Forty-three people rescued and early death toll stands at five after blaze aboard MV ‌June Aster in waters off Coron, Palawan, says coast guard

Five people were confirmed dead ⁠in early counting and ​more than 80 were missing after a ferry caught fire ⁠off Palawan island in the western Philippines on Wednesday night, the Philippine coast ⁠guard said.

Forty-three people were ​rescued from the MV ‌June Aster in waters off Coron, Palawan, the coast guard said. Footage showed flames engulfing parts of the vessel and responders placing victims ‌in body bags.

Adam Mosseri says platform’s algorithm ‘feels like a black box’ but company trying to give users more control after Labor announces opt-out plan

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Instagram’s chief executive has said users will have a worse experience in an algorithm-free world, seeing more brand-related content, and spend less time on the app.

The comments come as the Australian government plans to give users the option to opt out of algorithms, with the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, announcing plans on Tuesday to require social media platforms to prompt users to choose between a feed of algorithm-recommended content or a reverse chronological feed of the pages users follow. Labor also plans to introduce a range of measures designed to address online harm on the sites.

Temperatures reached 1.65C above preindustrial levels, months before El Niño system reaches full strength

August was the joint-hottest month ever recorded around the world, with global temperatures reaching 1.65C above preindustrial levels, scientists said on Thursday, amid warnings of further heating on the way.

August 2026 tied with July 2023 for the hottest month ever recorded, according to the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service. Sea surface temperatures also soared to their highest levels on record for August.

‘Guess who?’ says Fire Point, Ukrainian maker of long-range weaponry; drone alert in Moldova as Zelenskyy waited to fly out. What we know on day 1,660

• American rallies from brink to defeat Andreeva

• Gauff survives 12 double faults in three-set escape

Coco Gauff has played far cleaner matches than on Wednesday afternoon. But few players today on the women’s tour have become better at finding answers on the fly when almost nothing is working for them.

The 22-year-old American’s serene march through the US Open women’s draw hit extreme turbulence early in her quarter-final clash with fifth-seeded Mirra Andreeva inside Arthur Ashe Stadium. She dropped the first four games before surrendering the opening set in 26 minutes, ending a streak of 20 consecutive sets won dating back nearly a month. She piled up 12 double faults and 42 unforced errors, the majority off a forehand in open revolt. She found herself one point from defeat not once but twice during a hairy second-set tiebreaker.

Native only to the islands of Borneo and Sumatra, the rare apes were found thousands of kilometres away in Odisha state

Five baby orangutans have been found in a forest in India, prompting authorities to investigate if they were trafficked into the country from south-east Asia.

The orangutans, native only to the islands of Borneo and Sumatra and known for their shaggy red fur, were found in Balasore district of Odisha state, thousands of kilometres away from their natural habitat.

Former Anthropic employee Jacob Coxon said AI will become ‘superhuman systems’ that can cause human extinction by the end of the decade

Just a day after three Anthropic researchers warned that artificial intelligence could kill off humanity within the decade, lawmakers have begun lashing out about the risks of the burgeoning technology.

Ted Cruz, a republican senator from Texas, said in an interview on ABC’s The View, that AI poses a “catastrophic risk” and that he “read that whole tweet thread that that developer put out. It was highly concerning.

Critics say threshold pushes higher-paid staff to cut back on work and often mothers to stop working to avoid losing entitlement

John Healey has been urged to fix the £100,000 childcare “cliff edge”, that means some higher-paid employees cut back on work to avoid losing their entitlement.

Since the latest expansion of taxpayer-funded childcare in 2024, families with young children in which both parents earn less than £100,000 a year can be entitled to 30 hours a week of care - or none at all, if one of them cross that threshold.

From his claim of being ‘de-banked’ to a disturbing detail about a rape survivor’s story being used to fundraise, this film puts big questions to the co-founder of the English Defence League. But it is frustratingly hard to get answers

You can’t say it would be a huge surprise if a leading figure of the British far right turned out to be a fraudster: that whole strand of politics is, after all, a con job preying on angry citizens who are daft enough to believe that immigrants, and not the rapaciously greedy super-rich, are somehow the cause of the nation’s problems. If people will fall for that, fleecing them out of their money is not a big leap.

