Arlington Police Investigate “Annoying” Calls — The Arlington Police Department has received more than 150 reports of “annoying” phone calls from the 307 area code. Police say they believe the calls “may have been the result of a computer dialing error.” See the police statement here.
Emergency Landing at DCA — A U.S. Airways flight from Reagan National Airport to Boston turned around and made an emergency landing at Reagan National due to “mechanical problems,” the Washington Post reports.
Governor Bob McDonnell is expected to announce tomorrow that Northrop Grumman has selected Northern Virginia for the location of its new headquarters, according to sources cited by the Washington Business Journal.
McDonnell is not expected to announce which Northern Virginia site has been selected quite yet. Among the reported finalists are the 800 North Glebe Road development in Ballston, along with a site in Falls Church and a site in Alexandria.
We are in the midst of the “peak” season for weddings. Something about spring — the warmer temperatures, the flowers and plants blooming, the absence of pro and college football games — seems to make it a perfect time for nuptials.
It also seems that there are quite a few engagements this time of year. All those happy couples need some place to get married, so we started to wonder if there were any wedding-worthy locations in Arlington. For the answer, we turned to Arlington-based professional photographer Jan Graves, of Jan Michele Photography.
Michael Brown, Arlington’s incoming county manager, was honored on Friday by the city of Savannah, where he’s spent the past 15 years as city manager. A who’s who of Savannah’s civic and political establishment was on hand to wish Brown well in Arlington.
Brown was presented with two parting gifts: a gift certificate to Bass Pro Shops (Brown is reportedly something of an outdoorsman) and a painting of Savannah, according to TV station WSAV.
Together with fee increases totaling about $71 a year, the tax burden on the average household will increase by about $346 per year.
Arlington’s residential property tax burden will now total $0.958 cents per $100 of assessed value, which is still lower than most neighboring jurisdictions.
This weekend hundreds of Twilight fans converged on at the Sheraton National Hotel on Columbia Pike for the Official Twilight Convention. They met a few of their favorite supporting characters, discussed the upcoming Twilight movie in great detail and held a costume ball.
But they weren’t the only group using the hotel this weekend. The Nation of Islam was also holding some sort of sizable meeting, complete with guests in suits and bow ties and the occasional white robe and red star-imprinted headgear.
Arlington residents are being bombarded with mysterious, repeated hang-up calls from a Wyoming telephone number at all hours of the day and night.
At an online message board, dozens of people identifying themselves as residents of Arlington and other Northern Virginia communities have swapped stories of receiving calls from the same phone number, 307-459-1039.
It looks to be a rainy weekend, but don’t let that get you down — there’s plenty to do inside.
Saturday:
A liquidation sale is being held at the former Washington Golf Center store in Shirlington (2625 Shirlington Road).
The sale is being conducted by the building’s landlords, who said the owners of the store stopped paying their rent in October. According to one of the landlords, the owners of the store didn’t even declare bankruptcy, they just walked away from store, leaving the landlords “with all this stuff to get rid of.”
Wakefield High School was evacuated this afternoon due to a report of a strong odor of gas coming from a science lab.
Firefighters investigated and determined the gas odor was actually coming from lawnmowers that were being used outside. The odor had wafted into the school from an open door, according to principal Doris Jackson.
A Brinks armored truck guard was robbed in Crystal City just after 1:00 this afternoon.
Police say a man sprayed an unknown substance in a guard’s face as he was walking outside the truck at South Bell Street and 15th Street. The suspect grabbed a bag of money, got into a dark SUV with another suspect and sped off.
Police say the subject is a white male between 5’6″ and 5’8″, about 45 years old, with a slight beard. He was wearing an army green jacket, carpenter-style jeans and a tan safari hat. He was also carrying a black messenger bag.
The suspect entered the bank and demanded cash, police said. He did not display a weapon and no one was injured.
