The biggest news stories of the year

As 2025 draws to a close, have a look back at the biggest stories we have reported on across Hampshire, the Isle of Wight, Dorset, Berkshire and Oxfordshire.

At the start of the year, scientists discovered a window into the prehistoric past in an Oxfordshire quarry.

Dewars Farm Quarry has long been linked with dinosaurs and last year researchers found 200 huge footprints criss-crossing the quarry floor.

Led Zeppelin singer Robert Plant, as well as leading broadcasting figures were among the mourners for the funeral of the late DJ Johnnie Walker, held near his home in Shaftesbury, Dorset.

The veteran disc jockey’s death aged 79 was announced by his friend and fellow Radio 2 presenter Bob Harris in December.

Strong winds and heavy rain brought on by Storm Herminia caused disruption across the south of England.

Transport was disrupted and hundreds of people have been left without power across the region caused by unplanned outages

A medical student who had a hand transplant after losing several limbs to meningitis said the surgery had changed her life.

Becca Heritage was diagnosed with meningococcal septicaemia during her first term at the University of Southampton.

Medics were able to save her life by amputating both legs and most of her fingers and she went on to become only the ninth person in the UK to undergo a hand transplant.

TV personality Gemma Collins told her followers not to “stroke or feed” animals in the New Forest after facing a social media backlash for hugging a pony in the national park.

The former The Only Way Is Essex (Towie) star had previously deleted a post from her Instagram of her embracing the free-roaming pony.

Also in February, a large pothole that damaged cars proved difficult to repair.

Traffic lights were set up on the A4130 out of Didcot towards Wallingford as Oxfordshire County Council attempted to fix the problem on several occasions.

The local authority recently defended another road in the county after it had been dubbed “Pothole World”.

Members of a gang were convicted over the theft of a £4.8m gold toilet from an art exhibition at Blenheim Palace following a three-week trial.

Thieves smashed their way in and ripped out the functional toilet, hours after a glamorous launch party at the Oxfordshire stately home in September 2019.

James “Jimmy” Sheen, 40, pleaded guilty to burglary, transferring criminal property and conspiracy to do the same in 2024, while Michael Jones, 39, was found guilty of burglary.

The men, from Oxford, were sentenced to four years and two years and three months in prison respectively.

Fred Doe was convicted of conspiring to sell the gold and later received a suspended sentence.

Also this month, a filmmaker who spent months documenting Thames Water said the utility company felt “under siege”.

Barnaby Peel and his team were given exclusive access over six months for the BBC documentary Thames Water: Inside the Crisis.

A town was outraged after its Paddington statue was cut away and removed from his bench in Newbury, Berkshire, in the early hours of 2 March.

Two RAF engineers later each admitted an offence of criminal damage at Reading Magistrates’ Court. The statue was repaired and restored.

On the Isle of Wight, path closures were put place following a coastal landslip.

Part of the cliffs at Atherfield Point on the south-west coast of the island collapsed.

A woman at the centre of a free speech controversy involving the US government was convicted of breaching an abortion clinic protection zone.

Livia Tossici-Bolt, 64, was given a two-year conditional discharge and ordered to pay £20,000 for two charges of breaching the Public Spaces Protection Order (PSPO) after holding a sign saying “Here to talk, if you want” outside a clinic in Bournemouth.

Meanwhile, a cinema told customers to behave during showings of A Minecraft Movie after rowdy behaviour at other screenings went viral on social media.

A sign displayed at Cineworld in Witney, Oxfordshire, warned people any form of anti-social behaviour would see them removed without a refund.

Tributes poured in after the deaths of two firefighters and a 57-year-old man in a fire at an Oxfordshire business park.

A fire was reported at Bicester Motion on the evening of 15 May and rapidly spread through a former aircraft hangar at the site.

Firefighters Jennie Logan, 30, and Martyn Sadler, 38, along with father-of-two Dave Chester, 57, were killed in the blaze. Two other firefighters suffered serious injuries.

Also this month, South Western Railway was brought back under public ownership, however the first nationalised train was a bus replacement service.

Remember Monday performed the UK entry in the Eurovision Song Content and finished 19th.

Holly-Anne Hull, from Camberley, Charlotte Steele, from Farnham, and Lauren Byrne, from Fleet, all co-wrote What The Hell Just Happened?

They received 88 points from the national juries but none from the public vote, and said the competition had given them “memories that will last a lifetime”.

Two people were seriously injured after a double-decker bus carrying college students “careered” into a river.

The bus, bound for Barton Peveril Sixth Form College, left the carriageway and plunged into the water off Bishopstoke Road in Eastleigh, on 26 June.

The driver was later hailed has a “hero” after swerving the vehicle through oncoming traffic.

Dozens of people required medical assistance because of heat-related illness on the second day of Royal Ascot.

The event attracted more than 41,000 spectators on 18 June, during which temperatures reached 29.7C (85F). Royal Ascot said one person was taken to hospital while a further 42 received treatment on site.

And a dog that went missing for 36 days was thought to have covered about 100 miles (161km) – including swimming to an island off the Dorset Coast.

Amber was being cared for by a foster family near Bramshaw, in the New Forest, when she escaped after just a night there on 25 April.

The retriever cross, who was rescued as a street puppy in Qatar by a charity and moved to the UK, is thought to have swum to Brownsea Island.

