• About 275 flights were delayed, and two canceled completely at SFO between about noon and 1:30 pm Wednesday afternoon, as the FAA issued a ground delay for arriving flights because of high winds. This had everything to do with the weather and nothing to do with the fresh new government shutdown, as SFO’s TSA agents are technically not federal employees, and are not affected by the shutdown. [Chronicle]
• Another terrifying story out of Vallejo, as the body of 28-year-old Renia Lewis was found crammed into a secret attic wall in a house described as “a hoarder-like dwelling,” after she had not been seen or heard of since Friday. Vallejo police have already arrested 41-year-old Vallejo resident Douglas Irwin Shaw, and a relative of Lewis’s said that Shaw “is being cooperative, stating that he did indeed kill Renia, he threw her phone on top of the school.” [KTVU]
• Another bitter pill to swallow for 49ers fans, as quarterback Brock Purdy has been ruled out of Thursday night’s game against the Rams, with his toe injury acting up again. This year’s breakout receiver Ricky Pearsall is also sidelined Thursday night, as is his fellow wide receiver Jauan Jennings. [NBC Sports]

National:

• A Tuesday night 6.9-magnitude earthquake in the Philippines took the lives of at least 69 people, and the death toll is expected to rise significantly as the wreckage is cleared from the affected rural areas. [CBS News]
• As we wrap up Day One of the government shutdown, we learn that Trump’s Department of Health and Human Services instructed its employees to make their out-of-office emails say "Unfortunately, Democratic senators are blocking [a resolution's] passage in the Senate, which has led to a lapse in appropriations. Due to this lapse, I am currently in furlough status and unable to respond to emails.” [HuffPost]
• Globally beloved chimpanzee enthusiast and anthropologist Dr Jane Goodall has died, after a groundbreaking 60 years of studying chimps. She was 91. [NBC Bay Area]

Video:

• A shock announcement from ABC7 Mornings host and occasional anchor Reggie Aqui, who stunned viewers with the news Tuesday that he was leaving KGO after 10 years. “This is both my ten-year work anniversary and my last day here at ABC 7 News,” he says in the farewell video below, where he gets pretty choked up at the one-minute mark. (His co-host Amanda del Castillo did in fact cry.) Aqui said on his Instagram Tuesday, “Not sure what’s next. Other than a much deserved nap. What a ride that was."

Image: Reggie Aqui via Facebook

Our thoughts go out to longtime local TV reporter Dan Noyes, who was attacked Sunday by teens in the Presidio — but he foiled their attempt to steal his bike by threatening to put them on TV.

KGO I-Team investigative reporter Dan Noyes has covered plenty of crime stories, but Sunday night, became the victim of crime himself. In a video Noyes just posted to his Facebook and Twitter accounts Wednesday morning, we see freshly rattled Noyes describing that he was assaulted in an encounter with a group of teens, one of whom tried to steal his bike. And while Noyes has a badly bruised and possibly injured arm from the encounter, he did stymie the would-be bike thief by threatening, “You're about to be on Channel 7.”

Update: Noyes tells SFist that he did indeed suffer a broken elbow with a fractured radial head.

We realize it is kind of unfair to post a picture of a freshly roughed-up Dan Noyes, though the screenshot is important, as it establishes where the incident happened. It was Sunday before sundown, and he describes the location as “right by Sports Basement” in the Presidio, and a stone’s throw from the Palace of Fine Arts.

“I was riding along this bike path just now,” Noyes says in the video he took right after the incident. “I’m coming home, and I see a group of probably 15 young teens, young teens, probably couldn’t drive yet.”

“One of the kids all of a sudden just rushes over and body-blocks me off my bike,” he continues. “I came crashing to the ground, my left elbow is pretty darned sore, I hope it’s not a hairline fracture or something. But I nailed hard onto the ground. I got up, and the kid had grabbed my bike and started running away.”

“I jumped up and went after him, and said, ‘You're about to be on Channel 7.’ The kids, at that, just scattered,” he says.

The quick-thinking Noyes also got a photo of the group, whom he said split between heading toward the Tunnel Tops and the Golden Gate Bridge. He adds that he thinks the youth who tried to steal his bike is circled below.

And Noyes did suffer a pretty bad bruise, also shown in the video. But his reporting has not missed a beat, as after a rough night Sunday, the resilient Dan Noyes was right back to reporting and filing stories on Monday.

