ROLLINGSTONE, Minn.  — A man driving an off-road UTV was seriously hurt in the ridges north of Rollingstone when he drove into a farm tractor hauling a manure-spreader. Edwon Lester Maus, age 89, was taken 43 miles to a Rochester hospital, said Winona County deputies. Maus has a rural Minnesota address. The accident was about 4:50 p.m. on Hoffman Hill Road. The tractor driver, Timothy James Gordon, age 64, of Plainview, was unhurt.

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ZUMBRO FALLS, Minn. —A car rolled into a ditch north of Zumbro Falls, injuring the driver. Grace Lillian Meyer, 18, of Stewartville, was taken 22 miles to a Rochester hospital with sustainable injuries, Wabasha County deputies said. The accident was about 10:30 p.m. Meyer was driving a 2016 Chevrolet Trax. She was alone in the vehicle. She was southbound on U.S. Highway 63 into Zumbro Falls.

UTICA, Minn. — Surrounded by a perimeter of 13 police with an armored vehicle, a Lewiston man surrendered after holing up all day in his camp trailer. Arrested was James Robbert Hernstine, age 45. This was in a quarry near Utica. During the night, about 2:30 a.m., a woman called 911 that she had been assaulted while visiting Hernstine in the camper. She said he became angry, threatened her with an axe, grabbed her, threw her out of the camper, and beat her with a broom stick. The woman, age 40,  called a friend for a ride to get away. This was near County Road 33 and County Road 14 south of Utica. When deputies arrived at the camper, Hernstine’s pickup was gone. When deputies returned about 10 a.m., the pickup was back, but there was no response when they knocked on the camper door. Deputies then saw a pistol magazine in the back seat of the pickup truck. Concerned that Hernstine might be armed, deputies summoned a tactical squad and continued with voice commands for Hernstine to come out. For five hours he didn’t.  Finally with the tactical squad in place — with sharpshooters, the Bearcat armored vehicle and a drone and K-9 unit from neighboring Houston County — Hernstine emerged from the camper. He was taken without resistance. He was booked 22 miles away at the Winona County jail about 4:30 p.m.  The booking charges: Assault with dangerous weapons and instilling fear and harm. No weapon was found in the camper. An axe and broken pieces of a broom stick were taken as evidence

Hernstine. Ignored five hours of loudspeaker demands to surrender.

ELGIN, Minn. — A driver was injured critically in a collision at a crossroads north of Elgin. First-responders recovered Jeffrey Allen Rahman, age 60, of Elgin, from his 2018 Ford F150 pickup. He was sent 18 miles to a Rochester hospital, his injuries appearing life-threatening. He was not wearig a sabelt, said Wabasha County deputies.The other driver, Emma Julia Wellive. 21, of St. Charles, in a 2008 Dodge Grand Caravan, was unhurt. The cash was about 3:40 p.m. at State Highway 247 and County Road 2.

ROCHESTER, Minn. — A Dover man was injured in a three-vehicle pile-up on divided U.S. Highway 52 through northwest Rochester.  The other drivers, from Kasson and Rochester, were unhurt. Joseph David Wilschek, 44, of Dover, was taken to a nearby hospital with less than life-threatening injuries. The accident was about 1:20 p.m. in southbound lanes. Yhe vehicles were all headed the same direction. Wilschek was in a 2015 Toyota Camry and belted. Unhurt were Andrew Donald Stah, 45, of Kasson, in a 2009 Chevrolet Tahoe, and Brandi Diane Lind, 42, of Rochester, in a 2019 GMC Yukon.

WINONA, Minn. — A Goodview man posted $150,000 bail for release from jail pending more court appearances on charges ofsoliciting sex online from a 14-year-old girl. Louis Joel Lentner, age 44, had been under surveillance for online chats since mid-June, according to a court document. What Lentner didn’t know, according to the document, was that his chats on the online Kik site were neither with a girl nor a 14-year-old but an imposter FBI agent. The criminal complaint says the FBI traced Lentner’s Kik account to his IP address and then to the Goodview address where he lived. The FBI also  reported confirming his identity by matching photos from his Kik exchanges with his driver’s license photo. Conviction could mean 10 years in prison and $20,000 in fines.

