Australia braces for rare tropical cyclone Alfred

People are being told to “get out now” as Australia’s southeastern coast braces for a rare landfall of a tropical cyclone, churning towards Queensland and prompting warnings across two states.

Alfred, classified as a Category 1 system on Monday, is intensifying off Queensland’s coast and is expected to be one of the most destructive in the region in decades.

The cyclone is forecast to strengthen to a Category 2 system early morning on Tuesday, before making landfall between Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast late Thursday or early Friday.

If Alfred makes landfall as projected, it will be the first cyclone to directly impact Brisbane since Nancy in 1990.

Alfred is about 450km northeast of Brisbane, moving southwest at 20kmph, according to the Australian Bureau of Meteorology.

Communities from Sandy Cape south to Grafton, including Brisbane, Gold Coast, Sunshine Coast and Byron Bay, are in the watch zone and millions of people across Queensland and New South Wales are being urged to prepare for the worst.

While Queensland is in the cyclone’s path, New South Wales is expected to experience gale force winds over the next two days.

Alfred is bringing dangerous conditions to southeast Queensland and northern NSW. “We are expecting very heavy rainfall, particularly along the coast,” senior meteorologist Laura Buchan said. “Strong winds and large waves will also create hazardous surf conditions and we could see some coastal erosion.

Steven Bernasconi, manager of hazard preparedness at the Bureau of Meteorology, said the forecast is “unusual”. “We do not often have tropical cyclone watches and warnings in the NSW jurisdiction,” he said.

Forecasts indicate potential rainfall of 300-600mm, with some areas possibly receiving up to 700mm. Wind gusts are expected to exceed 120kmph, accompanied by large waves that may lead to coastal erosion and flooding.

Queensland premier David Crisafulli urged residents to “please be prepared” and ready “canned food and bottled water”. “It is important that people take the event seriously, they stay up to date with warnings,” he said.

“We’re dealing with a very heavily populated part of the state, a state that hasn’t seen a cyclone for many years, in fact, many decades, get this close to the coast.”

Authorities in flood-prone areas have issued evacuation warnings ahead of the cyclone’s arrival, particularly in low-lying areas.

Shane Chelepy, the state disaster coordinator, warned island communities east of Brisbane to leave now or “it will be too late”.

Authorities have suspended all CityCat and ferry services in Brisbane until further notice and people have been warned to avoid unnecessary travel.

Horror as woman’s body discovered dumped in suitcase on road

A woman’s body was discovered stuffed in a suitcase near a bus stand in the northern Indian state of Haryana, prompting shock and outrage.

Police arrested a man on suspicion of murder two days after the body of Himani Narwal, 23, was found on the Rohtak-Delhi highway on 1 March.

“We have arrested one accused and further investigations are on,” a police official said.

“The accused belonged to a village in Jhajjar district and was known to the deceased,” Hindustan Times quoting a senior police official as saying, referring to a region in Haryana.

“We will produce the man before the court and seek his remand to ascertain the reasons behind the gruesome murder. Prima facie it seems that some grudge took place between the accused and Himani.”

The suspect, identified only as Sachin, was detained in neighbouring Delhi and allegedly confessed to the crime, India Today reported.

The accused, married with two children, had been in contact with Narwal for more than a year, senior police officer Krishna Kumar Rao said at a press conference on Monday.

He allegedly visited the woman’s home in Rohtak on 27 February and stayed overnight.

The next day, they got into a heated argument during which he tied her up with a piece of cloth and strangled her to death with a mobile phone charging cable, Mr Rao said.

Sachin removed Narwal’s jewellery and stuffed her body inside a suitcase he found in the house. Later that night, he took an autorickshaw to the Rohtak bus stand and boarded a bus to Sampla, where he disposed of the body, the police officer added.

According to India Today, the man was in a relationship with Narwal and accused her of blackmailing him. He was carrying Narwal’s cell phone when he was detained.

Rajneesh Kumar, a deputy superintendent of police leading the investigation, said the suitcase belonged to the victim’s family. “We are investigating all angles. We have found certain clues but cannot reveal them at this stage. We are also taking help from cyber and forensic experts, and examining CCTV camera footage,” Mr Kumar was quoted as saying by The Indian Express.

Scratches and bite marks found on Sachin’s hands indicated that Narwal fought back, the Indian news agency ANI reported. Investigators were also checking whether he had pawned the jewellery as a receipt indicating such a transaction was found on him.

Narwal, a law student, had actively participated in opposition leader Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo campaign and was widely recognised as a Congress party worker.

She was last seen on 27 February.

