Prince George Citizen August 16, 2019

4-H chickens on display at BCNE

Christine HINZMANN Citizen staff chinzmann@pgcitizen.ca

Hen Solo, Princess Laya and Darth Clucker are showcased in the poultry barn at the British Columbia Northern Exhibition this year.

Hannah Houghtaling, 12, from the Beaverly 4-H Club, chose lavender Orpington chickens as her project this year. Last year she chose chocolate Orpington chickens and her first 4-H project three years ago was rabbits.

Hannah saw the pretty chickens online and thought she’d give it a go.

“They’re extremely rare birds,” Hannah said. “Not many people have ever seen lavender Orpingtons before.”

The birds are for meat and laying eggs so

they serve a dual purpose, she explained. Hannah has raised the three chickens since they were hatched six months ago to bring them to market at the fair this weekend.

“Bonding with them was the challenge,” she explained. “I had to just hang out with them and let them get to know me.”

Caring for chickens is fairly easy otherwise, she said.

During the fair, Hannah will be showing her fowl.

She will place a chicken on a table where a judge can inspect it and ask her questions about the chicken and its parts like the rooster’s comb and his saddle feathers that are located at the back of its neck.

The process offers different learning experi-

ences. Not only did Hannah learn how to care for and feed healthy chickens, she also learned an important life lesson.

“If you’re selling the chickens, which I am, you have to learn to love something and get over it,” she said. “You can’t really dwell on the sadness. You have to move on.”

Hannah said it was her friends that got her started in the 4-H Club that’s mission is youth development through hands-on experience in order to prepare current generations for their future through the four pillars of knowledge, leadership, citizenship and personal development.

The auction for the animals on display at the barns during the exhibition takes place Saturday at 6 p.m.

Annual Seniors Fair held at BCNE

Christine HINZMANN

The 13th annual Seniors Fair at the British Columbia Northern Exhibition took place Thursday in Kin 3.

There were about 1,300 people who took in the seniors’ event that is hosted by the Prince George Council of Seniors where people could try their hand at carpet bowling, watch line dancers, as well as visit more than 50 exhibitors who were showcasing their organizations that were mostly geared towards senior living.

The Old Boot Cafe offered lunch, snacks and drinks so fair-weary people could take a break from all the activities. Information booths included representatives from MEDIchair, the Prince George Hospice Society, B.C. Housing, Thrifty Friends Society and the Prince George chapter of the Canadian Kidney Foundation.

For the first time, Northern Health brought information about their community care services that include many elements from primary care interprofessional

teams that include doctors, nurse practitioners, nurses and social workers, as well as information about assisted living and longterm care facilities and support to keep seniors in their home for as long as possible.

The Prince George Genealogy Society, which has been in the community for more than 30 years, was in attendance to offer guidance about how to find a person’s ancestry.

“We are an enthusiastic and realistic group that traces our family and supports each other in doing that,” Carol Anderson, a member of the society, said.

The group meets the third Tuesday of every month at St. Giles Church, 1500 Edmonton St. at 7 p.m. from Sept. to June. The group hosts a variety of activities and speakers throughout the season.

The BCNE continues through Sunday at the fair grounds.

Brother of B.C. homicide victim says he may never know why she was killed

Amy SMART

The Canadian Press

The eldest brother of homicide victim Chynna Deese says he’s not expecting the police investigation to provide a definitive answer as to why she was killed in such a seemingly random act.

The RCMP has promised to release details in the coming weeks of its investigative conclusions in the case that sparked a manhunt across Western Canada before two young suspects were found dead last week in Manitoba.

The Mounties have already said they believe Bryer Schmegelsky and Kam McLeod were suspects in the deaths of Chynna Deese and her Australian boyfriend Lucas Fowler, and had also charged the teenagers from Port Alberni with second-degree murder in the death of botany lecturer Leonard Dyck. Stetson Deese, 30, said while more details may offer his family some clarity, they’re preparing for the possibility that they’ll be left with untestable theories about motive.

“We just don’t know why, and we may never know exactly why they were targeted,” he said in a phone interview from just outside New Orleans.

Chynna Deese, 24, was the baby of the family as the youngest of four siblings growing up in Charlotte, N.C. Although they had the largest age gap of more than five years among the siblings, Stetson Deese said he shared his sister’s common curiosity for the world.

He was the first “adventurous one” in the family, rotating between seasonal jobs in national parks across the United States and fisheries in Alaska. But his sister had recently surpassed him, exploring Europe and South America before coming to Canada with Fowler.

— see ‘WE STILL, page 3

CITIZEN PHOTO BY BRENT BRAATEN

Hannah Houghtalling, 12, from Beaverly 4-H with her Lavender Orpington rooster named Darth Clucker.

Citizen staff

CITIZEN PHOTO BY BRENT BRAATEN

The Prince George Council of Seniors Info Fair at the BCNE was a busy place Thursday in the Kin Centre.

Firearms incident

At approximately 9:30 a.m. on Thursday, the Prince George RCMP responded to a report of a man with a firearm at a residence on Highway 97 (Hart Highway) near Christopher Road at the north end of Prince George city limits. A portion of the highway was closed to traffic. At approximately 11:20 a.m., officers were able to resolve the situation without incident. The highway was reopened to traffic shortly after.

Highway to be closed for Hixon parade

Citizen staff

Highway 97 South will be closed in both directions on

Saturday for about a half-hour to make way for the Hixon parade.

Starting at 10 a.m. and ending at 10:30, a 1.1-kilometre stretch from Hixon Sub Road to Parenteau Road will be blocked to traffic without a detour, DriveBC said in a posting.

B.C. speaker’s road trip goes over budget

Douglas QUAN Postmedia

The controversial speaker of the B.C. legislature who lobbed explosive allegations this past year about wasteful spending in Victoria sent his chief of staff on a cross-continent fact-finding road trip this summer that, by his own acknowledgment, went over budget.

Earlier this summer, Darryl Plecas told the National Post that Alan Mullen’s road trip to several Canadian provinces and American states was budgeted for $10,000.

But this week, Plecas and Mullen confirmed that the total costs came in at just over $13,000.

But Plecas insisted the trip –whose purpose was to review legislature security practices – was carried out with taxpayers in mind and would’ve cost far more if Mullen had flown or if they had hired an outside agency to do the work.

“It’s a bargain at half the price,” he said. “It’s still not as though the whole thing leaves us in a budget crisis.”

But Jas Johal, a B.C. Liberal opposition member, questioned whether the trip – he called it Mullen’s “excellent summer adventure” – was even necessary, saying that Mullen could easily have gathered the same information by consulting in-house experts and experts in other jurisdictions without leaving Victoria.

“I still don’t know why the speaker’s friend has to jump in a car (and travel) across Western Canada and the States to acquire information that is rather rudimentary,” he said.

Johal also questioned Mullen’s qualifications for carrying out the fact-finding mission.

“We do not know what security expertise he actually has… I don’t think B.C. taxpayers are getting value for dollar,” Johal said.

Mullen had previously worked as a federal corrections administrator before he was hired in early 2018 as Plecas’ special adviser and then chief of staff.

Plecas turned the legislature upside down this past year after accusing the legislature’s top two unelected officials – Craig James, the clerk, and Gary Lenz, the sergeant-at-arms – of, among other things, “flagrant overspending” on travel and other inappropriate expenses.

James later resigned after a report from retired Supreme Court of Canada chief justice Beverley McLachlin agreed with some of Plecas’ allegations. She did not find any wrongdoing by Lenz.

Lenz, however, remains suspended with pay amidst an ongoing RCMP investigation that is being overseen by two special prosecutors. A few months ago, Plecas initiated a new investigation into whether Lenz may have violated the B.C. Police Act. Doug LePard, a retired police chief, was tapped to do the work.

Lenz and James have previously denied any wrongdoing. Their lawyers declined to comment about the ongoing investigations.

Meanwhile, Mullen spent several weeks this summer visiting several provincial legislature and U.S. state capitol buildings. Mullen said he made stops in Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Montana, Idaho, Oregon and Washington.

According to Plecas and Mullen, the purpose of the trip was to

study best practices when it comes to security. In some jurisdictions in Canada, the role of sergeantat-arms is purely ceremonial with a separate director of security, whereas in others, it’s a hybrid role, Mullen said.

Another goal of the trip was to examine how to run operations efficiently. They cited a June 2019 expense analysis report that showed overtime pay in 2018/19 among the B.C. legislature’s protective services staff exceeded a half-million dollars.

To those critics who are complaining about a $13,000 road trip, “where were they when we were burning off all this overtime?” Plecas said.

The trip, he added, was done in consultation with the B.C. legislature’s acting clerk and head of finance. Because Mullen drove his own vehicle, the only expenses he incurred were for gas, hotels and daily per diems.

“Where we felt we could save money would be if I drove,” Mullen said in mid-July when he was halfway through his trip. “We’re not paying for plane tickets all over North America and rental cars.”

Asked why he needed to physically visit all these places, Mullen said it was because “you don’t really get a full feeling for it if you get an email… or if it’s over the phone. You have a better opportunity to paint a picture when you’ve gone there yourself, you’ve taken pictures. I can communicate it better in my report.”

Mullen added that the Americans were “thrilled to have us there and take part in the review.”

Asked earlier this summer about the optics of going on a long trip after making allegations of wasteful spending, Plecas told the Post he knew there’d be pushback from critics but insisted, “you’re not getting a fulsome picture by just saying, ‘send me your information.’” He reiterated that again on Wednesday.

“The acid test will be what’s in the report,” he said, which is expected mid-September. “Wait for the report.”

Plecas said since the scandal erupted in the B.C. legislature, critics have been continuously looking for ways to malign him and Mullen. “At every turn, it’s been twisted to say, ‘What did the speaker do now?’ … ‘What did the chief of staff do?’ ” he said.

Over the summer, Plecas said, some critics questioned whether anyone had accompanied Mullen on his trip. Asked by the Post if anyone had, Plecas said he didn’t know and that it was irrelevant, as spouses are invited on trips all the time.

Mullen did not respond to a voice mail seeking clarity on the question. Johal agreed that it would only be relevant if it affected taxpayers.

PLECAS

CITIZEN PHOTO BY BRENT BRAATEN

Guild gift

Rory Summers and Tim Power from the Wood Turners Guild look over a wooden pen and pencil set with

the North Healthcare Foundation. The guild donated 15 pieces of art to the Spirit of the North Healthcare Foundation made from the ash and elm trees removed from the lawn of city hall to make way for the Parkhouse Condominium project.

Singh shocked by horror stories from Victoria renters

Richard WATTS

Victoria Times Colonist

Mother-of-three Riga Godron has been forced to move 28 times after moving back to Victoria 22 years ago.

Godron said she has been evicted so landlords could renovate. Her rent has been increased beyond her means. She has been forced out of subsidized housing because her partner got a job and the paycheque meant they no long qualified for assistance.

“It’s hard to maintain housing here with the high cost and the scarcity,” said the 41-year-old army veteran living on a disability pension. “But there’s also a lot of serious instability here.”

Godron and about 10 others were at a downtown Victoria coffee bar Wednesday to talk with federal NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh about housing in the region.

