Local News Now

Photo for Headline Surfer / Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University President John Johnson, shown at front-center, announces partnership with Diamond Aircraft Industries that will allow for the manugfacturer to have a presence in Daytona Beach. Behind Johnson is Gov. Rick Scott.

DAYTONA BEACH -- Today at the 50th Annual International Paris Air Show, Gov. Rick Scott and Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University officials announced that its president, John Johnson, and Diamond Aircraft Industries' CEO and owner Christian Dries, signed a partnership agreement that will establish the global manufacturer's presence at the Daytona Beach campus.

Headline Surfer videos  / Mike Catchings of Lake Mary was the lone biker in the empty lot at Pub 44 as opening night of Biketoberfest 2011 came to a sad conclusion. The local Cheapthrills Band plays a Chris Isaak '80s classic, "Wicked Game," to a handful of bikers earlier in the evening at the bar.

NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- Biketoberfest 2011 was quieter than a lawn mower on the first night of the four-day weekend at what was soon to be an extinct Pub 44. Just after midnight there were three Harleys in the parking lot and one bicycle.

2010's Biketoberfest recession was 2011's depression, at least through the first 24 hours at what for the last couple of decades or so has been the ground zero in Southeast Volusia for bikers, babes and booze.

Headline Surfer graphic / A topless woman interrupting traffic at the intersection of South Orange and West Euclid avenues, as shown here at left in this snapshot locator map, was taken into custody in the bizarre incident back in April 2008.

DeLAND -- Motorists in the vicinity of a well-travelled certainly got an eyeful on a mid-April morning five years ago, when traffic flow was interrupted by a woman walking around topless, DeLand cops said.

Police received a number of calls about the 30-year-old woman's state of undress at the intersection South Orange and West Euclid avenues during the mid-morning hours of April 18, 2008. 

Police received a number of calls about the 30-year-old woman's state of undress at the intersection South Orange and West Euclid avenues during the mid-morning hours of April 18, 2008. 

Photos for Headline Surfer /

NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- Father's Day is bittersweet for Mark Severance, a New Smyrna Beach police officer and retired Marine.

"Father's Day (June 15,1986) our son, 'Kyle David Severance,' was born at the Naval Hospital, Marine Corps Air Station, Cherry Point, NC," the elder Severance wrote on his Facebook page.

DAYTONA BEACH. Fla. -- Dist. 26 State Rep. Dwayne Taylor, D-Daytona Beach, received the Florida Professional Firefighters 2013 "Legislator of the Year" award during the 69th annual conference for professional firefighters at the Hilton Daytona Beach Oceanfront Resort.

Headline Surfer videos / Michele & Robert Lott, former owners of the Observer filed bankruptcy to stave off creditors. Realtor Tom Alcorn is bringing the paper back in print as a monthly, having languished with an online version for 9 months.

NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- A year after Tom Alcorn bought the defunct weekly Observer newspaper off the scrap heat of federal bankruptcy for $2,500 after then-owners Michele and Robert Lott sought protection from creditors owed half a million, the real estate broker has opted to bring it back as a free monthly print publication.

Whereabouts unknown since Monday

Photos for Headline Surfer / Be on the lookout: If you see this Deltona woman, Tonia Schurman, or her three young children, an 8-year-old boy and 6-year-old girl, all shown here, or her youngest, a 4-month-old baby girl, then please call Volusia County Sheriff's deputies at 386-736-5999. If you can't remember the number, then dial 9-1-1. The mother is believed to be traveling in a black, 2003 Isuzu Ascender SUV, with Florida tag BKM195. 

DELTONA -- A 27-year-old Deltona mother who was court-ordered to relinquish parental rights to her three small children -- ages 8, 6 and 4 months -- and hand them over to DCF, instead has fled and Volusia County Sheriff's deputies are asking for the public's help in finding her and her kids, an agency official said this afternoon.

Just after 7:15 a.m. today, Headline Surfer, by far smallest of the 400-plus media outlets with a lone staffer, was atop Google News Directories' national coverage of the coverage of the George Zimmerman trial with the Los Angeles Times second and CBS News third. 

SANFORD -- Between 6 and 7 o'clock this morning, more than 400 media outlets had filed stories on the George Zimmerman murder trial with the focus squarely on jury selection expected to get under way today at the Seminole County Courthouse.

This snapshot graphic shows Headline Surfer's advance coverage of the start of the George Zimmerman trial at the top of the Google News Directories for Sanford, FL., just after 6 a.m. this morning. It also topped the Google search engine using keywords 'Zimmernan' 'jury' and 'selection.'

SANFORD -- Headline Surfer's advance story on today's expected start of jury selection for the George Zimmerman murder trial didn't take long to climb to the top of the Google news directories and search engines before dawn.