Tommy Robinson, co-founder of the English Defence League and now an influencer, independent documentary-maker and international flag-shaggers’ guru, was convicted of mortgage fraud in 2014, but what about 2026? Is he a scam artist juicing idiots for cash? Robinson, real name Stephen Christopher Yaxley-Lennon, is undeniably a talented harvester of donations from his fans, whether it’s in person at his rallies or via the internet: in a video posted online, he admits to “continually ask[ing] you, the people, to support us”, and in another he boasts of having once convinced his admirers to hand over £350,000 in the space of two weeks. If you try to avoid seeing or hearing about Robinson, the amount of money he generates may shock you.

Tommy Robinson: Where’s the Money Gone? is on Channel 4 now.

• Rybakina into semis after 3-6, 6-1, 6-4 victory

• Coco Gauff battles back to beat Mirra Andreeva

Elena Rybakina will become the No 1 woman in the world for the first time after orchestrating a supreme recovery to reach the semi-finals of the US Open with a 3-6, 6-1, 6-4 win over the Olympic champion Zheng Qinwen.

By becoming just the 30th player in the history of the WTA to reach the No 1 ranking, Rybakina ends Aryna Sabalenka’s extended spell at the top. The Belarusian has held the position for 99 successive weeks, the sixth-longest consecutive reign in history, and 107 weeks in total.

Where’s the fun in doing it the easy way? Chelsea remain chaotic at the back but can drag their opponents into horrible places. It helps, mind you, to have some assistance from the referee. Jarred Gillett and Cole Palmer? They made for a killer combination as Chelsea swerved embarrassment and treated Stamford Bridge to one of life’s rarities: a classic in the third round of the Carabao Cup.

Gillett, a referee who always seems to be guessing when he makes key calls, was the villain as far as Leeds were concerned. They had just gone 2-0 up when Gillett altered the flow of the tie by pointing to the spot after Pep Chavarría made the most of slight contact from Daniel James. The subsequent conversion from Palmer was inevitable and from there so was the comeback from Chelsea, who rattled through four goals in 12 minutes before eventually reaching the last 16 by winning 6-3.

It was the time and place for Alexis Mac Allister to do his talking on the pitch and the disgruntled Liverpool midfielder delivered on cue. “Very sad” over Liverpool’s refusal to offer him a new contract, while Dominik Szoboszlai and Ryan Gravenberch were getting theirs, Mac Allister made Anfield very happy with a match-winning display against Atlético Madrid.

The Argentina international, one of five World Cup finalists involved in an absorbing, delicately-poised contest, vented his frustrations in the best possible and most professional way – from behind an immaculate 20-yard strike into Jan Oblak’s goal rather than a microphone. Mac Allister believes he is playing for a new deal this season and promised to give “100% to my last day” at the pre-match press conference. He was true to his word to extend Atlético’s winless sequence against English opposition in the Champions League league phase to 11 matches.

After their record-breaking feats last year in the Champions League, Arsenal are at it again. But having been delayed along with hundreds of travelling supporters by travel chaos on Tuesday, Mikel Arteta’s side had to bide their time against Napoli until Martin Ødegaard continued his rich vein of goalscoring with the crucial strike 15 minutes from full time.

Perhaps it was the fact that, at Uefa’s insistence, they were forced to wear red shorts for the first time since a Premier League game against Watford in 2022 that Arsenal were not quite at their flowing best here and missed a hatful of chances.

• Distance tops US men’s mark by more than 30 miles

• Eckert also beat women’s world record she set last year

While some teachers spent the second week of September easing into their school routines, Megan Eckert was making more ultrarunning history.

The New Mexico middle school math teacher shattered the six-day women’s world record and the American men’s record by running 636.482 miles, completing her feat on Wednesday morning in Balatonfüred, Hungary.

Venice film festival: Edoardo De Angelis’s claustrophobic drama brings a raging mother up from Naples for the holidays, with a capon. What could possibly not go wrong?

