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Thousands of protesters have converged upon Sydney and Melbourne's CBD to demonstrate against vaccine mandates, including Victoria's new pandemic laws introduced by the government.

Protesters gathered at Parliament House on Spring Street in Melbourne about 12pm, before rallying down Bourke Street chanting "free Victoria".

Crowds were carrying flags and banners, some of which read "reclaim the line" and "together we can stop vaccine passports".

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The protesters came to a stop at the Royal Exhibition Building, singing and playing music at the Carlton Gardens.

Protesters chanted: "What do we want? Freedom. When do we want it? Now."

One protester said the protests weren't about "being an anti-vaxxer".

"This is pro-choice," they said.

"No vaccine passports."

It comes as Premier Daniel Andrews made the state's first pandemic declaration under the new laws on Friday.

The premier confirmed the pandemic declaration would come into effect on December 15 at 11.59pm, when the state emergency expires.

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https://twitter.com/9NewsSyd/status/1469844606783135744

In Sydney, protesters packed out Hyde Park in an act of demonstration against vaccine mandates for a range of industries including entertainment, creative arts and healthcare.

The protests are part of a national day of action today across the country, with demonstrations also planned to take place in Queensland, Perth, Canberra, Adelaide and Hobart.

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More than $5 billion in illicit drugs have been burned this year as part of the Australian Federal Police's drug destruction program.

Drugs weighing more than 25 tonnes – equivalent to the weight of four large adult male African elephants – have been destroyed at specialised furnaces across the country in temperatures of up to 1400 degrees.

Illicit substances including methamphetamine, MDMA and amphetamines dominated the burning load with nearly 20 tonnes destroyed this year.

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While 1.3 tonnes of cocaine and 2.2 tonnes of cannabis and cannabis-related products went up in smoke.

The furnaces vaporise the drugs into steam that is channeled through a series of filtration systems until it is harmlessly released.

The drug destruction programs follow the AFP preventing transnational organised criminals from attempting to import drugs into Australia in 2021.

AFP Crime Command Detective Superintendent Russel Smith said the furnaces had vaporised the profits of organised crime gangs.

"The AFP has vaporised more than $5 billion of profit that was destined to line the pockets of the nation's most dangerous organised criminal gangs, including outlaw motorcycle gangs," he said.

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"This is a major hit to the balance sheets of these criminals and puts pressure on every aspect of their operations."

The 4.3 tonnes of methamphetamine destroyed this year had an estimated street value of nearly $3.9 billion.

The 1.3 tonnes of cocaine destroyed was valued at $533 million and the AFP also burned $349 million worth of heroin and $165 million worth of cannabis.

"The AFP will aggressively pursue anyone trying to spread misery on our streets in order to protect the community which pays the price for the greed of these criminal gangs," Superintendent Smith said.

"The 30 tonnes of illicit substances that the AFP has destroyed this year had the potential to cause massive damage to our communities through violence and long-term health impacts, which disproportionately affect the young and vulnerable."

Heavily-armed AFP members monitor every step of the destruction process and remain on-site until every ounce of the drugs has been destroyed.

Every gram of illicit drugs seized by the AFP gets destroyed once it is properly documented for court purposes.

An avalanche swept through part of a Washington state ski resort used to access backcountry skiing on Saturday, killing a 60-year-old man and temporarily trapping five others.

The avalanche was reported about 10:50 am in the Silver Basin area of Crystal Mountain, which is located about 137 kilometres southeast of Seattle, said Pierce County Sheriff’s Department Sergeant Darren Moss.

The identity of the man who died hasn’t been released, but authorities say he wasn’t breathing after being pulled out of the snow and didn't survive despite CPR efforts by another skier.

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The other skiers in his group rescued themselves with the help of two witnesses who saw them get swept up by the snow. All were wearing avalanche beacons.

While all of those caught in the avalanche were experienced backcountry skiers, a warning had been issued against skiing in the area, which was just inside the boundaries of Crystal Mountain Resort.

The private ski resort determines the conditions but there is nothing that stops skiers from going there because the property abuts public lands in the Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest.

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Frank DeBerry, the resort's president and CEO, said all six men held the ski resort’s uphill travel passes, which means they were registered with ski patrol, participated in an orientation on how and where to access backcountry skiing through the resort’s property and were required to check snow conditions prior to their excursion.

“Skiers can travel at will wherever they want in the national forest. They had gone out into the forest but ended up back in bounds (of the resort) where this slide occurred,” Mr DeBerry said

In addition to shutting the area where the slide occurred, the resort earlier in the day closed the Mt. Rainier Gondola because of winds reaching 161 kilometres per hour.

The avalanche came amid the season's first major snowfall.

The area is under a winter storm warning until Sunday morning, with the National Weather Service saying 38 centimetres of snow is possible for areas above 610 meters.

“We’ve had a late start to the season and now we’ve gone from virtually no snow to a giant snow storm. People got excited,” Mr DeBerry said.

“We all have to remember that it’s a sport that carries risk.”

Crystal Mountain is the largest ski resort in Washington state, encompassing 1,052 hectares.

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The bones of an extinct reptile tell a story of how this ancient creature took an 2.4-metre leap of faith in the air to take flight, new research has revealed.

The pterosaur Quetzalcoatlus, the largest known flying animal that ever lived, boasted a 12-metre wingspan that would allow it to soar through the sky, according to a research collection published Wednesday by the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology.

Scientists were puzzled for decades at how such a large creature could fly, said coauthor Matthew Brown, director of vertebrate paleontology collections at The University of Texas in Austin.

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After years of research, Mr Brown's team discovered Quetzalcoatlus likely took to the sky like a fighter jet off an aircraft carrier – punching 2.4 metres off the ground before flapping huge wings.

It took nearly 50 years between the time the bones were discovered in Big Bend National Park in Brewster County, Texas, and when scientists could determine how the creature flew. Mr Brown attributes that to the painstakingly slow process of unearthing the bones.

Like many other flying species during that time, this pterosaur had bones that were hollow to aid in flight, Mr Brown said.

"You have these sort of potato chip-like bones preserved in very hard rock, and you've got to remove the bones from the rock without destroying them," he said.

Two new species are discovered

Over the last half century, two new smaller species of pterosaurs were discovered in the national park as well.

At first, the scientists weren't sure if the animals were juvenile versions of the Quetzalcoatlus or a different species altogether.

The researchers took precise measurements of the fossils and ran them through a computer algorithm. If they didn't come back as near matches to the other animal, it was mostly likely another species, Mr Brown said.

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The smaller of the two new species has a blunt beak while the larger species has a long, thin, beak that comes to a point.

The animals lived in a forest oasis over 70 million years ago in what is now Texas, which was home to many bodies of water.

The larger Quetzalcoatlus would have likely used its narrow beak to forage for crabs and worms along the water, according to the research collection. This reptile species also tended to hunt alone.

The smaller Quetzalcoatlus was much more social and would spend time in large groups. Researchers found about 30 of the flying animals together at a fossil excavation.

Missing pieces of the fossil

Scientists have fairly complete skeletons of the smaller species, but only a portion of the original Quetzalcoatlus body.

Mr Brown said he wants to pick up where Douglas Lawson, a former geology graduate student at the University of Texas who discovered the original bones in 1971, left off.

One of Brown's personal goals is to obtain a permit and go out into the national park to find the rest of the animal and collect it.

"That would be hugely informative and would really test a lot of our hypothesis about what these big animals look like based on the small ones," Mr Brown said.