If you have any information on this incident, you’re asked to call the SFPD Tip Line at 415-575-4444, or text a tip to TIP411 and begin the message with “SFPD.” Tipsters can remain anonymous.

Related: KGO-TV Reporter Luz Peña Recovering From Near-Fatal Ski Accident in Tahoe [SFist]

Image Dan Noyes via Facebook

Dad rock fans rejoice! 59-year-old ABC 7 news anchor Dan Ashley, who does indeed moonlight as a rock’n’roll singer, has just had his band added to the Saturday lineup for Outside Lands.

It’s sort of a open secret that KGO evening news anchor of the last 28 years Dan Ashley has a rock band on the side. The band simply goes by the name Dan Ashley, and they’ll be a little less of an open secret once they play San Francisco's biggest music festival of the summer. KGO reported Friday that Dan Ashley’s band is scheduled to play Outside Lands, and the Outside Lands website now confirms that Dan Ashley is on the lineup for early Saturday.

According to KGO, “Dan and his band are slated to perform on Saturday, Aug. 12 in the early afternoon.” A specific set time is not detailed on the Outside Lands website, nor does it initiate at which stage Ashley and company will be performing.

But yes, Dan Ashley is a legit musician. He and his band opened for Joan Jett and the Blackhearts in April at a benefit for Ashley’s charity Rock the CASA, which benefits Big Brothers Big Sisters and the Boys & Girls Club. Ashley’s band is also playing the San Mateo’s Rock the Block outdoor concert series on Thursday, September 1 at the Hillsdale Shopping Center.

And Ashley is backed up by an 11-piece band, some of whom have played with the likes of Eddie Money, Starship, Boz Scaggs, and Huey Lewis. And as you can see from these embedded Youtube videos, that gives you a sense of Dan Ashley’s genre of music.  

But if Dan Ashley is the one thing that would get you to buy Outside Lands tickets, we’re afraid you’re out of luck. Single-day tickets for Saturday’s Outside Lands are already sold out, and three-day passes are sold out too. The only remaining Outside Lands ticket options are single-day tickets on Sunday, which features Odesza, the 1975, and Megan Thee Stallion.

Outside Lands 2023 is in two weeks, from August 11-13.

Related: Outside Lands 15th Anniversary Lineup Includes Kendrick Lamar, Odesza, Lana Del Rey, and Janelle Monae [SFist]

Image via Outside Lands

Longtime Bay Area House Rep. Jackie Speier, who just ended a 15-year stint in Congress, has revealed her next chapter, and it is going to keep her on local TV screens talking politics for the foreseeable future.

Speier announced her retirement in November 2021 but declined to elaborate on what else she had planned. Her term just ended last month, and at age 72 she will be taking on a new role, as political analyst for ABC 7/KGO. The station announced Monday that Speier will begin her stint by providing commentary tomorrow evening, February 7, after President Biden's State of the Union address.

After that, the station says, she will "make regular appearances on ABC7 News programs, offering expert knowledge of the inner workings of the political system happening at the local, state and national levels."

KGO is the second-old TV station in the Bay Area, after KPIX, and having launched in 1949, it was the 50th broadcast TV station in the U.S.

Speier has spent much of her life in politics, beginning as an aide to Congressman Leo Ryan, in the late 1970s. She and Ryan were both shot on the tarmac at the airstrip in Jonestown, Guyana, on November 18, 1978, while they were on a fact-finding mission about People's Temple members, who were almost entirely from the Bay Area. Ryan was killed, and Speier survived after playing dead, and then waiting 22 hours with five gunshot wounds, until help arrived.

She has said, while she waited to saved, "I vowed that if I survived I would dedicate my life to public service."

She later served in the state Assembly from 1986 to 1996 and the state Senate from 1998 to 2006, before her run for Congress. While in Congress, she has been a staunch champion of abortion rights and gun control, and she worked to remove cases of sexual assault from the chain of command in the U.S. military justice system.

Speier was succeeded last month by former Assemblymember Kevin Mullin, representing California's 15th District, which encompasses most of the eastern side of the Peninsula, along with Daly City and a small swath of San Francisco proper.

Biden's State of the Union will air on most broadcast stations Tuesday starting at 6 p.m. Pacific Time. This is Biden's second State of the Union address, and there is some speculation he may use it to signal whether he plans to run for a second term as President.