If there were a Golden Lion award for the most Italian film in Venice competition it would go to Edoardo De Angelis’s squawking domestic spat of a picture which contains an imperious matriarch, a pained Catholic priest, an argumentative family, and food, so much food. Bowls are stirred and pans are brandished. Pots are seen rattling angrily on the stove. The festival organisers like to deploy a little judicious home cooking when it comes to the selection and De Angelis is already a favoured guest, having opened the 2023 event with his war drama Comandante. But I fear they may have miscalculated with this one. It’s overdone, on the turn and too liberally salted with tears. It’s liable to provoke the occasional stab of heartburn.

At the head of the table sits the incorrigible Angela (Vanessa Scalera). She’s up from Naples (where she was presumably once a girl from the backstreets, begging in rags) to supervise Christmas Eve dinner at her son’s book-lined apartment in Milan. Angela’s a relic of the old world, breezily unreconstructed and openly disgusted by the woke state of her grandchildren. “One’s a gay dancer and the other’s a vegetarian,” she scoffs. They in turn are perturbed by the fact that she has brought in a live chicken to be cooked as the main course. Who’s going to catch it? Who’s going to kill it? What even is this creature, exactly? “It’s not a hen, it’s a capon,” sighs middle-aged Anto (Lino Musella), who dearly wishes his mother had never come at all. She’s a beautiful woman, he says, but she smells.

Brothers, arrested in Miami in July on UK rape and sex trafficking charges, to remain in custody in Florida

A US judge denied the bail request of the controversial social media influencers Andrew and Tristan Tate on Wednesday, ordering the brothers to remain behind bars as they fight extradition to the United Kingdom.

The Tate brothers, prominent figures in the so-called “manosphere”, were arrested in Miami on 18 July after British prosecutors filed new charges against them and sought their extradition to the UK. Those charges included criminal charges of rape and sex trafficking. British prosecutors previously charged the brothers with rape, human trafficking and sexual assault. The Tates, who are dual British-US citizens, have repeatedly denied the accusations against them.

Scotland Yard confirms it is investigating allegations broadcast by Channel 4 News after undercover sting

The financial scandal around Reform UK has deepened as police expanded their investigation into allegations of illegal foreign donations and the elections watchdog said it was considering regulatory steps.

Police confirmed on Wednesday they would broaden their inquiries into Reform after Channel 4 News broadcast an undercover sting by a group called Verbatim, in which a reporter posed as a foreign donor seeking to fund Reform.

The passport-size iPhone Duo serves as the first big test for John Ternus, who took over for Tim Cook last week

Apple has unveiled the iPhone Duo, the company’s first foldable phone and the most significant change to the iPhone since the smartphone’s introduction in 2007.

The nearly $2,000 device takes inspiration from iPads’ wide screens and combines them with the portability and camera features of iPhones. When opened, it is the company’s largest phone display and thinnest phone. The Duo opens and closes like a passport to double its screen size.

Razaullah offered the tourists a glimpse of audacity but it was Babar Azam who embodied the wider loss of hope

It was still morning when Babar Azam came in to bat at Edgbaston. The Test was only 45 minutes old but you could already see which direction it was heading. Pakistan were three wickets down. The floodlights were on, a thick smear of black cloud was moving slowly over the ground, there were odd spots of rain in the air. Ollie Robinson was bowling from one end, with the keeper standing up and five slips spread in a line just behind, and Jofra Archer was on at the other, four overs into his spell and only just warming up. It was a hell of a time to be batting.

But then it always seems to be, lately.

From hours stuck on planes awaiting takeoff, to sleeping the night on the floor at Heathrow. Here are some travellers’ experiences

More than 2,000 flights have been cancelled after an air traffic control system failure that has thrown airports across the UK into chaos. Nats, the air traffic control provider, fixed the problem within hours on Tuesday, but hundreds of thousands of passengers were hit by further delays and cancellations on Wednesday.

Martin Rolfe, the chief executive of Nats, has been given a week to report back on the reasons for the technical failure.