Singh and Victoria NDP candidate Laurel Collins spent the morning listening and talking to people and offered their party’s commitment to help with issues such as the high cost and availabil-

ity of housing. Singh said after the meeting broke up, he knew housing in Victoria was expensive by most standards across Canada. But he was surprised to hear how precarious accommodation can be for Victorians.

Godron’s story of move after move in particular shook him.

“One of the things I heard here that surprised me was the lack of security or the instability of housing here,” said Singh.

“That’s something you don’t see that often, having multiple moves in a year or many, many moves over a short period of time,” he said.

Singh told his listeners it’s important for government policies to support government goals. Right now, government housing policies don’t line up squarely enough with the goal of finding affordable housing for everyone.

Collins said she is aware of the challenges faced by many people looking for homes in Victoria, particularly vulnerable people.

Collins said in her work with non-profit agencies she has met women with children escaping

abusive relationships only to find it near impossible to find housing.

“The housing crisis disproportionately affects women, people fleeing violence, vulnerable people,” she said.

“But 60 per cent of us in Victoria are renters,” Collins said. “Lots of people here are just giving up on ever owning a home or they are even fleeing our city just because they can’t afford to start a family here.”

Shaylynn Sampson, a third-year political science student at the University of Victoria, said she has struggled to find housing.

Originally from the Prince George area, Sampson, 20, said the high rents and lack of availability have been a shock.

So it was good her to hear a national leader like Singh taking an interest in the issue. But she is still undecided over who to support when she votes.

“He seems very sincere, but I’m still taking things with a bit of salt,” Sampson said.

“But it’s definitely good to hear it (housing) is on the political radar with political leaders in the country,” she said.

Northern B.C. Indigenous to get free driver training

The provincial government has hired Terracebased All Nations Driving Academy to deliver driver training to as many as 1,000 Indigenous people in B.C.’s North Coast and Nechako regions at no cost to the students.

In all, $360,000 will be put towards courses and services for people to secure their Class 7 learner and novice driver’s licences and follows on $80,000 that helped 214 people get the training, the government said in a press release issued Thursday.

“Improving access to driver training in Indigenous communities was a clear call to action and systemic concern that First Nations leaders have raised with me,” said Minister of Advanced Education, Skills and Training Melanie Mark.

“Opening doors for individuals in more rural areas provides them access to the training and skills required to be independent members of their com-

munities. This expanded support will also empower Indigenous peoples, especially women, to travel with a greater sense of safety along the Highway 16 corridor.”

Access to safe transportation was identified as an issue for women in northern B.C. including in the report of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls.

“Studies have shown that between five per cent and 45 per cent of Indigenous peoples living on reserves do not have their driver’s licence, which can significantly reduce options for employment,” said Lucy Sager, CEO of All Nations Driving Academy.

“We hear over and over from our participants that obtaining their licence has had a profound impact on their livelihood, helps families stay connected and makes travel safer for everyone.”

Through the next decade, 12,990 job openings are expected in British Columbia’s North Coast and Nechako regions.

‘We still have a lot of questions’

— from page 1

“She took it to a whole new level, so she was a little more adventurous than me,” he said.

Mounties have maintained regular contact with the Deese family since Chynna Deese’s death, Stetson Deese said, but the family primarily knows the same thing the public does about what happened. So, Stetson Deese often finds himself combing through posts online, reading theories unverified by police about what role accomplices may have played or whether other missing persons cases in the region could be linked. Chynna Deese and Fowler were so affable that Stetson Deese said he can’t possibly imagine they were targets of anger or hatred.

“We still have a lot of questions, it’s like I think of a new one each day,” he said. His latest question is whether the van the couple were driving was found in working condition. He also heard that his sister was wearing a single shoe and speculated that perhaps that meant she was attacked at night.

“It can just give you headache, thinking of all kinds of different theories,” he said.

Confirmation that the bodies

of two suspects were found created mixed emotions for Stetson Deese. It was a significant step toward closure, he said.

“If they were never found and nobody knew what happened to them, then we would really have some questions.”

He believes the police theory that Schmegelsky and McLeod were responsible for the three killings. If that’s true, he said he is happy to learn others in the region are now safe.

But the deaths of Schmegelsky and McLeod also mean they will never be interviewed by police, and investigators’ theories about what happened will never be tested in court.

Stetson Deese said he believes the RCMP’s investigation will at least offer more resolution about why it happened.

The family isn’t in a rush to see the probe wrap up, he said. They all had to return to their jobs and could use a break for a few weeks, as they try to find moments of distraction from the tragedy.

“It’s been heavy lately, this whole month the air has been really heavy. So, if it lightens up a little that would be nice and then maybe within another month or so we can hear something else.”

Suspects charged following armed robbery

Citizen staff

Charges have been approved against two men and two teenagers following an armed robbery of a gas station early Wednesday morning. Each of Brandon Richard Joseph, 24, a 17-year-old girl and a 17-year-old boy, both who cannot be identified under the Youth Criminal Justice Act, face one count each of robbery, disguising face with intent and possessing stolen property under $5,000. The girl also faces a count of possessing a dangerous weapon while Jonathon Christopher

Matthews, 18, faces a count of possessing stolen property under $5,000.

Police said three suspects wearing masks entered the gas station at 5th Avenue and Tabor Boulevard just before 1 a.m. while a fourth remained outside. They demanded cash and struck the lone employee with a blunt instrument. They fled on foot with a small amount of cash and some cigarettes before police could be called. But several officers were called to the area and by shortly after 1 a.m., the four were found and arrested near an elementary school on Rainbow Drive.

CITIZEN PHOTO BY BRENT BRAATEN

Mayor Lyn Hall, which is part of the artwork donated to the Spirit of

Canadian plane to help peacekeeping mission in Africa

VANCOUVER — A Canadian Forces Hercules plane will be sent to Uganda to take part in a United Nations peacekeeping mission during the next 12 months, transporting troops, equipment and supplies to Congo and South Sudan.

Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan said Thursday the aircraft will be supported by as many as 25 Canadian Armed Forces personnel and it will be used up to five days a month to help the UN mission operating from Entebbe.

“Our contributions will help maintain the United Nations’ ability to respond to crises more quickly and more efficiently,” he said in making the announcement in Vancouver.

“We have worked closely with the United Nations to determine how to best use our resources.”

In late 2017, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau promised the UN that Canada would send the plane.

It was one of three promises he made when Canada hosted a major peacekeeping summit in Vancouver.

Only one of the promises had been fulfilled, and that was the deployment of a unit of helicopters and military personnel to help with medical evacuations in Mali.

Trudeau also promised the UN a 200-strong “quick reaction force,” but Canada has yet to register it in a UN database, which means it has not been formally offered.

Sajjan said Canada committed to a time frame of five years to deploy military resources to support UN peacekeeping missions.

“It takes time to be able to do the proper planning,” he said. “It’s very complex supporting multiple missions, working through the United Nations’ systems to make sure it’s done well” and to co-ordinate with other countries.

The federal Liberals campaigned in the last election on a promise to renew Canada’s commitment and role in peacekeeping in a major way, but have since been accused of not living up to the spirit of that pledge.

The government insists it is committed to peacekeeping, as evidenced by its decision to extend the mission in Mali by one month, which came after

pressure from the UN and some of Canada’s allies.

In a statement, Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland said adding a plane to the UN mission in Entebbe “is an excellent example of the smart pledges that Canada will continue to support so we can fill critical gaps in UN peacekeeping.”

The Security Council extended the mandate of the more than 18,000-strong peacekeeping mission in Congo – the UN’s biggest and most expensive, with a budget over US$1.1 billion – until Dec. 20 with a priority mandate of protecting civilians and supporting “the stabilization and strengthening of state institutions.”

Earlier this year, President Felix Tshisekedi succeeded Joseph Kabila, who governed the largely impoverished but mineral-rich central African country for 18 years.

A fact sheet released last month by the U.S.-based Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project said there have been nearly 790 “organized political violence events” in more than 420 locations since Tshisekedi’s inauguration on Jan. 24. There were nearly 1,900 conflict-related fatalities reported in these events, including over 760 deaths from violence targeting civilians, it said.

The peacekeeping mission to a disputed area of Sudan and South Sudan dates to 2011.

Both Sudan and South Sudan claim ownership of the oil-rich Abyei area.

Major projects credited for B.C. growth

Beth LEIGHTON

The Canadian Press VANCOUVER — A financial services organization in British Columbia is forecasting modest but slower growth for the province through 2022.

Central 1 says economic growth in B.C. should remain just above two per cent over the next 28 months.

Its report released Thursday says the growing economy is supported by a strong labour market, healthy construction industry and ongoing work on the Site C hydroelectric project, liquefied natural gas development in Kitimat and the twinning of the Trans Mountain pipeline.

But Central 1 says global trade uncertainty and a dip in new home construction will be among factors that dampen growth.

The forecast says economic growth in B.C. slipped from 2.4 per cent in 2018 to 2.2 per cent this year, but should rebound to 2.6 per cent by 2020 as major construction projects proceed.

Growth is expected to edge down to 2.1 per cent in 2021 and 2.2 per cent the following year, in part because Central 1 says recent housing market skids mean fewer apartment starts, while a weaker forestry sector and global trade concerns contribute to the sluggish outlook.

Central 1 is a service provider for credit unions in B.C. and Ontario as well as other financial institutions across the country

The report highlights job growth in B.C. as one of the brightest aspects of the economic outlook, noting annual labour force

employment growth is forecast to average 2.7 per cent.

With the exception of resource sectors such as forestry, “there aren’t many holes to poke in the current labour market picture,” says the report, although it forecasts employment growth will slip to near one per cent through 2022.

It blames the dip on dwindling jobs in the manufacturing and construction industries over the next two years, but Central 1 economists forecast service sector employment in areas such as technology, tourism and health care should pick up some of the slack.

“Labour force participation rates are elevated suggesting the tight market is attracting people into the workforce while others delay their potential retirement,” the report says.

British Columbia’s unemployment rate is tracking at 4.6 per cent, which Central 1 says is a near historic low that has not been seen since just before the financial crisis of 2008 and 2009.

Stronger economic conditions compared with Alberta, as well as ongoing demand for workers on major projects will continue to fuel interprovincial migration from about 3,400 people this year to 12,000 by 2020, Central 1 says.

Overall, B.C.’s population will expand by 1.2 per cent in 2019 says the report, crediting international immigration as the main reason for population gains over the coming years.

“From 2019 through 2021, B.C. is forecast to grow by an average of nearly 60,000 persons annually providing a significant source of consumer and housing demand,” it says.

Many cannabis users still buying illegal pot, Stats Can says

Maan ALHMIDI

The Canadian Press

OTTAWA — Six months after Canada legalized marijuana for recreational use more than 40 per cent of Canadians who said they used pot still bought it from illegal sources, a new Statistics Canada report shows.

The agency issued results from its latest National Cannabis Survey Thursday, which it is conducting every three months to get a sense of cannabis use after Canada legalized recreational pot in October 2018.

The federal Liberals made legalizing pot a campaign promise in 2015, citing a desire to take it out of the hands of the black market, as well as find better ways to keep it out of the hands of kids.

