Rescue workers were searching for more than 100 people on Thursday after flash floods triggered by a sudden heavy rainfall swamped several towns in northeastern India, killing at least 14 people, officials said.

More than 2,000 people were rescued after Wednesday's floods, the Sikkim State Disaster Management Authority said in a statement, adding that state authorities set up 26 relief camps for more than 22,000 people impacted by the floods.

Pope Francis shamed and challenged world leaders on Wednesday to commit to binding targets to slow climate change before it's too late, warning that God's increasingly warming creation is fast reaching a "point of no return."

In an update to his landmark 2015 encyclical on the environment, Francis heightened the alarm about the "irreversible" harm to people and planet already under way and lamented that once again, the world's poor and most vulnerable are paying the highest price.

Three homes were destroyed by a forest fire and a man was injured by a falling tree in the Bega Valley region of southeastern Australia, prompting a government leader to warn on Wednesday that a "horror" wildfire season was approaching.

Scores of wildfires have recently raged across the states of New South Wales, Victoria and Tasmania as Australia's driest September on record and unusually warm weather have brought an early start to the annual wildfire season, which peaks during the Southern Hemisphere summer.

Twenty-three Indian army soldiers were missing Wednesday after a cloudburst triggered flash floods in the northeastern state of Sikkim, the army said in a statement.

The flooding occurred along the Teesta River in Lachen valley, the statement said, adding that some army camps and vehicles were submerged under watery mud and that search efforts were underway. The army said water released from a nearby dam also caused water levels to rise.

More than 100 dolphins have died in the Brazilian Amazon rainforest in the past week as the region grapples with a severe drought, and many more could die soon if water temperatures remain high, experts say.

The Mamiraua Institute, a research group of Brazil's Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation, said two more dead dolphins were found Monday in the region around Tefe Lake, which is key for mammals and fish in the area. Video provided by the institute showed vultures picking at the dolphin carcasses beached on the lakeside. Thousands of fish have also died, local media reported.

Eight years after warning in a landmark thesis of the devastation of man-made climate change, Pope Francis is publishing an update Wednesday to take stock and offer ideas for action.

The short follow-up to the 2015 encyclical "Laudato Si" ("Praise Be To You") comes just weeks before the next round of U.N. climate talks kick off in Dubai amid warnings that the world is perilously off course in meeting its goals on reducing carbon emissions.

Sanjay Chauhan witnessed monsoon rains lash down over his home and farm in the Indian Himalayas this year with a magnitude and intensity he's never experienced before.

"Buildings have collapsed, roads are broken, there were so many landslides including one that has destroyed a large part of my orchard," said the 56-year-old farmer, who lives in the town of Shimla in Himachal Pradesh. "I have not seen anything like this."

More than 300 forest and peatland fires on Indonesia's Sumatra island caused hazy skies across the region on Monday, prompting government officials to ask people to work from home.

The military, police and local government were working together to extinguish the fires, which were burning in 316 places across South Sumatra province, but their work was complicated by the extreme dry weather, said Iriansyah, the head of the South Sumatra Disaster Management Agency.

The Emirati president-designate of the upcoming United Nations COP28 climate talks called on oil and gas companies on Monday to be "central to the solution" to fighting climate change, even as the industry boosts its production to enjoy rising global energy prices.

The call by Sultan al-Jaber highlights the gap between climate activists suspicious of his industry ties and his calls to drastically slash the world's emissions by nearly half in seven years to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) compared with pre-industrial times.

The U.S. West Coast produces over 90% of America's wine, but the region is also prone to wildfires — a combustible combination that spelled disaster for the industry in 2020 and one that scientists are scrambling to neutralize.

Sample a good wine and you might get notes of oak or red fruit. But sip on wine made from grapes that were penetrated by smoke, and it could taste like someone dumped the contents of an ashtray into your glass.