From May 5, households that have not completed the Census will receive a final notice

The 15-year-old heard a tapping on the door before finding an armed stranger in her home.

Jockey Mikaela Claridge's favourite saying to her dad was "how hard can it really be?".

When the proposition is a life without her, Bernie Claridge's answer is "really hard".

The 22-year-old was killed when her horse was spooked during an early morning training ride at Cranbourne in 2019.

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She and fellow rider Jaimee Hayes had already completed one loop of the sand trails at Cranbourne Turf Club in the pitch black at 4am on August 30 and were part way through another when something in the thick dark scrub that lined the trail frightened their horses.

Ms Claridge had earlier commented on how dark the morning was.

Both riders were thrown.

Ms Hayes landed on her knees, looked around and saw Ms Claridge on the ground unconscious.

She was treated at the scene but never regained consciousness.

The girls were riding for Saloon Park, the racing company run by trainer Ken Keys and his wife Louise.

A County Court jury convicted the company of failing to provide a safe workplace.

After running to get help for her best friend, Ms Hayes was told to take another horse out.

Ms Claridge was the youngest of three close-knit siblings who had been driven by their parents to motorcycle events, pony club and sports every weekend as a family.

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"I am beyond proud of what she achieved in her 22 years, and how lucky we were as a family to have such a beautiful daughter and sister in our lives," Mr Claridge said.

Ms Claridge had raised concerns with her dad about riding on the sand trails in the dark and with no safety barrier.

Judge Peter Rosen said he accepted that Ms Hayes and another rider, Chelsea Hall, had felt unable to raise the same concerns with Mr Keys himself.

"If they genuinely feel that, then that's impacting on (Saloon Park's) capacity to address safety risks. It's about the culture of the company, essentially," he said.

Cranbourne Turf Club was fined $250,000 after admitting they failed to maintain a safe workplace for Ms Claridge.

Robert Taylor, for Saloon Park, said a fine of the same magnitude would put the company out of business.

But prosecutor Colin Mandy SC highlighted the need for general deterrence, particularly in cases involving apprentices.

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He described them as a vulnerable set of employees who are worked hard, not paid well and aren't keen to ruffle feathers, particularly in the facing industry, given apprenticeships are hard to come by.

Judge Rosen said he had been left with the impression there is a blind spot within the racing industry about risk.

Colleen Claridge said everything the family had been through to achieve change would be her daughter's legacy.

A rider herself, she said the family knew the job was dangerous but if proper processes were followed Ms Claridge might still be alive.

Her daughter was finding her feet in her career.

Ms Claridge had moved to Melbourne and was happy in her personal and professional life.

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"She was loving what turned out to be the final months of her life," her mother said.

A WorkSafe probe found several features on the track could have spooked a horse, including overhanging tree branches, pooled water, and other horses and wildlife near the track.

The court was told the club could have reduced the risks by installing floodlights or limiting riders to daytime use of the facilities, while Saloon Park could have had riders use the sand trails in daylight only.

Saloon Park will be sentenced on May 5.

Union organiser who sent email raising complaint about official loses bid to get job back.

“So he hits me and goes back to life, but mine is changed forever,” was King’s reaction.

A Victorian construction company has announced it has gone into administration, just weeks after building giant Porter Davis collapsed.

Mahercorp, which is the parent company of Eight Homes and Urbanedge Homes, has today sent a letter to its customers to announce it is entering voluntary administration.

But director and chief executive Steve Maher insisted the company is not in liquidation.

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"I want to emphasise that Mahercorp has not collapsed and is not in liquidation. My intention is to work with the administrator on a plan that I hope allows us to restructure the business, creating more sustainable footing and to complete your home," the letter from him reads.

Maher has said construction of customers' homes will be put on hold for five weeks.

He has cited "unprecedented challenges" builders are facing, particularly skyrocketing costs, as the cause.

"Materials and labour costs are at record levels and rising inflation is putting huge pressure on builders," the letter reads.

"Entering voluntary administration was the only option after being advised earlier this week that the insurer for our supplier of essential safety equipment would no longer support our business."

Mahercorp is a Victorian company.

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Humpback whales have their own form of skincare and day spas, research claims.

Humpback whales use sandy and shallow bays to exfoliate dead skin cells off themselves by rolling around in the sand, research from Griffith University suggests.

As groups of humpback whales, called pods, migrated south between August 2021 and October 2022, a team of researchers monitored their movements, making the discovery.

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"On all occasions of sand rolling, the whales were observed on video to be slowly moving forward with their head first into the sand followed by rolling to one side or a full roll," Marine ecologist Dr Olaf Meynecke said.