The latest Statistics Canada report says in April, May and June, 4.9 million Canadians over the age of 15 consumed pot and 42 per cent of them bought at least some of their cannabis from illegal sources including drug dealers.

Three in four Canadians who bought pot said quality and safety were their most important considerations when buying it, while 42 per cent cited price.

Men and women report some-

what different pot habits – with men almost twice as likely to use marijuana as women and women more likely to consume edibles or use pot-based products like skin creams than men.

Women were also more likely to get pot for free from family and friends. More than one-third of all pot users sourced the product from friends and family, but among women, friends and family were the supplier for 42 per cent of pot users.

About 16 per cent of Canadians over 15 reported using pot in the second quarter of 2019, unchanged from the same quarter last year when recreational marijuana was still illegal. However, the number of Canadians aged 65 and older reporting cannabis use increased from 3 per cent to 5 per cent over this period.

About 27 per cent of young people between 15 and 24 years old used pot at least once in the second quarter of the year, compared with 24 per cent of those between 25 and 44.

Almost one in four Nova Scotians, and one in five Albertans used pot, the two provinces with the highest reported use. On the other end of the scale, is Quebec, where only one in 10 people reporting using it.

Amy SMART The Canadian Press

A Canadian Forces Hercules plane takes off from CFB Trenton in Trenton, Ont. Canada is sending a Hercules plane to support a United Nations peacekeeping missions in Congo and South Sudan.

SAJJAN

High profile could help Wilson-Raybould keep her seat

Joanna SMITH The Canadian Press

OTTAWA — There had been a few names floating around when the Liberals were seeking a candidate for the newly created riding of Vancouver Granville in the last federal election, but it soon became clear the party brass had only one person in mind.

That was Jody Wilson-Raybould, then a B.C. regional chief of the Assembly of First Nations, who quickly became one of the stars Justin Trudeau and his team were promoting heavily in their bid for power.

“They certainly dissuaded anyone else from running,” Sam Wyatt, who was on the board of the local Liberal riding association at the time.

“Now they find themselves in a situation where they probably wish they hadn’t made that choice.”

That same star candidate, who won the seat for the Liberals in 2015 with about 44 per cent of the vote, rocked the Trudeau government early this year with allegations that she had been improperly pressured to end a criminal prosecution against Montreal engineering firm SNC-Lavalin.

The scandal returned to the headlines with a vengeance Wednesday as the federal ethics watchdog issued a report that concluded the prime minister violated the Conflict of Interest Act.

The ongoing saga of SNC-Lavalin, which saw Wilson-Raybould resign from cabinet before being ousted from the Liberal caucus alongside Ontario MP Jane Philpott, had already caused the Liberals to slide in the polls.

Now, the finding by the ethics commissioner threatens to further derail the Liberal campaign, both nationally and, perhaps, in Vancouver Granville, where the Liberals are gearing up for a fight against someone they once called their own.

The former justice minister is now an Independent candidate, and political observers say her prominence and history in the riding give her a greater chance at victory than is usually the case for those running without a political party machine.

“It’s going to be crazy,” said Mario Canseco, president of Vancouver polling firm Research Co.

Taleeb Noormohamed, a 42-year-old tech entrepreneur, was acclaimed Tuesday as the Liberal candidate vying to unseat her. The New Democrats, who placed second with about 27 per cent of the vote in 2015, chose climate activist Yvonne Hanson as their candidate.

The Conservatives, who were close behind with about 26 per cent of the vote, are running Zach Segal, a former political

staffer in Ottawa.

The impact the SNC-Lavalin affair will have on the final result remains to be seen, but Lesli Boldt, a long-time observer of B.C. politics, said it is clear that WilsonRaybould earned a lot of local support from those who view her as a principled politician, even if they do not agree with her politics.

“She’s certainly got a head start... on some of the other candidates here,” said Boldt, president of Vancouver-based Boldt Communications.

Noormohamed was one of those who was dissuaded from seeking the Liberal nomination the last time around.

“I think you do the best that you can for your country when the time is right, and the timing was right this time,” said Noormohamed, who also ran unsuccessfully for the Liberals in North Vancouver in 2011.

Noormohamed said he wants to focus on housing affordability, transportation, climate change and health care, and that the Liberals helping him campaign are also uninterested in rehashing the SNC-Lavalin affair.

“What happened in the past, these types of questions that will be interesting to debate and discuss are not the questions that are going to move the country forward,” he said.

“I think that’s the priority.”

Claire Marshall, who is part of the campaign committee organizing for WilsonRaybould, also said she does not expect SNC-Lavalin to be a major focus, but said the people she meets at the doorstep do recognize her and express their admiration for what she did.

“They’re not specifically talking about the SNC-Lavalin thing, but they really just talk about how they’re really proud of what she’s done and how she spoke up,” said Marshall, who was the outgoing chair of the Liberal riding association when she left to support Wilson-Raybould.

There are significant barriers facing Independent candidates, including an inability to fundraise before the writs drop.

Candidates in Vancouver Granville are allowed to spend $106,685 on the election, and Marshall said the Wilson-Raybould campaign hopes to be able to raise enough

funds to meet that target. Registered parties, meanwhile, can spend an additional $84,823 in the riding and have money in the bank.

Canseco said another factor that could work against Wilson-Raybould is how close things get at the national level, as strategic voting could come into play if those sympathetic to Wilson-Raybould are worried the Conservatives could form government. Marshall, who remains a Liberal, said she wished the party had decided to sit this one out.

“Obviously that would make our lives easier,” she said.

David Gruber, chair of the Liberal riding association, said there was never a chance of that happening.

“I think there’s been an energy in the activist base of Liberals in Vancouver Granville since the spring that reflects a desire of people to see a Liberal representing us,” he said.

Wyatt said he too is a Liberal, but plans to vote for Wilson-Raybould this year.

“I think the party is bigger than any given government in the long run.”

Tories, NDP seek urgent meeting into ethics report

The Canadian Press

OTTAWA — Justin Trudeau doubled down Thursday on his refusal to apologize for his handling of the SNC-Lavalin affair even as opposition parties tried to ensure a scathing report that found the prime minister broke ethics law remains top of mind when Canadians head to the polls on Oct. 21. Conservative and New Democrat MPs demanded an emergency parliamentary committee meeting to delve into the report of federal ethics commissioner Mario Dion. The request came one day after Dion’s explosive conclusion that Trudeau violated the Conflict of Interest Act by pressuring his former attorney general, Jody Wilson-Raybould, to halt a criminal prosecution of SNC-Lavalin on fraud charges related to contracts in Libya. Dion found that Trudeau improperly used his position to influence a decision that would benefit the private interests of the Montreal engineering giant.

Two Conservative members of the House of Commons ethics committee wrote to the committee

chair, local MP Bob Zimmer, asking that an emergency meeting be held to consider a motion to invite Dion to give committee members a briefing on his report.

Dion’s report “is incredibly concerning,” wrote Conservative MPs Peter Kent and Jacques Gourde.

“This is a grave situation. Not only is Mr. Trudeau the first prime minister to have been found guilty of breaking the law, he is a repeat offender.”

Trudeau was found by Dion’s predecessor to have violated ethics law by accepting an all-expense paid family vacation in 2016 on the private Bahamian island owned by the Aga Khan, the billionaire spiritual leader of the world’s Ismaili Muslims.

NDP MP Charlie Angus sent Zimmer a similar letter. He also wants the committee to invite testimony from Trudeau; Finance Minister Bill Morneau; Morneau’s former chief of staff, Ben Chin, now a senior adviser to the prime minister; and the country’s top public servant, Ian Shugart. Between them, the two opposition parties have enough members

on the committee to force an emergency meeting. But the Liberals hold a majority of seats on the committee and - as they’ve done in the past when opposition MPs have tried to revive committee hearings into the SNC-Lavalin affair -are likely to reject opposition attempts to magnify the impact of Dion’s report just weeks before the Oct. 21 election.

That, in turn, will doubtless spark further opposition accusations of a cover up.

Trudeau, meanwhile, repeated Thursday what’s sure to be his goto election campaign message on the SNC-Lavalin affair: he won’t apologize for standing up for Canadian jobs.

During an event in Fredericton, Trudeau reiterated that he accepts Dion’s report and takes full responsibility for what happened. But he added: “I’m not going to apologize for standing up for Canadian jobs, because that’s my job – to make sure Canadians and communities and pensioners and families across the country are supported, and that’s what I will always do.”

No end date in sight for work on Fraser River landslide

The Canadian Press

LILLOOET — Officials working at a landslide in northwest British Columbia say they don’t know how long efforts to rescue spawning salmon will take on the Fraser River.

Al Magnan, who is incident commander with the federal government, says the main goal is to create a fish passage and crews are still working on it.

The slide in late June at Big Bar, northwest of Kamlooops, created a five-metre waterfall and is blocking the majority of hundreds of thousands of chinook salmon from migrating upstream to spawn.

Corino Salomi, the environmental unit lead for the federal government, says crews are moving rocks and boulders to create passageways for the fish.

He says they are using portable hydraulic rams and airbags, chippers, drills and small, low velocity explosives to further

break the rocks and create the passageways. Salomi says the team is also considering building a road around the slide so fish can be transported in trucks.

So far, the fish have primarily been transported by helicopters with more than 14,000 fish moved.

Officials have a tight timeline to implement solutions to the problem as more fish are expected to arrive this month, including a million or more sockeye salmon.

Several salmon species migrate along the Fraser River, including chinook, sockeye, coho and pink.

“Saving the salmon is of foremost importance because this incident has the potential to directly or indirectly impact everyone in B.C. including the ecosystem and other species dependent on the salmon survival,” said Greg Witzky of the Fraser River Aboriginal Fisheries Secretariat and the incident commander for First Nations’ governments.

Pressure is nevertheless mounting on Trudeau to say he’s sorry to Wilson-Raybould and former minister Jane Philpott, both of whom quit the cabinet over the affair and were subsequently booted out of the Liberal caucus.

Philpott said Trudeau owes an apology not to her or Wilson-Raybould, but to Canadians.

“I do believe that the people of Canada deserve an apology,” she said.

Trudeau maintains his only interest in the SNC-Lavalin affair was to protect innocent employees, pensioners and suppliers who would be negatively impacted if the company were to be convicted of corrupt practices and thereby banned from receiving federal government contracts for 10 years.

He and his senior aides wanted Wilson-Raybould to reconsider her refusal to overturn a decision by the director of public prosecutions to not negotiate a remediation agreement with SNC-Lavalin, which would have allowed it to avoid a criminal trial.

Dion ruled that there was no way to separate the company’s

private interest from the broader public interest and, therefore, Trudeau should not have had any contact with Wilson-Raybould on the matter.

“I disagree with the ethics commissioner’s conclusions, but he is an officer of Parliament doing his job and I fully accept his report, which means I take full responsibility,” Trudeau said.

Trudeau is casting the affair as a failure to find the right balance between respecting prosecutorial independence while standing up for the jobs that were at stake.

