What would happen to the dynamic in a school if the students locked away their mobile phones for the day? A lot, it turns out and it's all positive.

The Mini Minor car was a symbol of the Swinging Sixties and now it is helping one veteran dairy farmer keep a perspective on the rigours of family life and work.

Residents at a retirement village in New South Wales say life is becoming more like science fiction as an automated vehicle changes the way they stay connected.

A pharmaceutical giant owned by the Sackler family in the United States is using flaws in regulation to push its latest product deep into regional Australia.

MORNING BRIEFING: Police investigate what is believed to be a human bone discovered by passers-by at a Port Macquarie beach, while a Sydney northern beach road is closed after a pedestrian was killed by a car overnight.

A failure to look upward when parking by the river at a favourite roost for local pelicans has left a Port Macquarie man red-faced and his car disgraced.

There are calls for better police training in mental health after a man was shot dead following a nine-hour stand-off at his home on the NSW Mid North coast.

A wooden cross marked "2014" the same year that William Tyrrell went missing was among several false leads found during a large police search for the toddler around Kendall on the NSW mid-north coast, an inquest hears.

Early morning walkers in Port Macquarie received a surprise when a koala came walking down the middle of a popular breakwall path. The sighting has sparked renewed concerns about habitat loss and declining koala numbers.

A woman whose house burnt down in bushfires affecting the NSW North Coast said that she and her husband now plan on leaving the bush due to the hazard.

Ross Miller has no intention of putting the rod into the rack. Instead, he is building another prawn trawler as a legacy to his son.

Police recapture prisoner Matthew Furner, who escaped from custody at Port Macquarie Base Hospital on the NSW Mid North Coast and fled into nearby bushland.

Today the Macleay Valley is suffering unprecedented drought, but 70 years ago it was inundated with "mighty waves as high as telegraph poles" that flooded the region and left 2,000 people homeless.

A Kendall resident says he is certain he saw William Tyrrell being driven away by a blonde woman in a car at high speed moments after the toddler vanished from the New South Wales mid-north coast almost five years ago.

MORNING BRIEFING: NSW Sports Minister John Sidoti says claims he misused his position in a conflict of interest are 'gross misrepresentations', while Deputy Premier John Barilaro urges governments to take climate change seriously.

Young, adventurous and enterprising couple Jess Davidson and Andy Hoffman quit their jobs to follow a dream more than a year ago.

A search is underway for a small plane that has gone missing while flying two people from Murwillumbah to Taree in northern New South Wales, after it failed to arrive at its destination.

Police are appealing for witnesses after a car hit two women in an "horrific" incident in Nambucca Heads on Saturday night, with the mother of one of the women later charged with manslaughter.

MORNING BRIEFING: A woman has been charged with murder after a man was found with multiple stab wounds in a Sydney apartment complex, while easing weather conditions have helped firefighters in Tenterfield gain the upper hand on a bushfire.

750-year-old Indigenous bones, discovered under a house on the New South Wales mid-north coast, are returned to the place where they were found.

The Port Macquarie koala hospital fears more than 350 koalas may have died in a bushfire south of the town, with staff frustrated they cannot yet access the site.

Maggots were found in the mouth of a patient with advanced dementia by visiting family members, the Royal Commission into Aged Care sitting in WA has been told.

At least 80 people were killed in a Japanese attack on Broome in 1942, and now the search is on for the wrecks of the flying boats where they died.

The 6.6 magnitude earthquake that rattled Broome was 100 times more powerful than the one which claimed 13 lives in Newcastle in 1989 but there were no deaths and very little damage.

The area off the north coast of Western Australia has been hit by more than 30 aftershocks following a magnitude 6.6 earthquake that struck off Broome and was felt as far away as Perth.

There are calls for clearer emergency information after residents fled their homes during the Kimberley earthquake.

They collect vital climate information, but weather balloons are also a daily contributor to plastic pollution levels it's a dilemma the Bureau of Meteorology is struggling to solve.

In the dusty station country of northern Western Australia, a unique competition is highlighting the importance of animal welfare to cattle producers and attracting international attention.

Indigenous ranger teams have traditionally been dominated by men, but a growing female workforce in the Kimberley is being seen as a vital resource.

Vance Mazur will serve at least 15 years behind bars for fatally stabbing a 35-year-old Broome man outside a bottle shop in 2017 while suffering from violent delusions.