WXXI Local Stories

Hundreds of baseball fans lined up outside the Frontier Field box office Friday morning to buy tickets to see Yankee great Andy Pettitte. The five-time World Champion will pitch at Frontier Field Sunday for the Empire State Yankees. After standing in a long line for more than an hour, Dan Minchen purchased 6 tickets to Sunday's game.

"It's fantastic that you got a world class pitcher like Andy Pettitte making an appearance here in Rochester," Minchen says. "I had to see it. My wife is ecstatic. And I really think I gained points [with her]."

The Empire State Yankees are the Triple-A affiliate of the New York Yankees who are playing the bulk of their home games in Rochester this year. Pettitte starts against the Pawtucket Red Sox at 2 p.m. on Sunday at Frontier Field.

This weekend, the moon will perform an impressive visual illusion...it will "appear" to be much bigger and brighter than usual.

This optical illusion is called a 'supermoon,' when the full moon's peak coincides with its closest approach to the Earth's orbit. The moon will come within 221,802 thousand miles from the Earth. The last supermoon was in March of 2011. WXXI's LeShea Agnew spoke with Steve Fentress, Planetarium Director at the Rochester Museum and Science Center.
 

Rochester Police have charged the husband of Rochester city councilwoman Loretta Scott with assault for attacking her at their home on Friday.

Police say Scott suffered minor cuts from a knife to her hands and shoulder. According to court documents, Scott says her husband, Tim Scott, pinned her to the floor while holding a butcher knife over her and threatening to kill her.

Loretta Scott also says her husband tried choking her with his hands. And then put a garden hose with running water in her mouth. She received treatment for those injuries at a local clinic.

Tim Scott, 52, is charged with assault in the third, criminal obstruction of breathing and menacing in the second. He was arraigned over the weekend and was released on bail. 

Rochester Gas and Electric company expects power to be restored to nearly all their customers by tonight.

Fewer than 600 RG&E customers were off line throughout Western New York as of 2:46 p.m. Monday. At their peak, the outages numbered more than 6,000 including more than 4,000 in Monroe County.

The National Weather Service has discontinued weather warnings for Rochester and Monroe County as the bulk of the precipitation moved further west and south.  Warnings remain in effect for Wyoming County and other locations south and west hit hardest by the heavy, wet snowfall.

A storm carrying rain, snow and strong winds brought hazardous weather, power outages and school closings to much of western New York State Monday.

The National Weather service issued a Winter Storm Watch from 11:00 p.m. Sunday through Monday evening.

Monroe County saw accumulation of heavy wet snow after steady, wind-driven rain pelted the area overnight. Scattered power outages started as heavy wet snow accumulated on tree limbs that have already started to bloom and the winds knocked them onto power lines.

Click here to see closings caused by the storm.

Students and community members are rallying in downtown Rochester Friday afternoon to honor the life of a young man known as an “ambassador for change.”

The Monroe Community College student government is joining with the Center for Teen Empowerment to celebrate the life of Lawrence Richardson. The 22-year-old was murdered earlier this month.

Duane Yansen, a program coordinator at Teen Empowerment worked with Richardson. Yansen says he was a natural helper, "He represented a lot of what T.E. represents, being young and struggling and figuring out where his niche in life was and just the type of kid who no matter how many times he fell off the horse he still got up and brushed himself off."