Morning Roundup: Westmoreland vape shop burglarized; Hopewell schools targeted in ransomware attack

Here are some of the latest news items from this morning, Tuesday, Oct. 24:

Unity vape shop burglarized

A Unity vape shop was burglarized Monday night, Tribune-Review news partner WTAE-TV reported.

A person wearing a mask was caught on surveillance cameras around 9:40 p.m. using a rock to break into Complete Vapors on Route 30, the owner told the station.

The owner said the burglar took about $320 worth of merchandise.

No information was immediately available from state police.

Beaver County school district recovering from ransomware attack

Hopewell Area School District was the target of a ransomware attack last week, according to a message from the district.

In an update on its website, the district said it has been working with outside specialists to investigate and restore its systems so that classes continue with minimal interruptions.

“While we continue to restore network functionality and our investigation remains ongoing, we can now confirm this incident stemmed from a sophisticated ransomware attack by unknown criminal actors,” the district’s message said. “As a result, we have informed state and federal law enforcement, and we are continuing to make resecuring our network a top priority.”

The district is investigating whether any data stored on its network was accessed and said it will provide more updates as it is able to do so.

Student devices were not affected, and the district said they may continue to be used on and off campus.

Woman shot in Pittsburgh’s Perry South

A woman with multiple gunshot wounds showed up Monday at a hospital shortly after Pittsburgh police responded to an alert of several shots fired in the city’s Perry South neighborhood.

Police said officers went to the 2500 block of Maple Avenue just after 6:30 p.m. for an alert of seven shots being fired.

Officers were notified a short time later that a woman arrived at a hospital, which was not identified, with multiple gunshot wounds to her leg. She was listed in stable condition, police said.

The possible location of the shooting was found near a walkway leading from Perrysville Avenue up toward Maple Avenue.

Driver uninjured after vehicle goes into Allegheny River

Pittsburgh police, firefighters and medics responded to a report around 5 p.m. Monday of a vehicle in the Allegheny River.

The woman driving the vehicle was found on the river walk near the Mister Rogers statue on the North Shore. She was not hurt, police said.

The vehicle was removed from the river. Police were investigating.

General elk season opens Monday

Pennsylvania’s biggest elk season is about to get underway.

The general elk season opens Monday and runs six days through Nov. 4.

While the state has three separate seasons for elk, including a two-week archery season in September and a late season beginning Dec. 30, half of available elk licenses are used in the general season, the state Game Commission said.

This year, 72 of the 144 Pennsylvania elk licenses are for the general season. Of those, 30 hunters will be hunting antlered elk, or bulls, and 42 will be hunting anterless elk, or cows. Firearms are permitted.

General season licenses are allocated in 12 zones dispersed throughout northcentral Pennsylvania. Nearly 52,000 people applied for general season licenses through the state’s annual elk license drawing, the commission said.

Harvested elk are required to be taken to a commission check station, where they are tested for chronic wasting disease, brucellosis and tuberculosis. Chronic wasting disease has not been found in Pennsylvania elk, the commission said.

During this year’s archery season in September, 22 elk, including 17 bulls and five cows, were harvested, the commission said.