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Tom bought a plane to fly to his nearest major supermarket

Tom Forrest lives in the very small town of Wyndham in Western Australia's Kimberly region.

It has a population of about 940 people, one family-owned supermarket, a post office, a bottle-o and a local pool. 

"It's a dead-end town. You simply can't drive through it. It's the last town on the road, so it's a very tight-knit community," he said.

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Forrest has to drive an hour to his nearest major supermarket and 10 hours to the closest major city, Darwin.

"Living in the outback of Australia is beautiful, the community is amazing, the landscape is astonishing, but one of the real challenges we do have is how remote we live," he said.

"Regional flights out of [the nearest town] Kununurra have been really expensive.

"The town, over the years, many times have asked for government support to get these regional airfares reduced, because it just makes it really, really challenging for most locals to fly out of Kununurra."

Forrest became inspired by outback pilots who use a small aircraft for their personal use, including his childhood friend's dad who would land his helicopter next to his home after a day of mustering.

To make his life easier, he decided to do the same. 

He travelled 1000km to Darwin every fortnight for 11 months to train for his pilot's license before he was given the green light.

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Tom Forrest lives in the small town of Wyndham in Western Australia's Kimberly region.

Now, it takes Forrest only 15 minutes to fly to the next major supermarket in Kununurra.

He said it has made everything more accessible for him.

"Having my own plane, having my plane license as well, just means that I can wake up in the morning, and if I have to, I can hop in my plane and fly to Darwin in an hour and a half, opposed to a 10-hour drive," he said.

"It also means that getting to the remote locations across the Kimberley, like Broome or the Bungle Bungles or even remote communities, has opened up and made everything a whole lot more accessible.

"What would usually take an entire day to get across the Kimberley only takes two hours."

Forrest has shared his pilot journey on social media, where he also famously posts videos with his grandad for storytelling and sharing their outback living.

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Tom Forrest lives in the small town of Wyndham in Western Australia's Kimberly region.

That's when someone from the remote Indigenous town of Amanbidji reached out for help.

The small community, near the Northern Territory border, had been cut off due to cyclone-prompted flooding and was forced to go without any fresh produce for weeks.

Forrest did 100kg of shopping for them, loaded up the plane and flew to their town, where he was greeted by community members who received their first fresh food in weeks. 

"Where I can, I like to help out," he said. 

"I've had a lot of people reach out through social media all over Western Australia, people who live in rural, Indigenous communities who were there for work, asking if I could potentially help fly their mum from Broome to the remote communities."

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Tom Forrest lives in the small town of Wyndham in Western Australia's Kimberly region.

But with increasing fuel prices, which have sent diesel soaring past $3 a litre, each hour of flying costs him about $200.

For now, he has been forced to limit his plane use to necessary travel only.

"It's gone up significantly. So at the moment, I'm paying around $3.64 per litre, and the plane burns 54 litres an hour," he said.

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Couple slapped with $2200 in seatbelt fines by AI cameras

Exclusive: A driver has been slugged with back-to-back fines totalling more than $2000 and 24 demerit points by Western Australia's new AI-based cameras.

But she wasn't told about the fines until weeks after the fact, and her husband insists they wouldn't have been issued at all if a human officer had pulled her over.

Tina* was first caught by an AI camera on November 30 last year.

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Tina was snapped with her seatbelt under her arm by an AI-based camera in WA.

It snapped her driving with her seatbelt tucked under her arm on the Kwinana Freeway in Perth's southern suburbs.

It's an offence to wear a seatbelt improperly in all Australian states and territories.

Over the next three weeks, the same camera snapped Tina with her seatbelt under her arm three more times.

Tina wasn't notified until more than a month later, when four nearly identical fines hit her mailbox in January.

"All of a sudden we get a flurry, a rampage of tickets generated by an artificially intelligent machine with no human intervention," her husband James told nine.com.au.

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Five ways the fuel crisis is about to hit home

Australia's fuel supply crisis, sparked by the escalating Middle East conflict and the Strait of Hormuz shutdown, is moving beyond just eye-watering prices at the pump

The "diesel squeeze" is now threatening basic services that we've taken for granted.

Here are five key ways this crisis is about to hit home.

