SYDNEY (AP) — Australia's National Rugby League is set to expand its sporting footprint more than 3,000 kilometers (1,860 miles) west of Sydney a year ahead of going a similar distance in another direction to add another new team in the South Pacific.
The Australian Rugby League Commission on Thursday said it had agreed in principle to a revised proposal from the Western Australia state government for an NRL franchise in Perth, the state capital. It is set to begin play in 2027.
A team in rugby league-mad Papua New Guinea is set to enter the NRL in 2028, making it a 19-team competition, with 20 clubs being the league’s ambition.
Papua New Guinea's capital Port Moresby, where the team would be based, is 2,700 kilometers (1,700 miles) north of Sydney.
The in-principle agreement for the Perth franchise, likely to be known as the Perth Bears, must also be signed off by the existing 17 clubs and the Rugby League Players’ Association.
Australia's premier rugby league competition originated in Sydney but has expanded to include a team in New Zealand, a team in the national capital, Canberra, a team in Victoria state capital, Melbourne, and four teams in Queensland state.
Perth previously had a rugby league franchise, the Western Reds, in a nation-wide competition in the mid-1990s but the club was disbanded in 1997.
Rugby league is a 13-a-side game played mostly in the Australasia and northern England. Rugby union is traditionally a 15-a-side game with a global footprint.
There's a rugby union franchise, known as the Western Force, in the Super Rugby competition that takes in teams from Australia, New Zealand, Fiji and the Pacific islands.
AP sports: https://apnews.com/sports
FILE - Canberra Raiders Matthew Timoko is tackled by defenders during the opening match of Australia's National Rugby League competition between the Canberra Raiders and the New Zealand Warriors at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas, on March 1, 2025. (AP Photo/David Becker, File)
BOGUE CHITTO, Miss. (AP) — Powerful storms that included at least three tornadoes tore through several Mississippi counties, damaging around 500 homes, uprooting trees and injuring at least 17 people, authorities said Thursday.
There were no immediate reports of deaths after storms cut across the state's southwest on Wednesday night, said Scott Simmons, a spokesperson for the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency.
He said 12 of those hurt were transported from a hard-hit trailer park in the small community of Bogue Chitto, about an hour's drive south of the state capital in rural Lincoln County.
Most of the two dozen homes at Gene’s Mobile Home Supply were flattened into heaps of splintered boards and twisted metal. People picked through the debris Thursday morning under cloudy skies as a chainsaw buzzed in the background.
“I was just watching TikTok on my bed and thought it was thunder. I went to my living room. I went back to my room, and the room’s gone,” resident Max Mahaffey told WAPT-TV.
He said he wasn't injured, but his grandmother hurt her ankle and some of his neighbors suffered cuts and bruises.
One intact trailer lay flipped on its roof near the tree line. Several cars, some with hazard lights blinking, appeared to have been picked up by the storm.
“We know there were at least three tornadoes,” said Daniel Lamb, a meteorologist in the National Weather Service office in Jackson.
“The same storm produced at least two tornadoes from Franklin, Lincoln into Lawrence counties, and then there was another one from Lamar possibly into Forest County.”
He said there may have been more. “Those are just the ones that we are able to confirm by radar before even having gone down there.”
“Pray for Mississippi,” Gov. Tate Reeves posted online, saying the state Emergency Management Agency was coordinating response efforts.
Many roads were still blocked in Lincoln County and teams from the agency were assessing the damage.
“We ask that you please refrain from sightseeing as crews are working,” the department posted early Thursday.
The governor said a volunteer rescue group was providing a 50-person shelter pod, a high-powered generator and 10 pallets of supplies to the county, which reported at least 200 damaged homes.
Lamar County to the southeast reported about 275 homes damaged, according to the state emergency management agency. Another 10 to 12 homes were damaged in Lawrence County.
More storms were expected Thursday with the possibility of tornadoes across parts of Alabama, Georgia and Florida, the weather service said. Strong storms also were possible for parts of the Carolinas and Texas.
McCormack reported from Concord, New Hampshire.
In this frame grab from video taken by WDAM, damaged trees and a house or structure following a storm that tore through part of Lamar County, Mississippi, Wednesday, May 6, 2026. (WDAM via AP)
