With the Ottawa Dragon Boat Festival back after a two-year pandemic hiatus, one team pushed off into the Rideau River Saturday with more than just speed and a gold medal in mind.
One of the boats gliding across the waves in Mooney's Bay held the team from Ausome Ottawa, a sports and recreation charity for kids on the autism spectrum.
The charity seeks to fill a gap in the community, as many sporting events aren't designed for children with autism or other neurodivergent conditions.
"Neurotypical sport isn't really geared to our kids," said Kayla Garvey, program supervisor and long-serving staff member.
"These programs that we run, we mould them to fit our children. We don't want to change our children. We don't want them to fit the typical mould that some coaches would want."
Sticking to that mission statement, during Saturday's race the team allowed for parents and others to show support by jumping in the boat, with staff cheering them all on.
If someone in the boat felt angry that something wasn't going their way, the team was also ready to just take a second to breathe and calm down before continuing to push through the water.
About more than winning
Garvey said some children become "very excited" when told they need to use their "superhero power" and push harder — with some even screaming.
"Dragon boats [are] something special. We're all trapped on a boat together," she said. "So we have to make the best of it. We have to get along."
In Town and Out10:26Ausome Ottawa dragon boat team
We tag along with a group of children with autism (and a few of their parents) as they train for the Ottawa Dragon Boat Festival.
The team's coach, Andrea Nicholls, said children in the boat don't always communicate verbally, sometimes relying on physical cues instead.
Speaking ahead of race day, Nicholls said their goal was to not only finish the race but also improve on their previous times.
"It's not about winning the race for us. It's about being together, being a team and putting what we practiced into action," she told CBC Radio's In Town and Out.
Members of Ausome Ottawa's dragon boat team practice ahead of the city's annual dragon boat festival, held in June 2022 for the first time in three years due to the COVID-19 pandemic. (Giacomo Panico/CBC)
'Go big or go home'
"In our house, it's go big or go home," said Tori Hammond, whose son Finn helps paddle the boat.
"Otherwise, he'll be one of those kids that we never know how far he can go. We never know what challenges he wants to do."
Logan Ryan, who sits at the dragon boat's front, said he feels like an important part of the team. With his mother Nina sitting next to him, the two help set the pace for those behind them.
While some of Logan's classmates may feel frustrated he can't play other sports at the same level, Ausome Ottawa has created an environment, Nina said, where her son quickly picked up the skills to race on the water.
"I feel proud. Like I can do things. Like I can accomplish things," Logan said.
"They have a knack for teaching kids on the spectrum," Nina added. "I'm super proud of him."
There are ten times more asteroids than astronomers thought according to new data from a space telescope.
The findings come from a huge data release earlier this month from the European Space Agency’s Gaia space telescope, which was launched in 2013 and since then has been gradually creating an ever more detailed 3D map of our Milky Way galaxy.
The so-called “DR3” dataset includes more than 150,000 objects in the solar system objects, most of them asteroids—though also some moons.
“Based on Gaia DR3, Finnish researchers will change the conception of asteroids in our solar system,” said Karri Muinonen, Academy Professor at the University of Helsinki, Finland, which was involved in the new data release.
It’s thought that the new data will enormously help astronomers in calculating accurate orbits for asteroids. That’s because Gaia data adds-in the physical properties of asteroids. Rather than just seeing them as a point of light, its astrometry —precise measurements of the positions and movements—adds data on its size, shape, rotation and surface light scattering properties.
Something the Gaia DR3 data release has also revealed is the color of about 60,000 asteroids, something that was only known for a handful of asteroids beforehand. That’s going to help astronomers determine what they’re made of, which tells a story about where it comes from—and effectively the evolution of the whole Solar System.
The Gaia DR3 data release on June 13, 2022 was a big moment for astronomy that’s not gotten the media coverage it deserves. About 50 scientific articles were published from ground-breaking new data from Gaia on the chemical compositions, temperatures, colors, masses, brightnesses, ages and radial velocities (”wobbles”) of stars.
As well as uncovering many more asteroids than were previously thought to exist, DR3 contains the largest ever binary star catalog for the Milky Way as well as millions of galaxies and quasars beyond our Milky Way.
Gaia launched atop a Soyuz-Fregat rocket on December 19, 2013 from Europe’s spaceport in French Guina and has been observing from the same Lagrange L2-point where the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) resides. About a million miles/1.6 million kilometers from Earth, it’s at this precise point in space the spacecraft is in gravitational equilibrium in the Earth-Moon-Sun system.
