Bird flu was diagnosed in chickens on a poultry farm in Sint Philipsland, which forms part of the Zeeland municipality of Tholen. The company's approximately 42 thousand laying hens were culled, NOS reports.
The authorities believe that this diagnosis involves a mild variant of the H5 virus. But as a mild variant can mutate into a highly contagious and deadly variant, European rules require the culling of affected animals.
From this week the Dutch Ministry of Public Health is distributing iodine tablets in provinces located near nuclear plants. The pills are intended to protect against a certain type of radiation should there be a nuclear disaster. According to the Ministry, around 3 million people in large parts of the regions of Oost-Nederland, Noord-Nederland, Noord-Brabant, Zuid-Holland, Zeeland and Limburg will receive a packet of pills in the mail by the end of next week, the Volkskrant reports.
The lost Zeeland city of Reimerswaal was officially recognized as a national monument by the National Office for Cultural Heritage. It is the only sunken Dutch city that has national monument status, NU.nl reports
Reimerswaal disappeared underwater in the 17th century. Before that it was the third largest city in Zeeland, after Middelburg and Zierikzee. Around 6 thousand people lived in Reimerswaal and it had one of the largest ports in the region.
An oil tanker is stranded on the Westerschelde near Bath, Zeeland after it crashed with a bulk carrier around 6:30 a.m. on Wednesday morning. There is no danger to the environment, according to local safety office Veiligheidsregio Zeeland, AD reports.
The Netherlands' coastal provinces will face the season's first official autumn storm on Wednesday, according to meteorological institute KNMI. The KNMI warns of wind gusts on the coast and the IJsselmeer of up to 90 kilometers per hour. Weerplaza forecasts winds of up to 120 kilometers per hour on the Wadden.
Residents of the province of Zeeland spent the least money on vacationing abroad last year, according to data platform Localfocus based on figures from Statistics Netherlands. The average expenditure per Zeeland resident was 697 euros per resident. Noord-Holland residents spent the most money, 902 euros per holiday, NU.nl reports.
Destinations also differed between the two provinces. Zeeland residents preferred to go to Spain. While Noord-Holland residents opted for more expensive holiday countries like Germany and France.
Two loud bangs caused some panic in Zeeland around 10:15 p.m. on Monday night. According to the police, a large number of people called emergency line 112. The bangs were caused by two F-16 fighter jets breaking the sound barrier on their way to intercept a passenger plane that did not contact air traffic control.
Another cyclist died after being hit by a car in the Zeeland town of Hulst on Monday evening. This is the second cyclist killed in a road accident in Hulst this week.
Monday's accident happened on Oud Ferdinandusdijk. The diver of the car was arrested. So far no information was released about the identity of the victim of the motorist.
The police in Hulst, Zeeland are looking for a driver involved in a hit-and-run accident on Sunday morning in which a 64-year-old cyclist from Belgium was killed. The Belgian man's family was informed.
The accident happened around 10:45 a.m on Zandstraat in Hulst. The car involved was a gray Opel Vectra with Dutch license plates. A broken mirror was left behind at the scene of the accident.
The police call on the driver of the car to come forward. Witnesses, or anyone who spotted a grey Opel Vectra with a missing side mirror, are also asked to contact the police.
A 27-year-old volleyball coach from Berlicum was taken back into custody on he suspicion that he secretly filmed young players while they were nude, AD reports.
The coach was arrested late in May, and released from custody two weeks later. The Public Prosecutor filed an appeal against the release, and the court in Den Bosch ruled on Friday that the man must be taken back into custody.
The fire department issued a code red warning for forest fires in Noord-Brabant and Zeeland due to the hot and dry weather conditions expected in the provinces on Wednesday and Thursday. Meteorological institute KNMI also issued a code yellow heat warning for most of the Netherlands.
