WMC Announces '6 Steps to Outliving Your Kids' Program

WEIRTON - Officials at the Weirton Medical Center raised eyebrows Thursday when they announced a week-long seminar on living longer than your children. The program, spearheaded by neurologist Joseph Wapenski, is open to the public and begins on October 6.

"This has been a dream of mine for years," said Wapenski. "Longevity is pretty much the whole point of medicine"

Wapenski and other doctors involved with the program told us that the seminar will teach adults how to live healthy, adding years to their lives as well as taking years from their offspring.

"Healthier parents are a direct correlation to depressed, lonely children," said Wapenski. "Having health freaks for parents means kids miss out on the finer points of childhood: candy, underage drinking, teenage pregnancy, going to Kid Rock and Limp Bizkit concerts, that sort of debauchery. The longer you live, the longer your kids have to deal your crap."

Cardiologist Stanley Mannino said that healthy parents are seldom seen in the Ohio Valley.

"I'd call it an epidemic," he said. "100 percent of parents in the Ohio Valley are smokers and every last one of them is morbidly obese. Of that 100 percent, 100 percent of them are addicted to amphetamines."

At the last Board of Health meeting, Brooke County Health Officer Joseph DePetro praised the idea of promoting better health, but questioned the ethics of actually trying to live longer than one's children.

"Some of the things I see in this program are quite disturbing," DePetro said. "Things like keeping a lit cigarette behind behind a box fan in your kids' bedrooms and putting asbestos in their shampoo. What's the rationale here?"

Wapenski said that another of the program's goals is to enable long-term helicopter parenting.

"Ideally, you'd be alive for the entire duration of your children's lives," he said. "That way you can always monitor them, never let them out of your sight and never let them grow up. The world is safer than it has ever been, and we want to make sure it stays that way."

Lauttamus Security Battle Droids Cause Controversy in the Ohio Valley

WEIRTON - A Hancock County judge will hear a class-action lawsuit tomorrow filed by the American Civil Liberties Union against Lauttamus Communications. The lawsuit seeks compensation for damages to property, injuries and death caused by the company's recent line of security battle droids. West Virginia ACLU president Marybeth Beller says that the state has ignored many laws broken by the company.

"It's completely irresponsible," she said. "The Northern Panhandle has become a war zone lately and our elected officials have done absolutely nothing to address the problem."

Last week, Weirton residents protested in front Lauttamus's corporate office after a security bot incinerated a 90-year-old man who was sniffing flowers on private property. Governor Earl Ray Tomblin addressed the issue, saying that a referendum passed by popular vote allowing this type of vigilantism.

"This is what West Virginia wanted," said Tomblin. "That man, like it or not, was trespassing in order to smell those flowers."

The referendum adjusted West Virginia's castle laws last year, allowing residents to deal with trespassers in whatever manner they deemed necessary.

"You just never know what people on your property might be up to," said Tomblin. "The safety of any West Virginian's family always comes first in my book."

Amid Hancock County's controversial public smoking ban, Lauttamus announced today that all security battle droids will be fitted with smoke detectors and heat seeking missiles free of charge.

Michael Bay Directs Mock Accident at Weir High

WEIRTON - In an effort to reduce the risk of students drinking and driving at this year's prom, Weir High decided to step things up a notch. Susan Smith, superintendent for the Hancock County School District, said that standard mock accidents generally don't get the point across to students.

"This year, we concluded that we really needed to traumatize students," she said. "So we hired Hollywood special effects expert and director Michael Bay to coordinate this year's accident."

The mock scene began with a group of friends leaving a house party after prom night. They got in a car while joking that their 'designated drunk driver' was inebriated. Another student jumped in the car with a keg and inserted the tap into the driver's mouth.

"It's a little variant on the keg stand," Bay said. "You get in the car with the keg and then chug while driving. We used to do it all the time in high school."

The car was travelling at speeds over 90 mph, according to Bay. It sped through the high school's parking lot before running over an old woman in a wheelchair.

"And she had this crazy backstory we told the students too," said Bay. "She's just coming out of her nursing home to see the birth of her great-grandson, only she doesn't make it there."

The collision sent the old woman flying from the school all the way into the Ohio River. The car then lost control and slammed into parked cars where it exploded and shot 20 feet into the air.

"It was so awesome," said student president Greene Brian. "There were body parts flying everywhere out of that thing! The wreckage even landed on the principal's car!"

A Life Flight helicopter then attempted a landing, but it was too close to the car when its gas tank exploded, sending the helicopter spiraling out of control until it collided with the school. The helicopter dangled on the edge of the roof, threatening to fall while the crew waited inside helplessly.

"Then we rushed the students over to this little set we built," Bay said. "And there was this guy in there that screamed: 'We have to get them out of there!'"

Smith said that she thinks the program was a success.

