Queensland snake catcher says 80kg albino Burmese python found in Oxenford is the largest he has come across in 27 years
As a seasoned snake catcher, Tony Harrison is used to the people the claiming there is a five-metre snake on their doorstep. But for the first time on Monday, the caller wasn’t exaggerating.
“This was the largest snake I have come across in 27 years,” Harrison said. “The poor old lady who opened the front door to see it there got the fright of her life”
Continue reading...Planes will this week cover areas in the southern half of the reef that escaped earlier bleaching but may have undergone high levels of heat stress
The full impact of coral bleaching across the Great Barrier Reef will become clearer this week as aerial surveys of hundreds of reefs are completed in the bottom two thirds of the world’s biggest reef system.
An aerial survey carried out last week over almost 500 individual reefs between the Torres Strait and Cairns revealed some severe bleaching of corals closer to shore, but almost none on outer reefs.
Continue reading...Strong wind warnings also in place for coastal regions across south-east Queensland and northern NSW
Tropical Cyclone Gretel is set to bypass Norfolk Island in the next 48 hours, although it will still create damaging winds.
Tropical Cyclone Gretel may not make landfall but was still expected to have an impact with damaging wind warnings of around 100km/h for coastal regions across south-east Queensland and northern New South Wales.
Continue reading...Discredited themes, including that men’s aggression is caused by partners who seek to deny access to their kids, have drawn most of the attention this week
l The only authorised video stream of this week’s federal parliamentary hearings into Australia’s family law system was broadcast on Pauline Hanson’s Facebook page. The camera was operated by Hanson’s aide James Ashby, the stream captioned like an official broadcast but published with hundreds of unfiltered live comments from apparently aggrieved fathers, who called witnesses and MPs “man-hater” and “dirty snake”.
In the shadow of the murders of Hannah Clarke and her three children, expert witnesses have told the inquiry that reform to family law is increasingly urgent to better protect mostly women and children, primarily from men who perpetrate acts of coercive control and domestic violence.
Continue reading...State says virus ‘is no different’ to floods, cyclones and bushfires as it prepares to ramp up pressure at Coag meeting
Queensland will use the upcoming meeting of state leaders and the prime minister to appeal to the federal government to open up its natural disaster assistance payments to local industries impacted by the coronavirus.
Scott Morrison has previously rejected Queensland’s request for the disaster recovery funding arrangements to be made available for businesses knocked by the economic slowdown resulting from Covid-19 on 4 February, and again on 28 February.
Continue reading...LNP candidate advertised one of the grants on Facebook a month before election without specifying source of funds
Six taxpayer-funded grants were approved in the key marginal seat of Longman through the Department of Social Services in the month before the last federal election, including $177,000 for the Bribie Island and Districts Junior Rugby League Club.
Continue reading...Population received no emergency support and scant information during three-day outage in Northern Territory, says resident of one of the areas hit
Telecommunications outages that left Aboriginal people living on islands off the Northern Territory coast without food, fuel and essential supplies for almost three days last week were more widespread than originally reported, fuelling concerns about the network’s ability to support contact with remote communities as fears over coronavirus spread.
Telstra has confirmed the NT mainland communities of Borroloola and Numbulwar were affected by the same outage, while the Cape York community of Kowanyama was also without telecommunications for three days.
Continue reading...Heavy rainfall across New South Wales and Queensland boosts rivers and allow farmers to plant crops for the first time in several seasons
Heavy and widespread rain across three states is bringing joy to parched towns with some farming regions receiving “drought-breaking” rains.
Further rainfall from ex-Tropical Cyclone Esther was delivering water into regional water storages and rivers, with farmers able to plant crops for the first time in several seasons.
Continue reading...Asic boss confirms mining magnate and former politician charged with four offences by the regulator for conduct dating back to 2013
Mining magnate and former politician Clive Palmer has been charged with criminal offences that could see him jailed by Australia’s corporate regulator.
The head of the Australian Securities and Investment Commission, John Price, revealed on Friday that the Queensland businessman had been charged with four offences by the regulator for conduct dating back to 2013.
Continue reading...Police comments last week that they were keeping an ‘open mind’ on the murder of Hannah Clarke and her three young children by her former partner were widely condemned. In this episode of Full Story, reporter Ben Smee looks at the track record of Queensland police on domestic violence, and we hear from one woman about her own shocking story
You can read Ben Smee’s reporting on Dani’s case here, and his piece about how Hannah Clarke’s murder exposes a ‘failure in our system’.
You can also read his reporting on Queensland woman Julie, who was forced to go into hiding after a senior constable, Neil Punchard, accessed her address from a police database and sent it to her violent former husband.
