pulling up trash and other debris on Liberty Street. It was coming over Interstate 91 and headed over the river. It spun around by the bus station and headed down Main Street to downtown.

4:45 p.m. Springfield Police report heavy depris at Oakland and Allen Streets.

4:50 p.m.Police are encouraging people to stay home. Traffic is very heavy.

4:51 p.m. Police believe the tornado touched down in the downtown section. With most of the from State Street to Mill Street power lines are on the vehicle.

4:52 p.m. Tornado is heading to East Longmeadow.

4:53: p.m. There are reports of a house damaged. No information about where the location is.

4:53 p.m. Police are reporting multiple buildings are damaged on Maple Street.

4:54 p.m. Power lines are down around the area of Maple and Bridge Streets.

4:55 p.m. Tree fell through a house at 81 Federal Street extension. Police are also reporting trees are down all around Parker Street.

4:59: p.m. Police are looking for a 15-year-old girl in pink shorts. There is no information on whether she has been injured.

5 p.m. Woman is trapped in a house at 124 Arcaida Boulevard, Springfield police said.

5:01 p.m. There is an overturned car at Milton Bradley School in Springfield with people inside.

506 p.m. At least four trees are in front of City hall in Springfield. They are blocking traffic at State in front of the Civic Center.

5:10 p.m. Police are setting up an evacuation center at the MassMutual Center.

5:11 p.m. Police are forming groups of six and will start walking through neighborhoods the see if anyone has hurt.

5:11 p.m. Wilbraham police are reporting multiple structures damaged. They are requesting mutual assistance from Bondsville.

5:12 p.m. Police are reporting that McDuffie School on Maple Street has been evacuated.

5:12 p.m. Multiple buildings are down in the Merrick section of West Springfield, according to fire officials.

5:13 p.m. Police are reporting a strong odor of gas on Dale Street in the South End of the city.

5:13 p.m. Police are reporting an overturned tractor trailer truck on Riverside Road. The driver appears to be out of the vehicle but police are reporting he is injured.

5:14 p.m. Wilbraham is reporting a building struck in the south side of damage. Wind damage only is reported in Hampden.

5:14 p.m. Car crushed by a tree on the corner of Island Pond and Allen Street in Springfield.

5:15 p.m. Police are calling for all "all hands on deck" in Springfield.

5:16 p.m. A resident is reporting there damage to Cathedral High School, on Surrey Road and because of the damage people can see inside some of the classrooms.

5:20 p.m. Four poles are down on upper Tinkham Road. Police said the neighborhood is "just demolished."

5:21 p.m. In Wilbraham there are reports of trees down on Stony Hill Road and Main Street.

5:23 p.m. Cambria and Chesterfield in East Forest Park some of the houses are totally demolished.

5:25 p.m. There is a report of a tornado touchdown in Monson.

5:26 p.m. A gas leak is reported at the Mount Carmel Social Club on Winthrop and Main Streets. The gas is pouring out, according to police.

5:27 p.m. Brenda J. Gooch said she and coworkers saw the tornado forming over West Springfield from her perch on the 13th floor of First Financial Plaza overlooking Court Square where she works for Boston Medical.
"We were just transfixed by it. It was just huge; very dark. You could see debris and boards and everything flying through it,"
They saw it approaching. "It was just horrible," Gooch said. "It was like a freight train coming right at us. It was coming so fast."

5:33 p.m. Most of the streets in North Agawam are blocked to some degree and there are a number of trees on wires.

5:34: Wilbraham officials are reporting trees down on South Maple, Echo Hill Road and Brookside Circle. The streets are not drivable.

5:37 p.m. A disaster task force is staging a relief center at West Springfield Fire Department.

5:39 p.m. Western Massachusetts is reponding to 367 Central Street. There are a lot of wires down in the street.

5:41 p.m. Springfield police are reporting Belmont and Dickinson Streets are relatively clear.

5:42 p.m.Reporter Patrick Johnson is at the corner of Central and Maple streets and said three of four access points are completely blocked. Two enormous downed trees are lying across Central Street.

One of the buildings from McDuffie School at the corner of Maple and Central streets has been damaged. The roof is heavily damaged, an iron fence in front of it is completly twisted. A tree has fallen in front of the building.

Police are also doing a house-to-house search to make sure no one has been injured.

5:50 p.m. Springfield Police have checked house from Plumtree to the Veterans Golf Course and have found no injuries.

5:30 p.m. In Brimfield, trees were downed along Route 20 and the Fire Department is weighing whether to close the roadway to traffic. Trees and other debris also blocked Hollow Road, and police closed Route 19 to traffic.