All Dutch provinces except Groningen saw economic growth last year, according to figures Statistics Netherlands released on Tuesday. Of the four large Dutch cities, Amsterdam saw the biggest growth at 3 percent, The Hague the lowest at 2.2 percent. Rotterdam had the highest unemployment rate in the Netherlands last year at 11.3 percent, far above the national unemployment rate of around 6 percent.
Packets of what is believed to be drugs were found washed up at various locations along the coast of Zeeland and around Eemshaven in Groningen on Sunday. Whether there is a connection between the packets is being investigated, ANP reports.
The police called on citizens to report any washed up packets to emergency line 112.
Authorities positively identified two shooting victims as a 43-year-old man and his 39-year-old wife, police said on Monday. The victims were found shot to death in a grassy area at the edge of Dishoek, Zeeland last week.
Bullets whizzed through a Roosendaal neighborhood Sunday night in what police allege to be a targeted shooting of a home on the Diepenberg in the Noord-Brabant city. Several shots were fired at the home, bursting windows before the suspects escaped just after 11 p.m. on Easter.
There were no injuries in the incident despite at least one resident being home at the time of the shooting, police told Omroep Brabant.
Police have not yet identified a motive in the shooting.
A couple found killed in Dishoek, Zeeland yesterday were a 43-year-old man and 39-year-old woman living in Middelburg about nine kilometers away, police stated on Friday. Neighbors living on the Tamariskenlaan in Middelburg believe the victims are Serbian parents of five children, noting that their turbulent marriage frequently required police intervention, according to the AD.
The bodies of a man and a woman were found in the Zeeland village of Dishoek, near Vlissingen on Thursday morning. According to the police, they were murdered, NOS reports.
Emergency services were at the scene at around 9:30 a.m. According to BN de Stem, a passerby noticed a dark blue Mercedes in some bushes on Verlengde Dishoekseweg and called the police. Responding officers found the bodies and closed down the area, according to the newspaper.
It is unclear whether the bodies were found inside the car.
Three Zeeland girls were arrested for distributing nude photos of high school students from different places in the province on social media, the police announced in a statement on Thursday.
The girls posted nude photos and videos, but also Photoshopped images in which they pasted the heads of fellow students on disfigured bodies. They did so using an Instagram account, which the police removed.
The police made a gigantic drug bust when they searched a truck in the Zeeland town of Rilland on Thursday night. According to the police, the raw materials they found in the truck can be used to make 1 billion ecstasy pills, ANP reports.
Inside the truck the police found hundreds of bottles of hydrogen gas, 15 thousand kilos of caustic soda (drain cleaner) and 3 thousand liters of excipients. The trade value of the raw materials amounts to hundreds of thousands of euros, according to the Zeeland police on Twitter.
More than half of the 400 chemical- and other companies with a large risk factor in the Netherlands violated safety rules over the past two decades, the Volkskrant reports based on a survey of inspection reports. Over a fifth of the cases involved a medium to serious violation, according to the newspaper.
For the first time ever a list of endangered habitats in Europe was released, compiled by some 300 experts from over 30 countries working for three years on behalf of the European Commission. Across the EU there are 28 habitats that are considered "endangered" or "critically endangered". Fourteen of these habitats can be found in the Netherlands, Trouw reports.
In the Netherlands, endangered habitats include tidal rivers such as the Westerschelde and Eems, reed marshes in Noord-Holland and Zeeland, bogs like in Peel in Brabant among others, and sand banks such as the Veluwe.
Shell is teaming up with energy company Eneco and offshore company Van Oord to build a massive wind farm off the shore of Borssele in Zeeland .The wind farm will consist of about 100 windmills and will generate enough energy to supply a million households, AD reports.
The Netherlands had its first autumn storm of the season on Sunday. Five people were injured in Arnhem when deck screens were blown over and hit them. And reports of damage came in from accross the country, NOS reports.
If electricity prices stay at their current level or decline further, losses suffered from the struggling Borssele nuclear plant can amount to 500 million euros, according to an investigation done by consultancy Spring Associates
