LAST UPDATE | 10 Sep 2023

GOOD MORNING.

Here’s all the news you need to know as you start your day.

Morocco

1. Survivors are mourning the victims of the strongest ever earthquake to hit Morocco, which has claimed the lives of over 2,000 people.

Red Cross said it could take years of aid to get the rural communities around Marrakech and in other impacted areas back on their feet. 

Many buildings have been significantly structurally damaged, with some houses brought to rubble, and people are sleeping in the streets to stay safe from further building collapses. 

Fishers and drug trafficking

2. FISHING BOAT OWNERS are turning to trafficking huge amounts of drugs into Ireland and countries across the African and European Atlantic seaboard due to dwindling fish stocks and to deal with debt, according to a senior European policing official. 

The Journal sat down for an exclusive chat with the Maritime Analysis and Operations Centre – Narcotics, about the current situation for organised crime and drug smuggling operations in the seas around Portugal, Ireland and other countries. 

Train and vehicle collision

3. Yesterday, a collision involving a train and a vehicle occurred on the line near Claremorris Co Mayo. 

The adult male driver of the vehicle and the teenage male front-seat passenger have both been airlifted to Galway University Hospital where their condition was last described as “stable”. 

Misinformation

4. Major internet companies are not doing enough to combat misinformation on their platforms, according the CoP Monitor Report co-authored by the EDMO Ireland hub in DCU’s Institute for Future Media Democracy and Society.

Weather

5. Met Éireann has issued a status yellow thunderstorm warning for 12 counties as it is forecasting “localised thunderstorms/slow-moving heavy downpours giving frequent lightning and surface water-flooding.”

Today will be humid with both rain and sunny spells, with temperatures peaking between 20 and 24 degrees. 

Kyiv

6. Russia launched an extensive drone attack on Ukraine’s capital last night. 

Ukraine’s land forces said air defence systems destroyed 25 out of 32 Russian drones that targeted Kyiv and the surrounding regions. 

US explorer stuck in cave

7. An injured US explorer trapped more than 1,000 meters (3,280 feet) deep in a Turkish cave for eight days has been transported 300 meters toward the surface, rescuers said today.

Mark Dickey, 40, reported falling sick September 2 while exploring the Morca Cave in southern Turkey’s Taurus Mountains with an international team.

Parenting

8. Column: Margaret Lynch looks at the tricks for building resilience in her children, finding that communication is key.

“We can teach our kids that despite the best-laid plans, things often don’t work out how we had hoped. At some point, they will work a job that they hate, and they will have relationships that end. Not everyone is going to like them, and that’s ok.”

Sean Quinn

9. The former billionaire sat down with the Sunday Independent to promote his new book, which he has written after giving multiple interviews and starring in an RTÉ  documentary recently. 

He questions the validity of how he was portrayed in the RTÉ doc, and says it is a “relief” to get his version of the story out there.