"I hope that the students learned something today," she said. "Hopefully this will make them think twice about drinking and driving."

Greene Brian said that he and his friends enjoyed the mock accident.

"Man that was a heck of a show," said Brian. "I wonder if he'll come back for the sequel. Too bad I'm graduating, Homecoming would be the perfect setup."

Weirton Little League Team Selling Malaysian Airplane For Tag Day

WEIRTON - Temperatures are on the rise, and that means that Little League season is just around the corner. However, times have been tough in the Ohio Valley, and funding a youth baseball team is not easy. Chris Gillette, manager of the Weirton Marlins, has come up with a plan that will raise more than enough money to make it through the season.

"I recently came into possession of a Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777," said Gillette. "It's sitting out in the lot by Main St. We're selling it for $165 million."

Declining to say how exactly an average Weirton man got his hands on a wide-body jet airliner, Gillette instead discussed how he would use $165 million to fund a Little League baseball team.

"We're going to train in the mountains of Nepal this year," he said. "I think the high-altitude training will give us the edge this season."

Among other things, Gillette also said that he plans to hire a professional team masseuse, limousines and luxury hotels for away games.

"There are games as far away as Bergholz (Ohio) this year," he said. "Home-field advantage is a huge factor in Little League and I want my team loose."

Gillette said that if for some reason the airplane does not sell, he will find a use for it.

"We could always just use it to fly to the away games," he said. "Getting it here from Kuala Lumpur was simple enough."

After some helicopters began to circle overhead, Gillette looked around nervously before running into the forest. He was not available to comment further.

Weir High Gives Out Handguns to Students to Protect Against School Shootings

WEIRTON - Following the arrest of a 15-year-old girl for entering the school with a loaded firearm on Wednesday, Hancock County school officials told OVN that they will not let an incident like this threaten the safety of their students. Starting today, students at Weir High will receive their very own sidearm to protect themselves in the event of a school emergency.

"The only thing that can stop a bad student with a gun is a good student with a gun," said Hancock County Superintendent Suzan Smith. "If a crazed student runs into a classroom with 20 kids inside, do you really think one armed teacher is enough to stop him? What do you think the odds are of him lasting long if every student in the room is pointing a gun at him?"

The decision was praised by every single person in Weirton; Smith received exactly 19,746 (equal to the 2010 census) emails showing support for her decision.

"Obviously there will have to be some gun safety classes added to our curriculum," Smith said. "Just this morning a student left school, got locked out and shot the lock off the front door to get back in. We also had an incident where a student could not get a teacher's attention, so she shot her gun into the ceiling."

Smith also mentioned that she predicts the guns to ameliorate the bullying problem at Weir High.

"Usually a student bullies another because he's bigger than they are," she said. "But having a handgun evens the playing field. We won't punish students for simply defending themselves."

She also said that the new program lets the district cut more jobs than originally thought was possible.

"We were able to fire our guidance counselor this morning," Smith said with a smile. "There simply isn't a need for her services anymore."

Students seemed to be excited about the new program when we interviewed them after school.

"I'm so happy that the school board did this," said senior Kelly Bishop. "Now if that slut Danielle makes another move towards my boyfriend she is so going to get it."

Students are allowed to select either the Heckler & Koch USP or the Glock 17, and can choose the color of their gun from either blue, green, red, yellow, pink or 'School Pride' (red and black with school logo) for an extra $5.

US Rt. 22 Will Add Loop-the-Loop

WEIRTON - In an effort to make commutes to Pittsburgh more amusing, the US Department of Transportation has said that it will begin remodeling US Rt. 22 between Weirton and Pittsburgh. The highway will now feature a variety of twists and turns resembling roller coasters. Officials say that boredom has caused drivers to fall asleep at the wheel, leading to hundreds of millions of deaths last week in West Virginia alone. DOT spokesman Randy Smith says that the move will make the highway much safer.

"The vertical loop and helix turns will force drivers to pay more attention to the road," said Smith. "It also makes it a heck of a lot more fun to drive to Pittsburgh now."

The 110-foot loop-the-loop will be the first addition to open, and will take approximately 34 years to build.

"We're trying to set the bar high for road construction times," said Smith. "The faster we get this done, the better."

Also, in order to safely make it through the loop without falling from the top, the speed limit has been increased from 65 mph to 475 mph. Additionally, a speed minimum has also been added at 350 mph.

"Truck drivers will really like what we've done for them," said Smith. "We tried really hard to see if tractor trailers would be able make it trough but it always ended in catastrophe. So to compensate, we'll also be building a ramp where drivers can jump over a 50-foot wide canyon."

When asked if the new truck ramp will be open to normal traffic in the case of some drivers perhaps being too scared to try the loop, Smith sounded indifferent.

"Well I suppose they could. But why wouldn't you want to try it?"