Wednesday, 21 August - When that moon is big and bright

Good morning, it’s Wednesday, 21 August. In your Squiz Today…

• An Italian maritime mystery

• Israel recovers the bodies of more hostages

• And a picturesque quest…

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Squiz the Weather

Squiz Sayings

Said Blue Mountains City Council Mayor Mark Greenhill while confirming security cameras will be installed along their Corridor of Oaks after Tony Abbott’s prime-ministerial commemorative trees have been cut down twice in 2 weeks. It’s got the locals stumped…

An Italian maritime mystery

The Squiz

Questions linger in the wake of the sinking of a luxury sailing yacht off the coast of Sicily, which has left one man dead and 6 others missing. The missing include big business names British tech tycoon Mike Lynch and Morgan Stanley International bank chairman Jonathan Bloomer. Another 15 passengers were rescued after the 56m yacht sank within minutes of being hit by a freak storm in the early hours of Monday morning. Italian authorities said it’s a case of being ”in the wrong place at the wrong time”. 

Who is Mike Lynch?

It’s a good question because he’s been the person most focused on in the reporting. The 59yo is said to be ‘Britain’s Bill Gates’ after he co-founded and spent a decade building the UK’s biggest software firm Autonomy. It analyses huge caches of data and was bought by Hewlett-Packard in 2011 for over $16 billion. That deal led to 13 years of legal wrangling over allegations he’d committed fraud by exaggerating Autonomy’s success to get top dollar. It eventually saw him extradited to the US to face charges, where he was acquitted just weeks ago. Last month Lynch said he feared dying in prison if convicted due to a lung condition. “I have various medical things that would have made it very difficult to survive,” he said. 

Fascinating…

And it doesn’t end there… Just 2 days before the yacht sank, Lynch's co-defendant in the case died after being “fatally struck” by a car. That was Autonomy’s former VP of finance Stephen Chamberlain, who was also acquitted - he was out running when he was killed in the English village of Stretham in Cambridgeshire. Chamberlain’s lawyer Gary Lincenberg said his client “fought successfully to clear his good name, which lives on through his wonderful family.” As for the next steps, police divers are continuing to try to reach the hull of the yacht which is about 50m below the surface where it had been anchored near the town of Porticello. The missing are from several countries including the UK, which has also dispatched a 4-person team from its Marine Accident Investigation Branch to assess what happened. Reports say the body of the boat’s chef Recaldo Thomas has been recovered. 

A Squiz at News Club…

If you’re signed up for our News Club newsletters, look out for our Newsmakers interview with John McDuling from Capital Brief landing in your inbox around midday today, or tune into the podcast now. He’s the editor-in-chief of the business news challenger that’s focused on the new economy. We also dropped an interview with Mamamia co-founder Mia Freedman last week that’s had a lot of positive feedback, so if you haven’t checked it out we reckon you should.

And if you’re new around here, News Club is the place for conversations about the news. You can sign up here to get the newsletters straight to your inbox. And you’re so very welcome…

Squiz the Rest

More hostages' bodies recovered in Gaza

Six of them, in fact… They were retrieved by the Israel Defense Forces from underground tunnels in the Khan Younis area on Monday. These were people taken by Hamas terrorists from their kibbutz homes during the 7 October attacks and have been identified as Yagev Buchshtab, Alexander Dancyg, Avraham Munder, Yoram Metzger, Chaim Peri and British/Israeli citizen Nadav Popplewell. The deaths of 5 of the men were already known before this week. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said "Our hearts ache for the terrible loss". It comes as the US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has moved onto Qatar as he and representatives from nations like Egypt up the diplomatic effort to secure a Gaza ceasefire and a hostage release deal. He says Israel has moved some way towards agreeing, and has urged Hamas to do the same. 

A defence deal with the new boss

PM Anthony Albanese and Indonesia’s incoming President Prabowo Subianto have finalised a new defence agreement - touted as the “most significant” ever - during Subianto’s visit to Canberra yesterday. The gist is that it aims to strengthen the relationship between our militaries, with more cooperation on things like joint defence exercises. Albanese called it a "vital plank" that will help underpin "the stability of the region that we share". That's a not-so-subtle nod to China's moves in the Indo-Pacific in recent years - and it includes a blossoming relationship between Indonesia and China... It's prompted experts to say the agreement is a strategic play on our end but it's not quite locked in yet - Defence Minister Richard Marles is due to sign it off with Subianto during a visit to Indonesia soon. President-elect Subianto will be sworn in on 20 October. 

