Colored Rock Map of Texas at I-20 in Pecos, Click for Travel Guide Pecos Enterprise

Enterprise

ARCHIVES
Archives 62
Archives 74
Pecos Country History
Archives 87
1987 Tornado Photos
Rodeo Photos 88 |
Archives 95
Archives 96
Archives 97
News Photos 1997
Rodeo Photos 97 |
Archives 98
News Photos 1998
Rodeo Photos 98 |
Parade Photos 98 |

Area Newspapers
Advertising
Classified


|

Daily Newspaper and Travel Guide
for Pecos Country of West Texas

Top Stories

Wednesday, October 28, 1998

School's carnival begins Halloween events


By ROSIE FLORES
Staff Writer
Halloween is just around the corner and activities
surrounding the spooky night are underway.

A Halloween Carnival held at the Reeves County Civic Center
Tuesday evening proved to be a huge success judging from the
number of people who attended, according to organizers of
the event. The carnival was sponsored by Pecos Elementary
School and featured game booths, cake walks and a haunted
house. An enchilada supper was held in conjunction with the
carnival and a concession stand was open during the event.

Other activities planned are for Halloween night on
Saturday. A "Holy-Ween" Carnival is set for 7-9 p.m., at
Iglesia Bautista Nueva Vida (New Life Baptist Church)
located at 301 W. Third St.

All children in the community are invited to attend. The
event is sponsored by Girls in Action Group (GA's), a
missions organization of the local church consisting of
girls in first through seventh grades, who are learning and
doing mission work. It is co-sponsored by the Youth Group of
the church.

Church members planned the special event to keep children
off the streets at nights; and provide them with a good, fun
and safe environment.

Activities planned during the carnival include children
dressed in costumes (Biblical characters). The GA's will
present a program, where they will be dressed like someone
from Biblical times. They will pretend and act as if they
are "that" person. Members of the youth group will try to
figure out who they are and there will be prizes for best
costume and most original.

Christian music will be played throughout the evening and
different games, such as darts and balloons, bingo, bobbing
for apples, musical chairs, face-painting and a cake walk
will be held.

Attendees will receive grab bags (filled with lots of
goodies and refreshments will be served. Game and door
prizes will be awarded.

Also on Saturday, trick-or-treaters are invited that night
to come by the Reeves County Sheriff's Office from 5-7 p.m.
Children of all ages are welcome and must accompanied by a
parent or guardian. This event is sponsored by the Reeves
County Sheriff Explorers Post 600 and the Pecos Youth
Advisory Commission.

Law enforcement officials are warning motorists to beware of
trick-or-treaters Saturday night and to drive carefully.

Mom fears foul play over disappearance


By ROSIE FLORES
Staff Writer
A distraught mother is asking for help in finding her son,
who has been missing since April.

Catalina Garcia stated that she had not seen her son,
39-year-old Ruben Garcia Tercero, since April when he said
he was going to a friend's house.

"My brother gave him a ride to his friend's house because he
said they were having a meeting," said Garcia.

Garcia admits that her son has a drug problem and has been
arrested before, but said she doesn't think this is why he
disappeared.

Instead, Garcia suspects foul play.

"He knew there was a warrant out for his arrest, because he
had been arrested before and they had upped the bond," said
Garcia.

However, she states that he had been planning to turn
himself in after he visited with his two sons who were in
Pecos in June. "He was just waiting to see his children and
he said that after that he would turn himself in and seek
some help for his drug problem," she said.

Reeves County sheriff's deputy Bobby Jenkins officially
filed a missing person's report on Tercero on Monday.

Tercero was born on June 14, 1959, is described in the
report as being 5-foot-7 and weighing 150 pounds.

"He has been missing since April 1998 and was last seen in
Pecos, wearing a black T-shirt and blue jeans," said Jenkins.

Garcia said she spoke to several family members and friends
as to his whereabouts. "I've been going crazy talking to
everyone who knew him and have even made the rounds in
places he hung out at," said Garcia.

"I don't think this is just a disappearance case, but I
suspect foul play," said Garcia. "I think someone did
something to him and I am very worried."

"The last day I saw him my brother drove him to his friend's
house, now the friend says he left with my brother, but my
brother told me he didn't," said Garcia.

She said that regardless of her son's problems he wouldn't
just stay away this long and would at least call.

"He's my youngest son, and yes, I know he has problems, but
I don't want to think the worst right now," she said.

