Friday March 13 2026 - Scanner News

We cannot start today's news without thanking the area volunteer firefighters and emergency response personnel all over the Panhandle and beyond.

The state of Nebraska was on fire last night.

 

 

With too many individual stories to report, please see our news page at PanhandleScanner.com or our Facebook page by the same name. There is an important message posted at the top of our page from the Bridgeport Fire Department. The Bridgeport Fire Hall is open this morning for donations that everyone was asking about, including the need for Tylenol, Ibuprofen, baby wipes, eye drops, Chapstick, water, Gatorade, snacks, chips and sandwich fixins. That's what they could use if you fill inclined to help out by supporting the firefighters, take those items to the Bridgeport Fire Hall today.

Before the fire started, wind was causing severe damage around the valley, a shed blew over and struck a man causing an injury, and a hotel roof in Sidney was coming apart. While trampolines were slamming into the sides of people's houses, if it hadn't been for the devastating, fast-moving fires, the wind would have been the biggest story of the day.

But it didn't even come close.

In fact, there was a fatality crash on I-80 as well yesterday morning. In a minivan, rear ended a jeep causing it to go off the road with the driver succumbing to their injuries. The person in the suspect vehicle was arrested and charged initially with vehicular homicide. There must have been mitigating circumstances to levy that charge from the get-go. Typically, an accident that causes a death would be involuntary manslaughter. Stay tuned for more on this fatality on I-80 in the North Platte area.