Hometown Stories

GOES-T is going up. NOAA and NASA have launched a new satellite, GOES-T, that is top of the line for monitoring weather here on Earth and in Space.    In this episode of Hometown Stories, satellite project leader Liz Kline filled us in on GOES-T's mission right before it's successful launch. 

Globally, COVID-19-based restrictions are easing up as case counts seem to be stabilizing.   So, what will the future of this pandemic look like? What's next for us as we continue to fight back against COVID-19?   Those are the questions we posed in this episode of Hometown Stories to Dr. William Petri, a leader at the University of Virginia's Division of Infectious Diseases and International Heal...

Botetourt County, Virginia features something thought to be one of the last remaining of its kind in all of southwest Virginia: An unassuming cabin and a crumbling kitchen. They are leftover relics from Greenfield's history as an antebellum plantation.  For the last several years a group of dedicated volunteers, including descendants from Greenfield Plantation, have been working to restore the bui...

John Crews laid a wet bag filled with flopping fish onto the scale and stood back.  He just needed to see the number 16 appear. When the final weight leveled out, he didn't even bother to look at the ounces.  Fists and fish in the air, the fisherman from Salem, Virginia looked out to the crowd victorious.  In this episode of Hometown Stories, John Crews joins us from the bow of his boat as the new...

The Transportation Security Administration says people are packing heat at record numbers in Virginia airports. In 2021, agents stopped close to 100 firearms at Virginia airport security checkpoints. The upward trend is true for airports nationwide. In this episode of Hometown Stories, we're joined by a TSA spokesperson to take a look at the data, the things people try to bring on board planes and...

A lot of us tend to make healthier eating a goal for the new year. But how can we actually turn healthy ideas into healthy habits? While working at home during a pandemic? In this episode of Hometown Stories, Dietitian Clarence Tawney gives us practical solutions for eating our way into a better year.

Yes Virginia, there is a Mrs. Claus. And she lives in Roanoke, Virginia. In this episode of Lighter Fare, we introduce you to our Mrs. Claus and take you to her workshop, where magic, love, and memory make a WDBJ7 tradition sweet each year.

It's been several months since Afghans started fleeing their home country after Taliban takeover. Close to 90 of them have found a new home in southwest Virginia. What's the transition been like? And what challenges do the refugees face, as even more are expected to arrive? In this episode of Hometown Stories, we're checking in with Commonwealth Catholic Charities on their resettlement efforts.

All the way from Quebec, a special delivery to historic Lexington, Virginia takes precise and detailed work to get just right. But when ready, it's set to infuse fresh life to the community in a very special way. In this episode of Hometown Stories, reporter Bruce Young brings us to a place where the seemingly mundane carries a tune and a story from the past.

In Episode 1 of The Final Salute, we'll take you to the National D-Day Memorial in Bedford, Virginia. Bedford suffered the greatest number of casualties per capita of any American town on D-Day. We'll hear the stories about the 20 young men who were killed in the first 15 minutes of the invasion and how it affected an entire town for years to come.   You can find the rest of The Final Salute here,...

Roanoke writer Beth Macy has seen her bestselling book Dopesick turned into a Hulu miniseries staring Michael Keaton. In this episode of Hometown Stories, veteran reporter Joe Dashiell talks with Macy about turning stories into screenplays, sticking up for Appalachia and her brief but tough cameo on set.    

In the mid 1900s, polio outbreaks hit some communities hard - driving families to isolation and creative solutions to keep their children safe. Now, improved sanitation and vaccine campaigns have successfully eradicated most polio strains. Only one wild poliovirus strain remains. Dr. Bill Petri, Chair of the Polio Committee of the World Health Organization, joins us to talk about what's next in th...

In the summer of 1950, the rural community of Wythe County, Virginia had the highest number of polio cases per capita of anywhere in the country. We look back at an epidemic that has striking similarities to the COVID-19 pandemic - and what we can learn from both. In this episode of Hometown Stories, we examine the "Summer Without Children."

"We are literally made of star stuff" The Green Bank Observatory in West Virginia is home to the largest fully steerable telescope in the world. From inside the observatory, people like newly named director Dr. Jim Jackson, are looking at the cosmos beyond us and within us. In this episode of hometown stories, Dr. Jackson helps us take a look at what's on the horizon for the observatory and beyond...

Life after a stroke may be a lonely journey for the Rudder family. But by the numbers, they certainly aren't alone.  People living in Appalachia face greater obstacles when it comes to getting care for strokes. And we've learned, some of our hometowns have among the highest rate of strokes in not just Virginia, but the nation.   In this episode of Hometown Stories in our series Bridging the Great...

The Department of Health and Human Services is making it easier for more health care providers to prescribe a drug that could help people suffering from addiction. How might it make a difference for rural American in general and Appalachia in particular? That's the focus of our conversation with addiction expert Cheri Hartman,

We invited Christine Baldwin, a peer recovery specialist from the Roanoke Valley's Hope Initiative, and Dr. Robert Trestman - the Chair of Psychiatry and Behavioral Medicine with the Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine for a conversation In our roundtable discussion, we talk about resources for people looking for help for their substance use disorder

2020 will be the worst year on record by far for fatal overdoses for Virginia. That was the grim hindsight projection forecast by one of the Commonwealth's top medical leaders. But why? And what's being done to stave off the power of the poppy in communities hit hard by both the opioid crisis and COVID-19? In this episode of Hometown Stories, part one in our series Bridging the Great Health Divide...

A Virginia WWII pilot left his cap behind when he returned home from the European theatre. No one knows why. And up till now, no one in his family knew it even existed. But with the help of two strangers, a history buff in the Netherlands and a gemologist in Italy, Lt. E.B. Thrasher's family gets a present that allows a glimpse into the past. In this episode of Hometown Stories, the cap comes home...

If the walls of a home in a small, rural town could talk, they'd hold many of the answers to questions Sarah Meadows has had nearly her whole life. Walter Reed the Medical Center grabbed news headlines this month. But Walter Reed the person has a connection to a southwest Virginia hometown that reporter Michael Alachnowicz discovered during a recent Google search.

Meteorologist Brent Watts is a local TV staple. Known for his trustworthy forecasts, his service to the community and his sense of humor, Watts now finds himself on the mic in a while new way. In this episode of Hometown Stories, weather for the ear.

Cities are getting hotter, but not evenly. Studies suggest poorer parts of cities are bearing the brunt of brutal summers. And more studies are working to prove that. Meteorologist Ian Cassette takes a drive around Roanoke to measure the urban heat island effect and discover ways to battle rising inequality with rising temperatures.

In a series we call Lighter Fare, our editor Ben Riquelmy tries to get to the bottom of his messy closet and initiate a quarantine clean.

It's been three years since the deadly Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. What has happened since then? What is still to come?  In this episode of Hometown Stories, we hear from WDBJ7's Pete DeLuca who covered the events that unfolded that day. And we catch up with the families who were among those most affected by the violence. 

President Trump just signed the Great American Outdoors Act into law.  What could this mean for our local communities? And how did proper care of our parks, like the Blue Ridge Parkway, get pushed off for so long?  In this episode of Hometown Stories, we're taking a drive onto the parkway and detouring into the history of a bill so many are calling historic.