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Along with Annapolis attack, here's how many people were shot across U.S. yesterday

A closer look at the day's notable stories with The National's Jonathon Gatehouse: besides Annapolis newspaper attack there were dozens more gun victims across U.S. Thursday; attack on anti-terror task force in Mali kills six; record for English Channel crossing set by 12-year-old

Newsletter: A closer look at the day's most notable stories

Police officers secure the area after multiple people were shot at an office building housing The Capital Gazette newspaper in Annapolis, Md., on Thursday. (Jose Luis Magana/Associated Press)

Welcome to The National Today newsletter, which takes a closer look at what's happening around some of the day's most notable stories. Sign up here and it will be delivered directly to your inbox Monday to Friday.

TODAY:

  • While attention was on the Annapolis newspaper attack Thursday, there were dozens of other victims of gun violence across the U.S.
  • A coordinated bombing of the headquarters of an African anti-terror task force in Mali has left at least six dead
  • Record for English Channel crossing set by 12-year-old
  • Missed The National last night? Watch it here


U.S. gun violence

Five people were killed, and two wounded, when a gunman burst into the offices of the Capital Gazette newspaper in Annapolis, Md., yesterday.

The dead — four journalists and a sales assistant — and wounded were not the only victims of gun violence in America on Thursday.

By this tracker's count, there were at least 64 other shootings across the United States yesterday, resulting in 22 deaths and 37 injuries.

A man holds a copy of The Capital Gazette near the scene of a shooting at the newspaper's office on Friday in Annapolis, Md. A man armed with smoke grenades and a shotgun attacked journalists in the building Thursday. (Patrick Semansky/Associated Press)
And June 28 was a relatively slow day for gunplay.

On Wednesday, there were at least 93 gun incidents in the U.S., causing 30 more deaths and 83 woundings.

To date in 2018, there have been almost 28,500 shootings or attempted shootings in the U.S. More than 7,000 people have been killed, and just short of 13,500 have been injured.

Over the past four years, the U.S. has averaged more than 56,500 shootings annually, causing 14,200 deaths and almost 28,000 injuries.

It appears that gun violence is increasing in the United States — or people are doing a better job of keeping track of it.

Four-year-old Demi Gonzalez of New York stands among thousands of empty shoes owned by or representing deceased victims of gun-related violence in the United States, during a May 2 protest near the headquarters of the Smith & Wesson gun company in Springfield. Her cousin Christopher Matthews was accidentally shot to death by a 12-year-old friend. (DRIEGELAB)
In 2014, there were 12,556 deaths. In 2017, 15,631 people were shot and killed.

So far 2018, is running closer to the four-year average, on pace for:

  • 56,800 shootings
  • 14,150 deaths
  • 26,894 gun injuries

The number of mass shootings — defined as four or more shot and/or killed — seems to be declining, with 154 recorded through almost half the year, on pace for somewhere in the low 300s. (Although July and August are traditionally busy months for gun violence.) In 2017, there were 735 mass shootings, up from 671 in 2016, and 335 in 2015.

In the past week, the U.S. has experienced 15 mass shootings, including yesterday's Maryland attack. Nine people have been killed and 58 more wounded.

Gun violence happens in big cities, like Chicago — where 13 people shot on Wednesday and Thursday alone — and in places you might consider relatively safe. There were two mass shootings at birthday parties in the early hours on Sunday — one in Florida, the other in North Carolina.

Protestors march through the streets at the 'End of School Year Peace March and Rally' in Chicago on June 15 to kick off a national gun-reform tour by students from Parkland, Fla., site of one of the worst U.S. school shootings. (Jim Young/AFP/Getty Images)
Last weekend in Gary, Ind., there were four separate shootings, resulting in one death and 16 injuries.

"These senseless and egregious acts must stop," Richard Allen, the local police chief, told reporters. "Not only does it cause an emotional drain on the spirit of our city, but it casts a shadow on the progress we have made."

Last year, Gary — a city of 76,000 — had 46 murders and 118 gunshot wound victims. It has the third-highest murder rate of all American municipalities.


Mali attack

A coordinated attack on the headquarters of an African anti-terror task force in Mali has left at least six soldiers dead and wounded many more.

According to Agence France Presse, a suicide car bomber tried to breach the perimeter of the main base of the G5 Sahel in the city of Sevare, about 600 kilometres northeast of Bamako, the capital. There were reports of a large explosion and gunfire that persisted for more than an hour afterwards. Reuters says that several rockets were also fired during the attack.

A picture taken in Sevare in central Mali shows debris scattered in front of the headquarters of the anti-terror task force, the G5 Sahel, after an attack by a suicide bomber on Friday. Six people were killed and 'many' injured, according to authorities. (AFP/Getty Images)
Both news agencies report that several wounded were taken to hospital and that bodies were scattered around the compound following the fighting.

The G5 Sahel, which brings together forces from Mali, Chad, Mauritania, Niger and Burkina Faso to combat Islamic radicals in the region, was formed last year with French support. There has been slow progress towards its stated goal of having 5,000 pairs of boots on the ground in the West African nation.

G5 leaders are scheduled to meet with French President Emmanuel Macron in the Mauritanian capital of Nouakchott on Monday to discuss a way forward.

The base in Sevare is located some 560 kilometres southwest of Gao, where Canada's peacekeeping contingent in Mali will be based.

