Strikes on Sanaa and a bail refusal in Newcastle top an SBS News bulletin
The world roundup also runs through Brazil's vote, Spain's housing protests and a three-year October 7 memorial, and it has drawn far more viewers than the channel's own grand final clips.
SBS NewsStory of Why this story? The video opened at a pace of 94,913 views a day, 20 times a normal first day on this channel (4,764).
Houthi rebels & Saudi forces exchange strikes | Driver who allegedly crashed into fans refused bail
SBS News packed two very different stories into one title, and the pairing has carried. The bulletin opens in Yemen, where government forces say they struck Houthi targets in the capital Sanaa and in the group's stronghold of Saada, hours after the Iran-backed Houthis said they had attacked an oil refinery in Saudi Arabia. The report describes fighting that has escalated in recent weeks and, in its own words, has spilled over from the wider war between Iran and the United States.
The second half of the title is closer to home. The driver accused of crashing into NRL fans in Newcastle, at the Knights sendoff we reported on here, has appeared in court charged with serious driving offences and was refused bail. On the same weekend the Knights' finals run ended in a 19-18 grand final loss to the Sydney Roosters, and the channel's press conference clips from that night have drawn only a small slice of this bulletin's audience.
In about 20 hours the bulletin passed 87,000 views, when a new SBS News video usually finishes its whole first day with fewer than 5,000. The rest of the rundown moves quickly: Israel's prime minister inviting an Indian pilot to light a flame at Israel's Independence Day, Brazilians voting with President Lula facing the Bolsonaro family, a memorial three years after October 7, a deadly motorway crash in Kenya, a North Korean missile launch and Spain's biggest housing protests in years.
The comment section is small but pointed. Some viewers question whether Yemen's Saudi-backed side should be called a government at all, and others take the Spanish rent protests as a cue to talk about housing in Australia.
Published on Trari
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- Channel
- SBS News
- Subscribers
- 651,000 ▲ 1,000 this week
- Channel views, last 7 days
- 2,880,144
- Channel views, pace per day
- 400,439 (on a normal day: 277,263)
- Video published
- October 4, 2026
- Video views so far
- 87,338 (less than a day online)
- Video views, pace per day
- 94,913
The numbers
One bulletin has done several weeks' worth of first-day viewing for SBS News, and the channel as a whole is running above its usual daily pace.
