Leading up to the New Year, our news editors dig through all of the headlines of 2015 and try to determine which were the most important of the year.
Creating these lists of past headlines for our Year in Review package can be challenging. There are a lot of factors that help determine how to rank the importance of a news story, but the process is incredibly subjective.
That’s why when we finish our annual Year in Review, we like to present one final list that takes the editors’ opinions out of the equation.
Using only our readership metrics, we’ve again completed our list of most read stories for 2015. So here are the top 10 stories of 2015 as selected by you:
10. Crashing into the Gardens
Car crashes happen on a regular basis. When a car crashes into the wall of Fort William Gardens, and narrowly misses the painted curling ring, it tends to get a bit more attention.
9. Bus driver texts and drives?
Any news item we publish involving texting and driving, or the enforcement of distracted driving, gets a lot of attention. The distracted driving issue appears to be one that gets on reader’s nerves.
But when the accused texter is a bus driver and is seemingly caught on camera chatting away while driving, then people pay extra attention
8. Wedding dress trashed
It wasn’t enough that a bride-to-be had her vehicle stolen. The thieves stooped to another level of low when they trashed the wedding dress that was being kept in the stolen vehicle overnight.
7. Gas tax a no go
The fight for funding for a proposed event centre featured a series of well-read headlines. One of the most read of those news stories, by proponents and opponents of the project alike, came after city officials learned their plans to use gas tax funding would not be accepted by the federal government.
The city had hoped it could fund an event centre with $23 million in allocated gas tax funds over the next 10 years.
6. Yik-Yakking threats
Lakehead University became a tense place on this November day after a person allegedly made threats against the institution in a social media post. An 18-year-old has since been charged with mischief.
5. Great West Fire
If you were anywhere near the waterfront on June 17, than you saw this fire. The spectacular waterfront fire at the former Great West Timber property lit up the skies along Thunder Bay’s north side. There was little firefighters could do after the massive blaze broke out in a vacant sawmill on the Buchanan-owned former Great West Timber property on Water Street.
4. Project Dolphin returns
Four years after an undercover joint police operation codenamed Project Dolphin seized a multi-million-dollar drug cache and arrested seven people, the Thunder Bay Police Service announced six new arrests near the end of 2015.
Police announced that six men faced charges of possession, trafficking, importation and conspiracy of controlled substances for the benefit of a criminal organization related to 15 local warrants carried out on June 16, 2011, which seized $2.1-million cocaine and marijuana as well as $500,000 in cash.
The arrests were significant, which made it no surprise that it captured people’s attention. However, tbnewswatch.com staff is fairly confident the codename itself helped it become a people’s choice headline.
3. Police brutality? Not exactly.
U.S. media seemed to have video almost daily showing controversial incidents between police and civilians. Then one man in Thunder Bay claimed he had a video showing local police brutality.
But what appeared to the videographer as police brutality, seemed more like a typical arrest. Thunder Bay Police Service officials quickly backed the officer involved and potential controversy was dealt with before it even existed.
2. Prison riot destroys jail’s top floor, correctional officer confirms
It was a frightening night at the Thunder Bay District Jail when a prison riot led to a hostage taking and standoff with police. It is believed that 70 inmates took control of the protective custody floor and demanded prescription drugs and cigarettes. The entire ordeal took 12 hours.
1. Snowbrush bandit
This comes as little surprise. When a convenience store robber used a snowbrush to threaten the clerk, the pure bizarreness of the incident had people’s attention locally. But this headline really took off when reddit got its hands on it. The idea of someone in Canada robbing a convenience store with a snowbrush gave the robbery a made in Canada feel that wasn’t lost on the Internet.