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Generic petrol station in Sydney. Fuel, diesel, unleaded, oil, service station, prices, inflation, war, conflict, Iran. Ampol Petrol Station Chatswood East. Friday 27th March 2026 AFR photo Louie Douvis

Will our rubbish still get collected?

It is the ultimate "out of sight, out of mind" service, but the humble weekly bin run is now teetering on the edge. 

Local Government NSW (LGNSW) President and Inner West Council Mayor Darcy Byrne has mobilised more than 50 councils for emergency talks, held on Wednesday, aimed at preventing waste collection services from grinding to a halt.

A core function of local councils, rubbish collection, is being threatened by the fuel crisis.

"Communities rely on their councils for waste collection. Without fuel powering the trucks, councils can't collect waste," Mayor Byrne warned.

Although urban areas such as Sydney's Inner West were managing, many regional councils rely on independent fuel retailers whose tanks could soon run dry, Darcy said.

Most regional councils only have enough backup diesel to last a few weeks. If a guarantee of supply isn't secured, Australians could face a public health nightmare with garbage piling up on suburban streets.

Furthermore, the skyrocketing cost of diesel is pushing cash-strapped councils towards a financial cliff. 

Mayor Byrne is calling on the NSW Government to guarantee fuel supply for councils and repurpose the $1 billion collected annually via the waste levy – which currently sits in consolidated revenue – to subsidise these surging fuel costs.

"We can't have a situation in which communities… suddenly find that garbage is piling up on the street," Byrne said. "That will make a bad situation so much worse."

How much will food prices rise?

Even if you don't drive, it is likely that you will be paying for the fuel crisis at the checkout soon. 

Australia's "just-in-time" food delivery model is entirely dependent on heavy-vehicle transport, experts say. 

Strait of Hormuz / Fruit on supermarket shelf

With diesel surcharges hitting 10 per cent, every head of lettuce and carton of milk carries the weight of the fuel crisis. 

Farmers are also facing a crisis of their own; if they cannot fuel their harvesters, crops will rot in the ground, leading to scarcity and even higher prices.

The fuel crisis is carrying the potential for a structural collapse in food affordability and could lead to price rises of as much as 50 per cent, Associate Professor Devika Kannan from Adelaide University has warned.

"High fuel costs may compromise both food security and the resilience of domestic logistics infrastructure," she said.

This sentiment is echoed by Associate Professor David Ubilava of the University of Sydney, who noted that energy costs are "baked into" every stage of the food chain.

In a bid to blunt the impact on families, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced a "triple-intervention" strategy on Monday, and reiterated the measures taken in a rare national address on Wednesday evening.

The emergency package includes halving the fuel excise for the next three months and axing the heavy vehicle road user charge for the same period. 

The government has also temporarily lowered diesel standards to allow more fuel to flow into the market.

While these measures provide a temporary "circuit breaker" for transport companies, the volatility of the global oil market means it remains uncertain whether these savings will be enough to subdue price rises at the checkout.

Will my mortgage rates go up again?

The "diesel squeeze" is a primary driver of cost-push inflation. As transport and production costs rise, the Consumer Price Index (CPI) follows. 

This puts the Reserve Bank of Australia in a corner; to prevent inflation from spiraling out of control, the RBA may be forced to raise interest rates again, meaning the fuel crisis at the pump could directly lead to higher monthly mortgage repayments.

Westpac is now forecasting that mortgage holders will be hit by three more rate hikes – in May, June and August – because of the war in the Middle East and high oil prices.

Westpac chief economist Luci Ellis said even government measures such as halving the fuel excise may not halt the inevitable.

"This shift reflects the longer disruption to and slower recovery in fuel supply assumed… with the Strait of Hormuz essentially closed for eight weeks and traffic recovering only slowly after that," she said.

Is my renovation or new build about to stall?

The construction industry is one of the largest consumers of diesel in the country. From the excavators digging foundations to the semi-trailers delivering timber and steel, the entire sector is fueled by the very resource that is now in short supply. 

Builders say rising diesel prices are blowing out almost all of their costs.

"We are seeing price increases across multiple materials and suppliers, PVC pipe around 50 percent, plant hire 15 percent, civil earth works about 25 percent, asphalt 15 percent and concreting around eight to 12 percent," Matt Moran, CEO of the Master Builders Association of WA told ABC radio.

