colorado flooding

People rescued by helicopters from Colorado flooding

(Brennan Linsley/ Associated Press ) - A team from Rocky Mountain Rescue prepares to depart on a mountain flood rescue mission flown by the National Guard, in Boulder, Colo., Friday Sept. 13, 2013. Flash flooding in Colorado has left at least three people reportedly dead and the widespread high waters have hampered emergency workers’ access to affected communities as heavy rains hammered northern Colorado.

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By Associated Press, Published: September 13 | Updated: Saturday, September 14, 2:44 AM

LYONS, Colo. — This is what Associated Press reporters on the scene Friday are learning about unfolding events:

Helicopter news footage shows roads east of Greeley cut off by flooding, and broad swaths of land inundated by water. A man is seen escaping flooded farmland on horseback as rescue crews ferry an inflatable raft carrying at least two dogs. Heavy rain is moving through the area west of Denver.

4:04 p.m. MDT

Colorado officials raised the death toll from flooding to four after a woman’s body was found in Boulder. Sheriff Joe Pelle says the unidentified woman was swept away Thursday after a vehicle got stuck in high water. A man in the same vehicle died after he got out and tried to help her. Pelle says 80 people in Boulder County are still unaccounted for.

3:41 p.m. MDT

Authorities say as many as 2,500 people could be evacuated from Lyons by the end of the day.

3:30 p.m. MDT

Boulder County officials say National Guard helicopters are rescuing nearly 300 residents stranded in Jamestown, a mountain town cut off by flooding. It’s unclear how many more people are in the town.

3:26 p.m. MDT

A helicopter has been evacuating stranded people in Larimer County, focusing on those with medical problems. After getting his first aerial view of the destruction, Sheriff Justin Smith said hundreds if not thousands of people, remain stranded and are running low of food and fuel.

3:15 p.m. MDT

Sixth graders finishing a week at Jefferson County’s outdoor lab school on Mount Evans hiked down the mountain to school buses because a road to the school was impassable. The 138 students made the trek with authorities during a break in the weather.

1:56 p.m. MDT

The football game between Fresno State and Colorado is being postponed because of the flooding devastating the state. Chancellor Philip DiStefano said the community is hurting and it’s not a good time to put pressure on the community and divert attention away from people in need.

1:32 p.m. MDT

The National Park Service says a pair of hikers made it down Longs Peak, one of Colorado’s highest points, on their own after being stranded by an ice storm for two days. The news came just as the Park Service was organizing its latest effort to rescue the women.

12:30 p.m. MDT

Rocky Mountain National Park is closed and officials are escorting remaining visitors out of the park. Officials say they’re working to mount rescue efforts for two hikers reported missing on Longs Peak, a 14,259-foot mountain there. Trail Ridge Road through the park, the highest continuous paved road in the United States, remains open to emergency vehicles and residents evacuating from the town of Estes Park.

11:56 a.m. MDT

Flooding has closed Interstate 25 from north of Denver to Cheyenne, a 90-mile stretch. Three major rivers — Big Thompson, St. Vrain, and Poudre — normally flow under the highway in northern Colorado, but flood waters have pushed over the top of the roadway in some locations.

11:22 a.m. MDT

Officials at the University of Colorado are discussing whether the football game between Fresno State and Colorado will be played Saturday or pushed back because of flooding.

11:01 a.m. MDT

Helicopters are flying in Boulder and Larimer counties to reach stranded people and drop supplies. Low visibility had grounded them Thursday.

10:49 a.m. MDT

Blue skies are peeking through clouds over the Front Range, but more rain is expected in the afternoon.

10:10 a.m. MDT

An elderly man who was walking his dog was rescued from a Denver drainage ditch after being swept away by rushing water. Denver Fire Department spokesman Mark Watson said witnesses saw the man and dog fall into the water, and called for help. He was pulled from the water four blocks away, but his condition wasn’t immediately available.

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6:31 a.m. MDT

Authorities went door-to-door in Morrison, south of the historic Red Rocks Amphitheater, asking hundreds of people to evacuate as Bear Creek neared flood stage. The amphitheater was in no immediate danger.