Revolving one every six hours, Gaia observes the stars in vast circles. It studies the cosmos using two optical telescopes and three science instruments, which allow it to measure objects’ positions, how fast they’re moving and what they look like.
So far it’s collected new and/or more detailed data on almost two billion objects in our galaxy and the surrounding cosmos. It’s expected to continue observing through 2025.
A gunman opened fire in Oslo's nightlife district early Saturday, killing two people and leaving more than 20 wounded in what the Norwegian security service called an "Islamist terror act" during the capital's annual LGBTQ Pride festival.
Investigators said the suspect, identified as a 42-year-old Norwegian citizen originally from Iran, was arrested after opening fire at three locations in downtown Oslo.
Police said two men, one in his 50s and and the other in his 60s, died in the shootings. Ten people were treated for serious injuries, but none of them was believed to be in life-threatening condition. Eleven others had minor injuries.
The Norwegian Police Security Service raised its terror alert level from "moderate" to "extraordinary" — the highest level — after the attack, which sent panicked revellers fleeing into the streets or trying to hide from the gunman.
The service's acting chief, Roger Berg, called the attack an "extreme Islamist terror act" and said the suspect had a "long history of violence and threats," as well as mental health issues.
People stand at a memorial site for victims of Saturday's shooting, carried out in central Oslo during the Norwegian capital's annual LGBTQ Pride festival. (Sergei Grits/The Associated Press)
Berg said the agency, known by its Norwegian acronym PST, first became aware of the suspect in 2015 and later grew concerned he had become radicalized and was part of an unspecified Islamist network.
The suspect's defence lawyer, John Christian Elden, said his client "hasn't denied" carrying out the attack, but he cautioned against speculating on the motive.
"He has not given any reason. It is too early to conclude whether this is hate crime or terrorism," Elden said in an email to The Associated Press.
Upon the advice of police, organizers cancelled a Pride parade that was set for Saturday as the highlight of a weeklong festival. Scores of people marched through the capital anyway, waving rainbow flags.
Police lawyer Christian Hatlo said it was too early to say whether the gunman specifically targeted members of the LGBTQ community.
"We have to look closer at that, we don't know yet," he said.
Police examine the restaurant whose windows were shattered during the shooting. (Rodrigo Freitas/Getty Images)
Police said civilians assisted them in detaining the man in custody, who was being held on suspicion of murder, attempted murder and terrorism, based on the number of people targeted at multiple locations.
Investigators seized two weapons after the attack: a handgun and an automatic weapon. Hatlo described both as "not modern" but did not give details.
Not far from Oslo's cathedral, crime-scene tape cordoned off the bars where the shootings took place, including the London Pub, which is popular with the city's LGBTQ community.
Crowds gathered outside and dropped off cards and flowers at impromptu memorials.
People pay their respects near the scene of the shooting in central Oslo on Saturday. (Terje Pedersen/NTB Scanpix/The Associated Press)
Martin Ebbestad, 29, had walked by earlier, seen the memorials and returned with flowers.
London Pub "is our go-to place. My boyfriend left 20 minutes before [it happened]. He was sitting outside in the smoking area," Ebbestad said. "We know this place so well. It doesn't feel unsafe, but it does feel very close."
Norwegian television channel TV2 showed footage of people running down Oslo streets in panic as shots rang out in the background. Olav Roenneberg, a journalist from Norwegian public broadcaster NRK, said he witnessed the shooting.
"I saw a man arrive at the site with a bag. He picked up a weapon and started shooting," Roenneberg told NRK. "First I thought it was an air gun. Then the glass of the bar next door was shattered, and I understood I had to run for cover."
'A cruel and deeply shocking attack'
Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere called the shooting a "cruel and deeply shocking attack on innocent people."
He said while the motive was unclear, the shooting had caused fear and grief in the LGBTQ community.
"We all stand by you," Gahr Stoere wrote on Facebook.
People take part in a protest march in Oslo after two people were killed and at least 20 were injured when a man opened fire early Saturday morning near a popular LGBTQ club in the city's downtown, hours before the now-cancelled annual Oslo Pride parade. (Rodrigo Freitas/Getty Images)
Christian Bredeli, who was at the London Pub, told Norwegian newspaper VG that he hid on the fourth floor with a group of about 10 people until he was told it was safe to come out.
"Many were fearing for their lives," he said. "On our way out, we saw several injured people, so we understood that something serious had happened."
Desta G. Selassie, a co-owner of the London Pub, told The Associated Press that employees who witnessed the shooting were in shock and receiving psychological counselling.
Police said the suspect had a criminal record that included a narcotics offence and a weapons offence for carrying a knife.