AM radio station KGO 810 just announced “Today we say goodbye,” and now they’re playing nothing but songs about money and gambling, which could be a staff revolt, or might be a strange casino promotion?

We understand that AM radio is a tough racket in the modern era, as that industry’s advertising revenue had already been eaten up by competitors long before Craigslist, Facebook, and internet advertising ever came along. But San Francisco’s KGO 810 AM had been an exception, and was the Bay Area’s top-rated radio station up until 2010 with its original news content (which is around when they declared bankruptcy).

But the station announced Thursday morning that they were going off the air effective immediately, according to SFGate, and it sure appears this was an abrupt closure.

“Today we say goodbye to the legendary KGO,” the station said on both Twitter and on its website. “On Monday, 810am begins a new era. We hope you will tune in.”

Okay, so a format change. But something extremely odd is currently happening at 810 AM airwaves. If you tune in to the radio station (and their website has removed the “Tune In” button, but you can still get an online stream on iHeartRadio) there is something on the air. But it’s an automated loop, playing a lot of songs that reference money: Pink Floyd’s “Money,” AC/DC’s “Money Talks,” The Pet Shops Boys’ “Opportunities (Let’s Make Lots of Money)” and the Steve Miller Band’s “Take the Money and Run.” Is this a sign of disgruntled, fired employees making editorial comments about their owners and corporate overlords at Cumulus Media?

But there's another, more likely explanation. Some of the other songs in the loop are about gambling: Kenny Rogers’s “The Gambler,” and Elvis Presley’s “Viva Las Vegas.” The promo announcements in the loop say “The most unique radio station in the Bay Area is coming Monday. Bet on it!” and bill that the new station will be “The biggest gamble in Bay Area radio history.”

So, like, is KGO 810 becoming gambling-themed station? Is this all an elaborate casino promotion? Are the sports gambling Propositions 26 and 27 buying a radio station for a political advertising blitz? These all seem plausible theories in the era of increased normalization of sports gambling.

Many of the media reports, including the one above from KGO 810 former sister TV station, say that KGO is signing off "after 80 years.” This is not correct, though, KGO signed on in 1924. So it really is 98 years old.

The “80 years” figure is apparently a reference to 1942, when NBC sold the station to what would become the ABC Radio Network, and is now called Cumulus Media Networks. In recent decades, KGO 810AM had been widely respected as a talk-radio station, but maybe now if you're not running 24-7 conspiracy- and Trump content it doesn't pay the bills. And Cumulus is now shutting down the KGO 810 AM radio we always knew, and perhaps placing all their chips on some sort of gambling promotion.

Image: KGO 810 AM (RIP)

Here's a goofy blast from the past to end your day with us at SFist.

TV Spy recently dug up a classic (OK, that might be a wee bit generous of a word) promo featuring their old SkyLink satellite truck breaking the "sat-truck world land speed record" at a blazing 81.73 mph. We're no experts, but we're not positive that's recognized by Guinness.

Of course it was done and shot at where else but the world-famous Bonneville Speedway in Utah, where all the land-speed records are set. According to TV Spy, the truck had the record painted on its side. Bragging rights!

In the YouTube comments a Don McCuaig says he cut the original promo and identifies the man seen throwing his cap down as speed record holder Craig Breedlove, who says "Man that's a fast truck!" No word on whether or not he added the faux-thrash metal soundtrack too.

McCuaig adds, "Gas was cheap back then."

St. Patrick’s Day falls on the kind-of-weekend day of a Thursday this year, but the 165th Annual San Francisco St. Patrick’s Day Parade and Festival is scheduled for Saturday, March 12 at 11:30 a.m. Veteran San Francisco parade-goers know that finding a suitable vantage point for a parade in this town requires persistence and luck of the Irish, while other longtime San Franciscans would rather just shillelagh their way right to a good Irish bar. However you wish to brogue with the bros, SFist serves as your patron saint with this list of the best spots to watch the St. Patrick’s Day parade, or to ignore it altogether and rock out with your shamrock out at one of the nearby Irish bars.

Right Along the Parade Route
The most sensible plan is to just snag a good spot on the parade route. The parade starts at Market and Second Street, continues down Market and then ‘snakes’ its way down Golden Gate Avenue before turning south on Polk and concluding just past City Hall. But you’ll want to get there early to claim a spot, especially if you have little people in tow.
Market and Second st., continuing down Market to Golden Gate, west on Golden Gate and then south on Polk St.