Biden passes the baton

A month after dropping out of the US presidential election, the Democratic National Convention probably looked a bit different for President Joe Biden than he’d originally planned… He was tearful on stage, saying he’d given his “heart and soul” to further the interests of Americans during his more than 50 years in politics. After outlining his and Vice President Kamala Harris’s achievements, he took aim at Republican nominee Donald Trump - again calling him a threat to democracy. He also promised to be “the best volunteer the Harris-Walz campaign has ever seen”. Meanwhile, Trump fired back at the Harris campaign while pitching his economic agenda that includes “a total pro-American overhaul of our tax regulation and trade systems”. On stage at the DNC today will be the Obamas and several high profile Senators.

Summer is coming

We’ve been complaining about the cold recently, but that’s about to end as hot winds from the red centre are headed our way… The Bureau of Meteorology says most of Oz will reach the mid-20Cs on the weekend - 4-7C above August averages - thanks to a high-pressure system. The Northern Territory/South Australia are expected to hit new records, while Sydney could peak today at 26C. Looking forward (like, quite a bit forward…) new climate modelling from the NSW Government points to Sydneysiders facing an extra week of +35C temps by 2090, even if greenhouse gas emissions are limited. And if we don't get emissions down, there could be 3 extra-hot weeks, more severe fire conditions, a one-third increase in winter rainfall, and a sea-level rise of 50cm. Yikes… 

A not-so-cuckoo quest

Yesterday we flagged Florida’s Python Challenge as a way to earn some extra cash, and today it’s authorities in Switzerland offering a share of $85,000 for the best ideas to recover thousands of tonnes of munitions that lie deep beneath the country’s famous lakes. The top 3 plans won’t be enacted right away, but could form the basis of future research. Sitting at depths of 220m, it won’t be easy to recover the materiels dumped by the Swiss military over many years, especially as their disturbance could release toxic chemicals. Potential explosions are also a big problem but if you’ve got a mind for underwater logistics and a sense of danger, the competition is open until February so get your thinking/diving cap on…

Apropos of Nothing

We flagged the ‘blue’ sturgeon supermoon earlier in the week and it didn’t disappoint stargazers around the world who caught some mesmerising images of the lunar spectacle at some very well-known landmarks. Enjoy the photo gallery.

We rarely pay cash for anything anymore, but some loose change has proven very lucrative for one man who received a rare $2 coin at a servo. Experts say the coin, which features a flame over the Queen’s face due to a “bullseye error”, is worth about $6,000…

Fancy a snot block? If that hasn’t put you off, get down to Adelaide’s Banana Boogie Bakery which has won Oz’s best vanilla slice one month after winning best sausage roll. Go the South Aussies…

Squiz the Day

9.15am (AEST) - A coalition of State Education Ministers is set to join in a protest on the lawns of Parliament House calling for increases to Commonwealth funding for public schools - Canberra

10.00am (AEST) - A pre-trial hearing begins for Erin Patterson, the Victorian woman charged with 3 counts of murder and 5 of attempted murder after allegedly serving poisonous mushrooms - Melbourne

10.00am (AEST) - The National Farmers’ Federation Leaders Summit is on - Canberra

From 12.00pm (AEST) - To coincide with former US President Barack Obama’s speech at the Democratic Convention, Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate Tim Walz are tipped to hold a ‘surprise’ rally in Milwaukee 

12.30pm (AEST) - Domestic, Family, and Sexual Violence Commissioner Micaela Cronin will deliver the Inaugural Yearly Report to Parliament on the progress of the National Plan to End Violence against Women and Children - Canberra 

6.00pm (ACST) - ABC to host the Northern Territory leaders debate ahead of their election on Saturday - Darwin

Company results - Santos, IAG, Breville, The Lottery Corp, Dominos 

International Day of Remembrance and Tribute to the Victims of Terrorism 

World Entrepreneurs' Day

Birthdays for Usain Bolt (1986) and Kacey Musgraves (1988)

Anniversary of:

• the marriage of Peter the Great and Catherine II (1745)

• the founding of Hobart (1842)

• the marriage of Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo (1929)

• the release of Walt Disney’s Bambi (1942)

• Hawaii becoming the 50th state of America (1959)