Her family, who live in Rohtak’s Vijay Nagar, refused to perform her last rites until the perpetrators were brought to justice. Her mother, Savita Rani, alleged foul play saying Narwal’s rapid rise in the Congress party could have made her enemies.

“It could be someone in the party who was jealous of her or someone else entirely,” Ms Rani claimed.

Former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, from the Congress party, demanded a fair investigation. “A culprit is a culprit, whether he is in the party or outside it. The law must take its course,” Mr Hooda said.

Senior Haryana minister Anil Vij of the Bharatiya Janata Party described Ms Rani’s allegations about internal political rivalry as “serious” and assured that police were thoroughly investigating all possible motives.

Congress party lawmaker Deepender Hooda called for stringent action against the perpetrator. “We demand exemplary punishment for whoever is guilty in this case,” he said.

The autopsy was conducted at the Pandit Bhagwat Dayal Sharma Post Graduate Institute of Medical Sciences in Rohtak, but the report was still to come.

Fate of 8 workers trapped in collapsed tunnel unknown after 10 days

Eight workers trapped inside a collapsed tunnel in the southern Indian state of Telangana since 22 February remained out of contact despite multiple agencies working to rescue them.

They were trapped when a tunnel section of the under-construction Srisailam Left Bank Canal in Nagarkurnool area collapsed.

There were 50 workers inside the tunnel when it collapsed but 42 escaped. The fate of the rest was still unknown 10 days later.

Telangana chief minister Revanth Reddy said on Sunday that the exact location of the workers remained unknown. He said the over five-metre-deep layer of mud inside the tunnel had made it difficult for rescue teams to determine their precise whereabouts.

Twelve agencies were reported to be involved in the rescue operation and specialists from both state and central governments were assisting them.

Attempts to clear away silt from where the trapped engineers and labourers had been detected earlier inside the collapsed tunnel were intensifying as additional personnel and equipment was being deployed, The New Indian Express reported.

An unnamed official told the paper on Sunday that a conveyor belt damaged by the collapse was expected to be repaired by Monday. Once operational, it would facilitate the removal of debris and sludge from the tunnel.

“The number of personnel and equipment at the identified locations is being increased,” he said, adding that the process of silt removal and dewatering was ongoing.

It was reported over the weekend that scientists from the National Geophysical Research Institute had used ground penetrating radar to detect the positions of four of the eight trapped workers, and that they were expected to be rescued by the evening of 2 March. But the chief minister clarified on Sunday that their exact locations remained uncertain.

The collapse of the “world’s longest irrigation tunnel” was triggered by a sudden inflow of water and soil, causing a section to cave in.

An unidentified expert quoted by The Indian Express said that “there was seepage of water from the hillocks above into the tunnel”, which caused “the mud to loosen and caused a mudslide”. They pointed out that mudslides were not common in tunnel construction. In this case, however, “the tunnel was being dug at a place that was prone to mudslides, and the drilling triggered it”.

Mr Reddy visited the site of the accident on Sunday and said the rescue was progressing but remained a complex operation. It could take another two to three days to locate the workers, he added.

“They are not able to come to a full understanding on where the humans and the machinery got stuck. They have a preliminary estimation, but not fully,” he said, referring to the rescuers.

The Hindu reported that the leaders of key rescue agencies had informed Mr Reddy that clearing debris from the final 20 metres of the tunnel was the most difficult and challenging part of the rescue operation.

As the left flank and roof of this section was still unstable, with heavy water seepage ongoing, rescuers were considering alternative tunnel routes from 13.45km inside to connect with a more stable section of the original path.

“Actually, the operation is going on in full swing. Approximately twelve agencies are working around the clock to find the victims,” VVN Prasanna Kumar, National Disaster Response Force commandant, was quoted as saying by ANI news agency on Monday. “Unfortunately, we have not been able to locate them so far.”

State lawmaker Payal Shankar assured that prime minister Narendra Modi was monitoring the situation and had provided all necessary assistance.

“PM Modi is in continuous contact with the state government and has sent all the help required,” she said. “The rescue operation is underway. We hope that the eight people trapped inside come out safely.”

The trapped workers were earlier identified as Manoj Kumar and Sri Niwas from Uttar Pradesh, Sunny Singh from Jammu and Kashmir, Gurpreet Singh from Punjab, and Sandeep Sahu, Jegta Xess, Santosh Sahu and Anuj Sahu from Jharkhand.

Accidents related to large infrastructure projects are not uncommon in India.

In 2023, a 17-day rescue operation saved 41 workers trapped in a partially collapsed Himalayan road tunnel in the northern state of Uttarakhand.

