A woman is dead following a car crash in Monroe County. The accident happened Monday morning on Route 314 near Summit Road in Pocono Township. Allison Melendez of Pocono Township was killed in the wreck while her husband was taken to the local hospital, but his condition is unknown at this time.
A Monday evening fire in Allentown has left eight people displaced. The fire happened in a home, which may have been divided into apartments, on North 17th Street right across the street from St. Luke's Hospital-Allentown campus. Firefighters were called at around 5pm and officials say they had to pull out of the building for a bit because it was too unsafe to remain inside. The cause of the fire has not been determined.
Officials in Northampton County are sharing an update on the investigation into issues with voting machines that happened this past Election Day. County Executive Lamont McClure says voting machine company ES & S is "on the clock" when it comes to finding a solution for clerical and human errors that have led to problems in elections in 2019 and earlier this month. The company says someone made a mistake when typing in information for this year's general election, causing the paper printouts of vote tabulations to be incorrect. McClure has said a full investigation into what went wrong is expected to take weeks.
Pennsylvania State Police say they investigated 979 crashes during the Thanksgiving travel period of November 22-26. Those crashes resulted in four deaths and 197 injuries. Those numbers are nearly identical as 2022 when there were 970 crashes, 196 injuries and one fatality. Troop M, based in Bethlehem, say their troopers made 27 DUI arrests and investigated 68 crashes during the Thanksgiving travel period.
Some local Christmas tree farms are being forced to sit out this season because they simply don't have enough mature trees. Others, like Unangst Tree Farm are open but are limiting how many they sell this year to ensure they can be open next year. Trudy Unangst says this year's problems began many years ago. "I do believe there was a seed shortage years ago when we were trying to get transplants and it's been just a domino effect since then," she says. Unangst says combine that with disease and this past May's dry conditions and that restricts them to selling 7000 trees this season in order to remain viable for Christmas 2024.
It's almost December and Accu-Weather's Joe Lundberg says it'll feel like it today and tomorrow. Today's high is expected to be 36 and then Lundberg says we'll take a dip into the freezer tonight. "Tonight we do clear out and with winds backing off a little bit, I think we're getting down into the low 20s," Temperatures will return to the 40s on Thursday.