As one group of people gathered in southern Vancouver Island to protest the logging of B.C.’s old-growth forest in the Walbran Valley, another came together in Clayoquot Sound to celebrate 25 years of conservation and community building.

For decades, Clayoquot Sound on the west coast of Vancouver Island was a region in conflict as hundreds of people stood on logging roads to save a temperate coastal rainforest from being clearcut.   

A truck driver escaped with his life after his industrial truck loaded with woody debris and trees slid into Nitinaht Lake Aug. 26 when the embankment he was driving on collapsed.

A video of the incident has gone viral on social media. Posted by Roc-Star Enterprises, the video shows an industrial truck loaded with logs driving onto an embankment on Nitinaht Lake when the soil gives way, causing the truck to tumble sideways into the lake. The driver reportedly escaped through a window and swam ashore, uninjured.

Two traditional artists from different cultures came together to create a remarkable project that tells the story of the Wolf Clan at Yuquot on Nootka Island, B.C. – a place of first contact with Europeans and Nuu-chah-nulth First Nations. 

Over the span of seven years, master carver Sanford Williams (Ahtsik-sta Qwayachiik) of Mowachaht First Nation and large format film photographer Ron Smid from Orillia, Ontario worked on a bentwood box pinhole camera. 

Despite being the urban hub for a region with the highest fatal overdose rate on Vancouver Island, there are no detox beds in Port Alberni.

This summer the BC Coroners Service released data on drug overdose deaths for the first half of 2025, numbers that put the Alberni-Clayoquot local health area fourth in the province for the rate of fatalities. Comprising almost 36,000 residents, this health area includes Port Alberni, Tofino, Bamfield and all communities in between, where a fatality rate of 74.1 per 100,000 was tracked from January until the end of June 2025. 

After years of anticipation and ongoing physician shortages, Ucluelet’s new health centre will officially open its doors on Monday, Sept. 22.

There are exemptions to the rule, of course.

Mobility/accessibility cases are exempt. People can still purchase water bottles sold in packaged multiples or flats. If a State of Emergency is declared at the local, provincial, or federal level and the Emergency Operation Centre is activated, single-use plastic water bottles will be on hand; same applies when Stage 3 water conservation measures are announced.

A new tool is being introduced to Port Alberni’s streets as front-line workers fight to make life safer for illicit drug users. 

The Nuu-chah-nulth Tribal Council’s health department has purchased a mobile drug testing machine, which can instantly detect the contents of a sampled batch of substances. The device came into use on Sept. 15, and it will accompany harm reduction workers as they provide street-level services from a van operated by the NTC’s Teechuktl Mental Health department.

The Port Alberni branch of the Canadian Mental Health Association (CMHA) will be taking over managing operations of the Landmark Cinema effective October 1, 2025. 

An anonymous, private owner purchased Landmark Cinema earlier this year and chose to pass management rights onto the Port Alberni branch of the CMHA. No major changes are expected to take place after the switch in management, except changing how profits are allocated and a name change.