Dozens of workers pulled out alive after Himalayan snow avalanche

Eight shipping containers that withstood the force of a snow avalanche in the Himalayas ended up saving the lives of dozens of construction workers who were pulled out alive in the northern Indian state of Uttarakhand, officials said.

Eight workers died in the avalanche, while rescuers managed to save the remaining 46 Border Roads Organisation (BRO) workers, the Indian Army said. The avalanche struck Mana village in Chamoli district near the China border last week, burying the shipping containers the BRO workers were using as living quarters.

According to rescuers, the workers were found alive due to the eight steel containers being able to withstand the wrecking avalanche, despite being swallowed by the snow.

“These metal shelters saved most of them. They had just enough oxygen to hold on until we got them out,” a senior rescue official told The Times of India.

Rescue workers managed to pull out 50 of the trapped workers but four of them died later, the army said in a statement on Saturday.

The next day, the rescuers found the bodies of the remaining workers.

“All 54 persons have now been rescued or recovered. This marks the culmination of the Mana village rescue operation,” an army spokesperson said.

Jagbir Singh, a BRO officer from Amritsar, said he was sleeping in his container when the snowslide sent them tumbling several hundred metres down.

“The container we were in went rolling down. By the time we could figure out what had happened, I found a colleague had died and one of my legs was fractured. I also had an injury in the head. There were heaps of snow everywhere,” he told The New Indian Express.

Uttarakhand chief minister Pushkar Singh Dhami announced the conclusion of the operation. “It was a challenging task, but thanks to everyone, it has been a success,” he said.

Forty-four of the survivors were admitted to a military hospital in Joshimath, and were reported to be stable, and the other two were airlifted to the city of Rishikesh.

The survivors were taken from Mana to the pilgrim town of Joshimath, around 50 km away, by civil helicopters hired by the army, state broadcaster Doordarshan reported.

Many of the workers were migrant labourers engaged in widening a highway stretch from Mana, the last village on the Indian side, to the Mana Pass bordering Tibet.

The difficult weather forced authorities to bring in a drone-based “intelligent buried object detection system” from New Delhi to assist the search and rescue operation.

More than 200 personnel from various disaster management agencies, the local health department and the district administration were pressed into the rescue operation, as well as helicopters, sniffer dogs and thermal imaging technology.

Lalit Kumar Pandit, 28, a mechanic, said he was awakened by a huge jolt. Mr Pandit told News9 that he ran for his loader machine to carve a path in the snow but failed.

The mechanic, along with 22 other people, had to push forward for two hours through “snow and howling wind” until they reached the worker camp, located around 4km away.

The part of the Himalayas hit by the avalanche is ecologically sensitive and prone to avalanches and landslides. Experts have warned that major construction projects such as hydroelectric dams and new highways are increasing the risk of such calamities in the area.

In 2022, at least 27 mountaineers were killed in an avalanche in northern Uttarakhand and a deadly rock and ice avalanche the previous year had severely damaged two hydropower plants and left over 200 people dead.

Geologists say global warming is making the area’s frozen soil more unstable, leading to more landslides and avalanches.

Lithuanian rower rescued off Queensland coast

The Australian Navy rescued a Lithuanian rower caught in tropical cyclone Alfred during his solo venture crossing the Pacific Ocean.

Aurimas Mockus, a 44-year-old adventurer, was 740km off the coast of Mackay in Central Queensland when he got caught in the path of the category one cyclone with winds gusting at 130kmph.

The vessel was attempting to row 12,000km from San Diego to Brisbane when it sent out distress signals after running into trouble on Friday night.

The Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA) immediately initiated a search and rescue operation after receiving the emergency distress signal, the navy said.

The AMSA tasked the Cairns-based Challenger search and rescue aircraft to find the adventurer in the troubled water but was initially unsuccessful, with the vessel reporting heavy seas and 80kmph winds.

The weather conditions later eased but the Coral Sea was still within the category-two cyclone’s influence on Sunday, with winds up to 100kmph, Australian authorities said.

Mr Mockus was rescued by the Australian Navy ship HMAS Choules on Monday morning after two days, the AMSA spokesperson said. “The ship on its way back to Australian shores,” she added.

V Adm Justin Jones, chief of joint operations, in a statement said the sailor had been rescued and was “safely onboard HMAS Choules undergoing a medical assessment”.

Mr Mockus’s shore team on Sunday night confirmed the sailor was not injured. “According to the traveller, he has not suffered any serious injuries, is shovelling water from the boat and is asking for help as soon as possible,” the team said in a statement.

“Direct communication with the rescuers is maintained at all times.”

