The coronial inquest resumed in Christchurch after being adjourned from 2024.

The NZTA Board has endorsed the Tauriko West Road investment case in the Bay of Plenty.

A long-time friend said they are ‘extremely broken’.

The Serious Crash Unit are conducting a scene examination, Police said.

Brown admitted the offence and apologised for the error of judgement.

Some lucky Australians witnessed a meteor shower lighting up skies across the country's east last night.

Parts of south-east Queensland and regional New South Wales were treated to a spectacular display during the annual Lyrid meteor shower.

The annual celestial event peaked yesterday on April 21 and the meteorites made an astonishing appearance right on time – with some describing them as green and blue flashes in the sky.

LIVE UPDATES: Pope Francis dies aged 88

Shocked drivers captured the meteors quickly streaking across the sky on dashcam footage, while others were poised ready to film it with professional cameras.

Several witnesses also reported their homes shaking and hearing large booms during the astronomical shower.

One person took to social media to claim their sister's home in Tenterfield in regional NSW "shook" as the meteors travelled through the horizon.

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"My wife saw a massive flash, thought it was lighting," another said.

A few of the clearest displays were also captured in Bundaberg in Queensland and Glen Innes in regional NSW.

The Lyrid meteor shower was fuelled by debris from Comet Thatcher's trail, making it an especially bright display.

As our planet passed through this trail, small particles from the comet disintegrated upon entering the Earth's atmosphere at up to 47km/s.

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The Lyrids occur annually in mid-to-late April, typically becoming active around April 17 to April 26.

In Australia, the peak viewing time is usually April 21 to April 22, with anywhere between 10 to 20 meteors per hour.

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The FAA is investigating after an engine fire resulted in passengers on a Delta Air Lines flight evacuating down emergency slides onto the tarmac at Orlando International Airport this morning (local time).

The completely full Airbus A330 plane had just departed its gate to fly to Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport when a fire was reported in one of the two engines, according to statements from the Federal Aviation Administration and Delta Air Lines.

A large ball of orange flames was seen coming out of the right engine on cell phone video captured by Dylan Wallace, a passenger in the terminal.

LIVE UPDATES: Pope Francis dies aged 88

"We are calling the fire trucks right now, we see that," a controller noted on audio recorded by the website Broadcastify.

Emergency responders were then cleared to go to the plane.

After earlier saying there were 200 passengers on board, the airline updated the count to 282 in a statement.

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"Delta flight crews followed procedures to evacuate the passenger cabin when flames in the tailpipe of one of the aircraft's two engines were observed," the airline said.

No passengers were reported injured.

"We appreciate our customers' cooperation and apologize for the experience. Nothing is more important than safety and Delta teams will work to get our customers to their final destinations as soon as possible," the airline said.

A restaurant owner is fighting to keep his institution "old school" by only accepting cash payments and refusing to offer milk alternatives.

Bar Italia has only been accepting cash since it opened in Sydney's Leichhardt in 1952.

Owner Con Damouras said the decision came from his young children not knowing how to count money and the desire to keep circulating cash in a digital society.

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https://omny.fm/shows/ben-fordham-full-show/cash-is-king-the-business-owner-fighting-back-against-digital-payments/embed

"There is people who get disappointed, we have a few that call us different names," he told 2GB Sydney.

"We just say, 'Look, this is part of the institution and we're keeping it that way. Cash only'."

Damouras had an ATM installed near his restaurant to help accommodate customers, who were previously walking up the road to the nearest ATM.

"We contacted our bank, we said we're losing customers because most people are using credit cards," he told the radio show.

Damouras also does not offer milk alternatives.

READ MORE: How is a new pope elected? Inside the Vatican's secret process

Despite the old-fashioned way he does business, Bar Italia is bustling with people queuing up outside to get a seat.

"It works for us, we don't lose many people," he told 2GB.

"We just want to keep it old school, the way it was, the way it is."

Damouras is one of millions of Australians fighting to keep cash circulating. 

Today, about two million people are expected to participate in a cash-out protest against digital and card payments by withdrawing cash and using it at businesses.

The organisers, cash advocacy group Cash Welcome, said they hope to "keep cash alive".

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Among the Catholic Church's most senior officials charged with selecting a new pontiff following the death of Pope Francis will be a 45-year-old Australian cardinal.

Ukrainian-born Mykola Bychok, a bishop in Melbourne, was elevated to the position of cardinal by Francis last year.

He will be part of a centuries-old ritual involving sacred oaths by the cardinals electing a successor.

ROLLING COVERAGE: The death of Pope Francis

Bychok is Australia's sole cardinal and the youngest in the entire church.

Only cardinals under age 80 are eligible, and current regulations limit the number of electors to 120.

Speaking after Francis' death, Bychok called him a "pope of peace" who was filled with a sense of piety.

"In a world devastated by war he called for peace and justice," Bychok said.

"I am grateful for the late Holy Father's frequent appeals for a just peace in Ukraine and for the efforts of the Holy See that he oversaw, known and secret, that in some way helped bring relief to the imprisoned and suffering.

"The Holy Father was a strong defender of life and the dignity of every person.

"He worked for the healing of divisions between East and West and for a greater understanding of other faiths, building on that which we have in common rather than our differences."

IN PICTURES: The life of Pope Francis

According to The Catholic Leader newspaper, Cardinal Bychok was born on February 13, 1980 in Ternopil, a city in western Ukraine.

He made his lifelong vows in August 2003, and was ordained a priest on May 3, 2005.

Bychok later became abbot of a Ukrainian monastery and a parish priest in the north-eastern US.

In January 2020, Pope Francis appointed him as the new Bishop of the Diocese of Saints Peter and Paul in Melbourne of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church in Australia.

Bychok was installed as a cardinal during a Vatican ceremony last October, along with 21 other high-ranking church officials.

Throughout his recent rise in the church hierarchy, he continued to condemn Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

Bychok was heading to the Middle East on a pilgrimage but will make his way to Rome as soon as practicable. 

READ MORE: The rites and rituals following the death of a pope, his funeral and burial, explained

According to the most recently updated Vatican statistics, there were 136 cardinals under age 80 and eligible to vote, though that number may change before the conclave begins.

Those over 80 can't vote but can participate in pre-conclave meetings, known as general congregations, in which church problems are discussed.

It was in these meetings in 2013 that the future Pope Francis, then-Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio, spoke about the need for the church to go to the "existential peripheries" to find those who suffer — an off-the-cuff speech that helped his election.

The process of electing a new pope involves the piercing of ballots with a needle and thread after they're counted, and then burning them to produce either the white or black smoke to signal if there's a new leader for the world's 1.3 billion Catholics.

– With Associated Press

A popular saying in Vatican circles is that if you "enter a conclave as pope, you leave as a cardinal".