B.C. First Nation challenges dredging plan to accommodate larger tankers in Vancouver

NORTH VANCOUVER - A British Columbia First Nation says it has launched a legal challenge against a plan by the Vancouver Fraser Port Authority to dredge Burrard Inlet to make room for oil tankers with larger loads to operate.

In a release, the Tsleil-Waututh Nation says it has filed for a judicial review, seeking to overturn the permits issued by the port authority to allow for the dredging to take place.

The plan calls for the dredging along northern and southern edges of the navigation channel in Vancouver's Burrard Inlet underneath the Second Narrows bridge, starting in September.

The Tsleil-Waututh Nation says while it understands the project's importance for Canada's trade needs, the approval process was "rushed" and did not address any of its concerns about the impacts of the operation — including the "risks of more fully laden oil tankers traversing the inlet."

City of Winkler hit by cyberattack

Winkler has become the latest Manitoba municipality to grapple with cybersecurity incidents.

On Tuesday morning, the city’s cybersecurity protection systems detected an incident, prompting officials to isolate affected systems and take certain municipal systems and services offline as a precaution while the situation is assessed.

Phone and payment systems are unavailable as the city, about 115 kilometres southwest of Winnipeg, works to resolve the issue.

“We’re fortunate that we have a very good IT team, and security has always been a significant investment for us,” Winkler Mayor Henry Siemens said. “So we were maybe better prepared than others potentially would have been because of the strength of our staff and the strength of our security protocols.”

Keeping cool: How Meta plans to cut down on water use at its Alberta data centre

CALGARY - A Meta Platforms Inc. executive garnered applause at a news conference this week after he boasted that a gargantuan data centre planned for north of Edmonton would use less water annually than a typical Alberta golf course.

The tech behemoth was announcing a $13-billion-plus investment in a complex the size of 33 Canadian Football League fields. It will be powered by a new natural gas plant that could eventually produce more electricity than what the City of Edmonton uses.

The data centre in Sturgeon County, like other hyperscale proposals in Canada, is to use what's known as a closed-loop cooling system to keep servers from overheating. That differs from an evaporative cooling system, which requires enormous amounts of cool water that is not reused.

Gary Demasi, vice-president of data centre strategy and development at Meta, told a news conference Wednesday that no water will be needed for regular cooling operations.

Canada objects to Olympics loosening restrictions on Russia athletes amid Ukraine war

OTTAWA - Canada objected on Thursday to the International Olympic Committee loosening its suspension on Russian athletes.

The move, announced Tuesday, would apply to the 2028 games in Los Angeles, opening the door for Russian athletes to compete, but the IOC says it will decide later if they could do it with the Russian flag and anthem.

"I am appalled by the IOC’s decision," wrote Secretary of State for sport Adam van Koeverden, a former Olympian.

"The countries of Russia and Belarus should not be represented in international sports competitions while Russia's illegal and unjustifiable full-scale invasion against Ukraine continues," he wrote.

Court rules confidentiality clause for air travel complaints violates Charter

An Ontario Superior Court judge has struck down a rule that blocks travellers from sharing the outcome of passenger complaints made to the country’s transport regulator.

The ruling Wednesday found that federal regulations barring travellers from disclosing the result of complaints on matters ranging from refunds to accessibility violate Canadians' Charter right to freedom of expression.

The Canadian Transportation Agency's complaint resolution process, in place since 2023, had prevented consumers and airlines from publicly disclosing such information unless both parties agreed to waive confidentiality.

Canada’s biggest airlines, including Air Canada, WestJet, Air Transat, Jazz Aviation and the industry group that represents them, had opposed the court challenge.

News outlets urge a judge to sanction OpenAI in a high-stakes AI copyright fight

NEW YORK (AP) — The New York Times, the Daily News and other media outlets are asking a federal judge to impose sanctions on OpenAI, escalating a fight over artificial intelligence and copyright that could shape the future of a struggling news industry.

The newspapers allege the ChatGPT maker is hiding evidence important to what could be a landmark copyright infringement trial over how OpenAI and its business partner, Microsoft, built their AI technologies using millions of news articles. At issue is whether AI chatbots are unfairly competing as an information source, siphoning off web traffic without doing the journalistic work involved in gathering the news.

A filing Thursday in a Manhattan federal courthouse alleges OpenAI “chose obstruction” over releasing datasets and ChatGPT logs that could show how the AI system used copyrighted news content. The plaintiffs are asking the judge to penalize the company for "discovery misconduct” that could distort evidence, saying the recent deposition of an OpenAI employee contradicts the company's earlier claims.

New York Daily News attorney Steven Lieberman said OpenAI has been "making misrepresentations" for two years about its ability to search for copyrighted content in its AI training datasets and logs.

Disc drive: petition seeks to reverse Sony decision to stop producing physical discs

Atop a counter displaying vintage video games, a sign urges passersby to petition Sony Group Corp.

