"When vehicles are parked at a hydrant, it definitely impedes our operations, it slows everything down. Getting water on the fire fast is a critical part of our jobs," FDNY Deputy Chief Jeff Meister said.

Actor acknowledges 'unfortunate' lines in script and says film 'vilified' transgender community.

Exclusive: Figures said to reflect increased Russian military targeting of cities and infrastructure

Civilian casualties in Ukraine caused by bombing soared by 26% during 2025, reflecting increased Russian targeting of cities and infrastructure in the country, according a global conflict monitoring group.

Action on Armed Violence (AOAV) said 2,248 civilians were reported killed and 12,493 injured by explosive violence in Ukraine according to English-language reports – with the number of casualties an incident rising significantly.

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© Photograph: Tommaso Fumagalli/EPA

© Photograph: Tommaso Fumagalli/EPA

© Photograph: Tommaso Fumagalli/EPA

The Shepherd and the Bear is part of a new breed of films with a sympathy for country matters that has moved on from othering folk-horror

One of the best horror scenes this year arrives in a documentary about French pastoralism. It’s pitch-black out on a Pyrenean mountainside. Wagnerian lightning illuminates the ridges and the rain sheeting down. Bells clank in darkness as the sheep flee en masse to the other side of the col. Yves, the shepherd in charge, faces down this bewilderment, trying to perceive the threat: “Are those eyes?”

The Shepherd and the Bear, directed by Max Keegan, is part of a new breed of films with a heightened sympathy for country matters. Surveying the wind-ruffled pastures, lingering in battered cabins, it’s a highly cinematic depiction of the conflict in the Pyrenees provoked by the reintroduction of the brown bear. Much past rural cinema made hay from insisting we beware of the locals: Deliverance’s vicious hicks, The Wicker Man’s wily pagans, Hot Fuzz’s Barbour-jacketed cabal for the “greater good”. But the new school rides with the locals like Keegan’s film taps their knowledge and tells us what they’ve known all along: that it’s nature that’s truly scary.

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© Photograph: PR

© Photograph: PR

© Photograph: PR

Who is his constituency now? Not the left or the right – and not the centre any more. That’s why there’s been a nosedive in the polls

After a tumultuous few weeks, we are once again in “reset” territory. Keir Starmer has bought some more time, there is a modest bounce in his polling, and he has had the well-timed fortune of the Munich security conference. His call there for the “remaking” of western alliances and taking the initiative on European defence cooperation has fumigated the air a little of the sense of imminent demise that has been swirling around him. But it will probably be a temporary hiatus. He is in a hole that is too deep to climb out of. The prime minister’s persistent unpopularity is best understood as the result of abundance: there is simply, in Starmer, something for everyone to deplore.

In policy, he has taken stances that have established him in the minds of many people as devoid of principle and compassion. On Gaza, Starmer got it wrong from the start. From his early assertion that Israel had the right to cut off water and power, to refusing calls for a ceasefire and then cracking down on protest (a move now judged as unlawful by the high court), the prime minister positioned himself against a huge domestic swell of distress. Add to that the cuts to disability benefits that made him appear callous after so many years of austerity, and what you have – whatever U-turns or watering down followed – is an impression of a politician whose instincts are those of a state apparatchik; someone whose default is enforcing pre-existing conventional wisdoms in foreign policy and economics, no matter how damaging or unpopular they are.

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© Photograph: WPA/Getty Images

© Photograph: WPA/Getty Images

© Photograph: WPA/Getty Images

Collin Morikawa had gone 28 months since his last win, and he was reminded Sunday at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-am why it's never easy.

'Mr. and Mrs. Smith' star Angelina Jolie has been waiting for her children to turn 18 before making long-considered move abroad.

Add Daytona 500 winner to the long list of accomplishments next to NBA legend Michael Jordan’s name. 

By reaching back to Maoist tactics of “rectification,” the Chinese leader is signaling that control over the gun requires a state of perpetual cleansing.

© Florence Lo/Reuters

Curtis Signal allegedly asked the teen, "Are you a gangster?" then "punched her dead in the face," while saying "Little girl thought she was gangster," prosecutors said.

Wembanyama was captured on the NBC broadcast of Sunday’s All-Star Game festivities visibly upset after Scottie Barnes drilled the game-winning shot for Team Stars at the Intuit Dome.

Major League Baseball is being extra cautious with the new Automated Ball Strike Challenge System going into effect this season.

Investigators believe that Nancy Guthrie's abduction could have been the result of a botched robbery instead of a planned kidnapping, according to a report.

It hosted Olympic hockey in 1956 and James Bond a quarter-century later. Cortina’s beloved Olympic Stadium is now bursting with excitement for curling.