Canadian troops arrive at a UN base in Gao, Mali, on Monday. (Sean Kilpatrick/Canadian Press)
An advance group of a dozen Canadian soldiers touched down at a highly fortified air base used by UN troops last Sunday. Eventually there will be 250 Canadians in place for the year-long mission, which will see eight Canadian helicopters deployed to help with troop transport and medical evacuations.

There are approximately 13,000 foreign troops currently trying to impose peace in the violence-wracked country under the auspices of the UN Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA). Fifty-seven countries have contributed troops or support staff.

The UN says that 170 peacekeepers have been killed in Mali since 2013, and it has ranked as the world body's deadliest mission for four straight years.


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Epic crossings

It took Tom Goron 14 hours and 20 minutes to sail across the English Channel this week — or if you prefer, one hour and 11 minutes for each year he's been alive.

The 12-year-old from Aucaleuc, France, now holds the record for the fastest ever Channel crossing in an Optimist class dinghy, a simple 2.3-metre-long boat designed for children, having shaved 36 minutes off the time clocked by a 15-year-old French girl in 2016.

He began the 96 kilometre trip on the Isle of Wight at 7 a.m., and sailed into the harbour at Cherbourg, as the sun was beginning to dip, holding aloft a flare in celebration.

French skipper Tom Goron, 12, steers his optimist boat off the coast of Cherbourg-Octeville, northwestern France, on Wednesday during his record-breaking crossing of the English Channel. (Charly Triballeau/AFP/Getty Images)
"It was hard," Goron told reporters. "There was a bit of wind and I was seasick."

In fact, it later emerged that he had thrown up 10 times during the crossing, and had wanted to give up five hours in. But his father, Nicolas, who was travelling alongside in a rescue boat, persuaded him to carry on.

Goron started sailing when he was just two years old. He says that in a decade or so, he hopes to follow in the footsteps of François Gabart, a Frenchman who set an around-the-world solo sailing record in December.

"He's stubborn, ambitious, persistent and … you have to follow him," said Goron's mother, Sophie.

Another water crossing record was set Wednesday, when an American woman paddle-boarded the 160-kilometre strait from Cuba to the Florida Keys in just under 28 hours.

Victoria Burgess, a 34-year-old fire inspector from Pompano Beach, Fla., said she wanted to make the crossing to inspire girls and young women to follow their "wildest ideas, no matter what obstacles get in the way."

Victoria Burgess, 34, paddles the last few hundred feet to Key West, Fla., from Cuba on Wednesday. (Carol Tedesco/Associated Press)
She dedicated the trip to her late "best friend" Mufasa, a 17-year-old Yorkie dog.

You also may have missed the news about Szymon Kuczynski, a Polish mariner, who set a new record for the smallest boat to sail around the world single-handed and non-stop. The 37-year-old arrived back at Plymouth Harbour on England's southwest coast on May 17 aboard his 6.35-metre Atlantic Puffin, 270 days after his departure.

Meanwhile, Benoit Lecomte, a Frenchman who is attempting to swim 8,800 kilometres across the Pacific from Chōshi, Japan, to San Francisco, is now more than three weeks into what he hoped would be a six-month crossing.

French marathon swimmer Benoit Lecomte leaves Choshi, Japan, on June 5 at the start of his attempt to swim across the Pacific Ocean to San Francisco. (Martin Bureau/AFP/Getty Images)
As of yesterday, he had travelled just over 300 kilometres, well behind his desired 48-kilometre-per-day pace.

At his current rate, it will take him 657 more days to reach the shores of California, in mid-April, 2020.


Quote of the moment

"Italy is not alone anymore."

- Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte  hails a new European Union deal on migration that will strengthen borders and spread the responsibility for asylum seekers who are rescued at sea.

Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte leaves a European Union leaders summit in Brussels, Belgium, on Friday. (Eric Vidal/Reuters)

What The National is reading

  • Libya says 100 migrants bound for Europe missing after boat capsizes (CBC)
  • Obama: 'You are right to be concerned' (Politico)
  • UN talks help stall Saudi-led assault on strategic Yemen port (Guardian)
  • Carrie Grace wins back-pay as BBC apologizes for unequal salary (Telegraph)
  • Space X rocket blasts off with new Canadarm2 hand aboard (CBC)
  • Wisconsin man injured after upskirting shoe camera explodes (BBC)
  • New experiment shows that crows can recreate tools from memory (Gizmodo)
  • Abalonia: the island nation that never was (Atlas Obscura)

Today in history

June 29, 1969: Dancing Pierre Trudeau

The hosts of CBC TV's The Way It Is dissect the newish prime minister's appearances on the show, singling out a little dance — and pratfall — from an on-set stairway. All captured by the cameras of course. A "look at me" moment from the time of Trudeaumania, before the PM figured out that "just watch me" played even better with voters.  

Dancing Pierre Trudeau

55 years ago
Duration 0:51
Trudeau trips while hamming it up on the CBC's The Way It Is.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jonathon Gatehouse

Investigative Journalist

Jonathon Gatehouse has covered news and politics at home and abroad, reporting from dozens of countries. He has also written extensively about sports, covering seven Olympic Games and authoring a best-selling book on the business of pro-hockey. He works for CBC's national investigative unit in Toronto.