The coronavirus pandemic has made life harder for most people, but spare a thought for 66-year-old Isabel McLeary, who is looking after three teenagers with disability who can now only access vital support online.

Victoria's state political reporter Richard Willingham tells of a dramatic week during the COVID-19 pandemic when everything changed, and the particular challenges of reporting a story unlike any other he's covered.

The curve is flattening, the growth factor is below one, but is it still too early to ease coronavirus restrictions? We asked four health experts what Australia should be doing next.

Fire season is officially over in southern Australia, but the work is only just beginning for the royal commission into the deadly crisis.

A former Australia Zoo big cat keeper says an elusive population of wild pumas and panthers reportedly seen in the Australian wilderness could be long-escaped animals from travelling circuses, or former military mascots.

Health Minister Jenny Mikakos announces that Epping's Meadowglen Primary School will be closed for three days as the state confirms 13 new coronavirus cases.

Parents and teachers may be finding isolation tedious, but Kurnai College's school captain finds ways to keep the student body engaged and amused.

There have been 22 new confirmed cases of the coronavirus in Victoria overnight bringing the states total to 1406

When a farmworker was convicted of poisoning hundreds of wedge-tailed eagles in Victoria, he told the court he was ordered to do it. But due to legal limitations, no further charges were laid against his boss.

Residents against a controversial abattoir take their fight to the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal in a final attempt to stop the plan going ahead.

Melbourne tea shop manager Jennifer Li recorded a stranger hurling racially charged taunts at her when she tried to defend herself and customers who were wearing facemasks.

The Royal Flying Doctor Service is helping launch a mobile testing clinic in a small agricultural town in Victoria to reach an "at risk" population of itinerant farm workers and migrants.

The busiest airport in regional Victoria has laid off more than half its workforce and has lost 95 per cent of its revenue — but says it isn't eligible for government programs like the JobKeeper allowance.

The family of a man who went missing in Victoria's Latrobe Valley last month say they "fear the worst" and are urging anyone who has seen him to contact police.

A man who raped a woman in his Melbourne apartment, which he described as "the perfect location", has been jailed for eight years for the "violent act" he inflicted on his victim.

A self-styled daredevil who taught himself rocket science in a bid to prove the Earth is flat dies after crashing his homemade rocket in California.

A sighting of a sea creature not usually found in Tasmanian waters has surprised onlookers, but could become more frequent, experts say.

Fish have been found on the streets of Yowah, in outback Queensland, after record rainfall.

A snake catcher believes the 80-kilogram monster is likely to have been imported illegally and may be euthanased due to the threat it poses to native ecosystems.

If you think being stuck in short quarters with your family is hard, this family has have been living afloat overseas since September and 'boatschooling'.

The officer realised something was unusual when he could not see the driver. Then the boy said he was on his way to California to buy a Lamborghini.

Floodwaters are swelling rivers in drought-ravaged outback Queensland and lifting the spirits of graziers.

The Coalition's candidate for the marginal South Australian seat of Mayo moderates her previous position that the minimum wage and penalty rates should be abolished.

A controversial underground coal gasification project could tender for an SA Government electricity supply contract formerly held by a renewable energy project.

Australia's livestock feed supplies are under threat due to the drought, which is putting pressure on both domestic customers and the export market.

A flight school is forced to improve its safety regime after a student pilot who was sleep deprived and sick flew into Adelaide's controlled airspace after falling unconscious at the controls.

Journalist Andrew McGarry covered the trial of one of Australia's most notorious serial killings. Two decades since police made the gruesome discovery in a disused bank vault, he looks at the similarities between the actions of ringleader, John Bunting, and George Orwell's novel, Nineteen Eighty-Four.

A man is charged with the murder of another man at a home in South Australia's Mid North region in the early hours of Sunday morning.

Drugs including ice are readily available and "coming through the front door" of a South Australian jail, an inquest into a fatal overdose of a prisoner finds.

Australian creatives who have lived through devastating natural disasters turn their trauma into beautiful pieces of art.

Mining giants Rio Tinto, BHP and Glencore have listed several of their tailings dams across Australia as being at "high" or "extreme" risk to public safety if they fail.

The husband of murdered outback nurse Gayle Woodford says new protections for nurses named in her honour are necessary, but is worried healthcare workers could still be at risk.

A patient bringing a loaded gun into the Royal Adelaide Hospital and nurses being threatened with knives are just some of the concerning incidents plaguing staff at South Australian hospitals, the union for nurses says.

Tributes are flowing for a former Queensland police officer and a respected horse stud owner killed in an outback plane crash, with investigations into the cause of the incident continuing.

Former Queensland police officer Rachel Whitford, who died in a plane crash in outback South Australia on Saturday, posted to social media shortly before that she was "grateful for another safe landing".

A contentious ecotourism project on Kangaroo Island has been approved and could lead the way for similar projects that will open up South Australian national parks currently "under lock and key".

As the drought drives Australia's sheep flock to historic lows, a South Australian sheep sale has been called off three times due to a lack of animals.

A former military pilot from WA is being praised after switching his light plane's engine off when it flipped during a landing on a remote SA airstrip. He and his wife are in a stable condition in hospital in Adelaide.

A pig farmer receives a barrage of abusive online comments after opening up on Facebook about the closure of her pig business.

Two men have died in a head-on truck crash on the Sturt Highway near South Australia's Barossa Valley region, as wild weather continues to hit the state.

After undergoing a multi-million dollar development, the Port Pirie smelter is once again not producing anything.

A Flinders Ranges woman who killed a man after ramming him with her ute as part of a family dispute over a trailer is found guilty of manslaughter, not murder, with an Adelaide judge saying she "cannot be sure" the woman intended to kill.

A South Australian man killed his close friend when he landed on top of him during a drunken fight, causing an internal cyst to fatally rupture, a court hears.

For more than a decade, Australians have travelled to the South Australian outback ghost town of Farina, in an effort to restore the crumbling buildings.

After allegations of misconduct and violent behaviour at a South Australian fire station were revealed by the ABC, some staff are now facing fresh claims of a serious conflict of interest as calls for a public inquiry intensify.

A popular roadside attraction featuring about 2,000 teddy bears and other soft toys could secure a reprieve after an intervention from the SA Premier but two local councils remain concerned about the risk it poses to drivers.