Recently tagged Hurricane Igor
O Danny, bye: Williams retirement tops audience picks for top 2010 stories
About two weeks ago, we asked our readers to pick the most significant stories of the last 12 months.
In the end, it came down to Danny and Igor. By a narrow margin, readers favoured Danny Williams’s retirement as premier as the top story of the year, just ahead of Hurricane Igor, the Category One storm that caused tens of millions of dollars of damage in September.
Readers had more to say, of course. We put together a list of three dozen stories that kept our newsroom busy during the year, and then created an online survey that allowed the audience to pick their top choices. It’s far from a scientific bit of research, but it sheds some light on what people think as the year comes to a close.
In all, 1,025 people (or, more precisely, people at that many IP addresses) took part in the survey. We allowed people to vote for as many choices as they like, once a day, although most voted just once. Together, readers cast 6,436 votes.
Here’s the list, in declining order of votes, with the number of votes cast and the percentage of the total that that represents:
- Danny Williams retires as premier, returns to private life 914 14.2%
- Hurricane Igor strikes eastern Newfoundland, destroying roads and bridges 895 13.91%
- Lower Churchill deal struck between Nalcor and Nova Scotia’s Emera 559 8.69%
- Kathy Dunderdale sworn in as first female premier 361 5.61%
- Doctors campaign for new contract with government; some specialists tender resignations 241 3.74%
- Ann Marie Shirran murder case 238 3.7%
- U.S. hunter Mary Beth Harshbarger found not guilty in the shooting death of her husband 227 3.53%
- Bay Bulls resident engages in standoff with RCMP 226 3.51%
- Danny Williams has heart surgery in the U.S., sparking a debate on medicare 215 3.34%
- Offshore helicopter safety inquiry recommends overhaul of CNLOPB, new agency to protect oil workers 189 2.94%
- Curbside recycling finally starts in St. John’s 172 2.67%
- Steeple mysteriously cut down in March at Anglican church in St. Philip’s 166 2.58%
- Metrobus strike strands thousands of St. John’s commuters 163 2.53%
- Twillingate tragedy: two children, two men drown when a pleasure cruise goes awry 154 2.39%
- Air ambulance move from St. Anthony to Happy Valley-Goose Bay sparks outrage on Northern Peninsula 131 2.04%
- Yvonne Jones, leader of the Liberal Opposition, steps aside to fight breast cancer 126 1.96%
- Three Happy Valley-Goose Bay college students drown in Churchill River in May, days before their graduation 123 1.91%
- Purity Factories locks out workforce; supplies of hard tack and other traditional foods run out 117 1.82%
- Robert Croke of Torbay among oil workers kidnapped, released in Nigeria 114 1.77%
- Vale strike in Labrador, which started in August 2009, prompts industrial inquiry 104 1.62%
- Marine Atlantic booking system infuriates independent truckers 90 1.4%
- Sikorsky, the manufacturer of the chopper in the Cougar 491 crash, settles with families 90 1.4%
- Dianne Whalen, municipal affairs minister, dies of cancer 85 1.32%
- Orcas attacking minke whales become a viral-video sensation 84 1.31%
- UFO claimed to have been seen over skies of Harbour Mille 81 1.26%
- Razorback: Large drug bust made in January 76 1.18%
- Burin Peninsula support workers settle 13-month-long strike 75 1.17%
- Samantha Goodyear’s family launches a frantic search after she goes missing from her St. John’s apartment 71 1.1%
- Cyclosporine dosing errors spark concern at Eastern Health 59 0.92%
- Fortis proposes but later withdraws plan for St. John’s office towers 59 0.92%
- Chevron Canada angers environmentalists with a deepwater drill in the Orphan Basin 51 0.79%
- Prison break in Stephenville in September puts new focus on security lapses in corrections system 47 0.73%
- Natuashish residents vote in March to keep alcohol ban 44 0.68%
- Plane crashes outside Cartwright in May, killing 2 36 0.56%
- Murder suspected as body of Halifax resident Daniel Borden found on road outside Branch 30 0.47%
- Jason English convicted for biting off part of a bartender’s ear in George Street bar brawl 23 0.36%
Tags: Danny Williams, Hurricane Igor, News
Keep up with the Hurricane Igor concert, via Twitter
We Stand On Guard is the benefit concert taking place Tuesday evening at Mile One Centre in downtown St. John’s. CBC Radio will be carrying much of the concert; you can listen online by clicking this link.