Earlier: Goodview man caught in FBI sex-with-minor sting

WINONA, Minn.  — After more than a month of a drug investigation, police arrested a Winona couple in an East Side apartment. Officers reported finding 58 grams of fentanyl, 48 grams of meth, and 14 grams of cocaine — some packaged for street sale. Arrested were Craig Robert Neyers and Paige Kayleen Suchla. Twelve officers were involved in the mid-morning arrest near the Bloedow bakery in the 450 block of East Broadway. The officers, armed with a search warrant, were admitted to the apartment by Neyer and Suchla. The two were detained while the apartment was searched and then arrested. The booking charges: Drug possession and distribution.

ST. PAUL, Minn. — The Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy has called for close monitoring of a growing number of projects to build hyper-scale data processing centers. These centers, according to the Center’s chief executive, Kathryn Hoffman, have voracious appetites water to cool huge banks of computer banks that process data from around the world. At risk, Hoffmann said, is Minnesota’s water quality. These “data miners,” as she calls them, conceivably could drain aquifers that have been essential to Minnesota agriculture for two centuries. The Center is a nonprofit advocacy group based in St. Paul. The Center has sued the state’s Environmental Protection Agney to wake up to potentially horrific impact from data mining. Promoters, she said, often are negotiating for permits, licenses and rezoning with local governmental units that lack the experience to ask the right questions. This is while promotors dangle the prospect of hundreds of construction jobs that would be created to build water-mining facilities — although the centers would have only much smaller operating staffs after they’re built. Hoffman listed these Minnesota water-mining project that her group has identified:

> Apple Valley (population 56,000)., a far south Minneapolis suburb:  The city is reviewing an application for a 134-acre “Technology Park” that would include five large data center buildings.

> Becker (population 3,800) in Sherburne County: After suspending plans for a major data center in May, Amazon purchased a 350-acre parcel of land.

> Faribault (population 24,00): A project called “Archer Data Center.”

> Harmony (population 1,020), in Fillmore County:  The City Council has reviewed a petition to annex 60 acres of farmland into the city. The land needs to be zoned industrial. MiEnergy and Dairyland Power co-ops want for a data center.

> Hermantown (population 10,000), outside Duluth: A 1.8-million-square-foot data center complex has been proposed for a 200-acre site. Called r “Project Loon.”

> Monticello (population 15,000), on the Mississippi River east of St. Cloud: Developers have proposed a 550-acre technology campus for a data center.

North Mankato on (populaton14,000, on the Minnesota River.

> Pine Island (population 3,700, north of Rochester on the Olmsted-Goodhue county ljne: Ryan Companies proposed a 482-acre tech campus for a Google data center.

> Rosemount (population 28,000), a southeast St. Paul exurb:  Meta, formerly Facebook, is constructing an $800 million data center.

> Worthington, population 14,000), in Nobles County: A data center is in development by Geronimo Power.

Logo centerpiece a tree. Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy.

North Mankato case study

A Minnesota Center for Environmenntal Advocacy, Luke Norquist, drove to North Mankato in July to attend a City Council meeting regarding what he strongly suspected involved a hyper-scale data center. At issue, he said, was “a vaguely defined 4 million square foot “technology park.” Very little information had been provided to the public about:

> What a technology park was.

> What a technology would do.

> How the project would have environmental impacts.

Norquist, however, had been tacking the project. He saw troubling signs. for example: He learned that the project would draw 30 million gallons of water per day from the area’s Mt. Simon Hinckley Aquifer. Also: Promoters had admitted that the project would produce a lot of noise, just as would come from mega computer banks. Also, a document attached to an application listed a land use code commonly used for data centers. At the meeting, Norquist urged the City Council against approving the project unless it asked more questions. The City staff dodged Norquist’s concerns: “They said there was no data center project on the agenda, that they didn’t know what the development might end up being: ‘It could be a warehouse, or a data center, or a lot of different things.’” Days later, Norquist obtained city records through a public records request that showed the project indeed would be a water-mining data center.

