KU senior competes tonight at Miss America

A Kansas University pageant queen will try to twirl her way to the Miss America crown tonight.

Angelea Busby a KU senior from Lenexa, is this year’s Miss Kansas. She’ll compete for the Miss America title using, among other things, the baton skills that earned her a spot twirling in front of KU’s marching band during football halftime shows.

Busby, 21, won the state crown June 7 in Pratt, and has since been preparing for tonight’s big show — the culmination of a week of competition in Atlantic City, N.J. It airs at 7 p.m. on ABC, Sunflower Broadband channels 9 and 12.

Electrocution blamed in worker’s death

A worker who died Sept. 11 making repairs on an oil pump in southeast Douglas County was electrocuted, an autopsy released Friday showed.

Brent Hesse, 33, Osawatomie, an employee for Town Oil Co., Paola, collapsed in an oil field east of Baldwin at 1934 N. 250 Road. He and three other workers were at the site about 2:20 p.m. when Hesse died.

A Douglas County coroner’s report indicated that Hesse was electrocuted by a partially energized machine. And while he could have died from a heart attack, the circumstances at the scene suggested he died from electric shock, the report concluded.

Investigators from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration have examined the equipment, but officials were unavailable for comment. Company owner Mike Town declined to comment on the incident Friday.

Free State dance policy in effect tonight

The Free State High School Firebirds will head to the dance floor tonight for this year’s homecoming dance, but they will be watched like a hawk.

Tonight is the second time this year the school’s new no-provocative dance policy will be enforced.

On Friday, Student Council members and school administrators sat down to further discuss the new rule.

Under the new policy, Free State dance chaperones will give students a warning for violating the policy. A second infraction will result in the student being kicked out of the dance.

The dance begins at 8 tonight at the school, 4700 Overland Drive.