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By Giselle Goodman January 17, 2008 06:00 AM

Sunrise Herald is the early morning news update feature on pressherald.com. It is updated 6, 7, 8 and 9 on weekdays.

Welcome to the Sunrise Herald with Giselle Goodman. This is the place to go to know about:

THE WEATHER AND TRAFFIC
At 9 a.m., it was 16 degrees and clear in downtown Portland.

Cold this morning, but still as a winter morn can be. The air isn't even moving out there. That changes, though, as the evening rolls around. Clouds move in, bringing with them a winter mix of snow, rain and ice by tomorrow morning around this time. I'm on the road by 4:30 a.m. so check this spot tomorrow for an early morning road report!

FOR MARINERS:

Glassy sea in Casco Bay this morning, with little to no wind, no waves. The calm before the storm, so the saying goes.

High tide in Portland today now and at 6:07 p.m. Low tide at 11:55 a.m.

FOR TRAVELERS:

• A bit of a mess at the Warren Avenue overpass on I-95, where a truck hauling an excavator hit the overpass bridge and then kept going.

Police have stopped the truck on Warren Avenue, between Jokers and BJ's. There aren't any injuries, just a lot of noise and emergency rescue crew lights.

That's what's going on.

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THE NEWEST NEWS:

MAINE IS GETTING $8.8 MILLION FROM THE FEDS to support heating assistance for low-income families.

The money represents Maine’s share of $450 million in Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) contingency funding released Wednesday by the federal government. Another $156 million remains in the contingency fund.

“Maine is struggling under the grip of high oil prices and faces a difficult economy. This additional money will help a lot of Maine families,” Gov. John Baldacci said in a prepared statement. “Unfortunately, it won’t solve our heating crisis by itself. We must continue to look out for our friends and neighbors, and work toward alternatives to costly foreign oil.”

Gov. Baldacci thanked Maine’s Congressional delegation for its efforts in Washington to have the money released by the federal government.
It is not known when the additional LIHEAP funds will be available... “But as soon as the money is transferred we will get it out to our oil dealers within a couple of days,” Maine Housing director Dale McCormick, said. “The oil dealers who participate in LIHEAP will be going the extra mile to deliver the oil to people who need help, because small deliveries are costly for them to make.”

PORTLAND POLICE GOT A BREAK LAST NIGHT from the recent rash of vandalism that has bothered the city over the past week. South Portland, too, reports this morning that today is a different one than yesterday, with no new reports of shot-out car windows.

The night before, though, Portland police greeted the day with 40 reports of vandalism, all of which occurred between midnight Tuesday and 4 a.m. Wednesday.

It is the second round of similar mischief in a week. More than 30 cars in Portland, Scarborough, Gorham and South Portland had windows shot out last Thursday night into Friday morning.

Police have stepped up patrols in the area, looking for clues or suspects. Perhaps it is why the vandals were absent last night.

But, any information, even if it is made anonymously, would be appreciated. Call Portland Police at 874-8575 if you have any.

THEY SAY BETTER LATE THAN NEVER, BUT how late is too late?

A postcard that showed up at the post office in Stratford, Conn., yesterday has people pondering that one today, as the card is postmarked 1957 and was sent from a post office that no longer exists. What's more: The card's recipient has been dead for 40 years.

The postcard was mailed from East Sumner in Oxford County and was postmarked Aug. 14, 1957, and bears a 2-cent stamp. It was addressed to the late Town Manager Harry Flood, who served from 1945 to 1963, and was written by a woman who must have been a friend since she only used her first name — Alice.

"Hi, enjoying this rather fallish weather. It was 44 degrees yesterday. See you next week," she wrote.

So far, it's a mystery that has people in the Stratford post office scratching their heads in wonder.

A postal spokeswoman said it's possible that a collector sent the antique postcard to town hall.

One clue is that it was tightly wrapped in cellophane.

Maureen Marion, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Postal Service region serving Connecticut, called it a "very, very rare and a true mystery."

"The likelihood that this postcard has been sitting in a building for 50 years is very slim," she said. "My guess is that some collector decided to send it to the town, or someone just found it in an old attic among a pile of letters or other documents and didn't know what else to do with it."