“To make sure this government and no future government gets in this situation again,” he said the government will implement the recommendations of a separate report from former Liberal cabinet minister Anne McLellan on the merits of having the justice minister and the attorney general under the same cabinet portfolio. That report recommends keeping the two jobs together, but better educating parliamentarians, cabinet ministers and staff members on how best to consult with federal attorneys general.

Former justice minister Jody Wilson-Raybould gives the keynote speech to the First Nations Justice Council in Richmond on April 24. Wilson-Raybould, once a star candidate for the Liberals, will be running as an independent candidate in the upcoming federal election.

Language gives fake news away

Have you ever read something online and shared it among your networks, only to find out it was false?

As a software engineer and computational linguist who spends most of her work and even leisure hours in front of a computer screen, I am concerned about what I read online. In the age of social media, many of us consume unreliable news sources. We’re exposed to a wild flow of information in our social networks – especially if we spend a lot of time scanning our friends’ random posts on Twitter and Facebook.

My colleagues and I at the Discourse Processing Lab at Simon Fraser University have conducted research on the linguistic characteristics of fake news.

A study in the United Kingdom found that about two-thirds of the adults surveyed regularly read news on Facebook, and that half of those had the experience of initially believing a fake news story. Another study, conducted by researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, focused on the cognitive aspects of exposure to fake news and found that, on average, news readers believe a false news headline at least 20 per cent of the time.

False stories are now spreading 10 times faster than real news and the problem of fake news seriously threatens our society.

For example, during the 2016 election in the United States, an astounding number of U.S. citizens believed and shared a patently false conspiracy claiming that Hilary Clinton was connected to a human trafficking ring run out of a pizza restaurant. The owner of the restaurant received death threats and one believer showed up in the restaurant with a gun. This – and a number of other fake news stories distributed during the election season – had an undeniable impact on people’s votes.

It’s often difficult to find the origin of a story after partisan groups, social media bots and friends of friends have shared it thousands of times. Fact-checking websites such as Snopes and Buzzfeed can only address a small portion of the most popular rumours. The technology behind the internet and social media has enabled this spread of misinformation; maybe it’s time to ask what this technology has to offer in addressing the problem.

Recent advances in machine learning have made it possible for computers to instantaneously complete tasks that would have taken humans much longer. For example, there are computer programs that help police identify criminal faces in a matter of seconds. This kind of artificial intelligence trains algorithms to classify, detect and make decisions.

When machine learning is applied to

natural language processing, it is possible to build text classification systems that recognize one type of text from another.

During the past few years, natural language processing scientists have become more active in building algorithms to detect misinformation; this helps us to understand the characteristics of fake news and develop technology to help readers.

One approach finds relevant sources of information, assigns each source a credibility score and then integrates them to confirm or debunk a given claim. This approach is heavily dependent on tracking down the original source of news and scoring its credibility based on a variety of factors.

A second approach examines the writing style of a news article rather than its origin. The linguistic characteristics of a written piece can tell us a lot about the authors and their motives. For example, specific words and phrases tend to occur more frequently in a deceptive text compared to one written honestly.

Our research identifies linguistic characteristics to detect fake news using machine learning and natural language processing technology. Our analysis of a large collection of fact-checked news articles on a variety of topics shows that, on average, fake news articles use more expressions that are common in hate speech, as well as words related to sex, death and anxiety.

Passing as Canadian depends on skin colour

We thought they were municipal employees, the three men wearing reflective-yellow work vests. We thought they were directing traffic or giving directions. We asked them what was going on, why were people gathered across the lawn in front of the legislature building in Victoria?

One man explained they were protesting immigration. Really? We were friendly enough, willing to hear more. He went on, earnestly explaining their ideas to my husband. The craziness of it exploded out of me. Slapping my husband’s arm, I pointed out:

“You’re an immigrant!”

“Yeah! I am!” My husband is a white American who “passes” every day for Canadian. The yellowvesters made those embarrassed coughing, throat-clearing noises that meant “we didn’t mean you.” There wasn’t much more to talk about, so we went on our way, highly amused. I left Canada as a young adult, during the horrible recession of the early 1980s. Remember the double-whammy of collapsing oil prices and sky-high interest rates?

The collapsed oil market meant that the promised funding for the graduate research I hoped to do in Alberta had vapourized. And the U.S. Federal Reserve, tasked with bringing the then-high inflation under control did just that by raising interest rates so high they threw the American economy,

and naturally the Canadian economy as well, into terrible recessions.

My father kept his job, but many of our family friends did not. It was shocking and scary to see middle-aged people with solid, long-term careers suddenly unemployed. And there I was, in the midst of this economic cataclysm, trying to launch the next stage of my life in graduate school. There was nothing doing in Canada. But there were opportunities to be found in the U.S.

I was an economic migrant, like so many, blown across borders by the winds of global events. I hadn’t planned to leave Canada and for many years I intended to return. But then I didn’t. I married, I finished my education, I worked, I had children. Life happened. I had immigrated to the U.S.

Then life happened again.

After 32 years, almost all of my adult life, I returned to Canada.

My family came, too. I brought Canada the gift of my husband and our children. What would the yellow-vesters think of my boys? Would they reject these welleducated, kind, young white men because they are immigrants?

My life is full of immigrants.

My father was an immigrant. My brother’s wife immigrated to

Canada as a child, brought here by her immigrant parents. My husband’s sister married a Canadian and immigrated here. All these people bring tremendous benefits to Canada.

Would the yellow-vesters object to them? Would it make a difference that all these people are white? Not long after, I was gardening near our back fence, beyond which is a park where people often walk dogs.

A gentleman came along the fence with a large, brown, woolly dog. May I pet the dog? The fence is low enough that conversations happen over it. Yes, of course.

The gentleman was older and wore a turban. To my ears his accent was very strong, but even so we managed a very pleasant conversation, the kind that gives you a lift for the rest of the day, just because you’ve met a really nice person.

We talked about the places we had lived, me in Canada, the U.S., and now Canada again. He had lived in several places after India, I think Texas, maybe Montreal, and now Victoria. He has lived in Victoria for 43 years. Me? I didn’t grow up here. I’ve lived here less than four.

The yellow-vesters might not like this gentleman. Like my husband, he came from somewhere else, but unlike my husband, he has brown skin and speaks with an obvious accent. He wouldn’t “pass.”

But which of us really is the immigrant? Normally we would say he is. But you know, next to this man, I think I’m the immigrant.

Genuine news, on the other hand, contains a larger proportion of words related to work (business) and money (economy). This suggests that a stylistic approach combined with machine learning might be useful in detecting suspicious news. Our fake news detector is built based on linguistic characteristics extracted from a large body of news articles. It takes a piece of text and shows how similar it is to the fake news and real news items that it has seen before.

The main challenge, however, is to build a system that can handle the vast variety of news topics and the quick change of headlines online, because computer algorithms learn from samples and if these samples are not sufficiently representative of online news, the model’s predictions would not be reliable.

One option is to have human experts collect and label a large quantity of fake and real news articles. This data enables a machine-learning algorithm to find common features that keep occurring in each collection regardless of other varieties. Ultimately, the algorithm will be able to distinguish with confidence between previously unseen real or fake news articles.

— Fatemeh Torabi Asr is a postdoctoral research fellow at Simon Fraser University. This article first appeared in

Crime fear common

The summer of 2019 has been a challenge for law enforcement authorities in Canada’s largest city. During the August long weekend, at least 17 people were injured in 14 different shootings that Toronto Police Chief Mark Saunders blamed on “street gangs.” Canada’s situation is, thankfully, different from what has transpired in the U.S. on account of a convenient interpretation of the Second Amendment.

British Columbia has not been immune to gang-related violence.

The infamous “Surrey Six” incident in October 2007 led to many discussions about the intricacies of the justice system. In September 2018, Research Co. found that 79 per cent of British Columbians support a ban on handguns within the limits of their municipality.

In July, Research Co. found that “crime and public safety” is the most important “vote-defining” issue for only four per cent of Canadians in this year’s federal election, but the numbers rise slightly to six per cent in British Columbia – the highest in all provinces. This may not seem like much, but we can still expect campaign announcements issued from lecterns emblazoned with phrases like “building safe communities.”

Measuring public sentiment on criminal activity can be a complicated endeavour. Residents need to be asked about collective perceptions and their individual reality, as well as their views on fear, safety and the factors that may lead to crime in the first place.

When Research Co. recently asked British Columbians about this matter, one in five residents (20 per cent) reported that, over the past four years, they have been the victims of a crime in their community where the police were called in (such as an assault or a car break-in). Metro Vancouver has the highest incidence on this question at 22 per cent, while Vancouver Island has the lowest at 17 per cent.

But while four in five British Columbians have not experienced incidents that required alerting the authorities, the notion that lawlessness is rising lingers. Across the province, 41 per cent of residents say that the level of crime in their community has increased in the past four years.

This time, the regional numbers take a dramatic turn. In two areas – southern B.C. and the Fraser Valley – a majority of residents believe that crime has increased (56 per cent and 54 per cent respectively). In Vancouver Island and Metro Vancouver, perceptions are significantly better (38 per cent and 37 per cent respectively).

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Across the province, 40 per cent of residents say they fear becoming a victim of a crime in their community “a great deal” or a “fair amount.” This time, Metro Vancouverites are the ones that drag the provincial average upward, with 43 per cent experiencing this anxiety. The proportion is lower in all other regions, dropping to a B.C.-wide low of 30 per cent on Vancouver Island.

Islanders confirm their stature as the safest residents on a question related to a specific activity. Only 22 per cent of those living in Vancouver Island say they would feel “unsafe” walking in their own neighbourhood after dark, compared to a provincial average of 31 per cent. Northern B.C. is highest on this indicator (37 per cent).

The survey shows that there are challenges for the provincial government and municipal administrations on this particular issue. Aside from Vancouver Island, every region of the province has different concerns that move the needle.

When asked about the factors that are to blame for the current state of affairs, the top responses from British Columbians are “addiction and mental health issues” (45 per cent), “gangs and the illegal drug trade (32 per cent), an “inadequate court system” (24 per cent) and “poverty and inequality” (23 per cent). Residents of the Fraser Valley point their fingers primarily at “gangs and the illegal drug trade” (53 per cent), while residents of southern B.C. and Metro Vancouver select “addiction and mental health issues” (49 per cent and 44 per cent respectively). There are two issues that do not resonate loudly. Only 13 per cent of residents think “insufficient policing and a lack of resources to combat crime” is an issue that needs to be desperately addressed. Even fewer (nine per cent) choose to blame “immigrants and minorities” when provided with the opportunity to do so.

On the factors question, there are no major political differences among British Columbians. More than two in five of those who voted for the BC NDP (46 per cent), the BC Liberals (also 46 per cent) and the BC Green Party (44 per cent) in the 2017 provincial ballot believe addressing “addiction and mental health issues” will help immensely to bring down both the incidence of crime, and the perceptions of residents.

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BY THE NUMBERS

MARIO CANSECO

Bionic eyes look for wildfires

Bloomberg

On a tower in the Brazilian rain forest, a sentinel scans the horizon for the first signs of fire.

Only these eyes aren’t human.

