NCWLIFE Evening News 

NCWLIFE Evening News 

NCWLIFE Evening Newscast

•  Assessment and search teams were working in McNeil Canyon on Tuesday in an attempt to locate other possible casualties of the Chelan Hills Acres wildfire.

• A 100-acre brushfire burning north of Quincy was quickly encircled Wednesday morning by local fire crews.

•  East Wenatchee has become ground zero for a fair amount of road excavation and construction, including a traffic shutdown today at Fifth Street and Eastmont Avenue, which ends tomorrow morning.

• A criminal investigation of the Chelan Hills Acres Fire is underway. The wildfire is believed to be human-caused, and may have been started by fireworks.

•  Chelan County deputies responding to a vehicle crash report over the weekend recovered the body of a driver, killed when his vehicle slid into the Chelan River Gorge.

• As the Chelan Hills Fire progressed after its start on July 4th, it caused injuries for multiple firefighters, with some suffering minor burns and others enduring smoke inhalation.

• Authorities are working to assess the damage as the Chelan Hills Fire continues burning in Douglas County. That 10,000-acre fire that began on July 4th was about 20% contained as of this morning, but it’s damaged or destroyed 100 or more structures on either side of McNeil Canyon Road, including homes and farms. 

• The main eastbound highway into Leavenworth will close next week for four days, to permanently repair damage from the December 2025 flooding.

• Recovery workers have been able to raise a tugboat that sank last week in the Columbia River above Priest Rapids Dam.

• The Grant County Fire Marshal says the county experienced nearly a hundred brushfires over the July 4th weekend.

• One person has died over the weekend as an apparent result of the Chelan Hills Fire. Sheriff Tyler Caille said today a deceased person was found Sunday in a crashed vehicle, inside the nearly 10,000-acre footprint of the fire.

• Two climbers, one of them injured, were rescued Friday by Chelan County Mountain Rescue teams from 8,400 feet up on Mount Stuart, the tallest mountain on the popular Enchantments trail.

• The Wenatchee Police Department’s automatic license plate reading cameras will be coming back online, after the department shut down the eight cameras located around the city in late 2025.

• Fire crews were able to safely contain the Henderson Fire on Wednesday, after it grew to 350 acres and threatened homes on Henderson Road and Union Valley Road outside Chelan.

• The Leavenworth National Fish Hatchery will close the gate to its boat launch parking area on Monday due to waterflow levels in Icicle Creek.

• A fast-growing brushfire is sparking evacuation notices in the hills above Lake Chelan. The Henderson Fire was reported shortly after 1:30 this afternoon, burning near Henderson Road overlooking Lake Chelan Hills.

•  Washington state’s five national forests are expanding digital payment options at recreation sites with a mobile app.

• A woman accused of stealing from multiple banks in Washington, including in Leavenworth, says she was just a patsy for a larger criminal organization.

• County Commissioners have declined to ban the sale or discharge of fireworks in unincorporated Grant County ahead of the Fourth of July weekend, but urged safety practices.

• Mosquitoes collected for sampling in Grant County have tested positive for West Nile virus, which can lead to encephalitis when transmitted to humans.

• The Washington Court of Appeals agreed today that a Douglas County man was properly convicted of assault, but said there’s no evidence he concealed the weapon used in the attack.