The Japanese multinational company’s PlayStation system discs aren’t retro — yet. But they will be in 2028, when Sony plans to stop producing the physical products.

Its games will be sold online or in “digital formats” at shops, including as codes.

Winnipeg-based independent chain PNP Games has outfitted its St. Vital area store with signs of protest. It’s also launched an online petition — one garnering more than 231,000 signatures in roughly a week.

Celebrating an important milestone in their new country

Fourteen high school graduates gathered at Zaytoon on Wednesday to celebrate a milestone that represented years of hard work and adjustment.

The recent grads, all newcomers or refugees, arrived at the Osborne Village restaurant to find it decked out with balloons and flags from various countries for a special graduation dinner to honour their achievements.

The event was hosted by the Immigrant and Refugee Community Organization of Manitoba, which supports newcomer youth through programs including an after school program and homework and education for youth program.

“This is one of the biggest milestones in their life,” said Arshdeep Virk, IRCOM after-school program educator. “For some of them, coming from countries of war and different situations, them being able to come here and then graduate from high school is a big thing.”

Auto body shops swamped following record-setting weather-related claims

Manitoba’s auto body industry has kicked into high gear after rain and hail battered parts of the province in early June, smashing windshields, submerging vehicles and shattering the 30-year-old record for the most auto insurance claims tied to a single weather event, new data shows.

Manitoba Public Insurance logged more than 30,000 insurance claims connected to the massive storm system that settled over Winnipeg and surrounding areas on June 9 — exceeding the record set during a 1996 hailstorm that generated 24,000 claims, data provided to the Free Press shows.

“Truthfully, it has never been this busy,” said Trevor Sprechert, general manager of Dr. Dent Winnipeg.

“I’ve seen windshields being broken, sunroofs, pretty substantial dents on hoods and roofs. There is a plethora of different types of damage.”

Play for all: story time inspires students to fight for accessible playgrounds

Concerned about injustice on their school jungle gym, St. Vital students spent months researching upgrades to make playgrounds more accessible for children in Manitoba.

Darwin School is dismissed for the summer, but one of its teachers plans to resume an advocacy project after the break.

“It’s not fair,” 12-year-old Selena Wei said about the fact one of her classmates — along with other children who use wheelchairs — can’t fully experience the pea-gravel playground at 175 Darwin St. and others like it.

“A playground is a really big part of a child’s life. It’s where they experience most of their outside time and where they’re the most social,” Selena said.

The scoop on cricket

Need the scoop on cricket, but you’re not sure who to ask? Free Press mascot Scoop has you covered. Let’s break down the rules, plays and wickets of the second largest sport in the world.

John Deere owners will get the right to repair their own equipment under a new FTC settlement

It looks like John Deere owners can soon feel free to fix their own machines.

The Federal Trade Commission and attorneys general from several states secured a right-to-repair settlement Wednesday with agriculture equipment giant Deere & Co. — commonly known as John Deere — that requires the company to let farmers and independent shops fix their own equipment.

The Illinois-based manufacturer has faced complaints for years for withholding the software needed for repairs and forcing customers to use authorized dealers instead of independent ones.

This marks the second right-to-repair settlement Deere has reached this year, following a separate $99 million class-action settlement with farmers in April. Though the class-action compensated consumers, the FTC's settlement instead requires Deere to make its repair services available to equipment owners and independent shops.

Meta to build $13B data centre north of Edmonton, its first in Canada

CALGARY - The tech behemoth behind Facebook and Instagram says it plans to make Alberta home to its first artificial intelligence data centre in Canada and its largest outside the United States.

Meta announced Wednesday that the $13-billion-plus project is to be built in Sturgeon County, in the Industrial Heartland region north of Edmonton.

The one-gigawatt, nearly 270,000-square-metre data centre would be powered by a natural gas-fired plant to be built by a consortium that includes Calgary-based Pembina Pipeline Ltd.

It takes about 1.4 gigawatts to power Edmonton, and the proposed data centre campus could fit 33 Canadian Football League fields.

Data centre capacity could soar to 20 GW in planned projects: government document

OTTAWA - A document prepared for the federal artificial intelligence minister to use when pitching international investors on Canada’s AI ecosystem identifies a massive proposed increase in Canada’s data centre capacity.

But spokespeople for the government pushed back strongly on the figure, saying it is not a projection of the capacity Canada expects to build, and the total capacity will be much less.

It says Canada currently has about 337 megawatts of AI data centre capacity, and there are more than 20 gigawatts — or 20,000 megawatts — in projects that are "under planning or development."

The number was included in a presentation prepared by a government department for Artificial Intelligence Minister Evan Solomon to use with international investors. It was obtained by The Canadian Press through access-to-information.

Mosquito-free summers nice while they lasted

It was nice while it lasted, wasn’t it? And it certainly seemed to last a long, lovely time. But with this spring and early summer’s unusually heavy rainfall and significant standing-water accumulation, our blissful vacation from mosquito swarming and swatting is most definitely over.

