1. Newlyweds killed in Great Barrier Reef helicopter crash during honeymoon, despite strangers’ best rescue efforts.
A honeymoon in Australia has turned to tragedy after two American newlyweds were killed in a helicopter crash near Queensland’s Whitsunday Islands. Two other American passengers survived the crash, as did the pilot.
A 65-year-old woman and a 79-year-old man, identified by media as Sue and Pete Hensel, both from Hawaii, died when the Eurocopter 120 went down near a Great Barrier Reef pontoon on Wednesday afternoon.
According to Courier Mail, the pair – who had been “single forever” – were “so happy” when they found each other.
They were married in Hawaii and their journey to Australia was the “trip of a lifetime”.
“We used to have drinks with them at the bar almost every day. Pete doesn’t say much, but Sue, she was always chatting and smiling,” Pete’s lifelong friend Vern Ungerecht said, Courier Mail reports.
“For them to go doing something they had looked forward to for so long, we can take some pleasure in that.”
The couple was travelling with two of their relatives, a 33-year-old woman – reportedly Sue’s daughter – and her male partner, aged 34. Both tourists survived the crash, so too did the 35-year-old Australian pilot.
WATCH: Tragedy after helicopter crash at the Great Barrier Reef from Seven News.
The helicopter plunged into the water as it failed to land on a Great Barrier Reef pontoon. It’s reported onlookers risked their lives to save the five passengers, jumping into the water to help retrieve them.
Attempts to revive the Hansels continued for some time but they died at the scene.
Queensland Police Service District Inspector Ian Haughton said it was a traumatic experience for everyone involved.
“It was a normal flight … on this occasion, something went wrong and the consequences are tragic,” he said on Thursday.
“You couldn’t begin to imagine the impact on those people.”
2. Father slams Myer for “racial profiling” after his teenage son was surrounded by 10 security guards in a change room.
Perth's flagship Myer store has been slammed for racial profiling after security guards were called to check on a teenage Aboriginal boy who was trying on suits in the fitting rooms.
It was March 8, and 16-year-old Jaylen Garlett was shopping with his father, Shem, for his upcoming school formal. When Shem stepped out of the fitting rooms to take a phone call, he heard an announcement over the store's intercom for security to attend to the men's fitting rooms, ABC reports.
Ten security staff members converged on the teen in less than 30 seconds.
"As I neared the fitting room the staff from the nearby service desk had gathered," Shem said in a Facebook post following the incident.
"I asked the lady at the service desk if everything was okay. She told me that there was a boy unaccompanied in the change rooms that didn't have anything to try on so she called security."
Shem said the store assistant seemed "stunned" when he told her the boy in question was his son, and that Jaylen was simply waiting for another store assistant to bring him something to try on.
"She told me that last week a purse was taken from the service area, expecting me to understand," he wrote.
"I suggested that she was racially profiling as the only thing she would have noticed was a young Aboriginal man, in her mind, appearing to be in the wrong place."
Shem says this isn't the first time "something like this has happened" and that he doesn't typically let his son shop in Myer because of incidents such as these.
The department store issued a statement after the incident was taken public.
"Myer is committed to equality, diversity and inclusion across our stores and workplaces and we want our customers to feel welcome and safe shopping with us irrespective of gender, background or sexuality," a spokesman for the store said, ABC reports.
"Myer has looked into this matter, which came about due to a misunderstanding between team members when the customer entered the change rooms without any clothing items. There were no other factors involved."
3. Mark Zuckerberg has apologised for the Facebook data scandal... five days after it was made public.
Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has apologised for a major breach of trust at the social media network that's resulted in the user data of 50 million Facebook users being mined without their knowledge.
In an interview with US network CNN on Wednesday, Zuckerberg committed Facebook to continuing to strengthen regulations around the apps it allows to collect user data.
He said the rules that resulted in London-based Cambridge Analytica's ability to exploit data have been updated and restricted and that Facebook will put in place more regulations to stop future data mining.
He also reiterated an apology he made earlier on Wednesday in a blog about the scandal.
"This was a major breach of trust and I'm really sorry that this happened," Zuckerberg told CNN.
"We have a basic responsibility to protect people's data. And if we can't do that, then we don't deserve to have the opportunity to serve people. So our responsibility now is to make sure that this doesn't happen again."
Facebook is facing growing government scrutiny in Europe and the US after whistleblower allegations emerged about Cambridge Analytica's improper access of user information to build profiles on American voters which were later used to help elect US President Donald Trump in 2016.
During the CNN interview Zuckerberg was also pressed on the scope of Facebook's investigation into apps that had access to "large amounts of information".
"It's hard to know what we'll find," he responded.
"We're going to review thousands of apps. So this is going to be an intensive process, but this is important."
4. President Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden are trading bizarre messages of violence.
US President Donald Trump is lashing out at Joe Biden for wanting to "beat the hell out of him," saying the former vice president "would go down fast and hard, crying all the way".
The Republican president tweeted Thursday: "Crazy Joe Biden is trying to act like a tough guy. Actually, he is weak, both mentally and physically, and yet he threatens me, for the second time, with physical assault. He doesn't know me, but he would go down fast and hard, crying all the way. Don't threaten people Joe!"
Biden spoke at an anti-sexual assault rally in Florida on Tuesday and cited lewd comments Trump made in a 2005 Access Hollywood tape about grabbing women.
The Democrat said, "If we were in high school, I'd take him behind the gym and beat the hell out of him."
5. A serial Queensland rapist dubbed the "night stalker" is finally behind bars after eluding capture for eight years.
After eluding detection for eight years, a serial rapist dubbed the "night stalker" came undone when he fondled the teenage daughter of a friend, AAP reports.
Jason Juan Burr, 51, was sentenced on Thursday in the Southport District Court to 20 years imprisonment after pleading guilty to multiple charges, including 10 counts of rape.
The court heard Burr gave a DNA sample to police in late 2016 after being charged with touching the 13-year-old girl for "10-15 seconds" while she sat in her mother's living room.
That sample was then checked by police to other unknown samples including two from rapes that occurred in southeast Queensland between 2008 to 2016.
"The DNA was put into the system and it lit up like a Christmas tree," crown prosecutor Clayton Wallis told the court.
Burr's offending began in October 2008 when he raped a woman in her 50s after breaking into her Coombabah home on the Gold Coast.
He then committed three more attacks - in November 2015 and on two occasions in 2016 - at homes in Brisbane and the Gold Coast.
Judge Julie Dick labelled Burr's offending "brazen and abhorrent" as she handed down her sentence.
"It's every woman's worst nightmare," Judge Dick said.
"They were bad rapes. They were particularly bad because they were rapes of women in their own homes. Strangers to you. Strangers to each other."
Burr's defence barrister Wayne Tolton told the court his client was the son of a man who had raped his mother.
He'd grown up in a broken home and after being molested by a Christian Brother at school and enduring constant racial abuse had slipped into a life of drug and alcohol abuse.
"He always felt on the outside and never felt part of the group," Mr Tolton said.
Under Queensland law Burr must serve 80 per cent of his sentence, meaning he'll be eligible to apply for parole in January 2033.
If you or someone you know is in need of help, please call the National Sexual Assault, Domestic and Family Violence Counselling Service on 1800 RESPECT.
Top Comments
Trump was a draft dodging coward who is good at mouthing off but those who mouth off like him do so to cover up the reality. He is a coward, and jumped like hell when a man touched his leg on stage. He'd be the one cowering and crying.
I heard that Huggies are coming out with a new range of diapers that they've called 'TanTrumps'.
The Honest Company won't be stocking it.