Continue reading...Home affairs adviser accused of untruthfulness as Tamil family waits on court to decide if youngest daughter can apply for asylum
The Tamil asylum seeker family from Biloela may have to wait another three months for a decision on whether their youngest Australian-born daughter can have her asylum application assessed, after a court hearing in which a home affairs adviser was accused of untruthfulness.
Tamil asylum seekers Priya and Nades and their Australian-born daughters Kopika and Tharunicaa have been detained on Christmas Island since late last year awaiting the hearing on the processing of a visa application for Tharunicaa.
Continue reading...Commissioner says Det Insp Mark Thompson ‘gutted’ at phrasing he used about Camp Hill car fire deaths in Brisbane
A senior Queensland detective who said police were keeping an “open mind” as to whether the deaths of Hannah Clarke and her children were a case of a “husband being driven too far” has been stood aside from the investigation.
The Queensland police commissioner, Katarina Carroll, apologised on Friday for comments made by Det Insp Mark Thompson as he appealed for information into the deaths the previous day, saying the detective was “gutted” at his choice of words.
Continue reading...Domestic violence campaigners appalled force wants to consider suggestions Rowan Baxter was ‘driven too far’ when he set fire to his family in their car in Brisbane
Queensland police have revealed that a man who killed his wife and three children by dousing them with petrol and setting them alight had a history of domestic violence and was known to them.
But in comments that have shocked domestic violence campaigners, the force says they are keeping an “open mind” about suggestions the 42-year-old Rowan Baxter had been “driven too far” and are appealing to people who knew the couple to come forward to understand his motives.
Continue reading...The ALP leader says a feasibility study into a new coal-fired power station in Queensland is ‘hush money’ for climate sceptics
Anthony Albanese says he supports jobs and economic activity from the Adani coalmine, but he has blasted a feasibility study into a new coal-fired power plant in Collinsville as “hush money” for climate sceptics in the Coalition.
In Queensland on Wednesday for his fourth “vision statement” since taking the Labor leadership, Albanese told reporters the ALP needed to improve its electoral performance in the state given the poor showing in last year’s federal election. He said he was listening to voters in a number of regional centres.
Continue reading...Yang Chen says watching survival and adventure TV shows helped her stay alive, as she knew to keep hydrated and warm
A Chinese student who survived in flooded and dense Gold Coast bushland for five days used an empty milk bottle to collect water and get by.
Yang Chen went missing last Wednesday while walking with a friend in the Tallebudgera Valley and spent the next five nights sheltering in caves until she was found by water police near Gorge Falls on Monday morning.
Continue reading...Areas of Australia have burnt during the recent bushfire season that used to be too wet to burn. In this first episode of The Frontline, a new series that shows how everyday Australians are already experiencing the climate crisis, we go inside the new fire zone
Continue reading...A formal invitation from the prime minister to the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge is expected this week
The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge are expected to visit Australia to tour regions affected by this summer’s bushfire crisis.
The trip would be Prince William and his wife Catherine’s second visit to Australia as a married couple.
Continue reading...Sydney and the New South Wales Central Coast are set to receive more rainfall in 24 hours than they have since 1998. Follow the latest
• NSW weather: six families rescued from floodwaters as rain lashes east coast
Commiserations with Canberra and other parts of the east coast that have missed this rain.
Rain: the ONE type of weather #Canberra actually wants this summer, and apparently THE ONLY TYPE we won't get. pic.twitter.com/n7ftT8CNgi
Sydney is not the only place that’s flooded.
Awabakal Nation/Lake Macquarie pic.twitter.com/S5LVHa1PBp
Plenty of locals stopping to have a look at the flooded Hanlon Park in Stones Corner @abcbrisbane pic.twitter.com/Aawo9orQw5
Rains in Sydney#sydneyrain #sydneystorm #parramatta pic.twitter.com/3yTHtSgFaA
Continue reading...Morrison government to spend up to $4m in grant for feasibility study into coal-fired power plant in Queensland
The federal Labor opposition says private investors will not touch “with a barge pole” the Morrison government’s plan to support a coal-fired power plant in Queensland.
The government says it will spend up to $6m in grants for two new Queensland electricity generation projects, including a coal-fired power plant, as part of a bid to lower power prices.
Continue reading...Hail smashes into Parliament House and brings down trees in the ACT, with heavy rainfall hitting NSW, Queensland and Victoria
Australia’s south-east has been lashed by severe thunderstorms and large hailstones that destroyed buildings and cars in Canberra and left two tourists in hospital after they were injured by lightning.
Two supercell thunderstorms brought hail and heavy rain to cities and towns across the east coast on Monday, battering the outer suburbs of Sydney about 3pm, with 4.5cm hailstones recorded and strong winds bringing trees down over cars in the Sutherland area.
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