"During the different deployments, the sand rolling was observed in the context of socialising. The behaviour was either following courtship, competition or other forms of socialising."

The whales were monitored and filmed using suction cup trackers which had high-definition video cameras integrated into them.

Marine Biologists observed the pod of whales fully and partially rolling their bodies around in the sand on the seafloor, in about 45 metres of water.

The activity provides social and health benefits for the whales.

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"Humpback whales host diverse communities of skin bacteria that can pose a threat for open wounds if bacteria grow in large numbers," Meynecke said.

"Removing excess skin is likely a necessity to maintain a healthy bacterial skin community. Humpback whales can remove some barnacles and skin through surface activity such as breaches but not all."

Barnacles can drag whales down and cause them to lose energy.

Marine biologists also noticed that the exfoliation benefited the ocean's ecosystem, as they observed small fish feeding on the dead skin cells that fell off the whale's skin. 

Families of people killed in the Las Vegas Strip massacre in October 2017 will receive shares of almost all the $2 million estate of the man who unleashed the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history and killed himself before police reached him, according to a probate case that ended Thursday in Nevada.

In the next several weeks, the money will be distributed to the families of 61 victims of the shooting, said Alice Denton, the Las Vegas attorney who handled the case with her partner, Jarien Cho, at no cost to the estate of the gunman, Stephen Paddock.

“We have done what we set out to do,” Denton said of the more than five-year process to appraise, sell and distribute proceeds from Paddock's assets, including two homes and an investment property in Nevada, a vehicle and 49 guns.

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“We worked to ensure that the victims' families received the most that they could,” Denton told The Associated Press.

“The guns were destroyed, and the funds will be distributed to the families of the deceased victims according to the direction of the shooter's mother."

"None of the money is going to anyone in the Paddock family."

Fifty-eight people died the night of the shooting, and authorities said two died months later from their wounds. More than 850 people were injured.

The list of recipients of shares of Paddock's estate was sealed by the court, and Denton said she could not disclose the identity of a 61st person or how they died.

“This is not intended in any way to compensate for the loss of these lives. It can’t," Clark County District Court Judge Gloria Sturman said as she closed the case, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported.

The guns – including assault-style rifles that authorities found had been fitted with “bump stock” devices to make them fire more rapidly – were purchased for $93,000 by an anonymous donor in January 2019 with the provision that they be turned over to the FBI, according to court records.

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Thirty-six of the weapons were destroyed, according to documents the FBI provided on February 28 to the estate, and 13 were kept by the bureau for training purposes.

Las Vegas police and the FBI said they never found a conclusive motive for Paddock to rain gunfire from a 32nd-floor suite at the Mandalay Bay resort into an open-air concert audience of 22,000 people across Las Vegas Boulevard.

Recent disclosures of material collected by the FBI and letters released by Las Vegas police have provided new looks at the case, but no additional answers.

Paddock was a 64-year-old retired postal service worker, accountant and real estate investor with a penchant for guns and gambling, and homes in Reno and Mesquite, a retirement community more than an hour’s drive from Las Vegas.

His investment property was in suburban Henderson.

His father was a notorious bank robber and federal prison escapee once listed on the FBI most-wanted list. Stephen Paddock held a private pilot’s license, and he sometimes wagered tens of thousands of dollars at a time playing video poker.

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Police and the FBI concluded that Paddock meticulously planned the shooting, burned through more than $2.2 million of personal savings and distanced himself from his girlfriend and family in the months before the Las Vegas shooting.

A settlement totaling $1.19 billion was reached in September 2020 between casino company MGM Resorts International and its insurers with more than 4,400 relatives and victims of the shooting to resolve lawsuits involving plaintiffs from nearly every state in the US, at least eight Canadian provinces, the United Kingdom, Iran and Ireland.

Four dogs will be put down following an attack that left a toddler seriously injured in Queensland last week.

A three-year-old girl sustained serious head and neck injuries from the dog attack, which involved one of four of her grandmother's dogs.

Four dogs, described as German Shepherds and Mastiff breeds, were removed from the Yatala property following the attack on April 12, and will now be put down.

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The local council confirmed that complaints had been made about the dogs prior to the attack.

Officers had visited the property previously on several occasions. 

The decision to euthanise the dogs come as the Queensland Premier moved to fast-track a review into dangerous dog laws. 

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A toddler has died after being hit by a car in the driveway of a property in regional Queensland, south of Townsville.

The 15-month-old boy was struck about 4.40pm yesterday by a car being driven by a woman, police said.

The incident happened at a property at Carstairs, near Ayr.

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The boy was rushed to hospital but later died. 

Queensland Police are investigating the infant's sudden death and investigations are ongoing.