As It Happens
CBC Podcasts & Radio On-Demand
Nightly news that’s not afraid of fun. Every weeknight hosts Nil Köksal and Chris Howden bring you the people at the centre of the day’s most hard-hitting, hilarious and heartbreaking stories: powerful leaders, proud eccentrics and ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances. And plenty of puns too. Find out why As It Happens is one of Canada’s longest-running and most beloved shows.
Location:
Canada, ON
Networks:
CBC Podcasts & Radio On-Demand
Description:
Nightly news that’s not afraid of fun. Every weeknight hosts Nil Köksal and Chris Howden bring you the people at the centre of the day’s most hard-hitting, hilarious and heartbreaking stories: powerful leaders, proud eccentrics and ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances. And plenty of puns too. Find out why As It Happens is one of Canada’s longest-running and most beloved shows.
Twitter:
@cbcasithappens
Language:
English
Contact:
CBC Audience Relations P.O. Box 500, Station A Toronto, ON Canada M5W 1E6 866-481-5718
Website:
http://www.cbc.ca/asithappens/
Email:
aih@cbc.ca
Episodes
Contending with Donald Trump on Day One
1/20/2025
Interviews with Canada’s Minister of Energy and Natural Resources Jonathan Wilkinson, Thomas A. Saenz of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund and more.
Duration:01:07:30
TikTok and its creators up against the clock
1/17/2025
Plus: A New Zealand woman sets a new world record for sprinting - on a track covered with Lego.
Also: Some LA residents who had just gotten into housing find themselves right back where they started thanks to the wildfires; and an expert provides a nuanced perspective on the ban of Red Dye #3.
Duration:00:57:53
With a ceasefire in question, aid is still in limbo
1/16/2025
Plus: The terrifyingly massive “big boy” that will super size your arachnophobia.
Also: We speak to one of the Quebec pilots flying water bomber missions over the Los Angeles fires.
Duration:00:58:44
Hope and doubt over a fragile ceasefire deal
1/15/2025
Plus: Casey Stoney explains how she’ll lead Canada’s women’s soccer team out of scandal and back into the win column.
Also: A British pizzeria shows its reluctance to put pineapple on pies by charging the equivalent of 175 dollars Canadian to anyone who dares to order it. And we are pine-appalled.
Duration:01:05:15
A Meta fact checker on the job in Los Angeles
1/14/2025
Plus: On Prince Edward Island, a man nearly gets beaned by a meteorite…and ends up capturing a historic image with his home security system.
Also: After visiting the region, Canada's Minister for International Development Ahmed Hussen tells us he sees a window of opportunity for countries to support the rebuilding of a peaceful and prosperous Syria.
Duration:00:54:59
Bracing for more wind and fire in Los Angeles
1/13/2025
Plus: Russell Howells hits a “bleak” moment in his long fight to recover a fortune in Bitcoin from a dump in Wales.
Also: A team of Italian physicists think they've found the recipe for the perfect cacio e pepe pasta, featuring…cornstarch?
Duration:01:00:25
Premier Susan Holt on Trump, tariffs and 2025
1/10/2025
Plus: Zora Neale Hurston's last novel was almost destroyed in a fire. But the well-timed instincts of a friend helped save it for a new generation.
Also: We'll hear from the co-owner of a Los Angeles theatre – Public Displays of Altadena – destroyed in the Eaton fire about the livelihoods lost and the fine art of rebuilding.
Duration:01:02:18
Racing to save a home in the burning Pacific Palisades
1/9/2025
Plus: That’ll do, donkey. We bid farewell to the beast of burden who served as a model for Shrek’s two-dimensional donkey sidekick.
Also: After our story about a mysterious pile of bananas in England, listeners tipped us off to an equally unexplained phenomenon in Whitehorse.
Duration:00:57:31
Escaping the worst fire in modern L.A. history
1/8/2025
Plus: We reach a volunteer in Finland who’s getting out his shovel to build the snow drifts seals need to build their next generation.
Also: Survival of the fittest is a phrase we all learn in biology class. But new research suggests something else might also shape evolution in the animal kingdom: sheer luck.
