Good afternoon. Unprecedented wildfires have torn through the Hawaiian island of Maui overnight, killing six people and displacing 4,000.
The fires, fanned by strong winds from Hurricane Dora, destroyed businesses in the historic town of Lahaina and left at least two dozen people injured. Rescuers with the US Coast Guard pulled a dozen people from the ocean water off Lahaina after they had dived in to escape smoke and flames. Early assessments of the carnage have found 271 structures have been destroyed or damaged.
“Local people have lost everything,” said James Tokioka, director of the Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism. “They’ve lost their house, they’ve lost their animals.”
Top news
Cheaper prescriptions plan to proceed | Patients with chronic conditions are set to receive two months of medicine for the price of one from 1 September, after the Senate voted down a Coalition push to tear up Labor’s 60-day dispensing changes. The changes, which are estimated to save six million Australians up to $180 a year for each medicine, faced a disallowance motion brought by the opposition in the Senate on Thursday morning.
‘Significant gaps’ between NSW metro and country schools | A scathing audit of the New South Wales education department’s strategy has found “significant gaps” between the education and wellbeing outcomes of students in regional and remote parts of the state and their city counterparts are unlikely to close due to shortcomings.
Twitter/X defends restoring account that shared child abuse material | The company formerly known as Twitter has faced heat from politicians in a combative hearing over X’s tackling of child abuse material after the company restored an account that shared such material last month, despite claiming to have a “zero-tolerance approach”.
Beef wellington pie contained poisonous mushrooms | A beef wellington pie was the lunchtime dish that is believed to have left three people dead and one fighting for his life from a suspected mushroom poisoning in Victoria, according to a source familiar with the situation. Police have warned people not to speculate about the case because it could turn out to be “very innocent”.
English students remaining in the family home due to cost of living | One in three students starting university this year in England may opt to live at home, according to new research that found rising costs and family needs are affecting the “Covid generation” of school-leavers.
Kim Jong-un calls for weapons production boost | North Korean leader Kim Jong-un dismissed the military’s top general and called for more preparations for the possibility of war, a boost in weapons production and expansion of military drills, state media reported on Thursday.
Ecuador presidential candidate assassinated | Ecuadorian presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio (pictured) has been shot dead in Quito just days before an election where the central issue is the country’s slide into violence and crime.
Ukrainian troops break through Russian defensive lines | Ukrainian forces have made an attempt to cross the Dnipro River, which divides liberated and occupied Kherson, in a potential breach of what has for months served as the frontline in the south of Ukraine. Russian military bloggers reported that up to seven boats, each carrying six to seven people, landed near the village of Kozachi Laheri, east of Kherson city, on Tuesday.
Full Story
The Australian activists risking jail to raise the alarm on the climate crisis
Higher fines and longer jail terms have been introduced around Australia to deter disruptive climate protesters. But climate and environment editor Adam Morton tells Jane Lee that a small number are becoming increasingly desperate to draw attention to the climate crisis, and won’t be deterred.
What they said …
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“Je m’en fucking fous d’adversaire,” or in English: “I don’t give a fucking damn about the opposition”.
The original quote came from Ronan O’Gara, a former Ireland international who coaches the French club La Rochelle who lit up the internet with a pep talk to his team that seamlessly blended French with English swearing, graced with a Cork accent. French may be the language of Baudelaire, Rimbaud and Voltaire, but it seems sometimes it takes a rugby player from Cork to inject an extra oomph.
In numbers
Conservative thinktank LibertyWorks, which is chaired by the leading no voice campaigner Warren Mundine, has not responded to multiple requests to pay the federal government more than $172,000 in legal costs for two failed cases over Covid-19 restrictions and the foreign influence transparency register.
Before bed read
Women struggling with endometriosis – a disease that can cause severe pain and fatigue, painful periods, painful sex and infertility among women – have long been written off as hysterical type A personalities, too anxious about their health, or even as attention-seekers. But after generations of inaction, our understanding and treatment of the chronic condition may be on the verge of a breakthrough.
Daily word game
Today’s starter word is: BARB. You have five goes to get the longest word including the starter word. Play Wordiply.
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