To help keep track of reaction, as well as other comments about Hurricane Igor, here’s a real-time feed using the #igornl hashtag that has been used since the start of that dramatic storm. (You can read and see much of our Igor coverage through this feature page.)
Meanwhile, if you wish to make a donation to the Canadian Red Cross’s targeted Igor relief fund, here’s the toll-free number: 1-866-800-8011.
Tags: Hurricane Igor, community, music
The Current goes to Random Island
On Monday morning, The Current brought some compelling stories from Random Island and what Hurricane Igor has left behind. Producer Lara O’Brien talks with Anna Maria Tremonti about the people she met, and the heartbreak she witnessed.
Take the time to listen.
Tags: Current, Hurricane Igor
Should taxpayers' dollars be used to house people displaced by Hurricane Igor?
Tags: Hurricane Igor, polls
Where the Igor recovery efforts are focused
As the military moves into gear, we thought it would be useful to reproduce these maps supplied to us today by the RCMP.
For both, you can get a larger view by clicking on the image.
Here’s a map of the recovery efforts on the Bonavista Peninsula, where the Canadian Forces are putting their initial focus.
Here’s the map of the Burin Peninsula, which has had numerous challenges of its own. This map, like the one above, shows status problems as of Sunday.
Tags: Hurricane Igor
The long, rocky and washed-out road to Bonavista
On Saturday, CBC reporter Carolyn Ray went to Bonavista. Ordinarily, that would not be a big deal, but in the wake of Hurricane Igor - where one stretch after another of the Bonavista Peninsula was attacked by the storm, it took some effort.
As she went along the peninsula, Carolyn emailed photos to us, some of which I tweeted on the @cbcnl account. I thought it would be useful to showcase what Carolyn saw along the way.
Princeton “The town’s only store was completely destroyed. Today about fifty volunteers gutted the place to help the owner. He cried and called it a miracle.”
Carolyn tapped this when she sent this picture: “What used to be a road in Princeton.”
After hitching a ride on an ATV, Carolyn came to the turnoff to Trinity. If you can recognize it.
Even walking on the road to Trinity was a challenge.
The road to Port Rexton was no better.
In Port Rexton, the usually pretty scenery was replaced by devastation.
Food supplies were quickly depleted in many communities in the days after the storm. Here’s what the store in Port Rexton had left on Saturday:
In Port Union, the town that William Coaker created with a new vision of the fishery in mind, the local fish plant appeared Saturday to be severely damaged.
While conducting interviews along the way for CBC Radio, Carolyn finally made it to Bonavista. She wrote this to us with this last photo: “Eight hours, a quad trip, countless detours and one hitched ride later, I’m here!!!”
Tags: Hurricane Igor
States of emergency as of Sept. 25
We received this graphic from the RCMP. It describes very well what the status is of the states of emergency that have been called in communities in eastern Newfoundland, in the wake of Hurricane Igor.
Tags: Hurricane Igor
Hurricane Igor hits the video circuit
Hurricane Igor is now far offshore, but its legacy is left behind … including plenty of videos shots by people all over.
Here’s a video that was seen at least 80,000 times in its first day on YouTube. It was shot in Beau Bois, on the Burin Peninsula, as a wicked gale and heavy rains blew away a road, pushing a barn right out in the water. Warning: There’s strong language in this one; hit mute if you have children nearby.
The Waterford River was just one waterway to swell up on Tuesday. On Waterford Bridge Road, it was hard to see any asphalt at all:
Here’s another view of the Waterford, mid-morning:
Further west, this video shows how streets looked like ponds in Mount Pearl:
This video is a compilation of photographs taken on the Southern Shore:
The road by Gander International Airport looked like a canal:
Even little creeks looked quite threatening after Igor started dropping hefty rainfalls. Here’s a narrated video from the east end of St. John’s:
Commentary: Getting through Igor, and back to normal
Tags: Commentary, Here & Now, Hurricane Igor, Pam Pardy Ghent