General News
21 January, 2025
Year in review: May to August
A look into what made it into the headlines in Warracknabeal from May to August 2024.
MAY
- A freak accident in which a Warracknabeal family's outdoor setting is burnt to a crisp attracts an astonishing 20 million views on social media when a glass fishbowl on a wooden table in Sam and Indiana Tickner's backyard acts like a magnifying glass to turn the sun's rays into fire spots.
- Much-loved cat Ed walks himself home to Jason O'Brien and his partner after being missing in Warracknabeal since mid-April.
- As rallies across the country hear the harrowing stories of domestic violence survivors and the families of those who have not survived, Wimmera Mallee News launches an editorial series that explores how the epidemic is affecting the region's residents.
- Warracknabeal farmers join others across the Wimmera wanting their voices heard in a push to save productive agricultural land from mining, protesting against planned mines centred on Dooen north of Horsham and between Minyip and Donald.
- Since closing in April due to staff shortages, Hopetoun early learning centre has not yet reopened, despite telling failed candidates for vacancies that it has had a "very high" standard of applications.
- Photographers capture spectacular images of aurora australis – also known as the southern lights – in and around Warracknabeal as the phenomenon extends much further north across the continent than usual.
- Telstra withdraws a controversial project to promote its satellite home internet service on a silo or water tower after a backlash from local communities and Australian Silo Art Trail director and regional tourism ambassador Damian Modra, who describes the project as an attempt to "leverage" the silo art movement.
- The Farmer Wants A Wife journey ends for former Wilkur local Karli Hinkley when Farmer Bert shocks viewers, and his potential brides, by abruptly exiting the show.
- West Wimmera Health Service says uncertainty around a rumoured merger of health providers in the west of the state is causing distress for many of the organisation’s stakeholders, including staff, volunteers and community members as an independent expert advisory committee considers the possibility of amalgamating Victoria's 76 health services into 12.
- A ceremonial handover of YarriYak Cafe from Woodbine Inc to Rural Northwest Health takes place, but while its management might be new, the facility continues to give people with disabilities an opportunity to learn vital customer services, cash handling and barista skills.
JUNE
- Yarriambiack farmer and National Farmers' Federation president David Jochinke tells Prime Minister Anthony Albanese that farmers have lost all trust in the federal government over its decision to end live sheep exports.
- Quality Australian Hay's plant site on the Henty Highway is a hive of activity as construction is well under way about 5km south of Warracknabeal, where a new facility will have the capacity to store 35,000 tonnes of hay and accommodate road trains and shipping containers.
- While residents and businesses in the big smoke celebrate high-speed 5G network connections, out in the sticks, the 'gap' is becoming more noticeable – especially in Yarriambiack, where the frustrated community falls 9.2 points below the national average for digital inclusion.
- Convicted paedophile and primary school teacher Arthur Henry Eaton may have abused students at schools in the Wimmera while teaching at Lascelles and Nhill in 1967–79, according to lawyers representing five men victimised by Eaton.
- Homeowners in Warracknabeal can look forward to a potential increase in home values over the next five years of as much as 125 per cent data from PropTrack suggest, the median being tipped to rise from $240,000 to $540,000.
- Warracknabeal becomes the latest district to fall victim to the diesel thefts as police see a clear rise in incidents on farms in Yarriambiack, including four on Warracknabeal properties in the past two months.
- At a time when the country is reeling under cost-of-living and housing pressures, 543 people in the Wimmera have declared themselves homeless in the 2023–24 financial year - including 168 people under 25.
- Specialised Container Transport at Dooen is playing a crucial role in the nation's rail freight network as Australia's largest privately-owned logistics rail company, removing an estimated 22,000 truck loads from the highways between Horsham and Melbourne every year, founder and owner Peter Smith says during a forum at the facility.
- Warracknabeal Girl Guides celebrates Girl Guides Victoria awarding Frances Casey a 40-year long-service plaque and badge.
