Ten Things You Need to Know Today: Thursday 14 Mar 2019

1. May to try her Brexit deal a third time

Theresa May last night said she will ask the Commons to back her proposed version of Brexit within the next week, in a third vote following two resounding defeats. The prime minister is said to have negotiated with the DUP and hardline Tory Brexiteers behind the scenes. MPs will vote later today on whether to ask the EU to extend the leaving deadline.

2. Boeing grounds entire 737 Max fleet

Aeroplane manufacturer Boeing has grounded its entire fleet of 737 Max airliners, after more than half of the jets were taken out of service by airlines over safety fears. Two Max 8 jets have crashed in the past five months, with a combined loss of life of 346 – and investigators in Ethiopia say the two planes “behaved very similarly” as they came down.

3. Facebook suffers worst ever outage

Facebook has suffered the most severe service outage in its history, with users worldwide unable to use its social network for much of Wednesday. The last time Facebook had a disruption of this magnitude was in 2008, when the site had 150 million users - compared with around 2.3 billion monthly users now. Facebook-owned image-sharing app Instagram was also hit by the latest outage.

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4. Multimillion payout over talc-linked cancer

A California jury has awarded $29m (£22m) in damages to a woman who blames asbestos in talcum powder made by Johnson & Johnson for her cancer. The firm is facing more than 13,000 lawsuits across the US relating to its talcum and baby powder, but will appeal, claiming it has not been proven that its powder contained asbestos.

5. Hammond finds £100m to tackle stabbings

Chancellor Philip Hammond announced in his Spring Statement yesterday that police will get an extra £100m to help them fight the epidemic of knife violence in British cities. There were 285 knife killings in the UK in 2016-17, the highest number since 1946. At least 43 people have been fatally stabbed this year, including teenagers Yousef Makki and Jaden Moodie.

6. US exam cheating scandal: actor freed

US sitcom star Lori Loughlin has been released on $1m (£750,000) bail following her arrest over a bribery scandal. A Los Angeles federal court also granted the Full House actor permission to travel to British Columbia for a film project. Loughlin is one of 33 wealthy parents accused of taking part in an exam cheating scam to get their children into top universities.

7. Ben Nevis survivor tells of avalanche

A Swiss man who survived an avalanche on Britain’s highest mountain this week that killed his climbing partners has said they had only two seconds’ warning before being hit by the wall of snow. Mathieu Biselx, 30, and the three men who died were climbing Ben Nevis despite a severe warning issued by the Scottish Avalanche Service. Biselx sustained serious injuries and is in intensive care in a Glasgow hospital.

8. Joss Stone performs in North Korea

British singer Joss Stone sang in a bar in North Korea yesterday, as part of her attempt to sing in every country in the world. The 31-year-old learned a traditional Korean folk song called Arirang for the show, and performed reggae to a recorded backing. She also met the British ambassador to the country, Colin Crooks. Stone has already performed in Syria on her tour.

9. Italy: stolen £2.6m painting was fake

Police in Italy have revealed that a supposed masterpiece stolen from a church in Liguria this week was a fake put there as a decoy after officers learned that thieves were targeting the €3m (£2.6m) work of art. One of the few people aware of the subterfuge was the local mayor, who had to play along at first, telling reporters that the theft of the painting by 17th century Flemish artist Pieter Brueghel the Younger was a “hard blow”.

10. Briefing: can the woolly mammoth be brought back to life?

Japanese and Russian scientists have recorded minor activity in cells taken from a woolly mammoth that roamed the Earth 28,000 years ago, marking a potential breakthrough in the quest to clone the prehistoric animal.

Researchers involved in the project claim to have taken “a significant step” towards bringing the long-extinct animals back to life, The Daily Telegraph reports, after extracting bone marrow and muscle tissue from the remains of a mammoth in Siberia.

Can the woolly mammoth be brought back from extinction?