Correspondence after ferry’s loss of power mid-journey reveals concerns over operations.

Inquiries into the circumstances of the crash are underway.

‘What you did to me, this terrible experience, will be with me forever.’

At least 110 people have been injured after tennis ball-sized hail rained down on a region of northern Italy overnight Wednesday.

In a surprise storm, hailstones of up to 10 centimetres in diameter pelted the streets of Veneto, according to regional president Luca Zaia.

Emergency services responded to more than 500 calls for help due to damage to property and personal injuries, the Veneto regional civil protection said.

READ MORE: Mum's question after son fatally bashed over pair of Airpods

Workers have been removing glass from broken windows and cutting trees and other plants that were severely damaged in the storm.

"The wave of bad weather, after having impacted our mountain regions, has now also hit the plains, causing injury to some people," Zaia said, adding that most injuries were caused by broken glass and people slipping on the hailstones.

A 53-year-old man riding his bicycle died during the storm when his wife, who was following him with their car, ran over him, CNN affiliate Sky24 reported.

Europe has seen dramatic shifts in weather this year.

Italy, Spain and Greece have faced unrelenting heat for days. The Italian capital Rome hit a new record temperature of 41 degrees Celsius on Tuesday.

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The Italian Meteorological Society named the latest heat wave Cerberus after the three-headed monster that features in Dante's Inferno as a guard to the gates of hell.

"The earth has a high fever and Italy is feeling it firsthand," Luca Mercalli, head of the Italian Meteorological Society, told CNN.

In May, parts of the northern Italian region of Emilia Romagna suffered under 'once in a century' deadly flooding, with over 20 rivers in the region bursting their banks and prompting a wave of landslides.

As the human-caused climate crisis accelerates, scientists are clear that extreme weather events will only become more frequent and more intense.

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A teacher who was sentenced to community work for having a sexual relationship with her teenage student should have been jailed, prosecutors say.

Monique Ooms walked free from Victoria's County Court in March after admitting to having sex with her 16-year-old male student while he was under her care or supervision.

She was ordered to perform 300 hours of community work after pleading guilty to four charges, but the Director of Public Prosecutions has appealed this sentence.

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Ooms, who is now 17-weeks' pregnant, struck up a supportive friendship with the boy and spoke over Instagram and text messages before they started a sexual relationship, the court heard previously.

The school was notified anonymously and Ooms was stood down.

Ooms faced the Court of Appeal in Melbourne on Friday, where prosecutors argued she should have been handed a jail sentence.

"This is such serious offending, repeated offending, that for the respondent to not be in prison at all really undermines confidence in the system," Elizabeth Ruddle KC told the court.

She said the judge who sentenced Ooms had "really underestimated" the seriousness of the offending, since her position as a teacher helped her gain access to the victim.

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If they had met under different circumstances then no offence would have been committed, since the victim was old enough to have consented to the relationship, Ms Ruddle argued.

Ooms' barrister Jason Gullaci SC admitted her sentence was lenient, but said his client did not engage in grooming or predatory behaviour.

She had suffered extra punishment as she has been abused by people since her case was made public in the media, he argued.

This included Ooms receiving a phone call from a person pretending to be a police officer who said "I heard you've been touching kids at some other high school".

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If the appeal judges were to decide Ooms' sentence was too lenient, he urged them not to jail Ooms as her pregnancy was high-risk and she continued to experience poor mental health.

He went through details of her pregnancy, including the date of conception, to prove to the judges she believed she was free at the time and was not aware an appeal would be brought.

Ruddle said Ooms could continue to receive the same level of medical care, including fortnightly GP and midwife visits, while in prison.

Justices Richard Niall, Maree Kennedy and Cameron Macaulay will hand down their decision at a later date.

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Malka Leifer will soon learn her fate after a marathon ordeal bringing her to justice for child sexual abuse.

