CFA chief - the man who knew too little

CFA chief Russell Rees has spent days giving evidence with lawyers' blow-torches to his belly. Much of what has come out of his own mouth has been damning: he didn't know fire experts were doing predictive maps in a back office, he can't explain why communications broke down between two CFA centres over who would manage the Kilmore fire - and he didn't see it as his job to oversee warnings on Black Saturday.

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Is Australia racist? Was The Chaser sketch offensive? Does women's sport get a raw deal in the media?

Alone In The Darkness, Seeing Perfectly A Path To Peace

During a school trip to the remote indigenous community of Yuendumu in the Northern Territory, the year 10 students of Mount Evelyn Christian School (pictured) took part in The Darkness Activity. On a moonless night, they headed from their camp and into the bush with a torch, a stool, a pen and a journal. A whistle blew and five minutes of darkness and quiet began. When another whistle sounded, torches came on and the students recorded their experience. This is Melissa Morgan's response:

A Toast To The Binge-drinking Zealots

BINGE drinking is sort of the new black these days, isn't it? Well, being against it is. K07 starts throwing money towards campaigns to wean baby-faced teens off fizzy peach-flavoured liquor sherbets and the next minute you know every man and his dog have decided to wave a flag denouncing problem drinking. If binge drinking existed in human form we'd be outside its house with burning torches demanding satisfaction. We're an adorably rabid lot, truly we are.

Throwing Light On The Matter

Not only handy for reading the Melway, torches are essential in the car glove box or boot for all sorts of jobs and emergencies in the dark. Jenny Lamattina sheds some light on what's available.

Light Up For Carols By Candlelight Carols Song Book Starts Page 35

GOT your candles, torches and loved ones ready? Wollongong's Carols by Candlelight is on tonight.

It's All About Kate

Something For Kate's Paul Dempsey has a little post-album ritual - he torches all his song notebooks.

In The Onion Fields, The Only Tears Are Those Of Joy

Children wake before dawn in the onion fields of Griffith. Their parents would already have been at work for an hour there, grabbing handfuls of the bulbs in the dark or using head torches for light.

A New Kind Of Blue

WE are creeping down a ragged mountain staircase in the dark. Water is dripping from cliffs and trees and our torches are off, but Tim Tranter, who runs Tread Lightly Eco Tours, goes ahead with a red light, which helps a bit.

Boys Charged

LOWER Hunter police have charged two Raymond Terrace boys over a burglary at a Heatherbrae camping store. A police spokesman said clothing, knives and torches were stolen from the Been Camping Store on July 28. The boys, aged 15 and 17, have been bailed to face Raymond Terrace Children's Court on

The Two Torches

SOME Mount Hutton Year 6 students interviewed John Domandl on his experience at the Paralympic Games and as a torch bearer of the Olympic Torch Relay. John, from Eleebana, was given the opportunity to run with both the Paralympic and Olympic Torches. On both occasions he said, `I had the oppor

Ready, Willing And Able

SWANSEA teenager Adam Gardnir's first `real job' was scrutinised by a 90,000-strong live crowd and a TV audience of millions ? and he passed with flashing torches! The 19-year-old is working with the team that devised and staged the opening ceremony of the Sydney Paralympic Games. In his role

Humanity Shines In City's Eyes

AFTER more spectacle in the past month or so than most cities experience in a generation or even longer, Sydney turned out again last night and turned on their torches in their thousands in an even more potent lesson in humanity than the Olympics provided. Until last night the Paralympics were

Parade Raises The Standards High

THOUSANDS of lights flickered in the darkness of Stadium Australia; torches, like 87,000 stars, welcoming the shining lights of the 11th Paralympic Games, the athletes who worked so hard for so long to be there. As the first verse of Advance Australia Fair rose into the atmosphere last night the

From Bizarre To The Banal, Bondi Brings It All

It was in some ways a quintessential Bondi scene uniting the surreal, the banal and the simply strange. There they were a model, a soap star, a bouffant-haired drag queen and others, clasping identical Christmas beetle-green torches in front of a Japanese taiko drumming troupe. At its last

$2,500 Tag On Used Torches

IF YOU didn't get the chance to run with the Olympic torch, why not buy your own? Used Sydney 2000 torches are for sale on the internet, but the price is up to $2,500. Collectables dealers say the torches are among the potentially more profitable Olympic memorabilia. But for pin collectors

Maitland Triumph

MAITLAND was swept up in the spirit of the Olympics yesterday when the Olympic torch made its triumphant arrival in the city. Greeted by about 11,000 cheering Maitland residents, the torch was carried through a sea of balloons, flags and home-made torches to ignite the community cauldron. Well

Second Act Gives Jim Double The Enjoyment

IN 1956 it was a low key torch run for Jim Rixon but second time around, the 63-year-old was a bundle of nerves. Owning torches from Australia's two Olympic Games, Mr Rixon couldn't have been happier when he carried the flame through Belmont yesterday. He was 19 when he carried the torch thro

1000 Horses Muster To Meet The Olympic Flame In Scone

DAYBREAK, August 31, will see the Olympic flame travel through the Scone Shire. Runners will carry the torches through Aberdeen, Scone and Wingen, and each of these communities will celebrate the event with an array of community spirit on parade. Organisers are hoping to have up to 1000 horse

More Milestones On That Road To Sydney

ST ARNAUD Everyone in the small town of Murtoa had the morning off yesterday as the Olympic flame was relayed through Victoria's wheat-belt region to the Murray River. Workers from the town's few businesses stood in the main street and waved home-made torches, while other locals sat in the bac