PST said it spoke to him in May of this year "because he had shown a certain interest in statements that were interpreted as insults to Islam."
"In these conversations, it was assessed that he had no intention of violence, but PST is aware that he has had challenges related to mental health," the agency said in a statement.
WATCH | Anti-LGBTQ threats hang over North American Pride celebrations:
Anti-LGBTQ threats hang over Pride celebrations
1 day ago
Duration 4:47
Pride month is underway, but a recent string of violent threats and extremist confrontations are hanging over this year’s celebrations. CBC’s Jayme Poisson looks at what’s fuelling the anti-LGBTQ rhetoric and talks to drag performer Tynomi Banks.
Parade cancelled
Organizers of Oslo Pride cancelled the parade and other scheduled events, and encouraged "people all over Norway to show solidarity" in their homes, neighbourhoods and on social media instead.
"We'll be back later, proud, visible, but right now it's not the time for that," Inge Alexander Gjestvang, leader of FRI, a Norwegian organization for sexual and gender diversity, told TV2.
Norway's King Harald V said he and the royal family were devastated by the attack.
Security forces stand at the site where several people were injured during a shooting outside the London Pub in central Oslo early Saturday. (Javad Parsa/NTB/Reuters)
"We must stand together and defend our values: freedom, diversity and respect for each other. We must continue to stand up for all people to feel safe," the monarch said.
Norway has a relatively low crime rate but has experienced a series of lone-wolf attacks in recent decades, including one of the worst mass shootings in Europe. In 2011, a right-wing extremist killed 69 people on the island of Utoya after setting off a bomb in Oslo that left eight dead.
Former children's services minister Rebecca Schulz is running to become the leader of the United Conservative Party.Photo by Ian Kucerak /Postmedia, file
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UCP leadership hopeful Rebecca Schulz says she would consider boosting education funding if elected premier.
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In an interview Saturday with Postmedia, Schulz said she would commit to more educational assistants in K-12 classrooms, and more mental health support programs for students in schools.
“I really feel strongly that we need to do some things differently in education,” she said, adding she would “look at” an increased budget line although she didn’t offer any specific dollar figures.
“We have to make sure that there is accountability, but then we also have to make sure that there is funding to address some of the needs in the classroom,” she said.
Schulz said her platform would look at pilot programs offering wraparound youth mental health supports, “recognizing that schools are at the hub of the community.”
Her proposals would follow on the recommendations of the UCP government’s Child and Youth Well-Being review, which gathered information over about two months in mid-2021 to determine how the COVID-19 pandemic has affected children and youth. The report noted that health and mental health professionals reported “increased stress, anxiety, grief, depression, eating disorders, self-harm, suicide and suicidal ideation, and substance misuse among children and youth.”
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The provincial government has said it’s taking several new steps in response to the panel’s 10 broad recommendations, including expanding “prevention and early intervention supports” like virtual counselling and in-school supports.
Alberta is set to be flush with cash from high oil and gas prices, and could see at least a $10 billion surplus. When asked what she would do with that extra money, Schulz focused on saving and paying down debt, especially when interest rates are high and the province is paying more to service that debt.
“We have to have a practical plan to pay that off, and I will have that in my platform,” she said. However, with affordability issues top of mind, Schulz said she would be looking for ways to support Albertans.
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Fellow leadership candidates Rajan Sawhney and Leela Aheer have promised to re-index Assured Income for the Severely Handicapped (AISH) payments to inflation. Schulz said Saturday she would reconsider it.
“This is something that is important, especially at a time right now when costs are going up, and if it makes sense, I’ll do it,” she said.
When asked if she would switch gears or carry on with the UCP’s plan to revamp public health care, Schulz said private health-care providers have long operated in the province and most Albertans just want to see shorter wait times, especially for surgery. She acknowledged Albertans want to know they have local family doctors and paramedics, but pointed to fixing processes and red tape in the health-care system.
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“I do believe that frontline workers have the answers to many of those questions.”
The UCP had been working to save $2 billion in doctor pay after it came into office in 2020, but Schulz said now, the government needs to repair relationships with doctors, and doctors understand a need to curb growth in compensation.
When asked if she would continue funding the Canadian Energy Centre, known as the war room, Schulz said the province has to keep fighting for its energy sector and telling its story.
“I’m not going to commit to ending the war room.”
Schulz worked for three years under Saskatchewan premier Brad Wall, and said during that time she learned how important good communication is.
“You can have a government that is fiscally conservative and wholly committed to economic growth, but also be compassionate and show common sense when making decisions and be able to communicate those decisions well,” said Schulz.