They don’t blink or take breaks, and guided by artificial intelligence they can tell the difference between a dust cloud, an insect swarm and a plume of smoke that demands quick attention. In Brazil, the devices help keep mining giant Vale working, and protect trees for pulp and paper producer Suzano.

The equipment includes optical and thermal cameras, as well as spectrometric systems that identify the chemical makeup of substances.

By linking them to artificial intelligence, a small Portugal-based company working with IBM Corp. believes it can help tame the often unpredictable affects of climate change.

Others are using AI to predict dangerous hail storms, and studying how it can help find victims in bad weather.

“Climate change is dramatically changing the way we look at this problem of wildfires,” said Vasco Correia, chief business officer at Compta Emerging Business Solutions, which builds the devices.

“Two years ago we started looking to artificial intelligence and machine learning because we believe those can be game changers.”

In 2019, weather and climate events killed more than 4,000 people worldwide, and caused around $42 billion in insured losses, according to the insurer Munich Re.

Compta’s goal is to limit losses with warnings that can help keep a small blaze from becoming a conflagration.

The Compta system was first used in Brazil in a pilot program designed to test its effectiveness, but now is “available globally and operational,” Correia said.

The company recently opened an office in California, which had its deadliest wildfire last year when a blaze blamed on PG&E Corp. power lines consumed the town of Paradise, killing 85. Liabilities from that fire helped push the utility into bankruptcy in January.

Along with analyzing the data from on site, the device’s artificial intelligence will weigh similar events captured by the system over time. It will also use IBM’s Watson supercomputer to visually evaluate what it sees and forecasts from its Weather Company to predict how the fire might spread.

“The landscape of wildfires and how they ignite and how they evolve today is much different from what we had in past decades,’’ Correia said. “The fire seasons are two months longer than they were in the past decades, and wild fires today are burning six times the land area than they did before and lasting five times longer.’’

Wildfires are just one of many threats as extreme weather costs keep rising.

The trail of destruction through the first half of this year included

flooded farm fields across the Midwest and carnage along the African coast from Cyclone Idai, which killed 1,013 people, according to Munich Re.

One threat artificial intelligence could help humans prepare better for is hail, said David Gagne, a machine learning scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo. Since 2008, hail and severe thunderstorms damage has jumped to $19 billion a year adjusted for inflation and has stayed there since.

Gagne said the group is researching a tool that the National Weather Service can use to help meteorologists better predict where and when hail is going to happen a day in advance. So far the hail program has improved accuracy by 10 per cent, and there is work underway to test it real time within the weather service.

Capital One hacker hit 30 companies, U.S. prosecutors say

The Washington Post

The Seattle software engineer accused of illegally accessing more than 100 million credit card applications during a massive hack of Virginia-based Capital One also had stolen data from “more than 30 other companies,” according to federal prosecutors.

Federal agents seized servers from Paige Thompson’s bedroom that had “multiple terabytes” of stolen data from other companies or entities, including “educational institutions,” according to a memorandum filed by prosecutors Tuesday in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington.

“Although not all of those intrusions involved the theft of personal identifying information, it appears likely that a number of the intrusions did,” according to the memorandum. Prosecutors said they were still identifying all of the victims.

Thompson is likely to face new charges related to the additional alleged data thefts, according to the memorandum, filed by U.S. Attorney Brian Moran and Assistant U.S. attorneys Andrew Friedman and Steven Masada.

It argues that Thompson should be detained pending resolution of her case and not be released on bond.

“Thompson is charged with committing one of the largest cyber intrusions and data thefts in history,” the prosecutors said. Even if all of the stolen data is recovered “the impact of Thompson’s crime will be immense.”

Lawyers representing Thompson didn’t immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

Thompson was arrested last month on charges of computer fraud and abuse for the hack of Capital One, one of the largest data thefts to ever hit a financial services firm.

A criminal complaint says the software developer stole 100 million credit card applications from Capital One, exposing 140,000 Social Security numbers and 80,000 bank account numbers as well as credit scores and other personal information. The bank has said it expects the hack to cost it $100 million to $150 million this year. In Canada, the leak exposed the personal data of as many as six million Canadians,

including one million social insurance numbers.

Her arrest came just days after creditreporting company Equifax reached a $700 million settlement with U.S. regulators over the high-profile 2017 cyberattack that exposed the data of 147 million people.

Thompson, who authorities say used the name “erratic” in online conversations, made statements on social media tying herself to the hack of Capital One, according to court documents.

In one online posting, “erratic” wrote: “I’ve basically strapped myself with a bomb vest, (expletive) dropping capitol ones dox and admitting it,” according to court documents.

Prosecutors are seeking to keep Thompson detained until her trial and cited her “long history of threatening behavior that includes repeated threats to kill others, to kill herself, and to commit suicide by cop.”

Thompson may have mental health issues and has told others she takes psychiatric medications, the motion states.

During a search of Thompson’s home, federal agents also found an “arsenal of weapons, ammunition, and explosive material” in the bedroom of her roommate, who is a convicted felon, according to court documents.

Agents seized the firearms including two bump stocks and two 37 mm “flare launchers.”

“The fact that all of these weapons were recovered in the bedroom adjacent to Thompson, most of them readily accessible to her, is obviously of concern, given Thompson’s recurrent threats to commit violence against herself and other,” the prosecutors’ memorandum said.

“Thompson poses both a significant danger to the community and a risk of nonappearance.”

A hearing on whether Thompson should continue to be detained is scheduled for Aug. 22.

A surprising outcome is that the program has taught itself to recognize between supercell storms, which produce a lot of hail, from linear and pulse storms, which are less destructive. “You get a storm type classifier for free,” Gagne said. “It just kind of figured out storm type by looking at all the features of the storms. It is a really neat result.”

Artificial intelligence and machine learning programs are being used in other weather and climate related applications as well. For instance, defense and aerospace giant Raytheon has begun to explore AI’s use to coordinate rescues in the aftermath of disasters, said Todd Probert, a vice president with the company.

“Imagine that the National Guard could quickly pinpoint survivors hidden inside literally the terabyte satellite data that is com-

ing down,” Probert said. “What if those fire responders could make sense out of literally the thousands of texts and tweets and calls desperately seeking emergency services and vector into where the most critical need was.”

Humans do this by pouring over images. Imagine a computerized tool that searches for flooding, he said, adding, That’s a pretty good first order.”

Raytheon has been working with the National Guard to pull data off of Facebook to pinpoint people who need help in the aftermath of several recent storms. But these have been episodic and there aren’t machine learning tools on the back end to create a product rescue crews could use in all situations.

“The whole game here is about putting the data to work for us,” Probert said.

BLOOMBERG FILE PHOTO

A wildfire burns on Highway 63 south of Fort McMurray on May 7, 2016.

How Woodstock got his name

The Washington Post

Ever since the early ‘50s beginnings of Peanuts, creator Charles Schulz feathered his beloved comic strip with anonymous birds that popped in with mischievous, chirping whimsy.

Yet it was two decades until a winged Peanuts creature finally got a name, becoming a fully nested character.

On June 22, 1970, Schulz officially christened Snoopy’s little yellow friend Woodstock, naming him for the massive counterculture music festival that was staged 50 years ago this week on the farm in Bethel, New York.

Schulz was not particularly a fan of rock music – his record collection leaned toward classical and country-western – yet Life magazine’s coverage of the event caught his eye.

The Minnesota-born cartoonist lived in the Bay Area, which had been the locus of the “Summer of Love” a couple of years before, but the tumultuous decade was mostly reflected only glancingly in the strip, through the mostly warm and fuzzy filter of situational humor.

Yet something about that word, amid the generational rise of a new youth culture, rather fascinated Schulz.

“I can see him saying: ‘That sounds like a bird species name,’” Benjamin Clark, curator of the Charles M. Schulz Museum in Santa Rosa, Ca., says of choosing Woodstock.

“The character was pretty wellestablished – the character we had come to love – so he’s going: ‘OK, we’re going to need a name so I can go forward,’” he added.

Schulz – who collected words that amused him – was continually experimenting with his cast of characters, and one canary-yellow bird kept emerging as a fun foil to Snoopy, the beagle prone to flights of fancy. So what about the Woodstock name and its associations made it worthy for the cartoonist’s star bird?

Schulz, it turns out, was “kind of cryptic” about that, says Clark, who guided the museum’s current exhibit, Peace, Love and Woodstock, which runs through March. In one interview, the cartoonist said that the name would “be good for people who like that sort of thing,” says Clark before posing the question: was he being a savvy businessman?

“I think it’s much more than

that,” the curator continues. “He’s middle-aged and looking at these young people behind him, protesting, and (asking): ‘what’s that about?’”

Schulz, who served in the Army during the Second World War, began pulling back some on the war-themed strips during the Woodstock era, including Snoopy’s dogfight scenes piloting his fantasy plane, the Sopwith Camel. (The Royal Guardsmen had released the hit novelty song Snoopy vs. the Red Baron in 1968; the tune can be heard in Quentin Tarantino’s new 1969-set film, Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood.)

Yet Peanuts did sometimes reflect the changing times, including nods to civil rights and the Vietnam War. In one story, Snoopy gets invited to give a commencement speech at Daisy Hill Puppy Farm, where there’s a tear-gassed demonstration over the enlistment of dogs being sent to Vietnam.

And in the summer of 1968, Schulz integrated Peanuts by introducing Franklin, after a California schoolteacher – while grieving the Rev. Martin Luther

King’s assassination – wrote a letter urging the cartoonist to create a black character. Franklin, whose father is serving in Vietnam, begins by sharing a beach day with Charlie Brown.

Beyond the symbolism, “Schulz didn’t really take a strong, definite stance on some issues, but you know he was thinking about it,” Clark says. “He couldn’t quite come out and be an anti-war protester.”

Still, in Peanuts strips of the era, Schulz drew birds holding protesting signs that sported only perplexing punctuation marks. Snoopy, perhaps as the cartoonist’s avatar, observes the action with a wary but curious eye.

For the Peace Love and Woodstock exhibit, the Schulz Museum borrowed some historic festival memorabilia from New York’s Museum at Bethel Woods, including the original art for the Aquarian Exposition poster that features a white bird perched on a guitar neck. For his 3 Days of Peace & Music paper cut-out artwork, Arnold Skolnick had been influenced by a Matisse exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art.

The Schulz Museum cannot say for sure whether the cartoonist ever saw that poster. But the naming of Woodstock continued the evolution of this particular bird character, who at one point had been Snoopy’s female secretary.

Lee Mendelson, the Emmywinning producer of the classic Peanuts TV specials, including A Charlie Brown Christmas, says that as Woodstock emerged as a sidekick, he became especially useful on screen. “Woodstock gave the animators a chance for action, gave Snoopy someone new to get involved with – and gave viewers a new friend.”

At times, Snoopy and Woodstock became like a pantomiming comedy team.

Mendelson believes the animated Woodstock reached a creative zenith in the Emmy-nominated 1980 special She’s a Good Skate, Charlie Brown, in which the bird provides the impromptu musical accompaniment for Peppermint Patty’s competitive figure-skating routine.