The former ultra-Orthodox Jewish principal was this year convicted of raping and indecently assaulting Melbourne sisters Dassi Erlich and Elly Sapper when they were students at the Adass Israel School.

Leifer, a 56-year-old mother of eight, was principal and head of religion at the school until she was sacked by the board in 2008 when allegations first came to light.

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Within days she fled to Israel, and after lengthy extradition proceedings returned to Australia in January 2020.

Leifer on Friday faced a pre-sentence hearing at the County Court in Melbourne, where Judge Mark Gamble set her sentencing date for August 24.

Her barrister Ian Hill KC described her time in home detention as punitive, saying she was confined to a space away from her husband and children.

Hill conceded she was allowed to have visits, but said there were religious duties and functions she missed, and she was under constant supervision in home detention.

Prosecutor Justin Lewis argued Leifer feigned mental illness to avoid extradition, so the weight the judge put on her more than 600 days in home detention should be diminished.

READ MORE: Child located after alleged abduction while walking to school

A jury convicted Leifer of 18 offences, but she was found not guilty of nine charges, including five relating to the siblings' older sister, Nicole Meyer.

Meyer and Sapper were at court on Friday to witness Gamble set a sentencing date for Leifer.

The sisters were overwhelmed by the prospect that the proceedings could soon come to an end.

"It might actually be the end of an absolutely enormous journey," Meyer said.

"Even thinking it's possible is so overwhelming, but also exciting very slightly because we know that day is going to be very difficult as well.

"We hope that we'll get justice."

Gamble expected Leifer's sentence would take him a lengthy amount of time to hand down.

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

The federal government has released a National Wellbeing Framework to address inflation by measuring different economic and social factors.

It will use 50 different indicators to measure Australia's "economy and society" in addition to traditional measurements like the GDP, employment, inflation and wages.

The framework called Measuring What Matters will assess resident's collective health, security, sustainability, cohesiveness and prosperity.

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Treasurer Jim Chalmers said it was important to better align "our economic and social goals in our communities".

"Over the last two decades, Australia has made progress in improving life expectancy, job opportunities and resource use," Chalmers said.

"We are more accepting of diversity and have more trust in others.

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"Over those decades, our incomes have also improved."

But Australia has higher rates of chronic conditions and in some instances were finding it harder to access health, care and support services.

"We perceive our national security to be lower and we face new threats online.

"Over recent decades, biological diversity has fallen, fiscal sustainability has declined, and for many Australians, housing is taking up more of our income."

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He said Australia preformed well compared to other countries but there were ways to improve.

"The framework will help tell us how we are tracking over time, where we are doing well and where we need to do better," Chalmers said.

"Our aim is to provide a better, more comprehensive foundation for understanding our economy and our society to inform the efforts of government, business and the community sector in improving the wellbeing of all Australians."

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Three more horses have died across Victorian farms from mystery illnesses, as baffled authorities desperately try to work out the cause behind their sudden deaths.

A total of 13 horses have now died in the state in the space of a week, though officials have yet to determine any common links between the deaths.

It's believed none of the horses had died with any kind of infectious illness, adding to the bizarre mystery.

READ MORE: Urgent investigation in Victoria after 10 horses die of mystery illness

Chief Veterinary Officer at Agriculture Victoria, Dr Graeme Cooke, said it's a "worrying time for owners".

"We're still at 13 (deaths), however we have not had anymore reports of multiple sudden deaths – more than one horse at at one premises – since the fourteenth of July," Cooke said on 3AW.

"Our investigations are continuing and have suggested there are no common links between these incidences, and certainly no evidence of infectious diseases.

"So therefore there's been no reason to restrict horse movements or horse events.

https://omny.fm/shows/mornings-with-neil-mitchell/more-horses-pass-away-in-victorias-south-east-as-i/embed

"We're asking owners who have had horses who had deteriorated very rapidly, and we're talking about otherwise healthy horses that suddenly die within 24 hours, to report them to the vet and Agriculture Victoria."