© James Hill for The New York Times

Crackdown on undocumented people could lead to home raids, surveillance and racial profiling, 75 organisations say

More than 70 rights organisations have called on the EU to reject a proposal aimed at increasing the deportation of undocumented people, warning that it risks turning everyday spaces, public services and community interactions into tools of ICE-style immigration enforcement.

Last March, the European Commission laid out its proposal to increase deportations of people with no legal right to stay in the EU, including potentially sending them to offshore centres in non-EU countries.

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© Photograph: Giovanni Isolino/AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: Giovanni Isolino/AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: Giovanni Isolino/AFP/Getty Images

This extraordinary diner is the final wonder of the great Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer, who dreamt it up at the age of 103. And it’s a great place for a sunset kombucha and gin

Perched among old brick buildings in an industrial neighbourhood of Leipzig in eastern Germany, a giant white sphere appears to hover over the corner of a former boiler house. Is it a giant’s golf ball? An alien spacecraft? A fallen planet?

Twelve metres in diameter, the Niemeyer Sphere is the final design of world-famous Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer and probably the most surprising creation by a visionary who valued the sensation of newness in art above all else, the result being mesmerising buildings that seem both space age and out of this world. The Sphere is like a vision from the future, dropped among used-car dealerships and construction equipment rental outlets, in a working-class neighbourhood that few tourists would ever pass through by design.

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© Photograph: Margret Hoppe

© Photograph: Margret Hoppe

© Photograph: Margret Hoppe

Once a whites-only enclave, the grand McMillan Memorial library is one of three in the Kenyan capital that have been transformed for the community

Down a steep, narrow staircase, the basement of the McMillan Memorial Library in Nairobi holds more than 100 enormous, dust-covered bound volumes of newspapers. Here too are the minutes of council meetings and photographic negatives going back more than a century.

“Here lie some of the minute-by-minute recorded debates from the time British colonial powers ruled Nairobi, when it was a segregated city,” says Angela Wachuka, a publisher. Seconds later, a power cut plunges the room into darkness. “We still have a great deal of work to do,” she adds.

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© Photograph: Diego Menjíbar Reynés/The Guardian

© Photograph: Diego Menjíbar Reynés/The Guardian

© Photograph: Diego Menjíbar Reynés/The Guardian

The hit podcaster, author and former GP says a failure to regulate big tech is ‘failing a generation of children’. He explains why he quit the NHS and why he wants a ban on screen-based homework

A 16-year-old boy and his mum went to see their GP, Dr Rangan Chatterjee, on a busy Monday afternoon. That weekend, the boy had been at A&E after an attempt at self-harm, and in his notes the hospital doctor had recommended the teenager be prescribed antidepressants. “I thought: ‘Wait a minute, I can’t just start a 16-year-old on antidepressants,’” says Chatterjee. He wanted to understand what was going on in the boy’s life.

They talked for a while, and Chatterjee asked him about his screen use, which turned out to be high. “I said: ‘I think your screen use, particularly in the evenings, might be impacting your mental wellbeing.’” Chatterjee helped the boy and his mother set up a routine where digital devices and social media went off an hour before bed, gradually extending the screen-free period over six weeks. After two months, he says the boy stopped needing to see him. A few months after that, his mother wrote Chatterjee a note to say her son had been transformed – he was engaging with his friends and trying new activities. He was, she said, like a different boy from the one who had ended up in hospital.

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© Photograph: Christopher Thomond/The Guardian

© Photograph: Christopher Thomond/The Guardian

© Photograph: Christopher Thomond/The Guardian

The Yankees are losing captain Aaron Judge for a few weeks in March, but they plan on seeing plenty of him in game action until then.

Victor Wembanyama set the tone. The French superstar helped deliver what was a more competitive-than-expected slate of All-Star games.

Former US president clarifies ‘they’re real’ answer that he gave during quick-fire interview round

Hours after Barack Obama caused a frenzy by saying aliens were real on a podcast, the former US president has posted a statement clarifying that he has not seen any evidence of them.

In a conversation with the American podcast host Brian Tyler Cohen over the weekend, Obama appeared to confirm the apparent existence of aliens during a speed round of questioning where the host asks guests quick questions and the guests respond with brief answers.

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© Photograph: Vincent Alban/Reuters

© Photograph: Vincent Alban/Reuters

© Photograph: Vincent Alban/Reuters

Team USA captain Auston Matthews put forth arguably his best offensive game Sunday night against Germany since the ‘C’ was stitched onto his jersey.

Nick Castellanos has no hard feelings towards the Phillies, but the new Padres slugger acknowledged there are lessons to learn from the experience. 

Lindor is facing a six-week recovery from the surgery, which was performed Wednesday.