Duration:00:57:10
Donald Trump ups the ante on “51st state” threats
1/7/2025
Plus: When we heard about a mystery plate of peeled bananas on a British street corner we couldn't resist the urge to call up some locals…
And our efforts bore fruit. Also: The head of Physicians for Human Rights Israel calls for the release of a Palestinian doctor detained by the IDF after a December raid on the Kamal Adwan hospital in North Gaza.
Duration:01:00:32
Immigration Minister Marc Miller on Trudeau’s departure
1/6/2025
Plus: After a fire destroys a new romance bookstore in the DC area, readers come together to show it some love -- and give the story a happy ending.
Also: We reach Kate McElwee of the Women’s Ordination Conference after Pope Francis appoints a nun to a historically important role. She says she still believes that the Catholic Church is capable of full inclusion.
Duration:01:00:12
Are cancer-warning labels on alcohol a good idea?
1/3/2025
An orca who famously carried around her dead calf for weeks in 2018 is now repeating that behaviour after the recent death of her newborn calf.
In September, Carol Off was back in our studio to speak with Nil about her latest book, “At a Loss for Words: Conversation in an Age of Rage.” In it, the former host of As It Happens looks at six words (freedom, democracy, truth, woke, choice and taxes) and how their meaning has been distorted and politicized. She offers insight on how to reclaim those words -- and what’s at risk, if we're unable to do so.
Duration:00:49:20
Hosting the Sugar Bowl, the day after a terrorist attack
1/2/2025
“Kinda feels like it was my house that burned down.” A former employee of Telegraph Cove, BC’s whale museum is heartbroken when it’s destroyed by fire.
We revisit Nil’s feature-length conversation with R. Renee Hess. The hockey fan and author spoke to players, hockey parents, NHL employees and journalists for a collection of essays published last year. It’s called, "Blackness Is a Gift I Can Give Her: On Race, Community, and Black Women in Hockey," and includes her own journey in a sport that, as she writes, doesn’t always love her back.
Duration:00:52:12
Special Episode: Unexpected stories
1/1/2025
We go back to the archives to dig up the stories and guests who took us by surprise.
Duration:01:16:44
An attack on New Orleans' Bourbon Street
1/1/2025
At least 10 people are dead after a pickup truck driver rammed the vehicle into a crown in New Orleans' French Quarter. The FBI are investigating the incident as a suspected terror attack. Resident Brian O'Brien tells us about waking up to the aftermath of the attack, outside his doorstep. City councilmember Lesli Harris answers our questions about safeguards — and raises some question of her own.
Duration:00:10:29
A Guantanamo Bay detainee is repatriated, 23 years later
12/31/2024
Plus: A housing advocate isn’t surprised a Montreal encampment has popped up again, just weeks after being dismantled by police.
And an encore presentation of our feature-length conversation with Kevin Kwan, who rose to fame with his novel, Crazy Rich Asians. The Singaporean-American author has made a career of satirizing the richest of the rich. His latest book, "Lies and Weddings" features exactly as much of both as you'd hope.
Duration:00:50:41
How Jimmy Carter’s work building homes began in a NY project
12/30/2024
Plus: A Toronto artist gives unwanted presents a second life at the Museum of Bad Gifts.
And an encore presentation of our feature-length conversation with author and educator Solomon Ratt, on how he carried his mother’s stories with him during his time at residential school -- and found healing, refuge and connection in the written word.
Duration:00:50:42
What NASA learned by getting closer to the sun than ever
12/27/2024
Plus: We reach the man who helped make the bald eagle…finally…the official bird of the United States.
And our holiday readings continue. In this episode we bring you Al Maitland’s reading of Zlateh the Goat by Isaac Bashevis Singer.
Duration:00:49:54
Setting things right
12/26/2024
We delve into the As It Happens archives to celebrate the guests who saw something broken — and decided to fix it.
Duration:01:17:39
The Shepherd
12/24/2024
A Christmas Eve tradition since 1979. As It Happens presents Frederick Forsyth's The Shepherd, read by our late host “Fireside” Al Maitland.
Duration:00:31:45