destroyed

May 31 (UPI) — Fifty-five people were killed, including six children, in an accidental detonation of mining explosives in a rebel-held area of Myanmar, the armed group said Sunday.

The Palaung Self Liberation Front/Ta’ang National Liberation Army, also known as the PSLF/TNLA, said in a statement that many others were also hurt in the blast, which happened Sunday afternoon local time in northern Shan State.

Rescuers told the Shwe Phee Myay News Agency the entire village of Kaung Tat in Namkham Township had been virtually destroyed and that “dozens” had been injured in the disaster.

Local officials have sent out an urgent call for blood donations as emergency workers tried to free victims trapped in rubble.

The PSLF/TNLA confirmed that many homes in the village were damaged when soft gunpowder stored for mining operations accidentally exploded at around 12:30 p.m.

The fatalities included 25 females and 30 males, they said, adding that the cause of the explosion will be investigated in detail.

Authorities, they said, “will take action in accordance with the law.”

The Ta’ang National Liberation Army is one of the main ethnic rebel groups in Myanmar fighting for independence from the central government, which along with its ally the Palaung Self Liberation Front comprise a front of resistance to the country’s military government.

One coastal village was destroyed overnight.

A Devon fishing community was obliterated by a ferocious storm, back in 1917. By daybreak, only a single dwelling remained intact, forcing the town’s inhabitants to seek refuge in nearby settlements.

Hallsands, situated between Beesands to the north and Start Point to the south, boasts a heritage dating back to the 1600s. By 1891, the settlement had fostered a close-knit community of just 159 people.

Yet merely 26 years later, these residents would face catastrophe when all but one would see their homes claimed by the sea.

Luckily, nobody was injured, and while the inhabitants lost their dwellings, they all made it through the night. But their ordeal didn’t end there — it would take another seven years before they secured compensation for what they’d lost.

While it was a deadly combination of howling gales and surging tides that razed the village in a single night, this wasn’t the full picture — Hallsands had fallen prey to Government blunder.

During the 1890s, the UK Government determined that the naval dockyard at Keyham, near Plymouth, required expansion. To source the concrete needed for this project, the stretch between Hallsands and Beesands was dredged.

Despite fierce objections from Hallsands locals that this would endanger their community, the dredging pressed on until 1902. By 1900, the beach had begun to drop noticeably, and that autumn a storm swept away part of the sea wall.

This sparked fresh outcry from local residents — and this time, the Government started to take notice.

In September 1901, roughly a year after the town’s sea wall was lost, a Board of Trade inspector determined that future severe storms posed a real threat of significant damage and advised that dredging should cease.

Once dredging was halted, beach levels managed to recover to some extent, though storms kept battering the village and surrounding area.

Catastrophe then hit in 1917, when a storm caused the village to tumble into the sea, leaving just one house standing intact.

That house belonged to Elizabeth Prettyjohn, who steadfastly refused to abandon the village and lived there with her chickens until her death in 1964. The property remains to this day.

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander apparently isn’t amused by a new board game that pokes fun at the Oklahoma City Thunder star’s reputation for garnering foul calls at the hint of contact by an opposing player.

Last week, a lawyer representing the two-time reigning NBA MVP sent a cease-and-desist letter to sports prediction market and fantasy sports company Underdog that includes a demand for the destruction of all copies of the cheeky and extremely limited-edition game Unethical Hoops.

Done in the style of the children’s classic Operation, Unethical Hoops requires players to use tweezers to pull objects from tiny holes, with the slightest touch of a metal border setting off a buzzer indicating failure.

Instead of pretending to be doctors attempting to remove body parts from a patient, however, Unethical Hoops players act as members of an opposing basketball team trying to take the ball from a cartoon character who very much resembles Gilgeous-Alexander.

In this game, the buzzer represents the whistle of a foul-calling referee.

“Shai has made hoops all about foul baiting and now you’re stuck guarding him in Underdog’s new board game,” a description reads on the game’s website. “Don’t get baited. Steal the ball without getting whistled.”

In a letter dated May 22, attorney Eric Fishman of ArentFox Schiff LLP demanded that Underdog “immediately and permanently cease and desist from any and all use of Mr. Gilgeous-Alexander’s NIL in any and all media, including but not limited to your website (including the Unethical Hoops Website)… and any physical goods including but not limited to the board game advertised on the Unethical Hoops Website.”

The notice also calls for Underdog to “immediately destroy all physical goods or advertisements that use Mr. Gilgeous-Alexander’s NIL, including but not limited to the board game advertised on the Unethical Hoops Website,” as well as a promise never to use the star player’s name, image or likeness without his permission.

Fishman did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Times.

According to the Unethical Hoops website, which remains active more than a week after the date on the cease-and-desist order, only 100 copies of the game were made, to be given away to Underdog users. The giveaway ended as scheduled on Friday.

Underdog declined to comment on the matter other than to point out that the company has pulled comical stunts at the expense of members of the sports world.

“We’ve poked fun at Knicks and Lakers fans, the Red Sox owners, the Mets and more,” a spokesperson said via email. “We like to have some fun with whatever is in the sports fan zeitgeist.”

Gilgeous-Alexander is a four-time All-Star who led the league in scoring last season (2,484 points) and was second in scoring this season (2,117). He led the Thunder to their first NBA title last year and has them back in the Western Conference finals this year (the decisive Game 7 against the San Antonio Spurs is Saturday in Oklahoma City).

While one of the NBA’s biggest stars, Gilgeous-Alexander is often criticized for the number of favorable foul calls he receives — he has ranked second or third in the league for number of free throw attempts per game in each of the last four seasons and is currently second among all players in the 2026 playoffs with 9.8 a game — and the lengths he appears to go to in order to receive them.

