Nightly news that’s not afraid of fun. Every weeknight hosts Nil Köksal and Chris Howden bring you the people at the centre of the day’s most hard-hitting, hilarious and heartbreaking stories: powerful leaders, proud eccentrics and ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances. And plenty of puns too. Find out why As It Happens is one of Canada’s longest-running and most beloved shows.
Plus: A Kansas man tells us why he created a page to share terrifying and potentially deadly stairwells, and what makes for a “good” death stair. Also: New Brunswick Premier Susan Holt on why the province is now launching a scientific inquiry into the mysterious brain disease plaguing dozens – and possibly many more – in her province.
Plus: What’s behind the string of cheese heists bubbling up pretty much everywhere. Also: The Verge’s David Pierce on Bluesky’s big week.
Plus: LOL hell breaks loose. A new study suggests people who text using abbreviations are perceived as less sincere. Also: Tom Forrestall’s paintings may have a realistic approach, but a friend and curator tells us the late Canadian artist wasn’t afraid of bending the rules -- including using canvases of all shapes and sizes.
Plus: A Scottish town learns a marble head being used as a doorstop in a shed, is actually a bust of their founder that's worth millions. Also: Ottawa says a decades-old report about Second World War criminals who came to Canada is still too hot to release, but the founder of the Canadian Anti-Hate Network says we all deserve to see the Nazi secrets of decades past
Plus: An enormous diamond necklace that may have played a role in the downfall of Marie Antoinette sells for a commensurately enormous price. Also: Médecins Sans Frontières says a recent attack against an ambulance and patients in Haiti raises serious questions about their ability to provide care in the country.
Plus: Scientists reappraise a 1986 NASA flyby of Uranus…and come up with new theories about possible life there. Also: A month after warning Israel to increase aid to Gaza or risk losing military support, US officials say they won’t limit arms transfers because progress is being made. But a former state department official calls that decision shameless.
Plus: Neuroscientist Michael Brecht’s fascinating findings about a Berlin Zoo elephant who loves to shower…and her roommate who has other ideas. Also: A high flying doctor from Yukon with a penchant for paragliding narrowly survives a storm in the Himalayas…and lives to tell us the tale.
Sergeant Tyson Bowen was a frequent guest on Mainstreet over the years. He gave fourteen years of his life to the Canadian Armed Forces, including two combat tours of Afghanistan. He was a champion and an advocate who fell prey to his inner demons and died on September 3, 2022. Lest We Forget
Plus: The sole-baring story of Anton Nootenboom, who walked – barefoot – from Los Angeles to New York. Also: John Bolton -- former advisor to the current U-S President-elect -- tells us what a second Trump administration might mean for Ukraine, NATO, and Canada.
Plus: A researcher tries to crack the mysterious recipe of “baseball mud”. Also: Potential gubernatorial candidate Jon Bramnick sees an opening in Trump’s surprisingly close result in New Jersey.
Plus: A Welsh art gallery doubles down on nudes after getting a warning about “pornography” on display. Also: Canada’s Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne; newly reelected Montana state legislator Zooey Zephyr and more
Plus: “One vote, one beer”. We reach a A New York bar that’s one of many businesses across the country with an election day reward for voters. Also: By means ferret or foul... A cloned black-footed ferret has given birth -- bringing back a bloodline that had gone extinct and sparking hope for the future of the critically endangered species.
Plus: A Wales man on why he chose to promote men’s health…not by growing a moustache…but by creating a giant “phallus” map using the Strava app. Also: On election night, Kamala Harris will watch the results roll in at her alma mater: Howard University. And the student newspaper's editor-in-chief tells us there's a palpable energy on campus today.
Plus: A retired Scottish police officer’s quest to find a home for his collection of thousands and thousands of bricks. Also: Why giant rats (wearing tiny backpacks) may be the next frontier in sniffing out smuggled goods.
Plus: The strange saga of Quasi, a giant hand-shaped sculpture that divided Wellington, New Zealand…and is now on its way out of town. Also: Beloved Montreal political cartoonist Terry Mosher pays tribute to John Little – the painter who immortalized Quebec winter streetscapes.
Plus: A Calgary man manages to up the ante on Halloween, challenging his own home’s structural integrity by giving away thousands of 2L pop bottles. And: New York officially legalizes jaywalking, a term Gersh Kuntzman of Streetsblog NYC says you shouldn’t even use.