JULY
- Five aged care homes across the Wimmera – two in Warracknabeal run by Rural Northwest Health and one each in Birchip, Donald and Stawell – have failed to administer adequate Covid boosters to at least half of their residents, according to new figures.
- What was once a run-around vehicle on the farm of Winston Chivell at Wilkur becomes a unique part of the Extra-Ordinary Things exhibit at Canberra's National Museum of Australia, the 1967 VE-model Valiant Wayfarer ute having been included in the display by ABC's Tony Armstrong.
- West Vic Business and Yarriambiack Shire Council partner to provide rural business owners with resources, knowledge and the opportunity to make new connections at the inaugural Yarriambiack Business Expo at Warracknabeal Town Hall, drawing more than 60 attendees.
- Wimmera farmer Ross Johns promotes a farm safety plan to cut agricultural workplace deaths, calling for uniform national WorkSafe regulations and notification to all farmers and farm managers of all farm-related serious incidents, hospitalisations, near misses and deaths and saying that farming empoys only two per cent of Victoria's workforce but results in 14 per cent of workplace fatalities.
- Astron Corporation owner and managing director Tiger Brown ramps up the mining company's efforts to garner community support for its Donald rare earth and mineral sands project, announcing that he will visit Minyip at least once a month as work gathers pace.
- Much-loved former Warracknabeal police Sergeant Leonard Erwin Nuske, having died aged 96 in Ballarat, is farewelled at Warracknabeal Lutheran Church with a Victoria Police guard of honour and a Highway Patrol vehicle leading the procession to the cemetery.
- The Murra Warra Wind Farm Sustainable Community Grants Fund program distributes more than $110,000 in community grants to boost and strengthen Wimmera not-for-profit groups.
- A community consultation meeting in Hopetoun attended by a “strong” turnout of concerned residents, families and interested parties hears proposed plans from Uniting Vic Tas, Emerge Early Years Service and Yarriambiack Shire Council for solving the district's childcare crisis.
AUGUST
- The release of the annual community satisfaction survey for Yarriambiack Shire shows only a slight decline in residents' opinion of council’s service areas, with roads still the stand-out issue across the board as Yarriambiack receives scores that are higher than or equal to the state average in the majority of categories.
- The fascinating history of Warracknabeal Post Office is recorded by historian and former Warracknabeal secondary school teacher Ian Wright in his book "Everything comes to him who waits".
- Vocalists and musicians of all ages grace church stages in Horsham during the two days of the Wimmera Music Eisteddfod, a competition that for the first time includes a category dedicated specifically to pop star Taylor Swift.
- Warracknabeal local and owner of Pink Nade, Johanna Glennen, sees her design being worn by healthcare staff after she is chosen as the winner of Gorman and Dangerfield's "Scrub 'em up with love" competition to design scrubs for distribution to the hospital of her choice.
- Quality Australian Hay joint owner Scott Somers is as proud as punch of his newly roofed main production shed, the structure measuring 59m by 189m and standing 10m high after a mammoth construction operation.
- Warracknabeal Ladies Rest Rooms awards life membership to Valerie Wardle in recognition of her service as president and vice-president and presents a certificate of appreciation to Wendy Lovel for her contribution as treasurer.
- International company BayWa hones plans for a wind turbine and battery storage facility on 50 hectares between Horsham and Warracknabeal to house 52 turbines with a blade tip height of 247 metres producing sufficient renewable energy to power about 155,000 homes.
- A spate of farm thefts across the region sparks calls for greater vigilance by farmers whose unlocked sheds provide easy pickings for stealthy midnight raiders targeting diesel fuel, motorbikes and easy-to-carry gear such as chainsaws and batteries.
- Warracknabeal residents express their gratitude to George and Eva Youssef of Melbourne for having given a long-vacant church building in Jamouneau Street fresh life as a treasured holiday home.