The men who maintain the cross-country ski trails for the Blaine County Recreation District are vain about their grooming. Nearly an obsession, they are up at all hours working to perfect a look and feel that will be appreciated in the morning.

A New Year’s Day blizzard catapulted an avalanche into a cabin at the base of Soldier Mountain that took the lives of a Seattle couple early Friday morning. Five other family members escaped alive from the mangled cabin north of Fairfield. A Seattle couple was killed Friday, Jan. 2, after a 200-foot avalanche slammed their cabin abutting Soldier Mountain near Fairfield.

A cadre of local U.S. Marines who enlisted after graduating with the Wood River High School Class of 2001 have been trickling back into town from the Iraq War to the welcoming and thankful arms of families and friends.

Donning kitchen gloves, wading boots and sun hats, volunteers and employees of Idaho Fish and Game participated in a fish population study Thursday, Oct. 2, on a section of the Big Wood River called the Hailey reach.

The shooting death Friday of Hailey Chamber of Commerce Director Natalie Turner, 31, near Park City, Utah, has come as a shock to her family and peers. Natalie Turner, 31, who was killed Friday near Park City, Utah, had been director of the Hailey Chamber of Commerce since December 2002. Express file photo.

I get into their head and body and build the perfect board." Smack in the middle of cowboy country, the brand Double D sears an image of dust, cattle and sagebrush in the brain. But, for Hailey resident Paul Robinson the moniker means something other than roping steers. DD is his label and his nickname.

The Blaine County Board of Commissioners voted to approve a ban of personal watercraft use on Alturas and Pettit lakes in the Sawtooth Valley at the conclusion last week of its second public hearing on the contentious issue.

Rick Barker, organizer of the Sun Valley Mountaineer’s Club and 25-year veteran ski guide in the mountains flanking the Wood River Valley, is pleased with this year’s early season snow pack. Rick Barker assists a Sun Valley Mountaineer’s Club member as they close in on the location of a mock avalanche victim.

Bellevue tree committee workers Sallie Hanson and Carol Blackburn speak for the trees. Blackburn is a botanical consultant and Hanson is a student at the College of Southern Idaho in the horticultural department. They have walked every street in the city, including those in new subdivisions. The purpose of their journey is to complete an inventory of every tree in the city.

Old Reddy Kilowatt looks a little downcast these days hanging in front of the Idaho Power office in Hailey, but the smiling, unlit icon of electricity fits a new trend in the city. New dipped lights frame Terry Turner as he waters flowers on Main Street in Hailey. Express photo by Matt Furber. As of Aug. 21, all outdoor lighting must conform to the city’s new outdoor lighting ordinance.

State dam safety inspectors have ordered a Carey reservoir company to prove that the 92-foot high Fish Creek Dam is still safe. The Idaho Department of Water Resources said the dam might need to be breached to prevent its possible failure due to severe deterioration. State inspectors are ordering water shareholders to either breach the problematic Fish Creek Dam, northeast of Carey, or prove they can make needed upgrades.