Gale-force winds and floods struck several countries in Northern Europe as the region braced for more heavy rain on Friday. In Scotland, one person was reported dead after being swept into a river and authorities searched for a man thought to be trapped in his vehicle.
The gale-force winds are expected to hit hardest in the eastern part of Denmark's Jutland peninsula and the Danish islands in the Baltic Sea. But the northern part of the British Isles, southern Sweden and Norway, and northern Germany are also on the path of the storm, named Babet by U.K.'s weather forecaster, the Met Office.
Full StoryChanges in the climate and land use are combining to dramatically shrink the numbers of insects pollinating key tropical crops. As those problems intertwine and intensify, it likely will hit coffee lovers right in the mug, according to a new study.
And that one-two punch will melt some chocolate fans' dreams too, scientists said.
Full StoryDozens of people were evacuated from their homes in Argentina's central Cordoba province on Tuesday as wildfires grew amid an intense heat wave.
Images and video from the area showed massive flames in hills surrounding populated areas as firefighters worked to combat the flames that had reached some homes in the region. It was not immediately clear how many homes had been affected by the flames.
Full StoryFlooding triggered by heavy monsoon rains in Myanmar's southern areas has displaced more than 14,000 people and disrupted traffic on the rail lines that connect the country's biggest cities, officials and state-run media said.
State television MRTV reported Monday evening that the number of displaced people in Bago township, about 68 kilometers (42 miles) northeast of Yangon, the country's biggest city, had climbed to that figure, and they were taking shelter in 36 relief camps. It said almost 1,000 more people in Mon state's township, just east of Bago, were sheltering in three relief camps, and there some evacuations in a northern part of Yangon.
Full StoryStorms, floods, fires and other extreme weather events led to more than 43 million displacements involving children between 2016 and 2021, according to a United Nations report.
More than 113 million displacements of children will occur in the next three decades, estimated the UNICEF report released Friday, which took into account risks from flooding rivers, cyclonic winds and floods that follow a storm.
Full StoryWhales, dolphins and seals living in U.S. waters face major threats from warming ocean temperatures, rising sea levels and decreasing sea ice volumes associated with climate change, according to a first-of-its-kind assessment.
Researchers with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration examined more than 100 stocks of American marine mammal species and found more than 70% of those stocks are vulnerable to threats, such as loss of habitat and food, due to the consequences of warming waters. The impacts also include loss of dissolved oxygen and changes to ocean chemistry.
Full StoryHundreds of rescuers dug through slushy debris and fast-flowing, icy water Friday in a search for survivors after a glacial lake overflowed and burst through a dam in India's Himalayan north, a disaster that many had warned was possible for years.
The flood began in the early hours of Wednesday, when water overflowed a high mountain lake with enough force to break through the concrete of a major hydroelectric dam downstream. It then poured into the valley below, where it killed at least 31 people. One hundred are still missing, officials said, while thousands of people have had to flee their homes.
Full StoryFar more people are in harm's way as they move into high flood zones across the globe, adding to an increase in watery disasters from climate change, a new study said.
Since 1985, the number of the world's settlements in the riskiest flood zones has increased 122%, compared to 80% for the safest areas, according to a study in Wednesday's journal Nature by researchers at The World Bank. The authors looked at settlement extent and expansion using satellites instead of population, with the world's built-up regions growing 85% overall from 1985 to 2015.
Full StorySoldiers and firefighters were battling to control a new wildfire on Spain's Tenerife island that has forced some 3,000 people to leave their homes for safety, the Canary Islands government said Thursday.
The blaze, which started Wednesday, is centered on the towns of Santa Úrsula and La Orotava in the mountainous northeast of the island, away from the main tourist areas in Tenerife's southwest.
Full StoryTyphoon Koinu swept southern Taiwan on Thursday, injuring 190 people but causing no deaths as it brought pounding rain and record-breaking winds to the island, leading to school and office closures.
Koinu, which means "puppy" in Japanese, made landfall early Thursday in Cape Eluanbi, the southernmost tip of Taiwan, and is expected to weaken as it moves west toward Guangdong and Fujian provinces in southern China.
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