People on Lord Howe Island are trying to save their slice of paradise from a rat infestation, but a controversial eradication program has divided families and friends on the tiny outpost 600km off the NSW coast.

Recent whale entanglements on the NSW coast highlight the man-made threats marine life face at an increasing rate, and experts say we can expect to see more.

NSW Police confirm two men, reported to be father and son, died in a plane crash west of Coffs Harbour.

The Port Macquarie koala hospital fears more than 350 koalas may have died in a bushfire south of the town, with staff frustrated they cannot yet access the site.

More than 40 sawfish die in the Fitzroy River catchment, known to be the world's last stronghold for the species.

A review of WA's cattle stations finds at least a dozen are at risk of animal welfare issues in coming months because of a lack of food and water.

Stories of families not being told when elderly relatives have died, old people found surrounded by food scraps and with maggots these are reasons why some people regard aged care in the regions a "death sentence".

A health facility able to meet the needs of acclaimed Aboriginal playwright Jimmy Chi was not available at the time of his death, a coronial inquest has heard.

There have been calls for greater transparency on remote cattle stations after a FOI request revealed a push to keep the mass death of a critically endangered species under wraps.

Survivor is a word thrown around fairly lightly, but in the case of German migrant Frauke Bolten-Boshammer, you can't help but feel she's earned the title 10 times over.

Five dolphins found stranded at low tide on a beach at Broome's Roebuck Bay have now died.

A teenage boy was watching television on his iPad when a cattle truck slammed into his parents' caravan, killing both of them, on a Western Australian outback highway two years ago, a court is told.

A man and a woman are dead after they were hit by a truck overnight on Brookton Highway in Jelcobine, almost 100 kilometres south-east of Perth, with police closing the road to investigate the crash.

Micheal McRae is accused of bashing his baby son Nathaniel, leaving him with severe brain injuries, but the charge is upgraded after the boy spent a year fighting for life in hospital.

A WA wildlife photographer whose body was found at Bluff Knoll where he previously captured one of his most lauded shots is remembered as a kind, gentle and warm person who honed his craft over 30 years.

Sources have confirmed the $150 million public housing debt owed by Tasmania will be waived, as demanded by Senator Jacqui Lambie in exchange for her vote on the Federal Government's tax cuts.

DAILY BRIEFING: A Tasmanian shark attack victim commemorates a year since the incident, cattle deaths hearing delayed and basketball stars arrive in the state.

A 59-year-old man who died at Hobart's Nyrstar Zinc smelter yesterday has been named as Michael Lewis Petterwood of Risdon Vale.

DAILY BRIEFING: Two people plead not guilty to charges relating to the deaths of 16 polo ponies, police charge two men after last week's stabbing, and there are concerns over the second Bass Strait interconnector.

DAILY BRIEFING: A motorcyclist dies in the state's north after crashing into the back of a parked truck, and a 29-year-old charged with the murder of Jarrod Leigh Turner pleads not guilty.

Almost six years after her father died in a mining accident on Tasmania's west coast, Tameka Sylvester is still waiting for answers with the family learning of inquest news via social media.

The death of 17-year-old Maggie Lore at the Blackmans Bay blowhole in 2017 prompts a southern Tasmanian council to conduct a risk assessment of several areas in its municipality.

Isabella Corbin can remember sitting on her dad's lap in the cockpit of his helicopter when she was just a baby. Two years after his death, she's determined to keep his legacy alive.

The man accused of murdering a 29-year-old man on the Nullarbor Plain is remanded in custody after appearing briefly in court in Ceduna, in South Australia's far west.

Some members of South Australia's Aboriginal community have lost 23 members of their family in the past two years and they are desperate for help in dealing with grief.

A series of killings that happened 170 years ago have created deep rifts in South Australias Waterloo Bay and a new cliffside monument is at the centre of the debate.

A video showing an off-duty police officer stoning a wombat, apparently to death, leaves Aboriginal elders divided with one condemning the incident as "wrong" but defending traditional hunting.

A woman has faced court charged with murder following the death of a man at Port Augusta in South Australia's north.

Violent standover man Hizir Ferman may have "progressively suffocated" to death when Victorian prison officers used their body weight to pin him to the ground after forcibly removing him from his cell, an inquest has been told.

A man has been found not guilty of killing his 13-week-old son in regional Victoria, eight years after the baby died.

Finding the seal that is tangled in fishing line is the easy part for the Marine Response Unit, but helping the animal while staying safe from the rest of its colony is much more difficult.

Tanya Day died of traumatic brain injuries after she was arrested for public drunkenness in December, 2017. Lawyers for the Indigenous woman's family are now asking the Victorian coroner to consider whether systemic racism was a factor in her death.

Prison officers and nurses could have done more to prevent the death of underworld figure Hizir Ferman, who suffocated to death inside a Victorian prison after a stand-off with guards, a coroner finds.

A judge describes a man who ran down his fiance and mother of four, leaving her for dead after a heated argument, as cowardly and callous.

A judge indicates a woman who pleaded guilty to dangerous driving over the death of cyclist Jason Lowndes, who was killed when he was struck from behind while on a training run in 2017, is unlikely to go to jail.

The supermarket giant announces it will bypass processors and contract milk directly from dairy farmers in New South Wales and Victoria from July 1.

Energy Australia finds a unit controller at the Yallourn power station, Graeme Edwards, 54, was doing nothing wrong when he was fatally injured performing a routine task in November last year.

From sky-high water costs to prohibitively expensive livestock feed, new forecasts show how drought will impact Australia's exports and agricultural production.

A protest by Victorian oil and gas workers over pay and conditions at Esso's offshore operations has come to an end more than 700 days after workers first set up a picket line at the company's Longford gas plant.

Police allege a stolen vehicle collided with another car on the South Gippsland Highway yesterday afternoon.

A man has been ordered to stand trial over the death of his partner, who was hit by a car in the driveway of her Traralgon home.

A neighbour describes hearing a man screaming to be handed the phone on the afternoon a two-year-old boy died in Melbourne's outer-south-east. Police have arrested a man and a woman over the death.

Gippsland police say they are investigating what led to a young Melbourne couple being found dead in their car near Thompson Dam in west Gippsland.

Police find the bodies of Caleb Forbes and Shannon Lowden in their car, almost a week after they went missing near the Baw Baw National Park in eastern Victoria.

Rain has been so heavy in parts of Gippsland that it has caused landslides, severely limiting some residents' mobility. Meanwhile, the other half of the region continues to battle through the drought.