Thirty-three countries have reported 920 probable cases of severe acute hepatitis in children so far, a jump of 270 from May, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Friday.
The WHO said that the European Region accounted for half the probable cases, including 267 from the United Kingdom, while a third of the probable cases were from the United States.
Health authorities globally have been investigating the mysterious rise in severe cases of hepatitis – or liver inflammation – in young children. The outbreak was first reported in April in Britain and has since then hit dozens of other countries.
U.S. health officials say infection with adenovirus, a common childhood virus, is the leading hypothesis for the cases.
The latest WHO data was as of June 22 and excluded four countries with reported cases yet to be classified.
Of the 422 cases in which gender and age-related information is available, close to half occurred in males, with most of them under 6 years of age, according to the report.
The WHO said 45 children with acute hepatitis have required liver transplants, and there have been 18 deaths, most of them occurring in the Americas region.
(Reporting by Amruta Khandekar; Editing by Aditya Soni)
The U.S. Supreme Court shocked many people Friday morning by overturning Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 decision that legalized abortion across that country. It's become up to each state to decide whether or not to ban medical or surgical abortions.
Although this doesn't impact Canadian women directly, it does embolden anti-choice groups and sentiments, worries Roz Gunn, director of communications and Advocacy for YWCA Cambridge
“I think they are going to take this as a signal that their notions of rights and reproductive rights are true.”
"It has ripple effects, I don’t see it playing out in policy in Canada but I see it influencing prevailing narratives and emboldening anti-choice advocates or groups here in Canada," says Gunn.
"I do worry were going to see a resurgence of those groups, at our clinics and at our health care centres.”
The news that came out Friday upset the team at YWCA Cambridge who Gunn said work hard to fight for equal rights and help women with their sexual health in Cambridge.
“It’s not necessarily going to mean abortions aren’t going to happen, it means unsafe abortions are going to happen and that’s the scariest thing."
YWCA Cambridge is hoping not to see any more anti-choice protesters at its doorsteps but Gunn things it will start happening more now that Roe v. Wade was overturned.
In a statement provided to CambridgeToday from the Right to Life Cambridge group's spokesperson, Camilla Gunnarson, they stated they were thrilled with the decision made.
"We hope the effects of this momentous decision trickle into Canada in which our nation will one day recognize the harm abortion has done to women and society, and thus restore legal protection to the preborn child in the womb. We work toward a future where every woman has the support and resources she needs to bring her child to life. Women deserve better than abortion."
Gunn hopes the news coming out today will generate collective action and open a broader conversation in Canada about equal access to abortion care.
“It’s beyond time we treat abortion like healthcare because that's what it is, abortions are healthcare and it’s just infuriating to see these types of decisions and see rights clawed back,” said executive director of SHORE Centre, TK Pritchard.
The SHORE Centre helps not only women in Waterloo Region but women across the province get access to sexual healthcare and help them when their pregnant.
“The news is not unexpected but its still devastating. This is such a big blow to abortion access, not just in the states but beyond that. I think it’s really difficult news to grapple with and its definitely having an impact on our entire team today.”
In May, Pritchard spoke about the barriers still remaining in Canada for abortion access. They mentioned that it can be hard for people in smaller communities to find care in Canada, often having to travel long distances.
In Canada, many women get sent to the US for later term pregnancy abortion care and access. This decision changes the ability for those women to access care as well, as the states that do keep abortion access will start to have longer wait times, making it more challenging as it is a time sensitive issue, added Pritchard.
“It’s a really common misconception that abortion is easily accessible in Canada but the reality is a lot of folks don’t have access to them.
"People travel quite far so the logistics can be really difficult as well as the stigma and anti-choice beliefs.”
Pritchard and others at the SHORE Centre worry the news will embolden local anti-choice groups, like Right to Life Cambridge, creating more stigma and limiting access by validating conversations about anti-choice sentiments.
“I know our partners across the country and definitely our partners in the US there has been a rise of anti-choice sentiments in their community.”
“We really need to focus on increasing access and now were likely going to be focused on responding to these pieces,” added Pritchard.
Raise your voices in rage. In solidarity. Be infuriated that anyone believes they can regulate and restrict our bodies. Our choices. We’re here with you in anger. In grief. In the knowledge that we will never stop fighting.
The SHORE Centre is planning a rally for next Wednesday to support women and equal abortion access across the country while protesting against the recent decision that overturned women's rights in the US Friday.
