American millionaire Jonathan Lehrer denied bail after being charged with killing Canadian couple
American millionaire Jonathan Lehrer, one of two men charged in the killings of a Canadian couple in Dominica, has been denied bail.
Firefighters from across Europe struggled Thursday to contain a huge wildfire in France that has swept through a large swath of pine forest, while Germans and Poles faced a mass fish die-off in a river flowing between their countries.
Europe is suffering under a severe heat wave and drought that has produced tragic consequences for farmers and ecosystems already under threat from climate change and pollution.
The drought is causing a loss of agricultural products and other food at a time when supply shortages and Russia's war against Ukraine have caused inflation to spike.
In France, which is enduring its worst drought on record, flames raged through pine forests overnight, illuminating the sky with an intense orange light in the Gironde region, which was already ravaged by flames last month, and in neighboring Landes. More than 68 square kilometres (26 square miles) have burned since Tuesday.
The French wildfires have already forced the evacuation of about 10,000 people and destroyed at least 16 houses.
Along the Oder River, which flows from Czechia north into the Baltic Sea, volunteers have been collecting dead fish that have washed ashore in Poland and Germany.
Piotr Nieznanski, the conservation policy director at WWF Poland, said it appears that a toxic chemical was released into the water by an industry and the low water levels caused by the drought has made conditions far more dangerous for the fish.
"A tragic event is happening along the Oder River, an international river, and there is no transparent information about what is going on," he said, calling on government authorities to investigate.
People living along the river have been warned not to swim in the water or even touch it.
Poland's state water management body said the drought and high temperatures can cause even small amounts of pollution to lead to an ecological disaster but it has not identified the source of the pollution.
In northern Serbia, the dry bed of the Conopljankso reservoir is now littered with dead fish who were unable to survive the drought.
The water level along Germany's Rhine River was at risk of falling so low that it could become difficult to transport goods -- including critical energy items like coal and gasoline.
A national park in Portugal's highest hill range, the Serra da Estrela, was also being ravaged by a wildfire. Some 1,500 firefighters, 476 vehicles and 12 aircraft were deployed to fight it but the wind-driven blaze 250 kilometres (150 miles) northeast of Lisbon was very hard to reach, with inaccessible peaks almost 2,000 metres (6,560 feet) high and deep ravines. The fire has charred 10,000 hectares (25,000 acres) of woodland.
In Britain, where temperatures hit a record 40.3 degrees Celsius (104.5 degrees Fahrenheit) in July, the weather office has issued a new warning for "extreme heat" from Thursday through Sunday, with temperatures forecast to reach 36 C (96.8 F).
It has been one of the driest summers on record in southern Britain, and the Met Office weather service said there is an "exceptional risk" of wildfires over the next few days.
London Fire Brigade said its control room had dealt with 340 grass, garbage and open-land fires during the first week of August, eight times the number from last year. Assistant Commissioner Jonathan Smith said "the grass in London is tinderbox dry and the smallest of sparks can start a blaze which could cause devastation."
In Switzerland, a drought and high temperatures have endangered fish populations and authorities have begun moving fish out of some creeks that were running dry.
In Hausen, in the canton of Zurich, officials caught hundreds of fish, many of them brown trout, in the almost dried-up Heischerbach, Juchbach and Muehlebach creeks this week by anesthetizing them with electric shocks and then immediately placing them in a water tank enriched with oxygen, local media reported. Later, the fish were taken to creeks that still carry enough water.
Despite all the harm caused by the extreme weather, Swiss authorities see one morbid upside: they believe there's hope of finding some people who went missing in the mountains in the last few years because their bodies are being released as glaciers melt.
In the Swiss canton of Valais, melting glaciers have recently revealed parts of a crashed airplane and, at separate locations, at least two skeletons. The bodies have not yet been identified, news website 20Minuten reported Thursday.
Spanish state television showed dozens of trucks heading to France having to turn around and stay in Spain because wildfires had forced authorities to close some border crossings. TVE reported that truckers, many carrying perishable goods, were looking for ways to cross the border because the parking areas around the Irun crossing were full.
France this week is in its fourth heat wave of the year as it faces what the government describes as the country's worst drought on record. Temperatures were expected to reach 40 C (104 F) on Thursday.
------
Gera reported from Warsaw, Poland. Kirsten Grieshaber in Berlin, Jill Lawless in London, Ciaran Giles in Madrid and Barry Hatton in Lisbon, Portugal, contributed reporting.
American millionaire Jonathan Lehrer, one of two men charged in the killings of a Canadian couple in Dominica, has been denied bail.
Cabinet minister Dominic LeBlanc says he plans to run in the next election as a candidate under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's leadership, amid questions about his rumoured interest in succeeding his longtime friend for the top job.
A male columnist has apologized for a cringeworthy moment during former University of Iowa superstar and college basketball’s highest scorer Caitlin Clark’s first news conference as an Indiana Fever player.
Health Canada will change its longstanding policy restricting gay and bisexual men from donating to sperm banks in Canada, CTV News has learned. The federal health agency has adopted a revised directive removing the ban on gay, bisexual and other men who have sex with men, effective May 8.
The United States has vetoed a widely backed UN resolution that would have paved the way for full United Nations membership for the state of Palestine.
Bayer announced Thursday it is recalling two lots of its hydraSense Baby Nasal Care Easydose due to a potential contamination.
Technology from the 19th century has been brought out of retirement at a Newfoundland gardening store, as staff look for all the help they can get to fill orders during a busy season.
Kevin the cat has been reunited with his family after enduring a harrowing three-day ordeal while lost at Toronto Pearson International Airport earlier this week.
A group of suspects that allegedly defrauded seniors across Ontario and other parts of Canada using a so-called emergency grandparent scam appear to have ties to 'Italian traditional organized crime,' according to an investigator involved in the OPP-led probe.
Kevin the cat has been reunited with his family after enduring a harrowing three-day ordeal while lost at Toronto Pearson International Airport earlier this week.
Molly Knight, a grade four student in Nova Scotia, noticed her school library did not have many books on female athletes, so she started her own book drive in hopes of changing that.
Almost 7,000 bars of pure gold were stolen from Pearson International Airport exactly one year ago during an elaborate heist, but so far only a tiny fraction of that stolen loot has been found.
When Les Robertson was walking home from the gym in North Vancouver's Lower Lonsdale neighbourhood three weeks ago, he did a double take. Standing near a burrow it had dug in a vacant lot near East 1st Street and St. Georges Avenue was a yellow-bellied marmot.
A moulting seal who was relocated after drawing daily crowds of onlookers in Greater Victoria has made a surprise return, after what officials described as an 'astonishing' six-day journey.
Just steps from Parliament Hill is a barber shop that for the last 100 years has catered to everyone from prime ministers to tourists.
A high score on a Foo Fighters pinball machine has Edmonton player Dave Formenti on a high.
A compound used to treat sour gas that's been linked to fertility issues in cattle has been found throughout groundwater in the Prairies, according to a new study.
While many people choose to keep their medical appointments private, four longtime friends decided to undergo vasectomies as a group in B.C.'s Lower Mainland.