As of yesterday:

While all you folk down south are tending your crocuses and tulips and wondering how to green up that lawn without pesky pesticides we still have plenty of ice, dirty as it is.
I have started sowing some seeds, but this time to try growing some stuff indoors, small batches just to try things out.

The plot still continues to thicken in the aftermath of the Burton Winters tragedy. Despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary the provincial leadership still insists that everything happened as it should, except the part the Feds played.
It seems clear that everything did not play out as it should on the provincial level, so the agencies involved are playing political ping pong and the blame game. Its all too ridicules for words.

 I am no expert but here is how I see how search and rescue works in Labrador from the ground up. I may miss an agency or have the ascendance out of whack, so forgive me in advance.

First responders are local GSAR with RCMP as leads.
Canadian Rangers come into play also but I am not sure when and under what protocols are in play. Rangers and GSAR can also be the same people in many cases.
 Local RCMP then report to provincial RCMP command who are the operational leads in search and rescue in the province.

Then there is the Fire and Emergency Services Newfoundland (FES-NL) followed by EMO, but in what order I am not sure.
 FES-NL has the authority to call in contracted air services.

From there it seems to go federal to assets of the Canadian Armed services and the Coast guard.

Available but not used in the province are assets by a volunteer group called CASARA. Why the province and CASARA have not come to an agreement after 20 years of trying is a mystery.

So with all these groups involved and lacking some sort of coordination and accepted protocols, at least in the Burton case, would it not be prudent and in the public's interest to call an inquiry to attempt to fix something that is clearly broken.

 

Oh yeah, just aired this morning on CBC HV-GB. Plot thickens, waters muddy, pick your own analogy.

That fixed wing contract that Aurora Energy awarded to InnuMikun not long back.

 Wellllllll, it has now been taken from Innu Mikun and given to Air Labrador, an Inuit part owned airline.

No audio link up yet but make sure you listen to it when it is, mind boggling.

So here is the audio of two interviews, one with Aurora rep and another with NG first minister.

Lots of catch phrases like, propriety information, doing what is best for Nunatsiavut, Looking after the social and economic well being of the people of Nunatsiavut.

Be good to know what is really going on, since the story broke there have been figures thrown about from the 1 million dollar mark to 200 thousand to the now claimed 400 thousand value of the contract.
On the surface it looks like an Abbot and Costello comedy skit, 'whose on first".

But the underlying thing from my point is the double standard that NG is taking. Ask them to intervene or help in dealing with the food subsidy issue and the high cost of foods and all you get is, "oh we cant intervene in the affairs of private business" . But it is OK to intervene when you have a 51% stake in a private business.