Garcia states that whatever the circumstances she just wants
to know where Tercero is and what has happened to him. "If
they did do something to him, if he's no longer alive, I
want to know that too," she said.

Tercero has been entered into the National Crime Information
Center and the Texas Crime Information Center, according to
Jenkins.

If anyone has any information regarding this missing
person's whereabouts they are encouraged to contact the
Reeves County Sheriff's Office at 915-445-4901.

Garcia also urges anyone with any kind of information to
contact her at 915-445-6916 or to go to her home at 415 E.
Fourth St.

"I can't even sleep anymore I just pray and worry," she said.

Hailstorms strike Orla, El Paso area


By PEGGY McCRACKEN
Staff Writer
Hail and high winds out of the north hit the Orla area
Tuesday afternoon, smashing windows on mobile homes and
buildings, said Bessie Mitchell, Orla Grocery owner.

"It didn't hurt the store," Mitchell said. But her trailer
house had all the windows on the north side broken out, as
did a storage shed.

"I have been here 21 years, and that's the first time we
have had that bad a storm," Mitchell said, noting that the
hail storm extended for quite a way south of Orla.

The National Weather Service issued a tornado warning when a
funnel cloud was spotted southwest of Orla between 4:30 and
5 p.m., traveling east at 30 mph. Mentone residents were
also warned, but only wind and rain with small hail hit that
area.

Pyote got high winds and rain between 6 and 7 p.m., said
Mary Taggart, an employee of the West Texas State School.
The National Weather Service station at Wink reported .72
inch of rain on Tuesday from the same storm, while another
less severe storm dropped rain on the southern portion of
Reeves County around sunset.

Pecos also got some rain later in the night, with .10 inch
recorded by the National Weather Service observer. Another
.03 inch fell in the early morning hours Tuesday, bringing
the October total rainfall to 1.41 inches and the
year-to-date measure 5.57 inches.

The storms were part of a line of that brought showers
across West Texas from El Paso to Amarillo and in areas of
southeastern and south central New Mexico.

Tornado warnings were issued for southern Eddy County, N.M.,
prior to the storm warnings for the Orla area. A tornado
reportedly was spotted between Malaga and Loving, N.M., and
a later tornado warning was issued for the area around
Eunice, N.M.

To the west, severe storms caused flooding in the El Paso
area, and destroyed 30 homes in neighboring Juarez, Mexico.
Hail and rain were reported from El Paso north to Las
Cruces, N.M., and tornado warnings were issued for the area
between northwest El Paso and Canutillo.

El Paso reported .76 inch of rain from the storm, while in
the Panhandle, Amarillo received 1.35 inches and Dalhart
1.21 inches from the same line of storms that had moved into
Oklahoma by early this morning.

Hurricane lashes Honduras; Mexico next


By VICTOR R. CAIVANO
Associated Press Writer
LA CEIBA, Honduras -- Spreading fear across the western
Caribbean today, one of the century's most powerful
hurricanes forced tens of thousands to flee, dumped torrents
of rain, mowed down trees and damaged homes. At least 14
people were reported killed.

Hurricane Mitch hovered 30 miles off the coast of Honduras
this morning, its downpours causing rivers to flood across
that nation, Belize and elsewhere in Central America.

The U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said up to 25
inches of rain could fall on mountain areas.

At its peak Tuesday, Mitch was the fourth-strongest
Caribbean hurricane this century, with 180 mph winds. By 10
a.m. EST today, the 350-mile wide storm still packed a
punch, but its winds were down to 120 mph, with higher
gusts.

More than 45,000 people were evacuated from coastal and
low-lying areas of Honduras, according to Col. Guillermo
Pinel, chief of the National Emergency Committee. Many towns
were cut off by about 50 flooded rivers.

One was La Ceiba, a city of 40,000 where the two highways
out were both cut. To the east, the pillars of the Saopin
bridge were weakened by a swollen river and the bridge
sagged into the water. To the west, the Pico Bonito bridge
was entirely washed away.

The entire town was without electricity, and firefighter
Tomas Hayden said officials had banned private cars from
circulating to ease emergency rescue work.

Waves crashed against the walls of seafront discos and
people waded through knee-deep water with furniture on their
backs to flee flooded houses.

In the Barrio Ingles shantytown, the ground was entirely
covered in white foam from the surf, making it look like it
had snowed.