Mr Mockus had set off on his journey in October 2024 and was days away from reaching his goal after rowing 70 nautical miles per day. He was bracing the “maximum power” of the cyclone on Thursday, while attempting to join a short list of ocean rowers to make the Pacific crossing solo nonstop.

In 1983, Brit Peter Bird became the first person to achieve the feat, followed by John Beeden in 2015 and Australian Michelle Lee in 2023, Australian Associated Press reported.

Man has part of intestine removed after ‘childbirth simulation test’

A woman in China is reportedly facing a lawsuit for making her boyfriend undergo three hours of childbirth simulation that led to physical harm.

The man in Henan province had to be hospitalised and have part of his small intestine removed after undergoing the painful simulation, China Times reported.

The man had agreed to undergo the pain simulation test after his girlfriend and her mother insisted that he should experience a woman’s challenges before their engagement.

The man initially rejected the proposal but later reluctantly agreed to go to a medical centre where he was hooked up to electrodes that gave out electric currents to mimic the sensation of contractions, reports said. Several hospitals in China have been offering childbirth pain simulation experience for over a decade.

In a post on Chinese social media app Xiaohongshu or Red Note, the unidentified woman said the first 90 minutes involved manually increasing the level of pain, while for the rest of the session, the intensity of pain remained at the maximum level.

“My boyfriend started screaming and struggling at level 8, swearing and crying at level 10, and by the end, he was gasping for air. My sister and I kept wiping his sweat,” the woman wrote, according to South China Morning Post.

The man suffered from abdominal pain and started vomiting shortly after returning home. A week later, it was discovered that the simulation damaged a part of his small intestine, forcing him to undergo surgery.

The woman claimed she explained to her boyfriend that her family wanted him to understand the hardships of women and had no intention of hurting him. “I am willing to take full responsibility as long as he recovers,” she wrote.

Following the incident, the man’s mother cancelled the wedding and started legal action against the woman.

A lawyer reportedly said that if the injury assessment links the damage to the man’s body to the simulation, the woman could be financially liable as per Chinese law.

Her post on Red Note caused an uproar, with many criticising the woman and her family for forcing the man to undergo “absurd” three hours of pain simulation. “They should bear the consequences for doing such a reckless thing,” wrote one user. “They are making trouble for no reason,” said another person on social media.

Man whose plasma helped save lives of millions of babies has died

James Harrison, who helped save more than two million babies by donating blood over 1,100 times across six decades, has died at 88.

According to the Australian Red Cross Lifeblood, Harrison, also known as the “man with a golden arm”, had the “precious antibody in his blood” that was used to make a “lifesaving medication called Anti-D, given to mothers whose blood is at risk of attacking their unborn babies”.

Harrison died in his sleep at Peninsula Village Nursing Home on the NSW Central Coast on 17 February.

He began donating in 1954 at 18 and continued regularly until his retirement in 2018 at 81. According to Australian Red Cross Lifeblood, he has helped save the lives of more than 2.4 million Australian babies.

Harrison’s daughter, Tracey Mellowship, fondly remembered him as a generous soul with a wonderful sense of humour.

“James was a humanitarian at heart, but also very funny,” Ms Mellowship said.

“In his last years, he was immensely proud to become a great grandfather to two beautiful grandchildren, Trey and Addison.

“As an Anti-D recipient myself, he has left behind a family that may not have existed without his precious donations.”

She added: “He was also very proud to have saved so many lives, without any cost or pain. It made him happy to hear about the many families like ours, who existed because of his kindness.

“He always said it does not hurt, and the life you save could be your own.”

Harrison’s rare antibodies were crucial in developing Anti-D, the treatment that has protected millions of newborns from Rhesus disease (or Haemolytic Disease of the Foetus and Newborn) – a condition in which a pregnant woman’s blood attacks her unborn baby’s red blood cells, potentially leading to brain damage or even death.

It occurs when a mother has RhD-negative blood, while her baby inherits RhD-positive blood from the father. If the mother has been sensitised to RhD-positive blood – often during a previous pregnancy – her immune system may produce antibodies that attack the baby’s blood as a foreign threat.

“James was a pioneer of our Anti-D programme. More than 3 million doses of Anti-D containing James’ blood have been issued to Aussie mothers with a negative blood type since 1967,” Lifeblood said in a statement on their website.

“He has changed my world and I’m sure he’s done that for many other families, making him a very incredible human,” said Rebecca Ind, a recipient of Harrison’s blood donations during and after her pregnancy 12 years ago.

In 1999 Harrison was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia – one of the country’s most prestigious honours – for his extraordinary dedication to the Lifeblood and Anti-D programme. His kindness leaves a “remarkable legacy, and he has put the challenge out to the Australian community to beat it”, Lifeblood said in the statement.