Image: Suzanne W. via Yelp

Bike Messenger Steps at One Post Plaza
Always a popular place to get blarney-stoned, the steps of One Post Plaza (a.k.a “the bike messenger steps”) at the Montgomery St. Muni station offer as many as three precious feet of elevation for your parade-viewing pleasure. Since the parade is not on a weekday, the only “green” being busted out on the steps this day will be the clothing, accessories and Mardi Gras-style green bead necklaces. And sorry, crowd-hackers, the Crocker Galleria Roof Garden is not open on Saturdays.
One Post Plaza, One Post St. (at Market St.)

Image: Suzanne W. via Yelp

The Ramp at the Phillip Burton Federal Building
It’s a donnybrook out there, but the Phillip Burton Federal Building provides a large elevated ramp area that will provide a markedly better parade view than the sidewalk. Be warned that some spots have trees that will block your view, but it’s one of your best bets to get above the crowd since this parade has in recent years put police barriers in front of the steps of City Hall.
Phillip Burton Federal Building and U.S. Courthouse, 450 Golden Gate Ave. (at Larkin St.)

Image: Jaylena P. via Yelp

Irish Culture Festival at Civic Center
When the jig is up and the parade is over, the UN Plaza at Civic Center hosts the Irish Cultural Festival with kids’ rides, arts, crafts, food and live performances by The Shams and “Celtic Pirate Rock” artists O’Craven. It’s kind of like the Pride Parade afterparty, except that rainbows are presented in a completely different context.
UN Plaza, Civic Center, Larkin St. between Grove St. and McAllister St.

Image: Jaylena P. via Yelp

At Home, On TV
You can avoid the whole mess (and the 100,000 anticipated attendees) by just watching this the parade at home on live TV. Longtime sponsor ABC7 is playing the parade live from Noon to 1 p.m. on Saturday, and in previous years has kept the broadcast going until 2:30 p.m. online at ABC7news.com, on the ABC7 News app and on various ABC7 Comcast channels.
Wherever ABC7 KGO is shown

Image: Gerald R. via Yelp

The Irish Bank
‘Dublin’ the fun with two St. Patrick’s Day block parties both on parade Saturday and on actual St. Patrick’s Day, the Irish Bank blanks your memory with one of San Francisco’s drunkest, sloppiest, whiskey-fueled annual alley parties. On the day of the St. Patrick’s Day parade, they’ll feature the live music of The Watch (12-2 p.m.), Paddy’s Orchestra (2-5 p.m.), The Shams (5-8 p.m.) and DJ Marc Van Brabant (8 p.m.-Midnight).
10 Mark Lane, at Bush St.

Image: D.s. via Yelp

Johnny Foley’s Irish House
If it’s a St. Patrick’s Day party, why not drink on O’Farrell Street? You’ll probably have to stand in line at Johnny Foley’s, but once you’re furtunate enough to get in you’ll get all the pints, tacky wallpaper and traditional Irish pub food you can handle at this beloved Irish bar where it’s always “Time for a Pint”.
243 O’Farrell St., at Cyril Magnin St.

Image: Adam S. via Yelp

Lefty O’Doul’s
Known for selling 1,500 pounds of corned beef every St. Patrick’s Day, the bar founded by the former (New York) Giants left-handed pitcher and San Francisco native Lefty O’Doul keeps its venerable St. Patrick’s Day traditions alive and features live piano music from Frank O’Connor the night of the parade. More importantly, they start serving booze at 7 a.m. Saturday morning.
333 Geary St., at Powell St.

Image: Chris W. via Yelp

Harrington’s
More like “Scarrington’s”, amirite? This lovable FiDi dive bar has been doing St. Patrick’s Day parties for more than 80 years, and there will indeed be a mob outside on Front Street. But Harrington’s does a nice job structuring this event with ticketing and security, and the inside and patio areas are nowhere near as oodderly fook-ed as the scene depicted above.
245 Front St., at Sacramento St.

Image: The Chieftain via Yelp

The Chieftain
This SoMa sports bar is where Dubliners will go watch the Dubs after the parade (Golden State plays Phoenix at 7:30 p.m. Saturday night). The Chieftain has live music on Saturday nights and they’re serving apple whiskey now, so make sure to bring your barely-walking stick.
198 Fifth St., at Howard St.