Plus: It’s a nay from them. A new crop of British MPs challenge “bobbing” and other (frankly strange) parliamentary traditions. And: A petition filed to Ecuador's copyright office makes an unprecedented request to recognize one of the country's forests as the co-creator of a newly released song. Writer Robert Macfarlane tells us it's only natural.
Plus: A short piece of music written on a tiny card appears to be a lost work by Frédéric Chopin. And: In Lebanon, displaced people find shelter and support in the country's historic old movie theatres; and with Georgians on the streets of Tblisi a politician who led a team of EU observers tells us about the “democratic backsliding” taking place.
Plus: A team of Belgian ultrarunners set a truly punishing record by running a 6.7 kilometre loop every hour ... until they just can't anymore. And: Samar Abu Elouf sits down with Nil in studio. The Palestinian photojournalist and New York Times contributor was honoured this week by Canadian Journalists for Free Expression.
Plus: A Tory MP is fighting to have the classic Cockney dish “pie and mash” given protected status (but you can hold the eel). Also: A Canadian artist debuts his giant biodiversity jenga tower sculpture at the UN's COP16 climate conference.
Plus: A researcher was so frustrated by the lack of data on women that she scanned her own brain 75 times. Also: Two years after a foiled attempt on Masih Alinejad’s life, US prosecutors charge a senior official in Iran’s Revolutionary Guard in the plot. The activist tells us threats to her life won’t stop her from speaking out.
Plus: A Harvard scientist describes “S2”, which has a pretty boring name for an event that once boiled oceans and levelled mountains on earth. Also: More than a hundred women soccer players sign an open letter, calling on FIFA to drop its sponsorship deal with a Saudi company. Canadian captain Jessie Fleming says FIFA is choosing money over women’s safety and the safety of the planet.
Plus: We check in with food writer Jonathan Bender, as Kansas City gets set to open its Museum of BBQ. Also: The father of a murdered woman discovers his late daughter's name and image used to create an AI-powered chatbot; and after a major cyberattack Internet Archive founder Brewster Kahle tells us it's all part of a chilling set of attacks on library systems around the world.
Plus: We reach US attorney Martin Estrada for more on the case of Ryan Wedding, the Olympic snowboarder authorities allege became a drug kingpin. Also: Italy's new law criminalizing surrogacy abroad is sparking outrage among LGBTQ+ advocates; and we head to Kansas City for the 40th annual Lineman’s Rodeo.
Plus: A conversation with Liberal MP Sean Casey, whose call for Justin Trudeau to step aside may be gaining steam. Also: Finnish conductor and composer Leif Segerstam was as well known for his musical creativity as he was for yelling alongside his orchestra. His agent tells us he was a true artist.
Plus: As the very last Kmart gets set to close, a superfan – tattoo and all – makes her final pilgrimage. And: As time starts to run out for Robert Roberson, we reach The Innocence Project’s Vanessa Potkin for more on a case many say science, law and medicine got wrong; and we check in on early voting in Georgia.
Plus: Scandal rocks the World Conker Championship, with the newly crowned King Conker accused of using steel chestnuts. Also: A New York Times report casts China’s panda breeding program in a light that’s anything but black and white; and what a K Pop scandal means for some of the world’s most popular music.
Plus: Ratatouille – the movie – inspires a Tik Tok creator to do the "stupidest thing" she’s ever done with her engineering degree. Also: UNICEF’s James Elder on Israel’s latest strikes in Gaza and an imperilled polio vaccine campaign; and we reach a relief worker in North Carolina dealing with storm damage…and misinformation.
Plus: What the Hubble telescope is revealing about Jupiter’s “crimson vortex”, a gargantuan 100-year-old storm. Also: Tampa Bay Times reporter Ian Hodgson on covering the hurricane that toppled a crane onto his newsroom; and UnESCO recognizes Halifax’s historic Africville neighbourhood.
Plus: On the eve of this year's Nobel Peace Prize, we speak to the brother of last year's winner, Narges Mohammadi, who remains behind bars in Iran. Also: Researchers put together a pretty spicy experiment using hot sauce to test how the human brain processes pleasure and pain.