Champion whistler Jason Victor Serinus provided the “voice” of Woodstock by recording Puccini’s

O Mio Babbino Caro. Serinus thinks Charles “Sparky” Schulz found a sweet spot of appeal with Woodstock. The key ingredient, he says, is the character’s charm.

“Sparky had a way,” Serinus says, “of capturing the innocence and naïveté, as well as in some ways the dark side, of humanity that speaks to people.”

Schulz, for example, said that Woodstock wrestled with feeling small and inconsequential. Serinus notes, too, that Schulz once told him he initially intended the character to be a baby bald eagle.

Sarah Boxer, the writer and graphic novelist (In the Floyd Archives), takes a more skeptical view of the rise of Woodstock. By the 1970s, she says, Snoopy had become the rock star of the strip, necessitating a shift in character dynamics.

“Woodstock evokes two things at once,” says Boxer, a contributor to the forthcoming anthology The Peanuts Papers. “At his best, he reminds us of what Snoopy used to be in the strip – the id, the sole being who communicates only with gestures, noises and thoughts.”

Snoopy had spent the early years of the strip walking on all fours, behaving more like an actual dog, but he increasingly assumed human characteristics.

“But at his worst,” Boxer says, “he reminds us what a huge commercial success Snoopy came to be, and how all superstars need acolytes flitting around them” –as Woodstock indulges Snoopy’s various guises of coolness and expanding sense of self.

Some readers have long wanted to find aspects of Schulz’s personality within such main characters as hard-luck Charlie Brown and the ever-charming Snoopy. Yet was there part of Sparky in the small bird that couldn’t fly straight, yet kept seeking to elevate his life?

“There’s this idea of mattering – it’s so easy to feel insignificant,” the museum curator says. “Schulz himself struggled with that, and thought about that a lot.”

And Steve Martino, who directed The Peanuts Movie, says that sense of insignificance is essential to the character.

“I think the secret to capturing Woodstock’s essence is to always feel ‘the struggle of the little guy,’” he says. “No flight path can be straight, and everything he does takes great effort, but he gives it his all.”

IMAGES COURTESY CHARLES M. SCHULZ MUSEUM/WASHINGTON POST

Top, Snoopy finally finds out and reveals to a national audience in 1970 the name of his little yellow friend. Before that, Woodstock appeared regularly in Peanuts but was unnamed, as in this 1969 cartoon, below. Above, art from the current Peace, Love and Woodstock exhibit at the Schulz Museum in Santa Rosa, Calif.

Sports

Pisces sisters in provincial pool this weekend

Ted CLARKE Citizen staff tclarke@pgcitizen.ca

As sisters, Meghan and Emma Watson are cut from the same cloth.

Their faces are strikingly similar, ringette is their favourite wintertime activity, and they both swim like fish, racing with the Prince George Pisces Swim Club.

Meghan, a Division 6 swimmer in her fifth year with the Pisces, excels in distance events and likes the 100-metre butterfly and 200m individual medley, while Emma is in her element racing backstroke and breaststroke events, competing in the Division 5 age class.

Both are competing this week in their first B.C. Summer Swim Association provincial championships in Kamloops.

The meet starts Friday and runs through Sunday.

Meghan qualified for the B.C. championships in each of her previous four years but this is the first time she’s competing against her provincial peers.

“I’m kind of nervous because there are so many talented swimmers in the province and that kind of makes me stressed out,” she said.

“But I think I’m going to take off a time so I’ll be motivated.”

At the Pisces regional meet two weekends

ago at the Aquatic Centre, Meghan won gold the 200 IM, was a silver medalist in 50 and 100 butterfly events and swam to bronze in the 100 backstroke.

“I’m definitely more of an endurance swimmer, I like the longer races,” she said.

“My preliminary 200 IM was pretty good, I’d say, and 50 fly was pretty good, too. My best time in the 200 IM is three minutes and I’ve been trying to break it. It’s been my goal all year and I always get three minutes on the dot. This time I was one second off. It’s disappointing sometimes but it motivates me to go faster.”

Emma, 14, is 16 months younger than Meghan, who turned 16 on Aug. 6. As a third-year Pisces, Emma has been taking advantage of a growth spurt which has her up to five-foot-nine, an inch taller than her older sister.

“She’s built for swimming, big hands, big feet – height and length helps,” said Pisces head coach Ian Williams.

“She got into swimming because her sister was in it and this year especially she’s really gotten into it and wanted to get better, so she’s working a lot harder. It’s a sport where you really have to out in the work to see the results, you can’t fake it.”

Emma is within a second of her provincial qualifying time (PQT) in the 100m backstroke and is qualified to swim that event

at provincials based on her gold-medal finish in that event at the Prince George meet. The PQT is the average time of the top eight swimmers at provincials over the past four years and the fact Emma’s time of 1:17 two weekends ago is close to that standard bodes well for her at least making the B-final in the 100 back this weekend in Kamloops.

In the Pisces meet she also won bronze in the 200 IM in a personal-best 2:57, five seconds quicker than her previous best.

Meghan showed an interest in swimming at an early age, which convinced her dad Keith to sign her up for the club.

Until she joined the Pisces, Emma was into triathlons. But with the demise of the Prince George Triathlon at West Lake in 2017 due to organizational struggles and declining interest, the absence of a triathlon close to Prince George forced her to find another summertime activity.

“I did a lot of triathlon and swimming was my weakest link, so I thought I’d join the swim club to make it better,” said Emma.

Like her sister, Meghan is a past winner of the Kids of Steel Triathlon and has several silver medals from that event. When asked who is the better triathlete, the sibling rivalry surfaces.

“Me,” said Emma. “I went to B.C. Games for it last summer.”

Provincial peewee champions

“That’s because I didn’t try out for it,” was Meghan’s quick response. Their 12-year-old brother Colby has just started competing this year with the Pisces club. Athleticism runs in the Watson family and both girls have played ringette for 10 years. Their Prince George Beaut Showz under-16 team won the B provincial championship on home ice at the Kin Centre in March.

“We swim in the winter and last year a lot of our (ringette) practices were on the same day, so you have to go from one sport to another quickly,” said Emma.

The Pisces is sending 23 swimmers to the provincial meet, up from 11 last year.

Pisces swimmers train throughout the year on a two-hour per week schedule and step up their training sessions to three or four times per week to compete at swim meets in the summer months.

Forty Pisces swimmers entered the Cariboo regional meet. The six-club meet also included the Mackenzie Rainbows, Quesnel Sealions, Nechako Valley (Vanderhoof) Otters, Dawson Creek Seals and Fort St. John Stingrays.

Williams, the Cariboo region coach, says the club has shown steady growth over the past two years and the number of Pisces swimmers who competed in regional meets is up 33 per cent over last year.

Federer ousted in Cincinnati

MASON, Ohio — For Roger Federer, it was one big blur. The seven-time champion was ousted from one of his favourite tournaments in barely over an hour, falling in straight sets to a 21-yearold qualifier he’d never faced.

Andre Rublev – with only one career win over a top-five player to his credit – took advantages of Federer’s numerous mistakes for a 6-3, 6-4 victory Thursday that further depleted the top of the men’s bracket in the Western & Southern Open. It was over shockingly fast – Federer’s quickest defeat on the tour since 2003.

“To be honest, it’s tough when it’s fast like this to tell you, well, I could have done this or that,” he said.

Federer has won the tournament more than anyone, using it as a springboard to the U.S. Open. He had 16 unforced errors against the 70th-ranked Rublev, who raised both fists and wiped a teary eye in celebration after Federer’s forehand sailed long to end it.

Struggling with his serve, Federer got broken twice in the first set.

“And there you have it. It set the tone for the match a little bit,” Federer said. “He was super clean – offence, defence, serving well. He didn’t give me anything.”

Federer, who lost a classic five-set match for the Wimbledon title to Novak Djokovic, thinks he’s in good shape heading into the U.S. Open despite the upset in Cincinnati.

“I played 45 matches this year, so I think I should be fine,” he said, smiling.

But oh, this last one.

And oh, what a wide-open tournament.

Second-seeded Rafael Nadal withdrew before the start of the tournament because of fatigue after winning the Rogers Cup in Montreal on Sunday.

— see ‘WHEN YOU’RE WINNING, page 10

Emma and Meghan Watson pose for a photo on Sunday afternoon at the Prince George Aquatic Centre as the pair competed in the

hosted by the Prince George Pisces swim club.

Knights scored four runs the seventh inning to cinch

batters walked in the seventh

Duncan O’Neill, Dylan Kennedy, and Aidan Heggelund each delivered RBI singles. The Knights roster also includes Gunner Beetlestone, Mitchal Heggelund, Hunter Henry, Karson Husarski, Peyton Mackay, Joe Redden, Joshua Stachoski, Josh Tamblyn and Brody Wood. The head coach is Derek Wood. Tony Beetlestone, Ryan Henry, Mike Mackay are the assistant coaches. Chase Martin, an outfielder for the BC Minor provincial-champion Jepson Petroleum 15U bantam double-A Knights, is a special assistant coach for the peewee squad.

Joe KAY The Associated Press

Street stocks, Northern Outlaws featured at PGARA meet

Sprint cars return to P.G. Wednesday night

Ted CLARKE Citizen staff

tclarke@pgcitizen.ca

Stock car racing fans are in for a treat this weekend at PGARA Speedway.

There’s a double-whammy coming to the Playground of Power to the city’s three-eighths-mile oval track as the Prince George Auto Racing Association hosts the Tri-City Street Stock Series on Saturday and Northern Outlaws 4-Cylinder (pro mini) Invitational Saturday night and Sunday afternoon.

Lyall McComber, the current points leader in PGARA’s Canadian Tire street stock series, will be one of the jackrabbits to catch in Saturday’s 75-lap main event, as will Arnie Kunka of Williams Lake in Round 2 of the three-stop Tri-City street stock series.

Kunka won the feature race in the first Tri-City race June 29 at Thunder Mountain Speedway in Williams Lake and always seems to be running with the fast guys at PGARA. McComber finished second in that 23-car race, while Darren Lemky of Williams Lake also made it to the podium, finishing third.

“Sounds like we’ll have about 20 cars,” said PGARA president Jamie Crawford.

The third and final stop in the Tri-City series is set for Sept. 21 in Quesnel.

The four other PGARA race classes all have money to lure them to the race track tonight, and all drivers will be eligible for a share of the loot. The main event winner in each of the two-day Northern Outlaw 4-Cylinder Invitational (super minis) will earn $1,500, with $800 going to the secondplace driver and $500 for third. Crawford is hoping the cash payouts will raise car counts in all the classes.

“We don’t normally race for money,” said Crawford, who expects to see about eight street stocks entries from Prince George, as

well as 12 hornets, and 15 mini stocks and four super minis.

“I’d like to see more street stocks, I’d like to get more of the guys who have cars just sitting around already built or almost built. It’s a hard class and it’s kind of holding its own. The other car counts, the hornets and minis, have climbed up drastically.”

The Canadian Brewhouse Northern Outlaws, Canadian Tire street stocks, Chieftain Auto Parts mini stock and Ron’s Towing hornets will be back racing for points Sunday afternoon at PGARA.

The action starts tonight with time trials at 6 p.m. and racing at 7. On Sunday, time

trials are at 1 p.m., with racing at 2.

