Green groups say 52% vote against federal government facility should rule out region as potential site
Residents in South Australia’s Flinders Ranges have voted narrowly against having a nuclear waste dump in their region.
About 52% of the people who took part in the ballot voted against the federal government’s facility being established on land near Hawker.
Continue reading...Sydney’s pedestrian bottlenecks, Brisbane’s barren streetscapes and Perth’s freeway fiascos: cities across the country are making classic mistakes
In every city there are places where the road should be just a bit wider, where the bus stop would be better a few metres down or, perhaps, a multi-lane highway simply should not exist.
Bad urban design is a barrier to what should be the smooth flow of life in cities. It ruins commutes and can make daily life unnecessarily difficult for the disabled or elderly.
Continue reading...Temperatures top 40C in Victoria’s north as up to 11 properties hit by fire in South Australia, while NSW and Tasmania face difficult conditions
Record-breaking spring temperatures helped spark and fan bushfires across the country on Thursday, forecasting a potentially devastating bushfire summer.
In Victoria, 100km/h winds fanned more than 60 blazes, as an unprecedented heatwave moved north to south, drawing comparisons with the “worst conditions you’d see in February or March” from the state’s emergency services minister Lisa Neville.
Continue reading...Extreme heat hits across the country as parts of Victoria prepare for worst possible bushfire conditions on Thursday
All of Australia’s mainland states, and the Northern Territory, had areas that reached more than 40C on Wednesday, as a code red bushfire warning was issued for parts of Victoria for Thursday.
By 3pm AEDT on Wednesday, the highest temperatures recorded were 43.4C at Smithville in New South Wales and 42C at Walpepup in Victoria. Ballera in Queensland reached 43.7C, Warburton in WA got 43.8C, Nullarbor in South Australia recorded 46.6C and Lajamanu in the Northern Territory had hit 42.7C.
Continue reading...Catastrophic fire conditions in New South Wales ease, but dozens of Australian bushfires remain burning. In Queensland, 60 fires are burning, with strong winds and temperatures in mid-30s forecast to make for hazardous conditions on Australia’s east coast
• Factcheck: are greens really stopping bushfire hazard reduction?
• Open thread: tell us how you’re affected by the fires
• Sydney suburb in the pink after surviving bushfire emergency
• If you are in a bushfire affected area stay tuned to your local emergency broadcaster. Full alerts can be found here for NSW and here for Queensland
Residents of Pechey (near Hampton) have been told to leave now, and head towards the New England highway.
“There is a bushfire in Pechey and Hampton and conditions are getting worse,” QFES says. “A fast moving fire is travelling from Grapetree Road towards Deeth Road, Sewell Road, Parker Road, Bush Road and Misty Mountain Road. It is currently impacting Parker Road and Sewell Road. The fire could have on the significant impact on the community.”
LEAVE NOW: Pechey (near Hampton) bushfire as at 1pm Wed 13 Nov: https://t.co/ZLMRe45vEu
Images of Walkers Point, which is also at “leave now”.
Residents at Walkers Point, south of Bundaberg, are being told to evacuate to Woodgate with firefighters battling a large bushfire @abcnews pic.twitter.com/pffLy1elsV
Continue reading...Minister says he does not believe Indigenous artists are choosing to seek better economic opportunities in working for private dealers
The minister for Indigenous Australians, Ken Wyatt, says he intends to take stronger sanctions against private art dealers or “carpetbaggers” who are exploiting vulnerable and elderly Aboriginal artists in central Australia.
Speaking on ABC radio in Alice Springs on Wednesday, Wyatt said he thought the current system, under which dealers voluntarily join the Indigenous Art Code (IAC), was not working.
Continue reading...NunaX car of Dutch team catches fire 250km before finish of 3,000km Darwin to Adelaide race
The leading car in the World Solar Challenge has caught fire and withdrawn from the race a little more than 250km from the Adelaide finish.
The NunaX car of Dutch team Vattenfall caught fire just before Mambray Creek on Thursday.