Tragedy on two wheels: Motorbike deaths rising

This year has been a tragic one for Manitoba’s motorcycle community.

The latest fatality involves a 56-year-old Steinbach woman who crashed in Whiteshell Provincial Park on Sunday, the sixth motorcycle-related death of 2026.

The woman died in hospital after she lost control while heading eastbound on Highway 44 near Provincial Road 312. RCMP said Tuesday she flipped the bike into the south ditch at about 5:30 p.m. Her identity has not been released.

RCMP said the investigation is ongoing, but preliminary findings indicate debris or gravel on a curve in the road may have been a factor.

Union urges voters to make buy local civic election issue

The City of Winnipeg’s largest union is calling on voters to demand local-first practices from candidates running in the civic election in October.

The Canadian Union of Public Employees Local 500 has launched a petition and is running video ads that criticize city contracts recently awarded to U.S.-based companies: garbage collection from GFL Environmental, which moved its home base to Florida this year, and the decision to end its contract with Salisbury House, to provide food at two city-owned golf courses, after 16 years and switch to Aramark.

“These are city services paid for by Winnipeggers, but the money isn’t staying here, it’s not just going to your neighbour’s local business,” Winnipeg resident Ian Bawa says in one video ad posted to YouTube. “The local guarantee asks every municipal candidate to commit — when these contracts renew, bring the work back in house, give it to Manitoba-based companies.”

The petition has garnered more than 4,000 names.

Imperialist crusades: 21st-century style

In the 11th century and lasting into the 13th, the papacy launched a series of at least eight military campaigns we now refer to as the Crusades, or Holy Wars. They were an imperialistic call to arms for Christians to retake Jerusalem, which was at the time under Muslim rule.

Spiritual rewards for participation were implied, and other incentives offered, to dull the extra taxation demanded to fund the campaigns. Over time, the “crusades” morphed to become massacres of not only Muslims but also Jews and Christian dissidents — in other words, any enemies of the papacy. If today’s news sounds like déjà vu all over again, it probably should.

The stories keep repeating themselves in many forms. We now know that two 20th century world wars, global in scope, were caused by imperialistic ambitions, changes in the balance of international powers and corresponding arms races. The first was attributed to the assassination of the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne by a Bosnian Serb, a kind of “regime change” initiative. The second resulted from rising tensions between Allied and Axis powers, triggered by the rise of European fascism and Japanese militarism. The human toll of both was unimaginable.

In the First World War, 15 to 22 million people, including soldiers and civilians, were killed and another 23 million were wounded. These numbers do not account for those otherwise affected — victims of chemical warfare whose compromised health shortened their lives; of the subsequent Spanish flu epidemic amplified by the displacement of peoples; others who died from other diseases caused by war conditions; and those who were malnourished or starved. Nor do they account for the ongoing trauma and resentments passed on intergenerationally to this day.

What can you do with $200 million?

Let’s see if I’ve got this right. In the article Carbon capture project gains support (June 30), Julia-Simone Rutgers writes that the direct carbon capture facility proposed by Deep Sky for construction in southwestern Manitoba will cost $200 million to build.

The company claims the facility will scrub 30,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere each year and inject it 1,000 metres into the ground. To do this, it will need to draw up to 15 megawatts of power from the Manitoba Hydro grid for the first stage of the project. The project will be financed by selling carbon credits.

To put this into perspective, the Canadian industrial carbon price is set at $130 per tonne. At that price, Deep Sky will have to sell more than 1.5 million tonnes of carbon just to cover the upfront cost of building the plant. That’s over 51 years’ worth of carbon credits. And that doesn’t even cover the everyday operating costs, such as the electricity needed to run the plant.

Some studies suggest it requires about 2,000-2,500 kilowatt hours to electricity to capture one tonne of CO2 and inject it into the ground. To capture 30,000 tonnes, that’s about 60 million kWh. Even if Manitoba Hydro sells it to the facility for only $0.035/kWh, that’s an additional $70 per tonne.

Ottawa tabs $10.2M for AI development, use in Manitoba

Drones will replace books in Manitoba’s newest government-funded library. Ottawa has slated $1.14 million for the Manitoba Construction Sector Council, who will oversee the project.

Winnipeg high school football coach subject of hazing investigation

Manitoba’s independent teacher commissioner is investigating the head coach of the Grant Park Pirates football program amid allegations of team hazing.

The AAAA varsity team is at the centre of a probe into allegations student-athletes who played for Doug Kovacs during the 2025-26 school year drew blood while carrying out a locker room ritual.

Multiple sources confirmed Kovacs was put on leave from Grant Park High School in the spring in response to a complaint about his coaching style.

“There’s a lot of different red flags here,” said one parent of a football player who was recently contacted about the case by the office of commissioner Noni Classen.