The World This Hour - The World This Hour for 2025/12/27 at 05:00 EST

Episode Date: December 27, 2025

The World This Hour for 2025/12/27 at 05:00 EST

This ascent isn't for everyone. You need grit to climb this high this often. You've got to be an underdog that always over-delivers. You've got to be 6,500 hospital staff, 1,000 doctors, all doing so much with so little. You've got to be Scarborough. Defined by our uphill battle and always striving towards new heights. And you can help us keep climbing.

Donate at lovescarbro.cairbo. bro.ca. From CBC News, the world this hour. I'm Mike Miles. The last of the Dionne Quintoplitz died Christmas Eve. Annette Deion's family says our health had recently been worsening. Eve on. Annette.

Just see you. Marie over there and Amy over there. Annette Dion's birth and that of her four sisters was big news in 1934. Back then, Quintouplets didn't. survive. Even more surprising, they arrived prematurely. They were soon taken away from their parents and put on display like animals at a zoo. It's the home of those five amazing children. With nearly six million people from all over the world making the trek to so-called quinkland to see them, generating half a billion dollars in economic activity for the province

during the Depression. The Diyans were returned to their parents nine years later, but there was no bond, as Annette remembered in a 2017 interview. It was more happy to live in the nursery than at home. Annette Dion was 91. The Canadian Navy is looking ahead to what the future fleet might look like, and one of the concepts being floated is an all-Canadian ice-capable landing ship to defend the Arctic. As Murray Brewster tells us, it's just one of the projects being imagined by military planners as the federal government pours more than $81 billion into the defense over the next few years.

U.S. amphibious armored vehicles rolling down the back ramp of the USS Portland off California last summer. The U.S. Marines able to deploy troops and equipment on a beach anywhere in the world. It's a capability Canada doesn't have, and the Navy is wondering whether it should. We examined what would happen if we had a small community in distress in the high Arctic in February. How could we get capability there? Vice Admiral Angus Topshi is commander of the Navy. We sort of realized that some form of Arctic mobile base, probably made a lot of sense. And that is effectively what an amphibious ship is.

Topshi says an amphibious ship would also be useful for humanitarian relief operations overseas. The best example, during the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, the Canadian Army had to fly all of its equipment over several weeks into the country because it had no ability to be able to land vehicles quickly through the destroyed port infrastructure. The concept would solve a decades-old transportation problem for the military, one that until now, it hasn't had the money to address. Murray Brewster, CBC News, Ottawa. Boxing Day brought a blast of winter weather with a deep freeze gripping Canada's north and east. Snow and freezing rain also left tens of thousands without powering southwestern Ontario.

Angela McKinness reports. London, Ontario fire chief Gary Mossberger says hundreds of calls have been coming into 911 after freezing rain coated the city in ice. We're incredibly swamped right now with lots of trees down on electrical wires on home. The freezing rain started in the morning and kept going into the late afternoon, stretching from Kitchener to Windsor. By the time it stopped, thousands of people across southwestern Ontario were in the dark. The number of power outages continued to climb Friday night as more trees cracked under the weight of ice. Catherine Arnott is with London Hydro, where the damage was especially bad. Our lines and forestry crews have been dispatched, and they're working to isolate the areas.

Emergency crews were also responding to calls for help on the roads, including rollover crashes near the 401. Police continued to tell people to stay home, with temperatures not expected to rise until Sunday. Angela McKinnis, CBC News, London, Ontario. Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro wants Washington's attention. Maduro's accusing the U.S. of trying to impose colonial domination on his country, to steal natural resources, and he's not having it.

He insists U.S. intervention in Venezuela will fail. Meanwhile, the American military strength in the Caribbean is bulking up with U.S. President Donald Trump locating oil tankers entering and leaving Venezuela. That is the world this hour. For news anytime, visit our website, cbcnews.ca.ca. For CBC News, I'm Mike Miles. Thank you.