Hurricane Earl continues its course towards the Maritimes. The Category 4 system is currently about 660 kilometres south of Cape Hatteras, N.C., packing maximum sustained winds of 230 km/h. Environment Canada stated Thursday morning that Earl has a 20% probability of remaining a Category 4 Hurricane when it reaches the Maritimes this weekend. (Hurricane Juan in 2003 was a Category 2 Hurricane).   North Carolina and Virginia have both declared a state of emergency in advance of the hurricane. A tropical storm warning has been issued for the coast of Long Island, N.Y. and a hurricane watch was issued for parts of Massachusetts. ...

The areas of Victoria Cross, Montague, Dover, Scotchfort and Lorne Valley lost power for about 10 minutes early this afternoon. Kim Griffin of Maritime Electric said the outage was neither caused by heat nor by the grid being overloaded. Instead, the company suspects something came in contact with transmission lines somewhere in the area. Inspectors are currently searching for the cause.  ...

Hurricane Earl's fury headed for East Coast The Maritimes remains in the path of Hurricane Earl, and could see its effects as early as Saturday morning. The latest forecast from the Canadian Hurricane Centre says hurricane Earl continues on its projected track and is likely to affect Atlantic Canada by this weekend. The centre says it's still too early to issue warnings or discuss potential effects in Atlantic Canada because the hurricane is still too far away. The centre says Earl is expected to continue its northwestward track before heading more towards the north. There continues to be a wide-range of predictions of where ...

A litany of topics were covered on Tuesday night as the five candidates for the Progressive Conservative Party of PEI took part in a town hall forum in Pooles Corner. The topics of discussion included economic and rural development issues, and the candidates, including Olive Crane, Peter Llewellyn, Jamie Ballem, Jamie Fox and Fred McCardle, were asked questions on various issues including tourism, the Wood Islands/Caribou ferry, the Ghiz government’s early years initiative, electricity prices, agriculture and much more. ...

It could be next year before children attending one of the 36 Early Year Centres across the province will be learning from a standardized curriculum, because the Department of Education hasn’t finished developing it. Early Year Centres, are part of the government's new early learning system initiative and they are required to follow a curriculum. Department of Education deputy minister Sandy MacDonald said, "It’s a play-based curriculum and we’re working on it right now. We slowed down a bit as staff was focusing on rolling out the Early Year Centre and kindergarten programs, while some staff who worked in the ...

Down to Earth Day Care in Bothwell was among two small daycares on PEI approved to be an Early Years Centre despite not being able to offer capacity for up to 50 youth. The daycare located in the Eastern Kings area and owned by Shelly Manning can accommodate 20. The other facility was the Kinderstart Early Learning Centre, in Bloomfield in West Prince. One of the criteria looked at by the Department of Education and Early Childhood Learning is that a facility wanting to be an Early Years Centre can take up to 50 youth. But Deputy Minister Sandy MacDonald said an ...

Montague Town Council stands divided on the fate of a procedural bylaw, currently under review by the Department of Finance and Municipal Affairs and the town, which the town passed without seeking legal opinion on whether it violated the Municipalities Act. The department can’t say whether the bylaw, which gives council power traditionally reserved for the mayor, is legal. "I’m behind it," Councillor Janice MacBeth said. "We wrote it, we worked really hard on it and we thought it was a legitimate document. We thought it worked well with council. We wanted to respect the fact that everyone on council had to ...

The final cost of a new roundabout in Montague will be $1.1 million rather than $600,000, as cited earlier by Transportation Minister Ron MacKinley. In July Mr MacKinley said the initial figure did not include land costs, the design hadn’t been completed and tenders weren't advertised. But this week Mr MacKinley said the tender for the construction is $975,000, and an additional $50,000 to $75,000 was spent on purchasing land around the intersection at the top of the Wood Islands Hill. Kings County Construction's tender was accepted and owner Harry Annear said work will start Tuesday., September 7. Mr MacKinley attributed ...

A leak in the new Montague Regional High School has caused less than $10,000 to some carpet and cabinetry in the music department, Director of Public Works Foster Millar said. The construction manager and a provincial engineer discovered the damage during an inspection August 5. They traced it back to a pinhole leak in some copper piping in a small room adjacent to the larger music room. Repairs began immediately and will be completed by the time the school opens. The province hasn’t received the final bill yet and the $10,000 figure is an estimate. All piping was pressure tested during construction and ...

Chair of the King County Memorial Hospital Capital Campaign Al Green, left, receives a significant donation from Alan Joseph, manager of Montague Vogue Optical, for the hospital’s new X-ray machine. Also pictured is Frank Dolan, a member of the campaign. Jonathan Charlton photo  ...