Eleven people left ill in Sydney and six near Ballarat after Australia Day long weekend music festivals
A teenage boy has been found with almost 600 capsules and $2,000 cash at a Sydney music festival where several people left critically ill due to drug use.
Six young men aged under 25 left the Hardcore Till I Die festival at Sydney Olympic Park on Saturday in critical or serious conditions. All were either stable or discharged from hospital by Sunday.
Continue reading...With high temperatures also forecast for Victoria and NSW, there are warnings about potential power outages and blackouts, as well as total fire bans amid worsening weather. Follow developments live
Yes please.
Elite marketing by Royal Park Foodland #adelaideheatwave pic.twitter.com/IMMLZdywLq
Just on the issue of heatwaves and climate change, the ABC Melbourne presenter Rafael Epstein has pointed to recent statements from Victoria’s Bureau of Meteorology (Bom).
Just in case someone says hot weather has nothing to do with climate change
"Australia's climate is increasingly influenced by global warming... has warmed by just over one degree since 1910, with most of the warming occurring since 1950."
From @BOM_Vic this month
It was 48.9C last Tuesday in Port Augusta, South Australia, an old harbour city that now harvests solar power. Michelle Coles, the owner of the local cinema, took off her shoes at night to test the concrete before letting the dogs out. “People tend to stay at home,” she said. “They don’t walk around when it’s like this.”
It’s easy to see why: in the middle of the day it takes seconds to blister a dog’s paw or child’s foot. In Mildura, in northern Victoria, last week gardeners burned their hands when they picked up their tools, which had been left in the sun at 46C. Fish were dying in the rivers.
Continue reading...The 21-year-old student at Melbourne’s LaTrobe University is believed to have been returning home from a comedy show
A young woman who was killed outside a Bundoora shopping centre was an Israeli student who was on a video call to her younger sister when she was attacked.
Aiia Maasarwe, 21, had been in Australia for about six months on a study abroad program at LaTrobe University.
Continue reading...Australia had its warmest ever December on record and temperatures this week nudged 50C in some places
Temperature records have been broken in towns across parts of Australia sweltering through a heatwave, which is currently in its fourth day.
Australia also recorded its hottest December on record the Bureau of Meteorology said on Thursday in a special climate statement on “the unusual extended period of heatwaves” across much of the country.
Continue reading...Police ramped up breath testing target from 3.2m to 4.5m but had a ‘perverse’ incentive to limit the number of drunk drivers netted
An independent investigation has branded Victoria police’s widespread practice of falsifying breath tests as an “ethical failure”.
The former police chief commissioner Neil Comrie’s inquiry was unable to determine exactly how many times police had manipulated breath test devices to falsely inflate the number of tests conducted.
Continue reading...Severe weather conditions forecast to bring maximum temperatures 8C to 16C above average, as three towns record overnight minimums of 33C
Coping with extreme heat: share your photos
Port Augusta in South Australia has reached 48.9C on Tuesday, as a heatwave sets in across much of Australia threatening more record hot days.
All-time highest minimum temperatures have also been broken in three places. Meekatharra in Western Australia and Fowlers Gap and White Cliffs in New South Wales all registered an overnight minimum of 33C on Monday.
Continue reading...Much of Australia will bake this week with meteorologists forecasting the hot conditions will last for days in some parts
Every state and territory will bake through a heatwave on Monday with meteorologists saying soaring temperatures will last for days in some parts.
The Bureau of Meteorology said hot days were expected in January but multiple days in a row of temperatures above 40C were unusual.
Continue reading...Diplomatic headquarters in Canberra also targeted as firefighters remove bags labelled ‘Danger asbestos’
The United States, Pakistani, Swiss, Indian, South Korean and New Zealand consulates in Melbourne are among a number of foreign diplomatic headquarters across the city and in Canberra targeted with suspicious packages.
The deliveries on Wednesday sparked an emergency “hazardous material” response and, in some cases, evacuation.
Continue reading...Richard Pithouse referred to Judicial Commission of Victoria after reportedly saying woman put herself into position of allegedly being assaulted
The Victorian attorney general, Jill Hennessy, has asked the state’s judicial watchdog to investigate a Melbourne magistrate after he reportedly suggested that an alleged rape victim had suffered “buyer’s remorse”.
The magistrate, Richard Pithouse, allegedly made the comments while presiding over a preliminary hearing for a compensation claim in November, and they were reported in the Herald Sun.
Continue reading...