Honorable Mention of Irish Bars Located Nowhere Near the Parade - The Plough & Stars (116 Clement), The Dubliner (3838 24th St.), The Blarney Stone (5625 Geary Blvd.), Danny Coyle's (668 Haight St.), O'Keefe's (598 5th Ave.), The Napper Tandy (3200 24th St.),Kate O'Brien's (579 Howard St.) and Maggie McGarry's (1353 Grant Ave).

KGO-TV reporter Don Sanchez, who began his career at the station in 1972, retired after his broadcast last night. In recent years he's been the affable, mustachioed, always coiffed arts and entertainment correspondent for the ABC affiliate, going on all the junkets that one goes on as an arts and entertainment reporter — like a recent jaunt to Scotland with Pixar on the eve of the release of Brave, and various trips to the Oscars. And, of course, he's been the movie critic who rates things based on a full, half-full, or empty bucket of popcorn. It's been a cushy way to slide into retirement.

People who grew up in the Bay Area have always known Don't mug on their TV, and he's played pretty much every role a local newscaster can play, from cub reporter to sportscaster to nightly news anchor.

We've joked about Don being a wig model, but in all honesty, we have no confirmation that that is not still, against all odds and visual instincts, his own hair. His hair and mustache have been his signatures over the decades, and as he tells his one-time co-anchor Cheryl Jennings in this farewell piece, there was just one brief moment in the 70s when he shaved it off, but when he did a stint as a sportscaster the network told him he looked too young and ought to grow a mustache, so it returned.

The news of Don's retirement follows quickly on the recent announcement that longtime anchor Dana King was leaving KPIX to pursue her penis sculpting career.

Obviously, he will be missed, and we here at SFist wish him the best.

[ABC 7]

Citadel Broadcasting Corporation, noted as "the third-largest radio broadcaster in the U.S." and owner of San Francisco's KGO-AM 810 and KSFO 560, will file for bankruptcy by the end of the year, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Peninsula Press Club notes that "[t]he corporation is discussing with its creditors a "pre-arranged" Chapter 11 filing that would reduce the company's debts from $2 billion to $760 million."

ABC 7's Dan Noyes needs your help, public transit riders! It's for a story. According to his latest tweet, "I-Team's looking for anyone aboard MUNI bus 33 outbound yesterday @3:45pm who witnessed an altercation with driver at Ashbury and Frederick." Did you? If so, contact Noyes at Dan.Noyes@abc.com. Update: Be sure to catch the top of the six o'clock news on ABC 7 with the latest altercation on a Muni bus.

The woman who sent KGO radio host Bernie Ward's career and reputation into freefall is thirty-three-year-old mother of three Linda Figueiredo. She also goes by the online moniker "Sexfairy," or more intimately, "Mistress". Ward and Figueiredo developed an online relationship in 2004, which hit a pocket of turbulence after Ward sent his "Mistress" some juicy yet hardly-legal child pornography. Dan Noyes refreshes out memory thusly:

...it’s clear Ward and Figueiredo already had a relationship – he calls her "mistress", she calls him "slave". Ward looks to Figueiredo for approval and direction. (Ward’s lawyers argue he was role-playing as part of research for a book.) From the transcript, it’s Ward who brings up the issue of pictures, and he does so after nearly an hour of discussion about his own desires, fantasies and experiences. Ward uses the screen name "Vincentlio": "I love trading pictures." Figueiredo as "Sexfairy" answers, "And why haven't I gotten any pics, slave? Send me some."

Ward sends several pictures – one of a woman and two children. Ward describes her as a mother in her late thirties, she's topless. He says the naked boy is 14, that the girl wearing clothes is 12. They're all touching in a sexual way. "Sexfairy" writes, "brb" – be right back. A half hour later, she's on the phone with police.

Figueiredo refused an interview from Noyes, claiming she’s been asked not to talk to the media until the case ends. We look forward to hearing from Mistress as soon as possible.

The next installment of his long-running Muni investigation airs tonight at 6pm on ABC-7, and it sounds like it's going to be awesome: after spending months pouring through Muni's complaint records (while simultaneously fighting off the drivers' union), Dan's I-Team has the goods on Muni's most complained-about drivers.

We've known for some time now that there's just a small group of repeat-offender drivers who account for tons of complaints. So this brings up some pretty obvious questions -- like, why hasn't Muni fired them, what's WRONG with these people, does Muni even care about passenger complaints, why is Muni so fucking terrifying, and so forth. We can't wait to see it all hit the fan this evening.