Biker convoy in the capital and Mattea does it again: In The News for Apr. 29

It’s expected hundreds of motorcyclists will arrive Friday ahead of a gathering Saturday morning. They plan to do a loop around the downtown, with a stop at the National War Memorial and a march to a rally on Parliament Hill.

Vehicles involved in the rally won’t be allowed into a zone that includes the war memorial and Parliament, police say, nor will they be allowed to stop along the route, but participants can walk through the area.

“We aren’t going to prevent protesters from attending the nation’s capital to have their voices heard,” said Ottawa’s interim police chief, Steve Bell, during a briefing Thursday.

Neil Sheard, one of the organizers who’s been involved in protests against COVID-19 restrictions, previously warned of a “free-for-all” if police don’t let the group bring their bikes onto the streets around Parliament Hill.

The protesters say they plan to leave the city on Sunday.

That’s led to criticism that they may disrupt a planned cycling fundraiser for the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario the same day. Rolling Thunder organizers have added a link to their website and are encouraging supporters to donate to CHEO.

Police have said there will be no tolerance for a long-term protest like the one that occupied the downtown for weeks in February, and any encampments will be dismantled.

The February occupation — which ended after the federal government invoked the Emergencies Act for the first time and hundreds of police officers moved in to disperse the crowds, making dozens of arrests — disrupted traffic, closed businesses and led to complaints of harassment, intimidation and hateful conduct.

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Also this …

MONTREAL — American vaccine maker Moderna is to announce today it plans to build its promised Canadian production facility in Montreal.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel, and Quebec Premier François Legault are scheduled to attend a Friday morning health care announcement in the city.

Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante confirmed the news Thursday, but Moderna would only say that it was still finalizing an agreement to construct a biomanufacturing facility in Canada.

Moderna signed an initial agreement with the federal government last August to bring such a factory to Canada, with the details on where to be worked out.

At the time Bancel said he believed it would allow Canada to be ready for the next virus.

The Canadian agreement includes both production and vaccine research components with the building to be completed by 2024.

Canada’s biomanufacturing industry has declined but what remains is centred in Quebec and the Greater Toronto Area. Both were in the running for this plant.

Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine is its first authorized product but it now has more than two dozen others in various stages of research, including mRNA vaccines for influenza and respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV.

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What we are watching in the U.S. …

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Thousands of firefighters continued to slow the advance of destructive wildfires in the southwestern U.S. but warned they were bracing for the return Friday of the same dangerous conditions that quickly spread the wind-fueled blazes a week ago.

At least 166 homes have been destroyed in one rural county in northeast New Mexico since the biggest fire currently burning in the U.S. started racing through small towns east and northeast of Santa Fe on April 22, the local sheriff said.

Winds gusting up to 80 kph were forecast Friday in the drought-stricken region. One expert said it’s a recipe for disaster on the wildlands where some timber has a fuel moisture drier than kiln-dried wood.

“It’s a very, very dangerous fire day tomorrow,” fire behavior specialist Stewart Turner said at a briefing Thursday night on the edge of the Santa Fe National Forest in Las Vegas, New Mexico.

A swath of the country stretching from Arizona to the Texas panhandle is expected to be hit the hardest by the return of the bad firefighting weather that has generated unusually hot and fast-moving fires for this time of year, forecasters warned.

Red flag warnings were in place Thursday for all of New Mexico and parts of Arizona, Nevada, Colorado, Texas, Oklahoma and Nebraska.

More than 3,000 firefighters were battling fires in Arizona and New Mexico on Thursday — about half of those in northeast New Mexico, where more than 484 square kilometers of mostly timber and brush has been charred.

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What we are watching in the rest of the world …

KYIV, Ukraine — The head of the United Nations said Ukraine has become “an epicenter of unbearable heartache and pain” — a description underscored a short time later by the first Russian strike on the capital since Moscow’s forces retreated weeks ago.

Russia pounded targets all over Ukraine on Thursday, including the attack on Kyiv that struck a residential high-rise and another building and wounded 10 people, including at least one who lost a leg, according to Ukraine’s emergency services.

The bombardment came barely an hour after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy held a news conference with U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who toured some of the destruction in and around Kyiv and condemned the attacks on civilians.

Meanwhile, explosions were reported across the country, in Polonne in the west, Chernihiv near the border with Belarus, and Fastiv, a large railway hub southwest of the capital. The mayor of Odesa, in southern Ukraine, said rockets were intercepted by air defenses.

