ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) — Universal Orlando plans to reopen its hotels to guests on June 2, more than two months after they were closed to help prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

HELENA, Mont. (AP) — The National Weather Service has issued a blizzard warning for the northern Rocky Mountain Front and a winter storm warning for other parts of northwestern and southwestern Montana.

The blizzard warning takes effect Tuesday afternoon with up to a foot of snow (30 centimeters) expected to fall at Marias Pass near Glacier National Park and wind gusts of up to 80 mph (129 kilometers per hour).

MISSOULA, Mont. (AP) — A judge has ordered Bitterroot National Forest officials to allow the public to comment on whether the Blue Joint and Sapphire Wilderness Study Areas should be opened to bicycle use.

U.S. District Judge Dana Christensen also rejected snowmobilers' effort to open those protected areas for their use.

Christensen's order on Friday largely upheld the U.S. Forest Service's plan to preserve the two southwest Montana wilderness study areas' primitive conditions.

SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) — A man who nearly beat a woman to death must serve 100 months in prison for the crime.

The Spokesman-Review reports that Judge Kevin Korsmo sentenced Sonny Cannella on Friday after he pleaded guilty to first-degree domestic assault.

Before the sentencing, the woman, Sapphire Mattson, described the scene to the judge.

BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — A senior U.S. Forest Service official voiced support Wednesday for creating one new wilderness area in Montana and another proposal that would remove five sites from consideration.

U.S. Forest Service Associate Deputy Chief Glenn Casamassa testified in Washington on the two measures being considered by the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.

BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — Public lands advocates in Montana have launched a campaign to protect wilderness study areas in response to a Republican lawmaker's push to remove the federal designation from five sites.

Organizers of the Our Land, Our Legacy campaign announced Monday that they will be running newspaper advertisements across the state as they seek to protect the sites from changes.

GREAT FALLS, Mont. (AP) — Republican Montana Sen. Steve Daines introduced the "Protect Public Use of Public Lands Act" to remove more than 700 square miles (1,819 square kilometers) from the state's Wilderness Study Areas.

JESSUP, Md. (AP) — Nine-year-old Kuhmaria VanBuren ran into the prison gymnasium and jumped into her mother's arms with so much force they almost fell down.

For the next two hours, Kuhmaria let her mom braid her hair and cuddled in her arms, savoring the rare contact. Sapphire VanBuren, 26, has been incarcerated at the Maryland Correctional Institution for Women for over two years.

AUBURN, Maine (AP) — A Maine nightclub is being sued for serving a woman who was involved in a fatal accident on New Year's Day.

The Sun Journal reports Kathleen Berry filed the lawsuit against the Sapphire Nightclub and Event Center in Auburn after her husband was killed. An attorney for the nightclub filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit last month.

HELENA, Mont. (AP) — The cost of fighting wildfires in Montana is approaching $400 million at the tail end of the state's worst wildfire season in two decades.

To date, wildfires have burned almost 1,900 square miles (3,000 square kilometers), slightly more than the area burned in Montana's devastating 2012 fire season.

SAPPHIRE, N.C. (AP) — A popular waterfall is reopening after being closed when wildfires burned in western North Carolina last fall.

Cathy Dowd with the U.S. Forest Service in Asheville told local news outlets that Whitewater Falls was reopening Friday afternoon in the Nantahala National Forest.

The Whitewater Fire began Nov. 6 and Dowd said it burned only 23 acres but heavily damaged the stairs and the access facility to the observation deck.

NEW YORK (AP) — Authorities say they've seized 55 kilograms (121 pounds) of cocaine from a fictitious jewelry business in New York's diamond district.

They say the drugs were worth $2 million and had been shipped from a fake jewelry business in Los Angeles.

Law enforcers identified the two fictitious businesses as Los Angeles-based Sapphire and New York-based 21 Divine.

SAPPHIRE, N.C. (AP) — Two weeks of unseasonably warm weather has caused headaches for ski resort operators in North Carolina, but a forecast for cooler weather next weekend gives them cause for hope.

The Asheville Citizen-Times reports (http://avlne.ws/2j68PpD) Cataloochee Ski Area in Maggie Valley closed Jan. 18 and plans to reopen Jan. 26. Manager Chris Bates said he can't remember a time the resort has closed in January.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The University of Nebraska at Omaha has named its royal homecoming pair, but don't call them king and queen.

The school has joined a growing number of other schools around the county that are moving to gender-neutral homecoming courts to be more inclusive of transgender students.

NEW YORK (AP) — American Express is announcing a major enhancement to its widely-used Platinum Card this week, allowing card members to earn five Membership Reward points per dollar spent on airlines.

CHARLESTOWN, R.I. (AP) — Mystic Aquarium in Connecticut has released six seal pups in the waters off Charlestown, Rhode Island, after they were rescued earlier this year.

The harbor seal pups were rescued by the aquarium in April and May along the coast of Maine. Officials believe the pups were abandoned shortly after birth.

The pups — named Jett, Amethyst, Quartz, Obsidian, Amber and Sapphire — are between four and five months old.

ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) — Universal Orlando is opening its fifth hotel that's aimed at attracting more convention bookings.

The Orlando Sentinel reports (http://bit.ly/29BEePL ) that tropical-themed Sapphire Falls Resort will open Thursday with 1,000 rooms. It will have 115,000 square feet of space for meetings and events and a covered walkway to another hotel's conference area.

The Sentinel reports that Universal now advertises...