Petworth Spray Park muriatic acid follow-up

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Petworth Spray Park muriatic acid follow-up

I was pretty aghast at the incident with the open bottle of muriatic (hydrochloric) acid found on Sunday at the Petworth Spray Park. Anyone can make a mistake, sure... but for a Parks employee to leave an open, apparently full bottle of acid sitting inside a children's spray park on opening weekend is a huge mistake.

Imagine if instead of a parent finding the bottle, it was a curious 3 year old who picked it up, and thinking it was a bottle of water, pours it over his head. That's a typical scenario, and that's why this was such a big deal. 

Read more after the break:

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Lemonade Social brings new faces and good neighbors

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Lemonade Social brings new faces and good neighbors

The 2nd Southwest Petworth Lemonade Social was this evening at the triangle park between Kansas and Quincy St NW. A really nice group of neighbors gathered together.

Read more and see pictures after the break:

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PSA 404/407 meeting tomorrow

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801 Shepherd Street NW

801 Shepherd Street NW

The Police Service Area (PSA) meeting for 404 and 407 is tomorrow, Thursday, May 28th at 801 Shepherd St NW at 7pm. This is a very casual meeting and is a great opportunity to meet with local MPD officers and leadership, ask about recent incidents, express concerns or give them an 'atta boy compliment.

Not sure who from MPD will be attending, but should be the lieutenants from each PSA and perhaps Inspector Vendette Parker. 4D Commander Manlapaz attends when able.

PSA 404 & 407 meet quarterly, so if you miss this one, the next will be sometime at the end of summer.

I'll be there to take notes and will share after.

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Drew

Hyperlocal community journalist in Petworth, Washington DC.



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May 30th is going to be busy

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This weekend is busy -- EL Haynes has a festival, Powell Elementary is having a Carnival at Upshur Park at 11am, and the Petworth Library is having a Summer Reading Kickoff celebration, featuring one of the National's Presidential Mascots. Wonder who it'll be (please be Teddy please be Teddy!)

You can meet the mascot at the Petworth Library (4200 Kansas Ave NW) from 2:30 - 3pm on the 30th.

I'll post more info on all three events soon.

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Drew

Hyperlocal community journalist in Petworth, Washington DC.



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Is Petworth strange & hypnotic?

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Nah, we just enjoying living here. (Ok, maybe we're a little strange.) 

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Drew

Hyperlocal community journalist in Petworth, Washington DC.



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Thank You 1,000 times

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Thank you 1,000 times over for supporting Petworth News! It's a nice birthday present to have the Facebook page hit 1,000 Likes. 

I hope the blog here at PetworthNews.org and on Facebook continues to be useful to the community.

Be sure to come out to Petworth Citizen on Monday, June 29th at 6pm to celebrate!

Mildly interesting side note: the 1,000th Like was Katie Ashmore (thanks Katie!) then someone unliked the page, bringing it back to 999, then Dan Hausman brought it back to 1,000 (thanks Dan!) and Jeff Davis was 1,001 (thanks Jeff!).

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Drew

Hyperlocal community journalist in Petworth, Washington DC.



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Bottle of hydrochloric acid found at Petworth spray park

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An example of muriatic (hydrochloric) acid used at a pool

An example of muriatic (hydrochloric) acid used at a pool

File under WTF for the DC's Department of Parks & Recreation...

A parent found a full and uncapped bottle of muriatic (hydrochloric) acid at the Petworth Spray park on Sunday. The chemical is used as a cleaning agent and likely left by a DPR employee after cleaning the water pumps, etc., for the opening weekend... a very, very absent-minded employee who needs to be retrained on proper chemical handling.  (Here's some examples on how muriatic acid is used.)

Read the full article and some angry comments on Popville.com.

5/27/15 Update: I followed up with the DCPR Aquatics Director.

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Drew

Hyperlocal community journalist in Petworth, Washington DC.



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Video of WW2 plane's emergency landing at Reagan National

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Did you watch the Arsenal of Democracy flyover on May 8th? If you did, then you saw one of the WW2 fighters, the TBM Avenger, peel off from formation as it was coming over the city and head south. The pilot of the TBM Avenger had to conduct an emergency landing at Reagan National airport due to a hydraulic fluid leak. He posted a video of the event on YouTube. It's pretty interesting.

In the video, you can see the pilot open the canopy wider as what appears to be smoke starts to fill his cockpit. The pilot thought his passenger had passed out (in fact, the passenger was looking at what he thought was a fire).

"A 1500 psi pinhole hydraulic leak vaporized in the cockpit, appeared like smoke, and prompted a decision to abort the flyover and land at Reagan DCA airport," text accompanying the video says

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Drew

Hyperlocal community journalist in Petworth, Washington DC.



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It's a DC birthday

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I received some cool, DC-centric birthday gifts from family and friends today. A beautiful gold leaf map of DC (you can even see Petworth on it) and a signed copy of The Martini Shot by George Pelecanos. Thanks Heather & Fletchers!

And you know you're getting older when your teenage niece writes in a birthday card "Age is only a number!"  :)

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Drew

Hyperlocal community journalist in Petworth, Washington DC.



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A sign of the times in DC

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Posted on a streetlight...  "Helping DC residents grow it organically since 2015"  

Truly a sign of the times for Initiative 71 and pot decriminalization here in Washington.

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Drew

Hyperlocal community journalist in Petworth, Washington DC.



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Memorial Day 2015

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Thank you to those who served and sacrificed for freedom. Today is about remembering who gave their last full measure to protect and defend.

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Drew

Hyperlocal community journalist in Petworth, Washington DC.



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A ride-along with 4D MPD, part 1

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A ride-along with 4D MPD, part 1

Last month I had the opportunity to spend a day doing a ride-along with MPD Lieutenant Van Crawford, the PSA 407 manager in Petworth. My main goal was to get an understanding of some of the issues MPD is facing regarding local criminal activity and community engagement, and share with MPD some of the thoughts and concerns of the community. It was a great ride-along and I'd like to share the experience with you. This is a long read story, broken up into two separate posts, so grab a coffee, soda, beer or your favorite snack and dig in.

Read more after the break:

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A ride along with 4D MPD, part 2

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A ride along with 4D MPD, part 2

Here’s part two of my ride-along article with MPD Lt. Van Crawford that I conducted on April 7, 2015. (The first article is here.) Remember, treat all quotes as my recollection of the conversation. 

After we left the fellow asking about the neighborhood, we went through several areas talking about specific problem houses. I won’t mention addresses or streets, but do want to give you an idea of some of the issues we discussed, and a high-level overview of MPDs plans.

More after the break:

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Petworth Market offers new treats

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Petworth Market offers new treats

Another tasty, busy day at the Petworth Community Market! Thanks to all the vendors and neighbors who humor me with posing for pictures!

A special shout out to Elsa from The Little Peeps Emporium! Elsa Speezio and I met randomly on the National Mall at the beginning of May during the Arsenal of Democracy WW2 plan flyover. And now I meet her selling handmade jewelry at our very own Market. Elsa has been selling at the Petworth Market for a few seasons now, having first... More after the break:

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