With prolonged summer dry weather, a hosepipe ban affecting 1.1 million people was announced by Thames Water.

The utility said the measure would come into place across Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire, Berkshire and Wiltshire on 22 July due to a lack of rain and increasing demand, which had stretched supplies.

Southern Water quickly followed suit with its hosepipe ban – affecting almost one million customers.

Elsewhere, volunteers rebuilding a section of railway in Dorset that was ripped up in the 1960s laid the final section of a track extension, linking it to a station.

North Dorset Railway reinstated a section of the line at Shillingstone station, which is already home to a popular railway museum and cafe.

A former star of ITV’s The Bill has helped real-life officers arrest a suspected shoplifter.

Jeff Stewart, who played PC Reg Hollis for 24 years, came to the aid of police in Ocean Way, Southampton.

The fleeing suspect fell off a bicycle before being handcuffed and Stewart, who lives locally, sat on his legs.

Three people died and one person was seriously injured after a helicopter being used for a flying lesson “spiralled” to the ground and crashed in a field on the Isle of Wight.

Justyna Czoska, 52, Wojciech Kowalkowski, 49, and 54-year-old pilot Simon Hewitt were killed when the aircraft came down near Shanklin at about 09:20 BST on Monday, 25 August.

Also this month, singer-song-writer Dolly Mavies found herself at the centre of worldwide media attention when she pulled out of a gig after a tip-off US Vice-President JD Vance could be attending.

His visit to the Oxfordshire village of Dean resulted in an increased police presence in the area, and a number of protesters gathered carrying placards and banners opposing the vice-president’s stay.

Councils across the south of England warned of the risk of painting public signs and roundabouts after a spate of graffiti.

It came as Union flags and St George’s Cross markings also appeared across the region, believed to be part of an organised effort called Operation Raise the Colours.

Plans to introduce a temporary congestion charge for Oxford were approved.

Oxfordshire’s County Council’s cabinet agreed to introduce a £5 daily charge for car drivers that pass one of six points, located on roads with high levels of congestion. It came into effect in November.

Also in September, a woman planning a low-cost break away to Malta could not believe her eyes when her quote per person skyrocketed to £5.8m.

Sandra Nicklin from Blackfield, Hampshire was originally quoted £260.35 each online by Tui for the all inclusive week-long holiday to the island with flights from Luton airport. Tui blamed it on a system error.

And 75-year-old Mike James has chained himself to a “much loved” footbridge in the New Forest during a protest against its planned removal.

The bridge crosses a small stream on Martins Road, Brockenhurst, and was used by walkers and livestock to access open forest land outside the village.

Forestry England (FE) had planned to remove the 70-year-old bridge, saying its condition was “deteriorating”.

A man who was plucked from the sunroof of his sinking Bentley by passers-by described how “it went down and under the water like a submarine”.

Robert Hill, 72, recounted the moment when his car plunged from the Ferry Way Car Park at Sandbanks, in Poole, Dorset.

A number of local anglers and nearby pedestrians jumped into the harbour to help pull Mr Hill from the car shortly before it sank.

Elsewhere, the government said it would not call in the decision to grant Oxford United planning permission for its new stadium for further review.

Cherwell District Council had approved plans for a 16,000-capacity venue on land near Kidlington in August.

The family of Ozzy Osbourne visited a mural of the rock legend made from more than 10,000 pumpkins and squashes.

Sharon, Jack and Kelly Osbourne surprised visitors at Sunnyfields Farm in Totton, Hampshire. The former Black Sabbath frontman, who was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 2019, died on 22 July.

Reports of a mountain of fly-tipped waste dumped illegally in a field in Oxfordshire prompted a wave of outrage.

Environmental campaigners, local residents and Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer condemned the “sickening case” and demanded swift action.

The pile was up to 490ft (150m) long and 20ft (6m) high, located on a site between the River Cherwell and the A34 near Kidlington.

Also in November, the death of an Oasis fan who fell from a height at a concert at Wembley Stadium was a “tragic accident”, a pre-inquest review heard.

Lee Claydon, 45, from Bournemouth and known to his family by his middle name Clive, fell from an upper level at the end of the show on 2 August.

Conservation efforts to save the red kite in the UK come full circle as chicks are taken to Spain to help revive the population of the birds of prey there.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, red kite chicks from Spain and Sweden were released in the Chilterns on the Oxfordshire-Buckinghamshire border.

Warnings were broadcast to ships in the Solent after 16 containers, mostly containing bananas, fell overboard off the Isle of Wight.

HM Coastguard carried out aerial searches after they came off the Baltic Klipper cargo ship near the Nab tower lighthouse.

Seven later washed up in Selsey, two at Pagham Harbour and two at Bognor Regis with volunteers helping clear plastic and foam from beaches.

In the run up to Christmas, concerns over abandoned parcels and failed deliveries by courier firm Evri were raised by MPs.

Gosport MP Caroline Dinenage said she had been made aware of “numerous” cases of Evri parcels being “dumped or marked as delivered with no attempt made to actually reach the recipient”. The courier company said its priority was to “handle every parcel with care”.

Conservators restoring paintings at Blenheim Palace aimed to track down workmen or their relatives who left their names in the ceiling area decades ago.

About 11 names were found scribbled high up in the Great Hall of the stately home in Woodstock, Oxfordshire.

In response to an appeal, the team was contacted by the grandson of one of the signatories.