Late last month, students at Wolcott High School in Connecticut were on lockdown. An announcement on the intercom warned of a threatening intruder. Doors were locked and police swooped in with dogs…drug-sniffing dogs as it turned out. But there was no gun-toting maniac roaming the halls. It was a “lockdown intervention drill”… a ruse to clear the halls for a school-wide drug search.

Novelist Chuck Palahniuk of Fight Club fame reads his short story Romance before speaking with WoM host Virginia Prescott about 12 step programs, Occupy Wall Street, and his latest novel Damned. BE WARNED - this is the unedited reading and interview - it includes explicit, uncensored, and potentially offensive adult material that may not be suitable for all listeners. But still, very enjoyable.   

The growing evidence for a connection between the controversial drilling technique called"fracking" and earthquakes. A shocking tactic used by a Connecticut high school to clear the hallways for a drug search. And a new documentary follows a group of friends on their journey from impulsive teenagers to soldiers in Afghanistan, and then back again.

The ballots have been tallied from yesterday’s municipal elections, and New Hampshire voters have by-and-large chosen to hang on to their incumbents.

Mayors in Concord, Manchester, Rochester all defeated challengers by wide margins, while those in Nashua, Laconia, and Berlin had uncontested elections.

The one exception was in Claremont where Republican challenger James Nielson unseated incumbent Democrat Deborah Cutts by fewer than forty votes.

Dan Tuohy (TWO-ee) a reporter with New Hampshire Patch, spent the evening watching the votes being counted in Concord.

Voters didn’t just vote for mayors and alderman yesterday.

Several ballot initiatives were also passed around the state.

Two similar measures in Manchester and Dover sought to change how the tax cap is calculated in those cities, and give slightly more freedom to elected officials to raise funds.

The measure passed in Manchester but was defeated in Dover.

Meanwhile in Concord, voters passed two charter amendments.

The first gives control of the school board, which had been in the hands of the legislature, back to the municipality.

Still recovering from city-wide power outages from the surprise Halloween blizzard, Manchester
voters went to the polls yesterday and re-elected Mayor Ted Gatsas.

The incumbent secured a second term as mayor by a wide margin, trouncing
Democratic challenger Chris Herbert.

In his victory speech, Gatsas thanked his opponent for running a positive campaign and
stressed his commitment to reduce the city’s budget.

Almost since it was first unveiled a year ago, the Northern Pass , a $1.1 billion hydroelectric project that would transmit power from Canada to central NH then on to the new England grid, has provoked sharp debate especially in the north country, where some forests would have to be cut for transmission lines. But now the debate is spreading to Central New Hampshire. We get the latest from two reporters who have been covering the communities where the discussion had been the loudest.

Guests:  

A 31-year-old man killed in a hunting accident in Lisbon this morning was shot by a hunter in another party, according to a news release from New Hampshire Fish and Game.

The victim, Kenneth Brunelle of Marlboro, Mass. was hunting with his father and brother off Mt. Eustis Road in Lisbon when the accident occurred about 8 a.m.

Early reports said Brunelle was shot in the neck. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

The name of the alleged shooter was not released.

The accident is being investigated by Fish and Game and the New Hampshire State Police.

The October storm that left hundreds of thousands without power in New Hampshire may have been unlikely for this time of year, but it’s also a scenario familiar to Granite Staters who have weathered many natural disasters in recent years, including floods, ice storms, and even a tornado.  We take a look at what we’ve learned from these events, where our emergency preparedness is still lacking, and how we might fare as we head into another winter season. 

Guests:

On Wednesday, November 9, FEMA and the FCC will conduct the first ever national test of the Emergency Alert System.