Cooke said there's no indication any of the horses had even died by the same cause.

"We're treating this as a complex investigation," he said.

"The samples will take some time to run through.

"We're asking horse owners to really monitor their animals."

It's "unusual" to have multiple deaths in horses "in the same group", Cooke said, adding that the possibility of pure coincidence has not been ruled out.

"Certainly this is very unusual for Victoria against our records," he said. 

"We're open to all possibilities." 

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The mother of a man bashed to death over a pair of AirPods is still asking how her son died over something so trivial.

Janet Houllis faces another agonising wait before the second man who murdered her 28-year-old son Ross Houllis in February 2020 is sentenced on Monday afternoon.

"Can we get this over and done with?" she asked the NSW Supreme Court on Friday, two weeks after a sentencing hearing was initially scheduled.

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Houllis died in hospital three days after he was bashed on a suburban Wakeley street in Sydney's west on Valentine's Day 2020.

Abdul Karaali, 29, was found guilty of murdering him by a jury in March.

Ms Houllis was in court later that month when Sami Hamdach was jailed at least 12 years, after pleading guilty.

Hamdach had bought a pair of AirPods from Houllis, and believing they were not genuine, enlisted Karaali for a revenge attack.

Justice Stephen Campbell indicated when sentencing Hamdach that Karaali was likely to face a harsher penalty, describing him as the "primary offender".

In addition to not receiving the same discount on his sentence Hamdach did for pleading guilty, Karaali acted with more violence, kicking and stomping on an already unconscious Houllis.

"That was done with the intention to kill," crown prosecutor Phil Hogan urged the judge to find on Friday.

Karaali sat in the dock, glaring at a detective who took a seat in the gallery, before casting his eyes downward, not looking up as the mother of the man he murdered mourned her son, taken "brutally and cruelly".

"It seems to me (Karaali) did not care that he had taken another's life, over something that didn't really have anything to do with him," Ms Houllis said.

"How can someone kill my son over AirPods and money?"

It's a question that has also stumped the judge.

"I do not pretend to have found the answer," he said, sentencing Hamdach.

READ MORE: NZ politician slams justice system after Auckland shooting

Karaali's barrister Irving Wallach said on Friday the indescribable attack was not all Karaali's doing.

"The whole genesis of this very, very – whatever adjective I could use would be inadequate, but the events that led to the killing of Mr Houllis – all those elements were put in train, not by Mr Karaali, but by Mr Hamdach," he said.

Hamdach had planned for Karaali to inflict some violence on Houllis, holding his arms behind his back as Karaali dealt out blows in the car park of a suburban shopping centre, but Karaali stopped him from escaping after the initial attack.

"When Mr Houllis took flight, in response to the kick to the head … it was Mr Karaali who gave chase … it was Mr Karaali, as I understand it on my impression of the evidence, who tackled him to the ground," the judge said.

Karaali was also the one "doing the kicking while he was down".

Hamdach's actions were obscured on the CCTV footage that captured the events, Mr Wallach submitted.

"I'm not suggesting Mr Karaali did nothing and did not take part … clearly the CCTV shows otherwise," he said.

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Karaali was on parole for other offences when he murdered Houllis, which was revoked when he was arrested by tactical officers in February 2020, and the judge will have to determine when his sentence should begin for the murder.

Ms Houllis lamented Karaali may one day be released.

"As if my son's death was nothing but a mishap, a speed bump on his life."

The judge said he did not want to rush a judgment on Friday afternoon and adjourned until Monday.

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"If it goes on like this for another six or seven months like this, we're going to close."

That's the reality for Ashraf Saleh's restaurant Coya in Sydney's North Shore as the small business battles the dramatic reduction in consumer spending while cost of living pressures bite.

Saleh opened the restaurant in Northern Beaches eight years ago and business was booming but in the last few years with COVID-19 and now the cost of living crisis, he's struggling to keep the doors open.

READ MORE: What to do if you can't make mortgage payments

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