Ukrainian authorities also reported intense Russian fire in the Donbas — the eastern industrial heartland that the Kremlin says is its main objective — and near Kharkiv, a northeastern city outside the Donbas that is seen as key to the offensive.

In the ruined southern port city of Mariupol, Ukrainian fighters holed up in the steel plant that represents the last pocket of resistance said concentrated bombing killed and wounded more people. And authorities warned that a lack of safe drinking water inside the city could lead to outbreaks of deadly diseases such as cholera and dysentery.

In Zaporizhzhia, a crucial way station for tens of thousands of Ukrainians fleeing Mariupol, an 11-year-old-boy was among at least three people wounded in a rocket attack that authorities said was the first to hit a residential area in the southern city since the war began.

Western officials say the Kremlin’s apparent goal is to take the Donbas by encircling and crushing Ukrainian forces from the north, south and east.

But so far, Russia’s troops and their allied separatist forces appear to have made only minor gains — a senior U.S. defense official described them as covering several kilometers a day — taking several small towns as they try to advance in relatively small groups against staunch Ukrainian resistance.

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On this day in 1867 …

Queen Victoria gave royal assent to the British North America Act. Canada became the first Dominion of the British Empire the following July 1st. In 1947, the British government amended the act to allow Canada to draft its own constitution, but it was not patriated until 1982.

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In entertainment …

TORONTO — Canadian “Jeopardy!” champ Mattea Roach extended an impressive win streak Thursday with her 18th consecutive triumph.

It allows the 23-year-old to face another pair of challengers Friday, when victory would move her up the ranking for top consecutive wins.

She currently has the eighth-longest win streak in the program’s history but one more puts her into a three-way tie with 2005’s David Madden and 2019’s Jason Zuffranieri.

On Thursday’s episode, Roach earned US$42,001, bringing her cumulative payout to US$438,183.

The win cements an exhilarating star turn by the affable Canuck in edge-of-your-seat play.

That has included a recent nail-biting episode in which Roach squeezed out a victory by just US$1 – a reminder that it takes far more than just trivia smarts to dominate the game, according to former Canadian contestants.

Roach’s 17th win Wednesday came down to some careful wagering in the final clue about Irish poet William Butler Yeats.

After Roach’s third-placed competitor got the clue wrong, her second-placed rival bet his entire $13,600 bounty and won – tying him with the Toronto-based law tutor.

Roach, who spent part of her childhood in Halifax, also answered correctly but only bet $1, vaulting her by the slimmest of margins while netting $27,201 on top of her previous winnings of $368,981.

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Also this …

NEW ORLEANS — Once silenced by the pandemic, the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival opens Friday for the first time in three years — a long awaited 2022 revival that holds echoes of 2006 when the annual celebration of music and culture went on even after Hurricane Katrina.

The two-weekend production draws tens of thousands to the city’s Fair Grounds Race Course, where as many as 80 musical acts perform daily on more than a dozen stages, complemented by art and craft exhibits and an array of booths featuring foods from Louisiana and beyond.

Lionel Richie and Death Cab for Cutie are among Friday’s draws. The Who headlines Saturday; the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Sunday. But the festival may be best known for showcasing a dizzying array of Louisiana musical talent, styles and genres — jazz, blues, Cajun, Zydeco and more.

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Did you see this?

TORONTO — The Toronto Raptors tried to look at the positives after their NBA post-season ended in blowout fashion.

A team that’s building for the future did well to earn the fifth seed in the Eastern Conference before falling to Philadelphia in the first round. The 76ers took the series in six games with an emphatic 132-97 win on Thursday night at Scotiabank Arena.

“I felt like we learned so much,” said Raptors forward Chris Boucher. “The fact that we made it to the playoffs and we were down 3-0 and fought all the way back, it really showed our character and the fight that we have.”

Joel Embiid led the Sixers with 33 points as Philadelphia’s 37-17 romp through the third quarter essentially put the game out of reach.

Toronto had eyes on evening the series at home and forcing a seventh game in Philadelphia. No NBA team has ever dropped the first three games of a best-of-seven series and come back to win.

The Raptors were feeling confident after earning a Game 4 win at home and taking Game 5 on the road. But after an even two quarters in Game 6, the 76ers started to pull away right after halftime and they never looked back.

Boucher led Toronto with 25 points and 10 rebounds. Pascal Siakam had 24 points.

The 76ers will face the Miami Heat in the second round. The Raptors will hold season-ending media availabilities on Friday.

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This report by The Canadian Press was first published Apr. 29, 2022

The Canadian Press

by Canadian Press

Biker convoy in the capital and Mattea does it again: In The News for Apr. 29

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