One man traveling along Route 20 said the wind had picked his sport-utility vehicle off the ground and moved it across the road.

5:53 p.m. National Weather Service is announcing the possibility of another tornado in the next 10 minutes in the Springfield area. People are being warned to take shelter in the MassMutual Center, the downtown parking garage or any other place that looks safe.

5:56 p.m. A spokesman from the Springfield Catholic Diocese said Cathedral High School was hit by the storm and sustained damage. Students were safe inside the building when the storm hit and blew out a number of windows. A planned event at the school is canceled.

5:59 p.m. Deputy Springfield Police Chief Robert Macfarlane said, “No one is going south of State Street or north of Central because of multiple building collapses and gas leaks.”

Police were ushering people out of the area. Dozens of vehicles were damaged in the parking lot of the First Spiritualist Church on Bliss Street in Springfield’s South End. Some had obvious structural damage; most vehicles have broken shattered windshields.

Bliss Street was blocked by a fallen tree. Despite the circumstances, a number of people were light-heartedly showing off the damage

6:01 p.m. In Court Square in Springfield Jason Rodrigues, employee of the Cafe Lebanon, said the restaurant’s 60-pound concrete patio tables were smashed into pieces after being tossed into the air by the force of the storm. Concrete flower pots, each weighing 30 to 40 pounds were also tossed into air.

The restaurants and many other businesses in the downtown were closed. Businesses that remained open were largely empty, and workes are milling outside the storefronts.

Rick Paiva, who described himself as an advocate for the homeless, predicts that homelesss shelters will be packed because people won’t feel safe on the street. He was outside the Peter Pan bus station when the tornado touched down. “I saw debris flying all over ... the funnel scared be a little.”

6:04 p.m. Reporter Jim Kinney in the South End said windows were blown out and roofs ripped off everywhere. Damaged structures include South End Community Center, Red Rose Pizzeria, and the former Zanetti School.

Frantic parents coming to the South End center, where part of the roof was gone, were directed to the MassMutual Center where people were being evacuated.

Sandra Blaney said she had just left work and was in her car on Bliss Street when she saw trees snap. “I just closed my eyes. I didn’t want to see what happened."

She felt the glass hit her as her windows blew out. When she opened her eyes, she saw the devastation. Blaney said She suffered minor cuts.

She said she was working in lower Manhattan on Sept. 11, 2001. “It reminded me of that horrible day.”

6:08 p.m. Police are setting up a triage center for non life-threatening injuries at Dunkin Donuts at Main and Central streets.

6:09 p.m. Jane Albert of Baystate Medical Center in Springfield said there are people coming in injured by the tornado. There are high velocity wounds caused by trees and other debris.

"We have the walking wounded coming in on their own and others being brought in by ambulance," she said.

There are serious injuries. Surgeons are there and have set up more trauma rooms. Patients may be transferred to other hospitals if Baystate gets overwhelmed.

6:12 p.m. Janice Kucewicz of Wing Memorial Hospital in Palmer said they had not received any injuries yet but are preparing for possible injuries, especially from Monson. Both hospitals moved patients away from windows and into hallways prior to the tornado.

6:

A funnel cloud hit West Springfield and then moved into Springfield's South End and moved toward East Longmeadow.

5:45 p.m. update There are reports of a tornado touching down in Monson and Wilbraham; rescue personnel continue to respond to affected areas.
» Live updates

6 p.m. update Another storm cell is heading toward Springfield. Emergency personnel are warning residents to seek shelter. A tornado watch remains in effect until 8 p.m.

A tornado hit West Springfield and moved into Springfield at about 4:45 on Wednesday afternoon.

The funnel cloud damaged a house on Route 5 in West Springfield, and then slammed into the South End of Springfield, affecting the Main and Central streets area.

Emergency personnel, state and local police responded to the area. There were injuries reported and people trapped in houses and buildings.

Emergency officials asked that people stay in their houses and and don't travel to the tornado area because of power lines, gas leaks and the need for emergency vehicles to enter and exit the area.

The path of the tornado seemed to head through the East Forest Park area toward east Longmeadow.

The Republican | Larry RivaisThe skies over Springfield shortly after the tornado struck.

Police reported an overturned vehicle near the Milton Bradley School on Maple Street with people trapped inside.

A command post has been set up at 50 Maple St.

At 4:50 p.m., Springfield resident Tracy Kittrell, 42, said that trees are down everywhere in the South End, where she is working at Dillon's Package Store.