The World This Hour - The World This Hour for 2025/02/18 at 03:00 EST

Episode Date: February 18, 2025

The World This Hour for 2025/02/18 at 03:00 EST

In Scarborough, there's this fire behind our eyes. A passion in our bellies. It's in the hearts of our neighbors. The eyes of our nurses. And the hands of our doctors. It's what makes Scarborough, Scarborough. In our hospitals, we do more than anyone thought possible. We've less than anyone could imagine.

But it's time to imagine what we can do with more. Join Scarborough Health Network and together, we can turn grit into greatness. Donate at lovescarborough.ca. From CBC News, the world this hour. I'm Neil Herland. Harrowing stories are emerging from the passengers who survived the plane crash at Toronto's Pearson Airport. John Nelson was on the Delta Regional Flight from Minneapolis

yesterday. He describes the landing. When we hit it was just a super hard hit the ground and the plane went sideways. We skidded like on our side and then flipped over on our back. There was like a big fireball out this left side of the plane. And when we got finished it was, I was upside down. Everybody else was there as well. Thankfully everybody was okay. Pete Carlson was also on that flight. He has a few cuts and bruises. This is how he escaped the plane. We all made our way kind of, I don't know, six to eight feet and then climbed out. We all made our way kind of, I don't know, six to eight feet and then climbed out. It felt like I was stepping onto the tundra, first of all, there's just snow just kind of blowing and I didn't care how cold it was, I didn't care how far I had to walk, how long I had to stand, I just,

all of us wanted to just be out of the aircraft. There was a wing there before and when we went out that exit there was no wing to be found and so once we got back to a safe distance and kind of checked one another because there's so much adrenaline and stress, by that point there was a fire truck driving towards us on the tarmac. Eighty people were on board, everyone survived, but eighteen were taken to hospital, three in critical condition. Todd Aitken is the fire chief at Toronto's Pearson Airport, his first responders race to the runway. Upon arrival, my team conducted fire suppression. Self-evacuation was already taking place.

This is an active investigation. It's very early on. It's really important that we do not speculate. What we can say is the runway was dry and there was no crosswind conditions. This is the fourth major aviation mishap in North America in the past month. The deadliest disaster happened in Washington on January 29th when a commercial jetliner and a U.S. Army helicopter collided, killing 67 people. The leaders of Ontario's main political parties faced off in an election debate last night. One of the testiest moments was this exchange between Ontario Liberal leader Bonnie Crombie and Progressive Conservative leader Doug Ford.

Doug, I have one question for you and one question only. After seven years of lies, why should anyone trust a word you say? Well, first of all, action speaks louder than words and people have seen us spend over $200 billion on infrastructure, no matter if it's $50 billion worth of hospitals or $28 billion in building roads and highways or 70 billion in building transit. How does any one government spend a hundred billion dollars? NDP leader Marit Stiles and Green Party leader Mike Schreiner also took part in the debate. Ontario votes on February 27th. A historic meeting is planned for today. U.S. officials will sit down with their Russian counterparts to get peace talks started for Ukraine.

Cameron McIntosh reports. Even before touching down in Riyadh, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said he wasn't heading to Saudi Arabia to make a deal, just to see if there's the possibility of one. We're just not there yet, but hopefully we will be, because we'd all like to see this war end. Rubio meeting with his Russian counterpart, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, to try to re-establish relations enough to get negotiations going on Ukraine. Talks the Russians call serious. Ukraine, however, is not invited.

Ukraine will never accept deals made behind our backs without our involvement. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky says he won't recognize the talks. NATO membership for Ukraine and whether Russia keeps any of its occupied territory, about six million people, stand as critical issues, along with how involved the U.S. remains. If this leads to negotiations, President Trump says Ukraine and Europe will be invited. The president, who promised to end the war quickly, now trying to see if he can lay the groundwork for a deal. Cameron McIntosh, CBC News, Washington.

And that's the CBC News. I'm Neil Herland.