Light smoke and a strange smell filling an apartment complex causing an afternoon evacuation.
Platoon
Chief Eric Garland says they evacuated everyone in the 48-unit apartment
building at 10 Woodhollow Park while crews looked for the source—which they found to be a malfunctioning ventilation system that's now in need of servicing.
Fire
crews were on the scene for about an hour, and everybody was allowed to
return home. One older woman was brought to hospital, but Garland says
it's nothing serious.
As the
Port City holds onto the title of highest unemployment of all cities in a
Stats Canada survey, this announcement could bring some hope to Saint
Johners looking for work — a major retail chain is doing some hiring.
Target
is hosting a job fair throughout the week at Loch Lomond Place. It runs
from 8:30am to 5:30 on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday and from 11:00am to
8pm on Wednesday.
The store itself will will open sometime before Christmas.
The Saint John Jewish Historical Museum fund has just received a big donation from a man who passed away last week.
Author,
lawyer, educator and human rights advocate Lorne Rozovsky has given the
group $25,000. In a letter, he wrote that he wanted to make a lasting
contribution to the preservation of the history of the city's Jewish
community.
Rozovsky died last Monday at the age of 70 after a 15-month battle with pancreatic cancer.
Acrobatics,
costumes, bagpipes and standup comedy: just a few of the wild and wacky
performance styles you can expect at the Port City's most unique
theater festival....which you may not have heard of yet.
Fundy
Fringe Fest is a brand-new theater festival coming to the Port City.
The titles range from "Morlock the Warlock" to "That Boob Show" and "I
Get Naked," and the performers are from all over Canada.
Sandra
Bell of the Fundy Fringe Fest tells CHSJ News it's not your usual
highbrow theater experience, and there's something at Fringe everyone
can appreciate.
The
Fundy Fringe Festival festival runs from August 21 to the 25 and a $50
festival pass gets you into 8 different shows of your choice. For more
information, click here.
Fire crews getting to the bottom of a strong smell on the West side of Saint John.
The calls started coming in just after 10pm, with numerous West side residents reporting a strange smell in the air—many saying it smelled like natural gas.
Firefighters tracked down the source of the odour—a
Maritimes and Northeast substation on the West side that had released a
small amount of gas. Wilson says the low atmosphere and the fog at the
time made the smell seem much worse than it actually was.
He says there was no danger.
The
federal government will review whether or not it needs to play a role in
how exotic pet stores are regulated says Prime Minister Stephen
Harper.
Early
on Monday, two young brothers in Campbellton were killed by an African
rock python that escaped its enclosure in an apartment located above
exotic pet store, Reptile Ocean.
As Harper made the vow yesterday, zoo staff seized 23 reptiles—among them, snakes, lizards and a Cuban crocodile—and
euthanized four American alligators belonging to the store. Officials
say they had to put the animals down because no zoo would take them.
The
species of python is banned in the province unless you have a special
permit. Environment Canada spokesman Mark Johnson says the department
was enlisted to help transport the python to Reptile Ocean 11 years ago
after it was abandoned at the SPCA in Moncton.
A funeral service is being held today for the two boys killed by a python in Campbellton.
Four
year-old Noah Barthe and his six year-old brother Connor were found dead
on Monday morning after a 45-kilogram African rock python escaped its
enclosure in the apartment, which is above an exotic pet store.
Preliminary autopsy results show the boys died of asphyxiation.
Campbellton's
deputy mayor, Ian Comeau, says the brothers will be buried together in
one casket and that the service will celebrate their short lives. The
funeral will be held at St. Thomas Aquinas Roman Catholic Church.
Both the
apartment and store are owned by Jean-Claude Savoie, a family friend,
who took the boys shopping and to a farm before hosting a sleepover on
Sunday with his son.
A two-car crack up on the East side of Saint John.
Division
Chief Mark Wilson of the Saint John Fire Department says two people
were brought to hospital after the crash, which happened just after nine
o'clock in the evening on the corner of Westmorland Road and Retail
Drive.
Their injuries are not life-threatening.
A Bordertown blaze gutting a mobile home in the Milltown area, leaving a man temporarily homeless.
Crews
from St. Stephen and Calais, Maine, responded to the fire which was
reported at 3 o'clock in the afternoon. No word yet on a cause.
The Canadian Red Cross is providing emergency lodging for the man, who they say is focusing on his daughter's wedding today.
Fire crews from Calais and St. Stephen responding to a fire today at the Milltown trailer park.
No word yet on the extent of damage or any injuries.
The
Canadian Taxpayers Federation says it should be the provincial
Conservative party paying for the new TV ad featuring Premier David
Alward.
He's
talking about turning around the economic fortunes of the province and
bringing New Brunswick workers back home from out west but the
Federation's Atlantic Director Kevin Lacey tells CHSJ News he doubts
taxpayers in the province want to foot the bill.