"We're getting messages and comments from our members daily," he said.

While fixed price contracts often meant these increases could not be passed on to customers, it increased the risk of builders going insolvent, he said.

Is this the end of the great Aussie road trip?

Beyond essential services, the crisis is hitting our way of life. High fuel costs and limited supply are already forcing schools to cancel excursions and families to scrap Easter holiday plans. 

Westpac data revealed on Thursday that just over half, 52 percent, of Australians are cancelling or changing their Easter long weekend plans due to cost and fuel shortage concerns.

For many regional communities that rely on "drive-in" tourism, the absence of families taking road trips these holidays could prove to be an economic disaster, effectively cutting off these towns from their primary source of income.

Caravan and holiday parks have been reporting a spike in cancellations due to the cost of fuel.

Operators at the Ocean View Holiday Park's told nine.com.au bookings are now quieter than usual.

"Yeah, light on, not got a few bookings but nowhere near like what we usually have," Jenny Smart said.

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Man charged with his father’s murder after fatal stabbing in Sydney’s west

A son has been denied bail after being accused of fatally stabbing his father inside the family home in Sydney's west last night.

NSW Police were called to Clouta Place, Emu Plains, at 6.45pm yesterday and said 58-year-old John Clark was found with multiple stab wounds to his upper body.

He was treated by NSW Ambulance paramedics but died at the scene.

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Evan Davis Clark

The man's son, Evan Davis Clark, 30, was arrested at the scene and taken to Penrith police station.

He was later charged with one count of domestic violence murder, police said this morning, as investigators continued to pulled bags of evidence from the home.

Videos posted to social media showed more than a dozen police cars, ambulances and the police helicopter responding to the incident.

"It was probably about 15 cop cars and everything there, so pretty hectic," a neighbour told 9News.

A man has been charged after his father was allegedly fatally stabbed in Sydney's west last night.

Police said there was a history of domestic violence allegations, however, there were no reports in the past few years.

"For someone's family to start off the long weekend in such tragic circumstances is very tough," Acting Superintendent Michael Cantrell said.

Residents told 9News that the family have been living at the home for more than 40 years.

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"[It is] a quiet street, you would never think something like this would occur here," a resident said.

"There were no indications that something like this would occur up there."

"I can't say I would have expected something like this."

The 30-year-old man was charged this morning.

Clark appeared in court today, saying he "just wants to do the time" as he was denied bail.

His lawyer raised concerns about his mental capacity as he spends at least the next two months behind bars.

Support is available from the National Sexual Assault, Domestic and Family Violence Counselling Service at 1800RESPECT (1800 737 732)

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Child injured in serious farm accident in South Australia

A child is in a critical condition after a buggy rollover on a farm north of Adelaide.

The child was involved in the accident on a private property at Yattalunga about 4.30pm (5pm AEDT).

Multiple ambulances were called to the private property.

Emergency services including multiple ambulances, a helicopter and a paediatric team were called to the scene.

Yattalunga is a small community between Adelaide and Gawler.

More to come.

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‘Insane turnout’: Traffic chaos over $100k free fuel stunt

Police have been forced to shut down a $100,000 fuel giveaway at a Melbourne petrol station after the stunt resulted in traffic mayhem.

The giveaway by a rewards club sparked a frenzy outside a Liberty fuel station in Truganina in the city's west, with dozens of cars lining up around the block to in a desperate bid to nab a free tank of petrol.

Cars sat bumper-to-bumper on Leakes Road early today after the club's founder Billy Beasley announced the Good Friday promotion, which was offered to drivers on a first-come, first-served basis.

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Free fuel mayhem Melbourne

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The free fuel eventually dried up after several hours.

Some motorists ran out of fuel while waiting in line, with one driver resorting to pushing his car toward the pumps.

Free fuel mayhem Melbourne'Insane turnout': Traffic chaos over $100k free fuel stunt

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Police attended the scene about 7.30am to manage the flow of traffic and establish hazards.

Beasley told 9News the giveaway only lasted under an hour before officers arrived to shut it down.

Four police units cars remain on the scene as traffic slowly clears.

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