Blog

Photo: RNZ / Angus Dreaver Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has denounced a suspicious blaze that tore through a Melbourne synagogue as a violent act of antisemitism aimed at creating fear in the community. Fire crews were called to the Adass Israel synagogue at Ripponlea in Melbourne's south-east shortly after 4am and found a large fire burning through the building. Early-morning worshippers inside the synagogue reported seeing two masked men throw fuel inside the premises, before setting it alight. "There was some banging on a door with some liquid thrown inside and was lit alight, the few people inside the synagogue ran outside the back door, one of them got burnt," Adass Israel Synagogue board member Benjamin Klein said. "The whole place took alight pretty quickly." He beli...

By Chris Isidore, CNN UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson was shot and killed in what police described as a bold and deliberate attack in the heart of New York City. Photo: CNN Newsource UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson had an in-house security detail assigned to him during his trip to New York City, according to a source familiar with the company's security, but the detail was not with him when he was shot and killed in front of a hotel early Wednesday morning. It is common for top executives of major corporations to have personal security provided by their companies. Those measures are often significant expenses listed in corporate filings, though UnitedHealth Group, UnitedHealthcare's corporate parent, does break out the cost in its own filings. The need to protect the safety o...

By Abhirup Roy and Andrew Hay for Reuters Photo: USGS/Supplied A large magnitude 7 earthquake hit off a sparsely populated stretch of northern California coast on Thursday, prompting coastal towns to evacuate low-lying areas amid a tsunami warning that was later cancelled. No deaths or injuries were reported. The National Weather Service said that the tsunami warning that extended along 800km of the California and Oregon coasts was called off about 90 minutes after the earthquake struck. The Zoo has closed due to national weather emergency and tsunami warning. Guests have been evacuated, animals secured and staff have moved to higher ground.— San Francisco Zoo & Gardens (@sfzoo) December 5, 2024 The quake, which hit at a shallow depth of 10km was centred about 63km west of t...

By Peter de Kruijff, ABC environment reporter All clouds have some level of cooling effect on the planet. Photo: Bruce Rolff A drop in the number of low-altitude clouds was behind unexplained warming that contributed to the world's hottest year on record, a new study suggests. The record-breaking heat of 2023, which saw the planet warm an average 1.45 degrees Celsius over pre-industrial surface temperatures, took many climate scientists by surprise. Their closest predictions, which simulated the effects of human-created warming and other known drivers, were around 0.2C lower than observed temperatures. Experts could not fully explain the extra heat source at the time. Now research published in Science today suggests the missing warming mechanism from the prediction models was a low i...