Families Minister Karina Gould, the minister responsible for passport services, said Thursday the government is adding more staff on the ground to help triage hours-long lineups at many passport offices as tens of thousands of people look to get their hands on travel documents.
The strategy shift comes as policy experts, and the government's Conservative critics, say the situation should never have been allowed to get so dire when it was obvious to many that there'd be a strong interest in travel as the pandemic receded.
Gould said, after reports of chaos at some passport offices in the Montreal area this week, Service Canada is deploying managers to walk the lineups that have popped up at some offices.
These managers will speak to would-be travellers about their applications before they get to a customer service agent — a system that will help staff identify people who are most in need of a passport.
People who require a passport for travel in the next 12, 24 and 36 hours will get priority service while others will be told to come back at another time, Gould said.
WATCH: Anger boils over as passport applicants wait days in line:
Anger boils over as passport applicants wait days in line
1 day ago
Duration 2:16
Long lines persist at passport offices across the country with desperate applicants waiting days in line. Montreal improved the situation slightly by handing out tickets for appointments, but the prime minister called the backlog 'unacceptable.'
The minister said, after the first day it was in place in Montreal, the process "didn't go as smoothly, quite frankly, as we had hoped, but today we're seeing much better progress."
While Gould reported "progress," the government website that tracks wait times was warning people to expect delays of at least six hours at busy sites like Montreal's Guy-Favreau complex and Ottawa's only passport office on Meadowlands Drive.
The minister said a similar process is being rolled out in Toronto Thursday and Vancouver-area offices will also have managers triaging passport applicants as of Monday.
People camp out overnight in line outside a Service Canada passport office, in Vancouver, on Wednesday, June 22, 2022. (Darryl Dyck/Canadian Press)
Gould also said more passports will be printed in bulk at the Gatineau, Que. processing centre near Ottawa and ferried to other locations, which will take some of the stress off of smaller passport offices that don't have large industrial printers to churn out hundreds of passports each day.
"We have received a large volume of passports. That doesn't make the situation acceptable," Gould said. "Canadians should never have to experience this."
Bureaucrats warned government about passport onslaught
Andrew Griffith is a former director general with Citizenship and Immigration Canada, and a former top official at Service Canada and the Privy Council Office.
In an interview with CBC News, Griffith said the government should never have allowed the situation to get to this point.
In Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada's 2022-23 department plan, bureaucrats told the government there would almost certainly be a surge in passport applications as COVID-related travel restrictions were relaxed, Griffith said, and yet not enough was done to prepare passport offices for the onslaught of applicants.
In that department plan, which Griffith shared with CBC News, internal experts advised the government that "forecasts predict that a recovery to pre-COVID-19 demand will begin in spring of 2022, and that demand for passports will continue to increase over the next three years."
"This growth will be due in part to applications being delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic, and an anticipated surge related to the renewal of the first wave of passports issued with a 10-year validity period," the departmental plan reads.
People wait outside in line outside a Services Canada Passport office in Surrey, British Columbia on Tuesday, May 24, 2022. (Ben Nelms/CBC)
Griffith said the passport situation is a clear instance of the government "neglecting its core responsibilities and not planning or preparing properly."
"It's very clear that the policy folks were aware that there would be an increase but it wasn't connected to the operations side to make sure they were putting adequate preparations in place. It's one of those unfortunate examples of where the government sort of tends to over promise and under deliver," he said.
Speaking to CBC Radio's The House in an interview that will air Saturday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau defended the government's record on the passport issue but vowed to do more to address an "unacceptable" situation.
Trudeau said the government did hire 600 more passport workers in January to support the existing workforce and it's looking to add more in the coming weeks to clear mounting backlogs.
Griffith said subjecting thousands of Canadians to hours-long lineups risks undermining faith in government institutions. Canadians expect a certain level of service from the federal government and, when it fails to deliver, there's an erosion of trust, he said.
"If they can't get service in a timely manner, people become disillusioned. People are understandably frustrated about these things. I think it's a really serious issue," Griffith said.
'This is a waiting nation'
Conservative leadership candidate Pierre Poilievre said Thursday, in a video posted to his social media channels, that Canadians deserve better than what has transpired at passport offices in recent weeks.
Poilievre is seen walking the lines that have formed at Ottawa's passport office in the video, speaking to applicants who have camped out since 3 a.m. to get to an agent.
"What's the deal folks? Well, this is a waiting nation. We are asked to wait for everything as sleepy bureaucrats and government gatekeepers stand in the way of you getting the basic services to which you are entitled — one of them is a passport," Poilievre said.
"You see what's happening here? The government is doing a lot of things poorly rather than a few things well."