“I hope it’s a record that somebody breaks, because it will mean they are dedicated to the cause,” Harrison said of his last donation at the age of 81.

“It becomes quite humbling when they say, ‘oh you’ve done this or you’ve done that or you’re a hero,’” Harrison said at the time. “It’s something I can do. It’s one of my talents, probably my only talent, is that I can be a blood donor.”

At 14, Harrison underwent major chest surgery and relied on the generosity of blood donors to survive. Determined to give back, he vowed to donate as soon as he was eligible – and at 18, he kept his promise, despite a fear of needles.

More than a decade later, doctors discovered that his blood contained a rare antibody essential for producing Anti-D injections. Committed to helping others, Harrison willingly switched to plasma donation, ensuring his contributions could save as many lives as possible.

“James was a remarkable, stoically kind, and generous person who was committed to a lifetime of giving and he captured the hearts of many people around the world,” Lifeblood chief executive officer Stephen Cornelissen was quoted as saying by Australia’s Nine News.

“It was James’ belief that his donations were no more important than any other donors’, and that everyone can be special in the same way that he was.

“James extended his arm to help others and babies he would never know a remarkable 1173 times and expected nothing in return.”

Robyn Barlow, coordinator of Australia’s Rh Program – designed to prevent Haemolytic Disease of the Foetus and Newborn (HDFN) – said she had been friends with Harrison for nearly 60 years after first recruiting him as a donor.

“He made my job very easy because he was so keen to donate all the time,” Barlow told 7NEWS.com.au.

“I never had to worry about him – I never had to call and say: ‘when you’re coming’, nothing like that, he was there standing in front of me.”

In an interview with NPR in 2015, Harrison said: “I was always looking forward to donating, right from the operation, because I don’t know how many people it took to save my life.”

Several reports pointed out that doctors were not entirely sure why and how Harrison developed this rare blood antibody, though they suspect it may be linked to the transfusions he received at 14 after his surgery.

“Every batch of Anti-D that has ever been made in Australia has come from James’ blood,” Jemma Falkenmire, of the Australian Red Cross Lifeblood (then known as Australian Red Cross Blood Service), told CNN in 2015. “And more than 17 per cent of women in Australia are at risk, so James has helped save a lot of lives.”

Fewer than 200 people in Australia donate Anti-D, yet their contributions help an estimated 45,000 mothers and babies each year, according to the Australian Red Cross Lifeblood.

Scientists from WEHI (Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research) in Melbourne, in collaboration with Lifeblood, are working on a project called “James in a Jar” to grow the Anti-D antibody in the lab. Using blood and immune cells from Harrison and other donors, the team has successfully recreated and cultivated the antibody, according to Lifeblood.

This breakthrough could one day help prevent Haemolytic Disease of the Foetus and Newborn, benefiting pregnant women not just in Australia but worldwide, the statement said.

Two men flogged in Indonesia after being found guilty of gay sex

A Shariah court in Indonesia’s Aceh province sentenced two men to public caning after neighbourhood vigilantes caught them having gay sex in a rented room.

The court found them guilty and sentenced them to 85 and 80 lashes, with the older man receiving a harsher punishment for allegedly facilitating the act.

Dozens of people watched as the men, aged 24 and 18, were publicly caned in Banda Aceh’s Bustanussalatin city park for engaging in gay sex. The punishment, carried out by five enforcers in robes and hoods, involved lashes across their backs with breaks for water and medical treatment after 20 strokes, media reports said.

This was the fourth time Aceh had flogged people for homosexuality since implementing Shariah law in 2006 under a peace deal to end a separatist rebellion.

The two college students were arrested last November after neighbours, suspected them of being gay, broke into their rented room and found them naked and hugging.

An Islamic Shariah court sentenced them to 85 and 80 lashes, but they received 82 and 77 strokes after a remission for time served. One of the men was so weak after the final lash he reportedly had to be carried.

Two other individuals were sentenced to 34 and 8 lashes, respectively, for gambling.

Rights groups condemned the punishments.

The “intimidation, discrimination and abuses” against LGBTQIA+ people in Aceh was “like a bottomless well”, Andreas Harsono, Indonesia researcher at Human Rights Watch was quoted as saying by AFP.

“The Aceh government should learn from these mistakes and review their Islamic criminal code.”

Amnesty International called the punishment a “horrifying act of discrimination” against the men.

“Intimate sexual relations between consenting adults should never be criminalised, and no one should be punished because of their real or perceived sexual orientation,” Amnesty’s deputy regional director Montse Ferrer said.

Additional reporting by agencies.