Maybe those rescued kayakers who thought it was a good idea to paddle during a hurricane Saturday night just had a momentary lapse of judgement. However, after reading the Daily News' account of the NYPD's rescue off of Great Kills, Staten Island, it's considerably tougher to keep an open mind. While one of the first thrill-seekers was "grateful to be alive, apologetic," his buddy was "trying to save his cell phone, get it inside a Ziploc bag as we're trying to get him into the boat," one of the heroic, infinitely patient officers said, "even though I can see water sloshing around inside the bag." more ›

It seems obvious that one shouldn't try to kayak during Hurricane Irene, a storm which has already brought the MTA to a complete standstill without uprooting a single tree—heck, just boarding up your home can be dangerous in this weather. And yet, two people who completely ignored the warnings about Irene had to be rescued by emergency services this evening off of Great Kills, Staten Island. As a grumpy Mayor Bloomberg said tonight, "Clearly a reckless act that diverted badly needed NYPD resources." more ›

Staten Islanders really love their TV. A week after reports surfaced of a Staten Island man who beat his wife (possibly leading to her death) after she didn't pay for his cable in the hospital comes the story of 47-year-old Dominick Salinari who on Friday was arrested after he brutally attacked his girlfriend's father—fracturing his skull and eye sockets—after "some argument over the TV." more ›

Don't you hate it when you're building a kick-ass sand castle in your favorite sandbox, and you're digging with your plastic blue shovel, and the sun is beating down on your skin, and your overalls are getting all dirty, and you have to avoid the used needle sticking out of the ground? We do. So do families in Great Kills, Staten Island, where a mother found such an item sticking up in a sandbox at the newly opened Seaside Wildlife Nature Park where her child was playing. more ›

A Staten Island man died early Sunday morning while trying to back his SUV out of a tight parking space in a pub parking lot. Oleg Kantarovich had gone outside to pull the car around for his wife, who was celebrating her 30th birthday, so that she wouldn't get caught in the rain. Police say he was leaning out of the front door of his 2007 Audi SUV as he backed up because it may have been difficult to see through the tinted side window. more ›

A Staten Island man may have prevented the rape of a local 15-year-old girl when he heard her screams from inside the woods near his home and immediately raced out wielding a baseball bat. The girl was walking to a friend's house on Cleveland Avenue in Great Kills Thursday night around 9:30 p.m. when she was dragged into the woods by her neck by a man described as a heavyset Hispanic male, about 5-foot-5 and about 200 pounds. The girl said to her attacker, "Please don't rape me," and he responded, "No, don't scream." more ›

Today on Staten Island, a couple had to call the authorities about a python that found its way onto their property. No one's quite sure where the 10-foot long yellow Albino python came from when it was spotted on the Great Kills driveway, but it's suspected that someone nearby released their pet when the creature became beyond their control. A spokesman for Animal Care and Control told the SI Advance, "[People] get them when they're very young, when they're a foot or two long. They outgrow their enclosure and they get to be too much to handle." Last year alone, the agency brought in 91 snakes—pythons being one of the classifications of snakes that are banned as pets. (In Florida just today, a pet python strangled a two-year-old girl to death.) The Staten Island snake has been put on a a wildlife rehabilitator in Brooklyn until it can be moved to a sanctuary outside the city. That sure beats the fate of one python in Brooklyn—he ended up being peed on! more ›

Our li'l hero of the day goes out to Dennis Reynolds, a 14-year-old from Staten Island who has the Department of Education backtracking after being sent home for arriving at school today with the most badass haircut seen in quite some time. The Great Kills eighth grader says that he was sent home from Barnes Intermediate School because administration wasn't fond of his Vice Do. Reynolds told the SI Advance,"The assistant principal told me my hair cut wasn't good enough." The school says that he will be let back in tomorrow, but they thought that he must have secretly shaved off half his head last night while sleeping over at a friend's. Quite the contrary—his mom was totally down! She said, "If a Mohawk is allowed, everything else should be allowed...It's better than wearing his pants hanging down. That I won't tolerate." The youngster, who we predict will have a facial tat by his sweet sixteenth says that he plans to get a star shaved in the hair that's left. When asked why half a haircut, he said, "I didn't want to go completely bald." more ›

A woman was robbed in her Staten Island home by a man clad in black on Monday morning but authorities do not think it's the Ninja Burglar. A police source told the Staten Island Advance, "There are burglaries committed every day and everybody is wearing black out there." more ›

On Friday, dozens of birds fell out of the sky and died on a street in the Great Kills section of Staten Island. Residents grew concerned as, the Staten Island Advance reported, birds "flopped and twitched...as they breathed their last" (video here). One resident said the birds were flying "as if they were drunk" before falling to the ground. more ›

The other day, Mayor Bloomberg unveiled a new way the city will be able to monitor streets and make sure they are in good repair: The Street Conditions Observation Unit (SCOUT). SCOUT inspectors will "drive every City street once per month and report conditions that negatively impact quality of life to 311." The inspectors will use their Blackberrys to report things like graffiti, clogged sewers, potholes, damaged bus shelters, and more. more ›

After scaring residents of two boroughs when a woman discovered a pipe bomb on her Jeep Cherokee, police arrested Baudelio Rodriguez for making a pipe bomb and placing it on a car. What makes the story more strange is that it was Rodriguez's daughter who discovered the bomb - the Jeep belongs to his daughter and his wife! He was reportedly angry at his wife for leaving their Brooklyn home and staying with their daughter in Staten Island. more ›

City trash inspectors have been checking out neighborhoods all around town and say that the South Shore of Staten Island has the cleanest streets. The dirtiest? Brooklyn's Bedford-Stuyvesant, where residents tell the Daily News that drivers litter the streets. A church administrator said, "It seems every time we sweep, more trash comes." more ›

Photograph of the Save Coney Island rally at City Hall by Matthew McDermott more ›

For the second time in a year a patch of radioactive land has been found in the Great Kills Gateway National Recreation Area on Staten Island. The contaminated area is in a wetland area that was made accessible after a wildfire last week. more ›

A woman in her car at the park and ride in Pleasant Plains, near the Outerbridge Crossing, was shot in the head. The victim, 58 year old Jeanne Kane of Great Kills, was taken to Staten Island University Hospital, where she died. more ›

Well, maybe not. But parts of it are radioactive. AM New York tells of a secret program conducted by the Department of Energy which had federal helicopters surveying the city to look for areas with abnormal radiation activity. This was in order to help the NYPD prepare in case a "dirty bomb" or other radiation-based weapon was ever deployed in New York. The survey discovered 80 radiological "hot spots" around the city with a particularly unusual hot spot in the Great Kills park in Staten Island. more ›

Well, Gateway National Recreation Area is right in our neck of the woods, extending in three New York City boroughs and into northern New Jersey. It is a good place to start your quest for the perfect patch of sand and cooling waters. more ›

There was a fire this afternoon on Lafayette Street, and Eric Brown took some photographs that are on Flickr. And what we found interesting is that the fire seems to be on the roof - most fires we see seem to come from the inside of the building. We hope no one was hurt. [Related: There was another brush fire in Staten Island's Great Kills area last night...arson or just brush fire season?] more ›

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A bunch of people emailed to ask if we knew what was going on with that huge cloud of smoke visible over Brooklyn. One of our Gothamist Contribute commenters answers: "There is a brush fire in Great Kills Park That is in Staten Island for those who don't know." NY1 is reporting that the fire is pretty large, but no one has been injured. more ›