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2 a.m. MDT

Boulder Police Chief Mark Beckner tours the flood damage, and says Boulder Creek has begun to recede but conditions remain dangerous.

America's Cup

What America's Cup means to NZ business

The America’s Cup is not won yet, but already Auckland is gearing up to defend it.

The marine industry is anxious for its return as it struggles with a high dollar and falling sales.

But one cup insider says if New Zealand does win, it should consider the unthinkable – hosting the cup overseas.

Waterfront Auckland is not waiting for the America's Cup to be won. Work is underway dredging the harbour to make room for up to 16 more super yachts.

“We are hearing from the super yacht skippers that they love Auckland as a destination because their crews have access to so much amenity here, the hotels are only a couple of minutes away, and the skippers themselves can stay here with their families,” says Waterfront Auckland general manager of development Rod Marler.

There will be enough power for an entire suburb, or four office blocks.

It's hoped winning the America's Cup will power up the whole economy, by an estimated half a billion dollars. That's if the past defences are anything to go by.

“There are a lot of people who cruise around the world and we are looking to put New Zealand more on the map as a nice destination for them to sail into our waters and enjoy our lovely pure water and our mountains, our wineries and our restaurants,” says Peter Busfield of the Marine Industry Association.

On some of those boats all they have to do is have a small job that can create $200,000 worth of work,” says Greg Salthouse of Salthouse Boatbuilders.

Salthouse Boatbuilders produced two chase boats for Team New Zealand's San Francisco campaign and one for Prada.

A San Francisco resident watching Team New Zealand practising on the harbour was so impressed with their chase boat he decided to buy one for himself. That was a $650,000 order. Another is going to the British Virgin Islands.

“Team New Zealand was allowed to show them over the boat so they could get the client down there, have a look at the boat, take them for a run – do all the stuff we couldn't do back here,” says Mr Salthouse.

The man whose company provided the animated graphics for the cup says we should consider what some will consider unthinkable – hosting the next cup outside of New Zealand.

“Let's just at least debate the idea that we tender this thing,” says Ian Taylor of Animation Research Ltd. “We put it out to the world. We tender it to countries where we want to do business. We shift. We find the city that suits us.”

But that's a decision that will be made by the team that wins the cup.

“I don’t think they are racing and winning to go to Dubai,” says Auckland Waterfront chairman Bob Harvey. “They are racing and winning to bring it here, and here is its place.”

First of course, we need to win it.

The Family

Cast

• Robert De Niro as Fred Blake / Giovanni Manzoni
• Michelle Pfeiffer as Maggie Blake
• Tommy Lee Jones
• Dianna Agron as Bella Blake
• John D'Leo as Warren Blake
• Vincent Pastore as Fat Willy
• Joseph Perrino as Joey
• Paul Borghese as Albert
• Jimmy Palumbo as DiCicco
• Kresh Novakovic as Vincenze

Director

• Luc Besson

Screenplay

• Luc Besson
• Michael Caleo

Comedy, Crime, Drama, Thriller

Rated R

Life is tough in the Witness Protection Program. Life is pretty cushy, too, especially if you're the Manzoni family in Luc Besson's "The Family": you get to live in a quaint house in a tiny village in Normandy, you eat well, you have FBI guys stationed across the street 24/7, and you have a personal handler who makes sure that you and your loved ones are safe. The point of being in Normandy for the Manzonis is to somehow "pass" as regular Americans on holiday or sabbatical, and the Manzonis fail to manage this from the start, mainly because they are all raging maniacs. 

"The Family" is a pretty uneven film, lurching from comedy to violence to sentiment, but it's best when it sticks in the realm of flat-out farce. The pleasure comes in watching the actors (Michelle Pfeiffer, in particular) submitting wholeheartedly to ridiculous situations. The film has a mix of influences and genres, obviously, and Besson plays with these and references them openly, but the farcical elements rest uneasily beside the violence, leaving the unmistakeable feeling that this is a film slightly at war with itself. 