Earlier: Harmony frets at MiEnergy’s data mine plan

Construction on Fremont Street.  After 60-plus years the Lewiston firehall is rubble. Construction will begin in comings weeks for a $3.4 million structure, larger and state of the art, to house emergency services. Image: Steve Lunde

Earlier: Final goodbyes soon for Lewiston fire station

Earlier: Lewiston replacing squeezed emergency quarters

A previous friendship circle. The Winona-Dakota Unity Alliane will gather for its traditional celebration this weekend at Lake Winona’s east end.  The theme: “Back to the Land.” Events include drums and dancers. Time: 1 p.m. on Saturday. The city has a covenant with the Dakota people to preserve and protect the natural environment surrounding Winona. This includes burial grounds and archaeological sites. Wapasha Prairie had been a seasonal home for the Dakotas until the 1860s when federal troops forced them into a forced match to resettle in arid several hundred miles west. Many didn’t survive.

Soccer (women): Minot State 4, Winona State 1

Soccer (women): UW-Stevens Point 1, Saint Mary’s 0

Clever, distinctive and oh so Winona. Every school child knows about the Oregon Treaty of 1846. The treaty settled the primary United States-Canada border on 49th Latitude North. Now, 60 feet up,  there’s a highly visible reminder that Winona is at the 44th latitude north of the Equator. Who knew. Signage has been hoisted on the new Levee hotel, which is scheduled to accept its first guests in November.  For now, constuction barriers remain in place. Image: Steve Lunde

Earlier: Rising on the Levee: Hotel suites, flats

Earlier: New Levee hotel profile in final form

Earlier: Levee hotel’s structural core takes form

Earlier: New levee hotel news: No rooftop sipping

Earlier: Levee hotel regears for extended stay guests

Earlier: City OKs financial package for riverfront hotel

Earlier: Riverside hotel plan passes financing hurdle

Earlier: Developers offer peek at riverfront hotel

Earlier: A hotel on the Winona Levee? Still yakking

Earlier: Port to would-be hoteliers: Stop dallying

Earlier: Levee hotel project wins $601,000 state grant

Football: Augustana 34, Winona State 25

Football: Rochester Community 21, Minnesota North-Mesabi Range 0

Soccer (men): Saint Mary’s 1, Hamline 1

Soccer (women): Saint Mary’s 2, Hamline 0

Soccer (women): UW-LaCrosse 9, Concordia of Wisconsin 2

ST. PAUL, Minn. — Two Goodview firefighters were inducted n the Firefighters Hall of Fame:

> Jason Gruett, who served 19 years, including eight years as chief. He died in 2025.

> Roland Limpert, a charter member of the department, who died of a heart attack suffered at a fire at the Westgate Shopping Center in 1965. He was 35.

The ceremony, sponsored the Minnesota Firefighters Association, was on the state Capitol grounds.

Sprouting an ear. Look close near the ground: You’ll see a tiny ear of corn emerging. This is under a bird feeder up East Burns Valley. How did this single seed take root where it did? Ask the birds. Does the ear still have time to ripen before frost?  Or will the raccoons get it first. Image: Andy Frank

Truck ruts at 10th hole. Vandals ruined the 10th hole at the Oak Summit golfcCourse south of Rochester. Surveillance video showed a gray and rusting 3/4-ton crew cab pickup entering from the east and exiting on on Highway 30. This at 1:03 a.m. The DeCook family, which owns the course, offered a $2,000 reward for help arresting the vandals.

SOLDIERS GROVE, Wis. — A police K-9 deputy sniffed drugs during a traffic stop, leading its handler to a baggie with cocaine in the vehicle, according to the sheriff’s log. The deputy handler also reported finding a loaded handgun. The LaCosse man driving the car, Josh Emmer, 37, was arrested and taken 40 miles to the Crawford County jail in Prairie du Chien. The arrest was on U.S. Highway 61.

Emmer, Arrested passing through Soldiers Grove on the Kickapoo River.