After Game 2 against the Spurs, one NBA fan account on X wrote, “Shai flopped on every single shot attempt” and posted a video that showed seven such examples (Gilgeous-Alexander actually attempted 24 shots that night). The post has been viewed 22.7 million times.

Earlier this week, prior to Game 6 of the conference finals, another fan account on X posted a video “ranking all 44 times SGA fell on the floor while shooting during the 2026 playoffs from least to most egregious.” That post has been viewed 1.3 million times.

As the cartoon likeness of Gilgeous-Alexander states in the Unethical Hoops ad, “so much as breathe on me, I’m getting the call.”

The real-life SGA was asked during a TV interview after Game 3 in San Antonio about the “flopper!” chants that rained down on him at Frost Bank Center.

“It’s part of the game,” he said. “It’s nothing. I’ve been dealing with it for a long time. I don’t really hear it. I’m focused on what’s going on on the court.”

TURN back the clock 12 months, and Wynne Evans’ life was falling apart.

Being axed by the BBC from his radio show last May appeared to be the final nail in the Welsh tenor’s career coffin after he was sacked from the Strictly Live Tour over accusations of an inappropriate sexual comment.

Devastated, Wynne, 54, told this newspaper of his anguish and despair at being made a “scapegoat” for yet another BBC scandal – confirming what was pushed as a “vile sexual remark” was actually a joke amongst his one-time friend Jamie Borthwick.

The apology issued at the time for the comment was, Wynne explained, written by the BBC and ultimately ended up being the metaphorical sword he would die on.

Friends furiously rushed to defend Wynne to The Sun, and today still pour scorn on soap actor Jamie for failing to defend Wynne when he knew the truth behind the comment.

Jamie, 31, was later sacked by EastEnders four months after Wynne was given the boot.

“It felt like karma,” one friend tells The Sun.

“Wynne was hung out to dry, and Jamie, who was at the centre of it all, said absolutely nothing. They both ended up losing everything.”

Suicidal, Wynne was kept afloat by his long-time fiancée, Liz Cooke, his two grown-up daughters, and a legion of friends – including Gavin And Stacey star Joanna Page and Strictly’s Aljaz Škorjanec and Janette Manrara – who kept tabs on him at his home in Carmarthen.

Broken but not beaten, friends explain Wynne has quietly rebuilt his life – and is slowly carving out a life away from the constrictions of his old BBC paymasters.

His property business, Wildvine Properties, friends say, is starting to take off – allowing Wynne to return to what he loves: performing.

“Wynne is made for radio, and his daily show, broadcast from a studio he built in his home, is doing really well.

“He started working on Radio Dragon last month, too, and his Sunday morning show has been really successful.

“His devoted following, who loved his BBC Radio Wales show, have all followed him there, and the audience research has shown Wynne is beyond loved.

“Last month, he was invited to sing at Wrexham FC too, and the reception was so warm, it was a massive boost for him.

“Quietly, Wynne has built up a property business, which includes a three-bed house in Llansteffan, which is hugely popular on Airbnb.

Wynne could have allowed the BBC to cancel him, but he refused to be cowed.

Insider

“It’s given him a quiet income so he can focus on rebuilding and moving on with his life.

“Wynne was virtually destroyed by the BBC and hung out to dry. But he is proof that once the chips are down, you can turn things around.”

In a heart-wrenching interview with this newspaper in May last year, Wynne admitted that his jokes on Strictly, made between people he believed at the time were friends, were clumsy.

But there is no question that his actions were nothing more than ill-judged.

Wynne said: I realise now you cannot make jokes like that in the workplace – it’s deeply unprofessional.

“I’d be happy to go on any language and behavioural course that the BBC wants to send me on. I’d be thrilled to go on a course that could save me from situations like this.

“Society’s changing so quickly, and I’d be the first to say perhaps I’ve got it wrong on occasion. Unfortunately, I wasn’t offered a course like that.

“All I want now is to focus on performing and get back to my radio show – I can’t quite believe I’ve ended up here, and I just hope everyone can read this and know I’m not a bad guy.”

‘Wynne is a good man’

As he started to move forward with his life, friends explained that the support from his loyal fans, affectionately known as “Wynners”, is the people Wynne feels most grateful for.

“Wynne is a good man who has been through hell,” a pal says.

“The fans who have always supported him stood by him, and that means the world to him.”

Wynne’s personal company finances certainly show things are not as dark as they were this time last year.

The latest report for the firm shows Wynne is sitting on reserves of just over £670,000.

He has taken his time and slowly rebuilt his life. He was totally broken this time last year.His whole world had imploded, and at times he felt like he had nothing to live for.

Insider

And pals explain Wynne is keen to continue carving out a new position for himself in the public domain – starting next with a series of four live shows.

The performances are billed as a mix of stand-up comedy and opera, and Wynne is looking forward to taking another step back into the limelight.

“Wynne could have allowed the BBC to cancel him, but he refused to be cowed,” a friend explains.

“He has taken his time and slowly rebuilt his life. He was totally broken this time last year.

“His whole world had imploded, and at times he felt like he had nothing to live for.

“Wynne took baby steps and got himself back on his feet. Now things are really moving in a positive direction, and the future is looking bright again.

“What happened last year is something that Wynne will never be able to forget, and really, he is still processing that.

“But he wants to show people that no matter how bad things get, no matter how many times your name is dragged through the mud, no matter how many people you thought were friends turn on you, with the love of your family and your friends, you can make it through.

“Wynne’s story is one of salvation, and he will be telling it with brutal honesty and humour.”

US band The Strokes used their Coachella set to showcase the US-Israeli destruction of universities in Gaza and Iran, including Gaza’s al-Israa University.