Will Michaels

State agricultural officials have placed a quarantine on firewood from three counties due to a destructive insect infestation.  Pest control crews have found  evidence of a beetle known as the Emerald Ash Borer for the first time in North Carolina.  It makes its home in ash trees and kills them over a period of two to three years.  The quarantine applies to any wood products made from ash trees in Granville, Person and Vance Counties. 

Phil Wilson of the state Agriculture Department says the bug spreads by flying from tree to tree or by lumber transportation.

Current and former members of the military want to talk about how climate change could be threatening national security. 

A public meeting in Fayetteville tonight will include discussions about evidence linking climate change to a rising risk of stronger natural disasters.  Spring Lake mayor Chris Rey is one of the speakers at the meeting and a former Army captain.  He says storms that cause widespread damage divert military resources, leaving the impacted areas more vulnerable.

Researchers at Duke University say people who play video games regularly tend to see more around them.  A recent study used a fast-paced visual memory test on gamers who often play action games like first-person shooters, and compared the results to non-gamers.  It found the gamers consistently scored better, meaning they were able to gather more information in a short amount of time. 

Power was still out Friday morning for hundreds of thousands of people in North Carolina after severe storms. 

A fast-moving system swept across the state Thursday, knocking down trees and power lines.  Duke Energy Progress says nearly 60,000 people were without power Friday morning in Wake County.  Meteorologist Phil Badgett says damage reports came in quickly Thursday night.

The town of Holly Springs is interested in laying a fiber optic network that could lead to super high-speed Internet for local residents and businesses. 

The Town Council voted unanimously to move forward with the project, which would install 16 miles of fiber optic cable in two loops underneath the town.  Joanne Hovis is president of CTC Technology, which the town hired to design the network.  She told the council at a recent meeting the service would start out as a communications system for the town, but lays the groundwork for Internet Service Providers to build commercial and residential connections.

The American Dance Festival is entering its 80th year as performances begin in Durham. 

The national festival opens Thursday at the Durham Performing Arts Center.  This year's celebration includes dance companies from as far away as Argentina, Ireland and Taiwan. 

Researchers at NC State say it's safer and more cost effective for the government to treat people with mental illnesses. 

  The General Assembly is in its last few weeks of budget discussions, with tax overhauls in mind.  Three proposals are still on the table.  All of them cut the corporate and individual income tax rates while expanding the sales tax to cover more services. 

Alexandra Sirota of the liberal North Carolina Justice Center says that disproportionately benefits the wealthy.

NC State is going to its first College World Series since 1968.  The Wolfpack beat Rice in 17 innings last night, 5-4.  Brett Williams drove in the go-ahead run with a RBI double. 

The game was the longest Super Regional in NCAA history.  Coach Elliot Avent says it's fulfilling for his team to break the streak of 45 years without a World Series appearance.

State archeologists say they have the ambitious goal of recovering eight cannons from Blackbeard's ship.  The Queen Anne's Revenge sunk near Beaufort Inlet, North Carolina, in June of 1718, and the state Department of Cultural Resources has been leading efforts to recover artifacts from the ship since 1997. Divers use good weather during the summer and fall months to bring artifacts to the surface.  Last week, bad weather prevented divers from starting their yearly digs, but Fay Mitchell of the Department of Cultural Resources says they hope to surface up to three sunken cannons this week.