When dealing with the family's adjustment (or lack thereof) to small-town French life, it is on sure (and often hilarious) footing. Giovanni Manzoni (Robert De Niro) snitched on his Mafia friends back in the States, and because of that there is now a $20 million price on his head. In exchange for his testimony, he and his family (wife and two teenage kids, Belle and Warren) are placed in the Witness Protection Program, under the control of FBI agent Robert Stansfield (Tommy Lee Jones). Maggie Manzoni (Pfeiffer) is already sick of the life in hiding, and has a tiny habit of blowing stuff up when she gets upset. Of course placing a well-known Mob boss into a tiny village in France doesn't seem like the best strategy for the FBI, because the witness will stick out even more there, but you really can't ask those questions when you watch "The Family." The answers will not hold up under interrogation.

The film opens with the family (Robert De Niro, Michelle Pfeiffer, Dianna Agron, and John D’Leo) driving through the French countryside to yet another hideout since their cover was blown in the Riviera. The two kids loll bored in the back seat, Giovanni tries to tell everyone the new place will be fine, everything will be okay, the dog gets blamed for the bad smell in the car (when actually it is the stink of a dead corpse in the trunk, hidden there by Giovanni on his way out of Nice). This opening scene contains everything that is good and pleasurable about the film: watching Pfeiffer and De Niro act with one another, the weird juxtaposition of violence and everyday family matters, the family's anxiety at being in France when they'd rather be in Brooklyn. You are lulled into a false sense that you understand what is going on here—that the father, Giovanni Manzoni (Robert De Niro) is the "wise guy," and his family is just along for the ride. But the next couple of scenes explode that sense of safety (literally) as you realize that all of them, all four of them, are out of their minds.

Belle and Warren size up their new small-town school and promptly begin to wreak havoc among their peer group. In a matter of days, Warren has taken over 50% of the blackmarket cigarette business, as well as the prescription pill business, and when he is told by a teacher that his conduct has been poor, he says he wants a lawyer. On her first day, Belle accepts a ride home with four French guys who tell her they want to "practice their English," and when she realizes that maybe they want more from her, she beats one of the guys to a pulp with a tennis racket. Played by "Glee"'s Dianna Argon, Belle is a creepy character, gorgeous and innocent, but when she falls in love with her math tutor, you can't get the image of her smashing the tennis racket into another human being's face out of your mind. Meanwhile, Warren and Belle's parents are oblivious to what's happening in their children's lives. Giovanni thinks he might try his hand at a memoir, not a smart move for someone who is supposed to be in hiding. Maggie visits a local church, trying to re-connect to her faith.  Tommy Lee Jones shows up now and then to say it's hard to protect them if they insist on breaking the plumber's legs because he can't fix the pipes.

De Niro could play this role in his sleep, but he's fun to watch, especially in the scenes with Pfeiffer, and when his power is demeaned by his family's shenanigans. In one awesome sequence, the curator of a local film group calls up Giovanni and asks if he wouldn't come to their next meeting to have a nice debate on a great American film, Vincente Minnelli's "Some Came Running" (starring Frank Sinatra as an aspiring writer with a tormented past). Against the advice of Stansfield, Giovanni accepts. The head of the film society tells him they were sent "Goodfellas" by mistake, so maybe the visiting American would have something to say about that? Boy, does he ever. It's a giant wink to the audience, an inside joke, as we are treated to the bizarre vision of Robert De Niro as Giovanni Manzoni watching Robert De Niro as Jimmy in "Goodfellas."

Pfeiffer's performance is the reason to see the film, though. Calling back her show-stopping turn in "Married to the Mob," her Maggie is both supportive and bored out of her mind, yearning towards her old Catholic faith but unrepentant about blowing stuff up. She cooks at the stove, her hair in gigantic curlers. She kneels in church, praying to Jesus with earnest eyes. Pfeiffer has been very good in dramatic material, but she might be a comedienne at heart. There's one scene near the end of "The Family" where events are coming to a boil, buildings are exploding, and she crawls across the floor as quickly as she can clutching a gigantic kitchen knife. Her eyes are manic, wild, and yet also focused, like an assassin's. 

Luc Besson has built a career on stylish and thrilling action films, and "The Family" is a mess compared to such earlier efforts as "Le Femme Nikita" and "Léon: The Professional." But for what it is, it works, while reminding us and again to not take it too seriously.