Roof

Elvis has left the building. More specifically, a 7-foot-tall statue of the king appears to have been stolen from atop the Happy Day Diner in Rosedale, where he'd stood for nearly a decade. Customers alerted owners Maria and Dimitrios Pigiaditis to the missing statue Sunday morning, and they filed a report with the Baltimore County Police. Elvis was bolted to the roof, and the thieves apparently broke him off, leaving behind part of his feet. The couple reviewed surveillance tapes, which they have turned over to police, and saw a white van pull up overnight Wednesday, when they think the theft occurred.

High atop Regi's American Bistro in Federal Hill, 55 tomato plants grow in large pots, strategically located along support beams so they don't strain the rowhouse roof. Looking for a more affordable, dependable source for the tasty heirloom varieties that can fetch $4 to $5 a pound at area farmers' markets, Regi's owner Alan Morstein this spring created a rooftop tomato farmette that he proudly shows off to diners. Regi's chefs Mike Broglio and Ben Troast have grown used to them, traipsing through the prep area to reach the roof.

A dining room roof at a historic hotel and residence in Frostburg has collapsed, but no one was injured. The collapse at the Hotel Gunter happened just before 9 a.m. Saturday. Frostburg Fire Department spokeswoman Megan Blubaugh says firefighters arrived after a fire alarm went off in the building; the roof of the dining room crumbled while firefighters were inside. The hotel opened in 1897, but the roof that was destroyed was part of a one-story dining room later added on the back of the building.

Lin-Manuel Miranda is prompt, voluble and animated. Over the phone, his words come tumbling out in a great rush, and he takes command of the conversation as easily and dexterously as he assumed command of the Broadway stage. He conceived of "In the Heights" back in 1999, when he was a sophomore at Wesleyan University. Nine years later, his musical about a close-knit Latino neighborhood in New York made it to Broadway. Audiences and critics fell for the show, which boasts a propulsive score infused with salsa, merengue and hip-hop, and which won the 2008 Tony Award for best musical.

Pablo Loja was sitting in a conference room Friday at the Casa de Maryland immigrant center in East Baltimore, trying to remember the last time he had worked before the snowstorms came. The 36-year-old Ecuadoran man smiled, looked at the ceiling, tapped his left hand against the long, wooden table. He tried to remember, but he could not. More than once he used the word difícil , which hardly needed translation. In what is usually a slow time of year for day laborers - often immigrants, trying to pick up a few dollars painting, hanging drywall, doing carpentry, moving furniture or washing cars - the weak economy has made this winter particularly difficult.

Three people were injured when the awnings of adjoining rowhouses crumpled in Northwest Baltimore on Friday, one in a string of collapses across the region as the weight of huge snowfalls exacted a toll on vulnerable buildings. An antiques store in downtown Ellicott City suffered damage, and barns in Anne Arundel and Harford counties fell, killing some animals. On Oakford Avenue in Northwest Baltimore, Marlow Hill, 66, surveyed the twisted metal on the steps of his home and pointed to the blood left when his wife, daughter and brother-in-law were trapped beneath the awnings.

- Just hours before the caldron was lighted to mark the start of these Winter Olympics, a young athlete's life was snuffed out in a horrific crash on the world's fastest luge track. On a morning practice run under the first blue sky in days, Nodar Kumaritashvili, 21, of the Republic of Georgia lost control of his sled at about 80 mph as he came out of the final curve - nicknamed Thunderbird - and approached the finish line. He was catapulted over the outer lip of the track and slammed into an unpadded roof support post.

With construction down and the economy sluggish, the state's roofers have grown accustomed in recent years to looking for business. But after back-to-back snowstorms, business is now coming to them. "The phones are ringing off the hook," Randy Piccoli, sales director of Brothers Services in Hampstead, said between calls from homeowners frantic about leaking roofs and collapsing gutters. "They're asking, 'What can you do immediately? Can you get here today?' "Piccoli said.

A Carroll County fire station caught fire Thursday morning after the snow-covered roof of its social hall collapsed and debris severed a gas line, a spokesman for the Sykesville Fire Department said. According to Dave Kreimer, the three-alarm blaze at the Sykesville Freedom Fire District destroyed the social hall, and caused damage to adjoining classrooms and administrative offices. The engine bays were smoke-filled but not damaged. More than two dozen units from Carroll, Howard and Baltimore counties responded to the fire that broke out shortly before 9 a.m. It took nearly two hours for the fire to be brought under control.

A heavy accumulation of snow caused the roof to collapse Friday on an 1850 wooden building in historic Ellicott City that houses the Wagon Wheel Antique Shop. No one was inside, but Ed Crowl, who owns both the store and the building, said the exterior wall of the two-story building buckled out from the weight and the flat roof fell in on the top floor. The building is located on Tiber Alley, a small cobblestone side street a half-block off Main Street's southern end, near the Patapsco River.