The ad cost 15 thousand dollars to make and another 75 thousand dollars to air.
A
spokesperson for the Premier says they're just trying to be transparent
but Lacey views it as the first ad of next year's provincial election
campaign.
Health Canada should regulate the mixing of drugs outside a licensed pharmacy.
That conclusion emerges from a report on why more than 12 hundred cancer patients at the Regional Hospital and in Ontario were receiving lower dosages for their chemotherapy than they should have, some for as long as a year.
Prime Minister Harper will be making a brief stop in Saint John at noonhour.
He's here for what is described as a photo op with Premier David Alward and Arthur Irving at the Irving Oil refinery.
This
comes just a few days after the announcement that Trans Canada is moving
ahead with the West to East pipeline which has the support of the
federal government as a way to reduce dependence on foreign oil, get
more money for Alberta oil and spur some economic activity.
The
Minister of Healthy and Inclusive Communities isn't taking issue with
the estimate of 24 per cent of children in the province growing up in
homes where getting enough food is a problem.
Dorothy
Shephard, who's also the M-L-A for Saint John Lancaster, tells CHSJ
News the Alward Government is not sitting back, waiting for the
provincial economy to get better.
She
says the government spends about 1 and a half million dollars a year on
29 different programmes which include community gardens, one of which
just opened on land leased to the Carleton Community Centre by the Port
Authority.
Shephard
also says food mentors go into communities to teach people how they can
shop well by buying nutritious foods that are cheaper than processed
food. She points out the community gardens are full of people.
A provincially-run registry that matches doctor-less patients with family doctors is showing results.
800 New
Brunswickers have been matched with a family doctor or nurse through
Patient Connect NB, and another 300 are being matched right now. 2000
people have signed up for the service in total.
Patient Connect NB was established at the end of May. To register for the service, click here.
With the
announcement the West side icon will be shutting its doors, the CEO of
Simms has said he'll help out of work employees find new jobs — and Ward One Councillor, Bill Farren, believes he'll be true to his word.
Farren
tells CHSJ News he knows Tom Simms will do his best to take care of
those who find themselves unemployed when the Simms Corner factory shuts
its doors this fall.
Farren says that's just in Simms' make-up, calling him a man of the people and a good, true businessman.
In a
release Simms said it was a tough choice to let go of a team of
employees they've worked with for decades. No word on how many people
will be out of a job.
The Simms Company, which will no longer be making its brushes in Saint John, had its beginnings in 1866. That's when Thomas Stockwell Simms, an American civil war veteran, invested his soldier's back pay and bonus in a small brush and broom operation in Portland, Maine. This fledgling enterprise moved in 1872 to Saint John.
David Goss knows more about Saint John history than just about anyone else and tells CHSJ News Simms played a huge role in the lives of many people on the west side. He says you will hardly meet anyone over 60 in that part of the city who hasn't had some connection with the company over the years.
Simms Corner used to be known as Avery's Corner and the company, which employed up to 500 workers at one time, had a building across the road on the former Centracare property which was used to house 60 factory girls if they had nowhere else to live.
Simms travelled all the way to the far east back in the early 1900's to get the best bristles and established a Baptist church in India which is still standing today.
The rules of the game have changed when it comes to winning public support for big industrial projects.
John Herron of the Atlantica Centre for Energy says the old argument of compromising the environment for the sake of jobs and economic growth isn't being accepted as readily anymore.
Shale gas development has run into strident opposition but Herron tells the Tide other jurisdictions have managed to get their publics on board with energy development.
Herron says protests occur when people feel they're not being listened to and there have been intensified protests in Kent County with arrests being made.
Provincial Green
Party leader David Coon says there might be overwhelming support for the
West to East pipeline in Saint John but such is not the case in
Quebec.
He
claims there's alot of concern and Quebec Premier Pauline Marois has
been hedging on where she stands so as not to alienate her populist
base. Coon points out environmental concerns in Quebec have been
heightened because of the train disaster with tankers of oil exploding
at Lac Magentic last month.
He
tells the Tide the pipeline project will increase carbon pollution and
that will have unforseen consequences, pointing out not many people
around here are aware the Bay of Fundy is becoming more acidified
because of climate change and increased carbon pollution. He warns that
acidification could damage the fishery over the long term.
Campbellton is in a
state of shock........The RCMP say two young boys, aged 5 and 7, are
dead after they were strangled by a python that escaped its enclosure at
an exotic pet store.
The
RCMP say the boys were sleeping in an apartment above Reptile Ocean and
it's believed the snake made its way into the apartment through the
ventilation system sometime through the overnight hours.
The
snake was captured and is in the possession of police. The boys were
visiting the apartment of the pet store's owner at the time.
Autopsies will be performed on the two victims today in Saint John.
