The Missouri River floodwater surging on to the air base housing the U.S. military's Strategic Command overwhelmed round-the-clock sandbagging by airmen and others. They had to scramble to save sensitive equipment, munitions and dozens of aircraft.

Days into the flooding, muddy water was still lapping at almost 80 flooded buildings at Nebraska's Offutt Air Force Base, some inundated by up to 7 feet (2.1 meters) of water. Piles of waterlogged corn cobs, husks and stalks lay heaped everywhere that the water had receded, swept onto the base from surrounding fields.

A cyclone that ravaged three southern African countries last week has killed at least 350 people, affected more than 1.7 million others and left 15,000 people still stranded by floods, according to estimates Thursday.

The United Nations said Wednesday it will be seeking a "large" amount of funding from member-states to help deal with the aftermath of Tropical Cyclone Idai.

A Thai tycoon accused of killing a black leopard was sentenced to 16 months in jail on other poaching-related charges Tuesday but allowed to go free pending an appeal, in a case that has caused an outcry in a country fed up with impunity for powerful figures.

A starving whale with 40 kilos (88 pounds) of plastic trash in its stomach has died after being washed ashore in the Philippines, activists said Monday, calling it one of the worst cases of poisoning they have seen.

More than a thousand people are feared to have died in a cyclone that smashed into Mozambique last week, while scores have been killed and more than 150 are missing in neighboring Zimbabwe.

The city of Beira in central Mozambique bore Cyclone Idai's full wrath on Thursday before the storm barreled on to neighboring Zimbabwe, unleashing fierce winds and flash floods and washing away roads and houses.

As much of Asia wheezes, coughs and sniffles its way through another smog season, one isolated and windswept corner of Australia is serving as the global standard for clean air.

More than 100 people have died and many more are missing in Mozambique and neighboring Zimbabwe on Sunday after tropical cyclone Idai barreled across the southern African nations with flash floods and ferocious winds.

Dozens of young climate change activists staged a "die-in" in front of the United Nations on Friday, lying sprawled on the pavement to draw attention to the lethal consequences of global warming.

"Today, the young people of the U.S. are declaring the era of American climate change denialism over," said Alexandria Villasenor, a 13-year-old who has been staging a climate strike outside the U.N. headquarters every Friday since December.

Tens of thousands of young people took part in the Paris edition of Friday's global student climate demonstration, according to the police and the rally's organizers.