Twelve-year-old Dalixa Reyes wandered through the foam in
the lashing rain, looking for her parents, brothers and
sisters, who live a few blocks away from where she lives
with other relatives.

``I'm worried about my family, my friends, about the people
who live here,'' she said.

She found them -- standing on a flooded sidewalk gazing in
awe at the destruction.

Mexico declared an alert throughout the Yucatan Peninsula,
evacuating thousands of residents and tourists from
vulnerable beach resorts like Cancun and Cozumel and cutting
back on pumping oil from wells in the Gulf of Mexico.

In Belize, most of the 75,000 people in Belize City fled
inland in cars and government buses.

Port officials at Chetumal, Mexico, said a wave kicked up by
Hurricane Mitch washed a Connecticut man off a catamaran
south of Cancun on Monday and he was presumed dead. He was
identified as Robert Gates, 55, of Niantic.

Honduras reported five deaths -- one in a collapsed house,
two men electrocuted when they were blown off a roof, one
man drowned in a swollen river and another killed when he
was washed away while trying to cross a bridge on his
bicycle.

The Red Cross in neighboring Nicaragua said eight people
died there in flooding from Mitch's rains.

Mitch was blasting the Bay Island of Guanaja, 75 miles
northeast of here, ripping the metal roofing off hundreds of
houses and knocking out power and telephones. Many residents
took shelter on larger nearby islands.

Tina Haylock, a Guanaja resident visiting the capital,
Tegucigalpa, told Canal 5 television she had talked to her
family early today and they told her 14 people had died on
the island. The report could not be independently confirmed.

She said most of the houses in the town of Sandy Bay were
destroyed, and that everyone had taken refuge in a shelter.

On Roatan, an island a few miles west of Guanaja, restaurant
worker Marta Ondina reported that electricity was out and
people had evacuated.

``It's raining hard and the winds are very strong,'' she
said by telephone. ``They have taken people from the shore
to churches and more secure places. The people are very
worried. There is no power.''

Mitch appeared nearly stalled today over Guanaja, moving
very slowing toward the Honduras coast. The hurricane center
said it was expected to head northwest Thursday, but the
storm's slow pace made its movements unpredictable.

The U.S. National Weather Service said only three Atlantic
storms were stronger than Mitch at its peak: Gilbert in
1988, Allen in 1980 and the Labor Day hurricane of 1935.

In the Mexican resort of Cancun, 375 miles north of here,
American and other tourists formed long lines at the airport
Tuesday trying to leave before the storm's arrival.

But as Mitch veered south, Cancun Mayor Rafael Lara Lara
canceled the city's emergency alert. State officials earlier
had evacuated several thousand people from coastal zones
further south, near the Belize border.

OBITUARY

Inez Lujan


Inez Carrasco Lujan, 82, died Tuesday, Oct. 27, 1998, at
Medical Center Hospital in Odessa.

A rosary will be held tonight at 7:30 p.m. at Martinez
Funeral Home and at 7:30 p.m., Thursday at Our Lady of
Guadalupe Catholic Church in Saragosa.

Services are scheduled for 10 a.m., Friday, Oct. 30, at Our
Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church in Saragosa with burial in
Saragosa Cemetery.

She was born April 20, 1916, in Mentone, was a housewife and
a Catholic.

Survivors include her husband, Concepcion Lujan, Sr. of
Saragosa; one son, Concepcion Lujan, Jr. of Odessa; one
daughter, Blasa Lujan Nino of Las Cruces, N.M.; one brother,
Pedro Carrasco of Odessa; four grandchildren and one
great-grandchild.

Martinez Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements.

WEATHER


High Tuesday 81. Low last night 55. Rainfall .13 inch.
October rainfall 1.41 inches. Year-to-date 5.57 inches.
Tonight, partly cloudy. Low in the mid 50s. Light wind.
Thursday, partly cloudy with a slight chance of
thunderstorms. high in the mid 70s. Southeast wind 5-15 mph.
Chance of rain 20 percent.



Search Entire Site:


Pecos Enterprise
Mac McKinnon, Publisher
Division of Buckner News Alliance, Inc.

324 S. Cedar St., Pecos, TX 79772
Phone 915-445-5475, FAX 915-445-4321
e-mail news@pecos.net

Associated Press text, photo, graphic, audio and/or video material shall not be published, broadcast, rewritten for broadcast or publication or redistributed directly or indirectly in any medium.

Copyright 1998 by Pecos Enterprise