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Mudslide results in death of chef
Donna Schaeffer
Philip G. Pavely/Tribune-Review
These ducks don't need a lake
Warren L. Leeder/Tribune-Review
Karen Zapf can be reached via e-mail or at 412-380-8522.
Justin Misura, 21, of White Oak, who had been planning his graduation from the Westmoreland County Community College in Youngwood, died about 3:30 p.m. in the parking lot behind the Stratwood Banquet Facility on Long Run Road.
Misura, who worked as a chef at Cavanaugh's, a restaurant in the Stratwood, had just left work and gotten into his car parked behind the restaurant, co-workers said.
The day's heavy rains apparently caused the hillside behind the restaurant to give way, Duquesne Light spokesman Joe Balaban said. The weight from the heavy dirt apparently caused excessive strain on the guide and support wire that anchored a utility pole to the hillside.
A set of three transformers -- each weighing between 1,000 and 1,500 pounds and servicing only the restaurant -- were on top of the pole.
The weight on the guide and support wire caused the top of the utility pole to snap, sending it and the transformers onto Misura's car parked below.
"It's tragic," Balaban said.
The Stratwood is owned by Kennywood Entertainment, said Mary Lou Rosemeyer, Kennywood Park spokeswoman.
Family members and friends gathered at the restaurant after the accident to mourn and comfort each other.
Misura's uncle, Ken Klaus, of Greensburg, said Misura was to graduate in two weeks from the culinary arts program at the community college.
"He loved cooking," Klaus said. "He's been cooking since he was 13 or 14."
John Swope, one of Misura's teachers at the McKeesport Area Technology Center, remembered the young chef as one of his prize students.
"Cooking was definitely his calling," Swope said. "He was full of energy and loved to cook."
Misura recently was featured in a McKeesport Area School District publication that highlighted successful students, school spokeswoman Robyn Tedesco said.
Between 1 1/2 and 3 inches of rain fell Monday and yesterday on parts of Western Pennsylvania, causing other mudslides and flooding, a spokesman for the National Weather Service said.
Brad Rehak, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service headquarters in Moon, said light rain was expected throughout the night and most of today before temperatures rise and skies clear.
It will be mostly sunny with a high of 58 Thursday, 65 Friday and 70 both Saturday and Sunday.
Nuisance flooding was reported yesterday in parts of Indiana, Westmoreland, Fayette and Greene counties, Rehak said.
A slide from Mt. Washington forced the evacuation of a Port Authority of Allegheny County construction site off West Carson Street near the Wabash Tunnel. There were no injuries.
The mud and stones from the fall also blocked the railroad tracks, delaying several trains, CSX spokesman David Hall said.
Hall said another slide in McKeesport forced officials to detour trains onto some nearby tracks.
Slides closed Shaler Street off Grandview Avenue in Duquesne Heights and reduced traffic along Painters Run Road in Upper St. Clair to a single lane.
Streets Run Road between Baldwin Borough and the Hays neighborhood of the city was closed much of the day because of flooding.
Rehak said minor flooding was expected overnight in Connellsville, Fayette County, as well as other areas along the middle and upper Youghiogheny River.
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