Next Wednesday night, the sprint cars return to Prince George for a night of racing put on by the West Coast Vintage Racing Association. Twenty-eight sprint cars are expected, including local drivers Bob Williams of Prince George, Ron Larson and Bruce Bentley of Quesnel, and former Prince George driver Wendall Moore, who now lives in Kamloops.

Don’t be surprised to see King of the Wing sprint car series veteran Jason Conn of Prince George racing a vintage car. Drivers from the Western United States, the Lower Mainland, Vancouver Island and the Okana-

‘When you’re winning, it’s fun’

— from page 1

Djokovic was the only one of the Top 3 left in Cincinnati, set to play later in the day. Qualifier Yoshihito Nishioka followed his upset of sixth-seeded Kei Nishikori – a player he called his hero - by beating Alex De Minaur 7-5-6-4. It’s the first time in 10 years that two qualifiers have reached the quarterfinals of an ATP Masters 1000 event.

The day began with the ATP fining Nick Kyrgios $113,000 for expletivefilled outbursts that included smashing rackets, insulting a chair umpire and refusing to get ready to return serve during a second-round match the previous night.

In the women’s bracket, top-seeded Ashleigh Barty reached the quarterfinals, joined by a resurgent Venus Williams. Barty beat Anett Kontaveit 4-6, 7-5, 7-5, raising her fist in triumph after fighting off one match point to take the 2-hour, 10-minute match. She was down a break in the second set before rallying on a day when she struggled to find consistency.

“The best thing is when my back was against the wall, the tennis was there,” Barty said. “It may not have been there the whole match, but we were able to find it when we needed it.”

Barty, the French Open champion and currently ranked No. 2, can move up to the top spot by reaching the final.

With the crowd cheering for her,

Williams recovered from a rough first set and beat Donna Vekic 2-6, 6-4, 6-3, her best stretch of tennis in since she won three straight matches in March at Miami.

After a first-round loss in Toronto last week, her ranking slipped to No. 65, her lowest in seven years. With sister Serena cheering courtside, Venus reached the semifinals.

“I mean, I’m pretty pumped,” Venus

Williams said. “When you’re winning, it’s fun.” Serena Williams withdrew from the tournament because of back spasms. She calmly watched her sister advance.

“I think she believed in me,” Venus Williams said.

“She was rooting hard but didn’t seem panicked at all after I lost the first set.” AP freelance writer Mark Schmetzer contributed to this report.

gan are expected.

“They used to race Wednesday nights back in the day, long before my time,” said Crawford.

“It’s a big series and they do tons of racing in the States. There’s some big-name guys who raced in the World of Outlaws that are coming racing. They’re just a group of older retired guys and they just tour around and race where they want to.”

The sprint cars will be backed by the PGARA racing classes. The vintage racers are coming to Quesnel’s Gold Pan Speedway next Friday and will be in Williams Lake on Aug. 24.

Midget Knights thinking repeat at Westerns

Citizen staff

The PG Surg Med Knights won’t have the element of surprise working in their favour on the ball diamond in Strathmore, Alta., when they start playing in the Western Canadian 18U midget double-A baseball championship.

As the defending champions at the five-team tournament, everybody will have their sights trained on them.

The Knights will try to pick up where they left off last Sunday when they beat the host Burnaby Braves 7-1 in the Baseball B.C. provincial final. The previous week in Kelowna, the Knights were crowned provincial champions of the B.C. Minor Baseball Association. The Knights won that title with a 9-4 win over the Vancouver Canadians in the final, Aug. 4.

In their first game at Westerns today at 1:15 p.m. PT, the Knights face the Saskatchewanchampion Unity Cardinals. Prince George plays the Altona Bisons of Manitoba Saturday at 8 a.m. PT, followed by a 1:30 p.m. PT game against the host Strathmore Reds. The Knights wrap up round-robin play Sunday at 8 a.m., against the Leduc Giants of Alberta.

The top two teams advance to the final Sunday at 4:45 p.m. PT. If a tiebreaker is needed it would be played Sunday at 1:45 p.m. PT.

Lyall McComber races around the track at PGARA Speedway on Sunday on the way to winning the Canadian Tire street stocks main event.

AP PHOTO

Venus Williams returns to Donna Vekic, of Croatia, during the quarterfinals of the Western & Southern Open tennis tournament onThursday in Mason, Ohio.

GE stung by fraud report

The Washington Post General Electric shares plunged Thursday after a whistleblower accused the conglomerate of using accounting tricks to mask the extent of its financial problems and called it “a bigger fraud than Enron.” Harry Markopolos, who alerted regulators about Bernie Madoff, published a report online Thursday that said GE’s accounting irregularities added up to $38 billion. The investigator, who is collaborating with an unnamed hedge fund, says GE understated its costs and liabilities and misled investors in its financial statements.

The research, first reported by The Wall Street Journal, alleges that the problems are focused on GE’s insurance business, asserting that the company is short on cash.

“GE will always take any allegation of financial misconduct seriously. But this is market manipulation – pure and simple,” chief executive Lawrence Culp said in a statement. “The fact that he wrote a 170-page paper but never talked to company officials goes to show that he is not interested in accurate financial analysis, but solely in generating downward volatility in GE stock so that he and his undisclosed hedge fund partner can personally profit.” GE shares fell 11 per cent, to $8.01, on Thursday. The stock traded near $12 a year ago and $30 at the start of 2017.

Researchers who reviewed GE’s financial statements from 2002 to 2018 alleged that the company does not have enough cash to cover the claims on long-term care policies, which help people pay for nursing homes and assisted living.

The report says GE reported earnings when policyholders were young and not filing insurance claims, but then miscalculated how much it would have to spend to issue those benefits. GE does not have “adequate reserves” to cover the liabilities on its longterm care business, even though it boosted those reserves by $15 billion last year, according to the research.

Markopolos, who declined to comment for this article, says GE is understating the losses it could face on insurance claims, adding

that they will rise “at an exponential rate” and put the company at risk of bankruptcy unless it finds a way to cover the costs.

“GE operates at the highest level of integrity and stands behind its financial reporting. We remain focused on running our businesses every day, following the strategic path we have laid out,” the company said in a statement. It called the claims “meritless,” adding that no one at the company has ever met, spoken to or had contact with Markopolos. GE said that it has the reserves to support its insurance portfolio and that it has a “strong liquidity position.”

Markopolos is a former financial analyst who spent nearly a decade investigating Bernie Madoff’s business before his Ponzi scam – the largest in U.S. history – was discovered in 2008. The researcher says he warned the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission about his Madoff investigation but was ignored. Markopolos is sharing his GE findings with regulators and reserved some information to be shared exclusively with law enforcement, according to the report.

The SEC declined to comment.

GE’s accounting practices are being scrutinized by the SEC and the Department of Justice regarding a $6 billion charge to its insurance business and a $22 billion write-down to its struggling power division.

Co-founded by Thomas Edison in the late 19th century, GE evolved into an iconic American company with a track record of innovation. Over time, its reach expanded across a range of industries, with products including home appliances, medical devices and airplanes.

Former CEO Jack Welch became a household name as the company flourished, peaking in 2000 with a market value of $594 billion. But it has been contracting for decades, burdened by debt and tainted by a probe into its accounting practices. The company, which now has a market value of about $78 billion, is now being lead by its second CEO since Jeffrey Immelt stepped down from the job in 2017.

Markopolos told CNBC that the GE review came at the request of a “mid-sized U.S.-based hedge fund,” but he declined to name the firm. He said he will get a “decent percentage” of any profits

the hedge fund earns from betting against the conglomerate. He also says the alleged fraud is “bigger than Enron and WorldCom combined.” At $38 billion, if true, it would add up to more than 40 per cent of GE’s market capitalization. Enron had been a $100 billiona-year behemoth and Wall Street superstar before the Houston energy trader was exposed as a “mind-numbingly complex” web of financial maneuvering and hidden debts. The scandal led to its 2001 implosion; the prosecution of several top executives, including Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling; and losses in excess of $60 billion. WorldCom, meanwhile, disclosed in 2002 that an internal audit unearthed $3.8 billion in inflated profits. It filed for bankruptcy soon after and several executives were convicted of fraud and other crimes.

Markopolos takes issue with the way GE recorded losses when it sold part of its investment in Baker Hughes, its oil and gas business. The conglomerate reduced its stake in the business to 50.2 per cent from 62.5 per cent, recording a loss of $2.2 billion.

Flying wind turbines make debut in Norway

Bloomberg

A carbon-fibre kite tethered to a buoy floating in waters 220 metres deep took flight in a test to prove that the future of offshore wind power might fly through the air.

The kite, owned by the Alphabet subsidiary Makani and backed by Royal Dutch Shell, completed its first demonstration 10 kilometres off the coast of Norway in the North Sea.

Makani grew as part of an Alphabet division that develops experimental new technologies.

Earlier this year, it partnered with Shell and is one of a handful of companies that work to develop kite-like wind turbines.

The machines are meant to tap into more reliable wind currents at higher altitudes, maybe up to 500 metres.

The device looks like a sleek airplane, about 26 metres across, with eight rotors attached to it that spin in the wind to generate electricity.

It’s secured by a cable to a buoy and makes a loop as it flies.

The advantage is that it requires less steel and concrete to install than a traditional offshore wind turbine, some of which are fixed by structures as large as skyscrapers.

Just moving tests of the kite to the water from land marked an accomplishment for the developers, since the salty sea air corrodes materials.

“The tests we conducted last week proved that it works,” Fort Felker, Makani’s chief executive officer, said in an interview.

“That’s the giant step forward. Now we’ll come back to adapt the systems for the overall marine environment that we’ll want to commercialize in.”

Ultimately, Makani wants its technology to be deployed to provide electricity for hundreds of millions of people in what it sees as an untapped market.

Many places aren’t suitable for conventional offshore wind turbines because the water is too deep. Floating platforms for conventional turbines do exist, but Makani said its technology would be about a fraction of the cost of those options.

Other applications could be to power floating offshore oil platforms or for small island nations that currently rely on diesel generators.

Large-scale generation is at least five to 10 years away for any of the companies working on airborne wind power, according to BNEF.

The technology is still in the early stages of testing. Smaller-scale applications could come much sooner, perhaps in one to three years. Those may include units that provide power far from traditional grids or for disaster relief.

“It’s a big step forward, but Makani has a lot more work to do before commercialization,” said BNEF wind analyst Rachel Shifman. “The next thing to look out for will be proof of continuous operation and scaling up to bigger machines for utility operations.”

Next summer, Makani will conduct another test in Norway where it will operate for a longer period in more kinds of weather – with a direct link to the grid. In the meantime, the developers plan to explore additional partnerships and improve on methods for servicing the kites as well as increase the automation of monitoring the devices.

