WestCentral

From major provincial updates to local courtroom news, readers flocked to a wide range of stories this week on West Central Online. Here are the top five most-read articles, from construction progress in Saskatoon to the long-awaited resolution of tensions in Richmound, and more.

As summer in the southwest speeds towards autumn, residents and visitors alike can continue enjoying and exploring nature at Saskatchewan Parks.

Saskatchewan's numerous provincial parks, including Cypress Hills, the Saskatchewan Landing, and Buffalo Pound, are still offering a plethora of outdoor and family-friendly adventures. 

Royce Pettyjohn, parks manager for Cypress Hills Interprovincial Park, shared that Meadows, Deer Hollow, and Rainbow are the three campgrounds currently open in Cypress Hills.

The University of Saskatchewan piggybacked off a government release earlier this week with their own statement on the new training program aimed at expanding the uptake of students in the physcian assistant profession.

A well-known food truck that’s become a staple at events across west-central Saskatchewan has been reported stolen.

The owners of SpuDogs said in a Facebook post that their food truck and trailer were taken from North Battleford sometime overnight Saturday and into the early morning hours of Sunday, Sept. 14.

The Saskatchewan RCMP Major Crimes Unit is investigating what it deems a "suspicious death" after a woman was fatally shot while riding as a passenger in an SUV just outside of Weyburn Friday night. The incident is currently believed to be random in nature.

Shortly after 8 p.m. on Friday, two adult women, who were friends, were traveling together in a black Ford Explorer on Highway 39 near the grain terminals on the northwest edge of town, heading towards Weyburn. They were the only occupants of the vehicle when, according to police, a large crack was heard.

Temporary housing units will be available this fall for residents displaced from Denare Beach, as municipal leaders and provincial officials outline plans to support the community through the winter months.

The federal government is investing $28.7 million to equip Canadian workers with skills for a rapidly evolving clean energy sector and to expand artificial intelligence (AI) research capacity.

Canadian scientists have contributed to exciting new findings from NASA’s Perseverance rover that may point to evidence of past life on Mars.

Researchers from the University of Winnipeg, University of Alberta, and Brock University analyzed rock samples collected from the Bright Angel formation, located in an area believed to be an ancient river channel that fed Jezero Crater billions of years ago. Their study, published in Nature, suggests the presence of a possible “biosignature,” a substance, feature, or pattern that could indicate past or present life.

The early-1960s revelation that British spy Kim Philby had worked for Moscow alarmed Canadian intelligence officials who feared that he had betrayed confidences gleaned from Soviet defector Igor Gouzenko, once-secret archival records show.

Harold Adrian Russell "Kim" Philby was recruited by Russian intelligence in the 1930s. He joined Britain's Secret Intelligence Service, known as MI-6, during the Second World War, rising through the ranks to become a senior liaison officer in Washington from 1949 to 1951.

Former federal environment minister Catherine McKenna says the Justin Trudeau government's efforts to explain the consumer carbon price to Canadians were "half-hearted" — and just getting a meeting with the prime minister to discuss it "seemed impossible."

McKenna offers those behind-the-scenes details in her new autobiography, Run Like A Girl, which is being launched next week.