Continue reading...South Australian man and his son found the bottle, which was dropped from an ocean liner by 13-year-old Paul Gilmore in 1969
The British author of a message in a bottle that recently washed up on the South Australian coast after more than half a century has been found – and he is currently out to sea, his sister says.
South Australian man Paul Elliot and his son Jyah told ABC radio they found the bottle on the Eyre Peninsula’s west coast recently while fishing.
Continue reading...Crystal-lee Wightley dies at her family’s home three days after getting sick
A Melbourne family say they are heartbroken after a 13-year-old girl died from the flu late last week, as the national death toll nears 300.
Crystal-lee Wightley had the flu for three days before she died at her family’s home.
Continue reading...Brumby 610 aircraft left William Creek airport and crashed on approach to Leigh Creek airport, police say
A pilot and his passenger from Queensland have been killed in a light plane crash in northern South Australia.
Police have confirmed stud farmer Peter Gesler, 59, and his 48-year-old female passenger died after the plane crashed in scrubland near a small airport just before 6.30pm on Saturday.
Continue reading...Instructions not to sell tickets were reportedly received before last year’s Naidoc Week AFL game
Box office staff at the Adelaide Oval were reportedly directed to stop selling tickets to Aboriginal people while fans gathered before last year’s Naidoc Week AFL match celebrating Indigenous culture.
The box office and Oval management said a supervisor “misinterpreted” an instruction from the police and security not to sell tickets to a specific group of people who were intoxicated and had been refused entry.
Continue reading...Rare creature found at the mouth of Murray River in South Australia
A rare giant sunfish has washed ashore at the mouth of the Murray River in South Australia.
Linette Grzelak posted a picture on Facebook of the sunfish, which was spotted by a couple of fishers on the beach at the weekend.
Continue reading...Company that was awarded $423m to provide services on Manus Island says reports linking it to bad debts are ‘offensive’ and ‘unsubstantiated’
Security contractor Paladin has broken its silence to attack suggestions of corruption as “offensive”, while rejecting reports linking it to a series of bad debts or failed contracts across Asia.
The firm said it is seeking legal advice about media articles it said had “failed to identify any evidence to sustain the damaging allegations being made against Paladin”.
Continue reading...Penny Wong says it’s ‘deeply concerning’ a company with ‘such a poor track record’ was awarded a lucrative sum through closed tender
Penny Wong has indicated Labor will target the Paladin offshore detention security contract in Senate estimates this week, accusing the government of failing to explain why the company was awarded $420m in contracts through closed tender.
The Australian Financial Review has reported that Paladin Group’s $420m of contracts to provide security to refugees on Manus Island in Papua New Guinea was extended by the home affairs department in January after a closed tender process.
Continue reading...Focus for year ahead will be on ‘providing drought refuges and avoiding irreversible loss of species’
The outlook for the environment in the Murray-Darling Basin, particularly in the north, is extremely challenging and there will be almost no scope for environmental flows for the remainder of the 2018-19 year unless it rains, the Murray-Darling Basin Authority has warned.
It says the focus will be “on providing drought refuges and avoiding irreversible loss of species”.
Continue reading...Commissioner to find $13bn plan to restore river took into account factors other than the environment’s needs when it set the amount of water needed to be bought back from irrigators
The Murray Darling Basin Plan is likely in breach of the commonwealth act that underpins it – the Water Act 2007, the South Australian royal commission into the plan is expected to find.
The report of the royal commission into the Murray Darling Basin Plan is being handed to the state governor on Tuesday but it is up to the SA government when it is released.
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
Murray-Darling commissioner offer to include Menindee fish kill in inquiry rejected by South Australia attorney general
Another 80cm Murray cod has died in the Lower Darling River on Friday afternoon, raising fears among Menindee locals that the predicted drop in temperature overnight will trigger another fish kill incident.
The Guardian saw the large cod, estimated to be about 30 to 40 years old, floating about 1km downstream from where another large cod died on Thursday.
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...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...