Markets have finally “sobered up” and are accepting that there is a global economic slowdown, said Kash Pashootan, CEO and chief investment officer at First Avenue Investment Counsel Inc. Pashootan said he doesn’t understand the euphoria that sent markets to record highs last month and that geopolitical uncertainties and a global growth slowdown justify why equities shouldn’t go higher. He said markets were intoxicated by central bank interest rate cuts but are now back to focusing on fundamentals and geopolitical factors such as the lingering trade war between the U.S. and China, protests in Hong Kong, an economic slowdown in Germany and weakerthan-expected data from India, Argentina and Singapore. The S&P/TSX composite index closed down 33.41 points to 16,012.53, after hitting an intraday low of 15,964.38, the lowest level since Feb. 19. In New York, the Dow Jones industrial average was up 99.97 points at 25,579.39 after losing 800 points on Wednesday. The S&P 500 index was up seven points at 2,847.60, while the Nasdaq composite was down 7.32 points at 7,766.62. Despite lingering fears of a recession, U.S. markets were buttressed by retail sales rising a healthy 0.7 per cent in July, indicating that the trade war and weaker economic growth hasn’t dampened consumer spending that is a key contributor to the economy. However, factory production declined 0.4 per cent, driven by lower output of autos, fabricated metals, and wood products. Manufacturing has now fallen 0.5 per cent in the past year. The Canadian dollar traded for an average of 75.05 cents US, compared with an average of 75.13 cents US on Wednesday. The health care sector was the worst TSX performer, falling 6.2 per cent as shares of cannabis producer Canopy Growth Corp. plunged 14.5 per cent and hit its lowest level of the year after quarterly results that suggested the cannabis producer

AP FILE PHOTO

The General Electric logo appears above a trading post on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange in June 2018.

Van Beek Cornelus Evert (Casey) Sept 2, 1946 to Aug 9, 2019

Went to be with the Lord August 9th, 2019, beloved husband of Patricia. He is survived by his son Duane (Gabbi) and daughter Michelle and grandson Taggart. Sister Evelyn (Ernie) Leboe, several cousins, nephews, & nieces. Funeral Service will be held on August 20th, 2019 at the Christian Reformed Church, 1905 Willow Street at 1:00 p.m. Interment to follow at the Prince George Cemetery. In lieu of Flowers, donations can be made to the Salvation Army or the charity of your choice.

It is with heavy hearts that we announce the passing of Robert (Bob) Beatch on August 8, 2019. Bob was born and raised in Richmond, BC, the son of the late Katherine & Clarence Beatch. At the age of 18 he enlisted in the Canadian Armed Forces, with 5yr postings in Trenton Ont., Lahr Germany and Kamloops. Bob moved to Prince George in 1981 where he retired from the Air Force. Bob then became a realtor with Century 21 for many years as well as the co-owner of Royal Rose Limousine with his son. Bob was particularly proud of his service in the Canadian Forces, especially his time spent in Lahr, Germany. His favorite hobbies included fishing/camping, computers (electronics), and spoiling his dogs. Bob also enjoyed serving on the PG Heritage Committee as well as BC SPCA Community Council. The former Rotarian, who held a perfect attendance record, looked forward to driving the bus to the Rotary RYLA camp each year. The youths were quiet on the way there unlike the ride home, due to the impact of the leadership program resulted in such youthful enthusiasm. Every Monday & Wednesday one would find Bob at the Coast Inn of the North with his Coffee Club which started almost 20 years ago. His friendship will be missed deeply by Paul E., Paul S., Roger, Jo, Kathi & Echo and others who often joined us including his servers Tim & Laura and his favorite Chef, Shelby. Bob is survived by his siblings Elaine, Sherry, Roxanne, Rod & Don. Bob is also survived by his wife Louise, son Wayne (Tracey) and granddaughter Sarah. He is pre-deceased by son Bobby. Bob Beatch was a classy man who loved people and they loved him back. There is an empty chair at the Coffee Club that can never be filled but has happy memories of the gentle soul with the big smile. Funeral services will be held on Saturday August 17th at 2:30 at Assmans Funeral Chapel with Susan Scott officiating. In lieu of flowers donations may be made to the S.P.C.A.

Rebman(Strom),EvelynJuneMarie June1,1925-August13,2019 EvelyndiedpeacefullysurroundedbyfamilyinPrince George,BC,onAugust13,2019. ShewasborninWillowRiver,BC,andresidedin PrinceGeorgeherentirelife.EvelynmarriedJohn (Jack)RebmanonJune19,1943,justbeforehe wentoverseaswithRCAFBomberCommand. Predeceasedbyherparents,CarlWilhelmStromin 1963andBorghildStrom(Benson)in1933; husband,Jackin1991;stepmother,Ruth Cunningham;brothers,AlfredStromandCarlStrom; andsister,LillianCoulling.

Evelynenjoyedbeingamother,grandmother,and great-grandmothermostinlife,butalsoenjoyedthe outdoors,poetry,reading,travel,gardening,and, laterinlife,hercomputer.Shewasveryactive writingletterstotheeditorintheCitizennewspaper formanyyearsandveryactiveonFacebook.Shewas agreatsourceoflocalhistoryinformation.Atruly remarkablewomanwhowillbemissedbyfamilyand friends. Evelynissurvivedbyherchildren,John(Joan) RebmanofChilliwack,Don(Alice)RebmanofPrince George,Mark(Lynn)RebmanofCoquitlam,Kirk (Cindy)RebmanofPrinceGeorge,andSherri (Marina)RebmanofVancouver,plusfive grandchildren;sixgreat-grandchildren;sister, Elizabeth(Jim)O’RourkeofVancouver;brothers,Bill (Muriel)StromofKamloopsandEric(Annette) StromofAbbotsford;andmanyniecesandnephews, aswellasmanyextendedrelativesinNorwayand Sweden. VeryspecialthankstoDr.Serwelandthenursesand staffonthesecondfloorofUHNBCHospital-Evelyn receivedsuchexcellentcare.Alsospecialthanksto thestaffatthePGHospiceHouse. TherewillbenofuneralserviceasperEvelyn’s wishes.Inlieuofflowers,pleasegivedonationsin hernametothePGHospiceSociety.

Pearl Grace Turner Sept 10, 1929 to Aug 11, 2019

Heaven gained an Angel, our amazing mother. Mom your loving children will miss you forever. Jo-anne(George), Ken (Leanne), Ted (Wendy), Cindy (Perry) and Doug (Marcia). 12 grandchildren, 8 great grandchildren. Mom’s second home was Pine Center, where having coffee with friends was special. Much love and many thanks to Dr. Preston and Hospice staff.

Irene Caplette June 20th,1939- Aug 9th, 2019

It with great sadness that our family announces Irene Marie Caplette has passed away peacefully at age 80, August 9th, 2019 Prince George B.C Predeceased By her Husband of 52 years Paul Caplette Survived by Her Children Janice, Casey, ( Marlene) Chad , ( Tammy) Carmen (Ryan) Her loving Grandchildren,Service will held Assman Funnel at 11am Saturday August 17, 2019 Reception to announced after service.

Terrance (Terry) Chester George Sept 10, 1958 Aug 8, 2019

It is with deepest regret and sorrow that we announce the passing of Terry. Left behind to cherish his memory are his daughter Kimberley and grandson James. Brothers; Ron, Rod, Jim and Peter, Sisters; Sheila, Jerenia and Cheryl. He was also surrounded by numerous nieces, nephews, cousins and friends. Terry is now united with his parents Jim and Mabel, sisters Louise and Vivian and brother Paul. Please join us at Assman’s Funeral Chapel on Saturday August 17th at 4:30 pm to celebrate Terry’s life. In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to the Fire Pit Cultural Drop-in Centre.

Edeltraud (Trudy) Luise Krueger Jun 6, 1938 to Aug 13, 2019

Our hearts are very deeply saddened at the sudden loss of our beloved Mom, Oma, Great Oma, Sister, Tante, and friend to so many. She was blessed to be a resident of Laurier Manor for the last seven years, where she received so much love and excellent care, and made many lasting friendships. We are eternally grateful for the caring staff there, and for the excellent medical care of Dr. McGhee. Our grateful thanks also to the staff of the Rotary Club hospice house, who made Trudy’s last night so comfortable. Trudy is predeceased by her husband Udo, several siblings, and leaves to mourn her loss children Norbert (Cheryl), Sylvia (Del), Conrad (Lavonne) and Gerhard (Michelle), grandchildren Nathan (Breanne), Kurt (Caitlyn), Travis (Carly), Chelsea, great grandchildren Reid, Corinn, and Ellis, as well as sisters Lydia, Christel, Gerti, and sisters-inlaw Elisabeth and Naemi (Manfred).

Celebration of life will take place Saturday, August 17th, 11:00 a.m. at Westwood Church, 2658 Ospika Blvd.

Apr 5, 1937 Hairy Hill, AB Aug 4, 2019 Vernon, BC A loving husband, father and grandfather, he is survived by his wife Carole and their children. Son Andrew Tkachuk (Katherine) of Prince George, Daughters Janice Tkachuk (Margaret Stephens) of Peterborough, ON and Catherine Featherstone (Peter) and the Featherstone grandchildren Gareth, Simon, David and Amelia of South Surrey, BC, and Grand dog Walter. Grateful thanks to the staff at Gateway, 3rd floor, and Simon Fraser Lodge in Prince George and Noric Care Home and hospital in Vernon. In lieu of flowers, donations to Canadian Cancer Society, SPCA or charity of your choice would be appreciated. Private service to be held in Vernon, BC. Arrangements in care of Vernon Funeral Home, 3007 28th Street, Vernon BC. 250-542-0155.

NOEL WILLIER Dec 21, 1934 - Aug 12, 2019

It is with great sadness that we announce the passing of our beloved Husband, Father, Grandfather, and GreatGrandfather, Noel. He passed away at UHNBC with his family by his side. Noel will be greatly missed by his loving wife Edna of 64 years, and all of his family and friends. A viewing will be held at Assman’s Funeral Chapel on Sunday, August 18, 2019 from 1:00pm until 2:00pm. Funeral service to start at 2pm. Following the service, everyone is welcome to join the family at the Native Friendship Centre for a POTLUCK at 4:00pm.

TKACHUK, MICHAEL D., P.Eng

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• Driftwood Rd, Dawson Rd, Seton Cres,

• Austin Rd. College Heights: Needed for Sept 1, 2019 O’Grady Rd and Park, Brock, Selkirk,

• Oxford, Cowart, Simon Fraser, Trent, Domano, Guelph, St Lawrence, Hartford, Harvard, Imperial, Jean De Brefeuf Cres, Loyola, Latrobe, Leicester Pl, Malaspina, Princeton, Newcastle, Prince Edward, Melbourne, Guerrier, Loedel, Sarah, Lancaster, Lemoyne, Leyden,St Anne, St Bernadette Pl, Southridge, Bernard Rd, St Clare, Creekside, Stillwater, Avison, Davis, Capella, Speca, Starlane, Bona Dea, Charella, Davis, Polaris, Starlane, Vega.

• • Needed for Aug 1, 2019

• • Moncton, Queens, Peidmont, Rochester, Renison, McMaster, Osgood, Marionopolis.

• Quinson Area

• Lyon, Moffat, Ogilvie, Patterson, Kelly, Hammond, Ruggles, Nicholson

Full Time and Temporary Routes Available. Contact for Details 250-562-3301 or rss@pgcitizen.ca