Landsat 8 acquired images of one of the larger fires in South America burning north of the Paraguay River near Puerto Busch on 25 August 2019 with IR Joshua Stevens NASA Earth Observatory

As Brazilian Amazon burns, fires in next-door Bolivia also wreak havoc – “I’ve never seen an environmental tragedy on this scale”

By Anatoly Kurmanaev and Monica Machicao 25 August 2019 LA PAZ, Bolivia (The New York Times) – Amid growing international alarm over fires in Brazil’s Amazon region, neighboring Bolivia is facing devastating fires of its own, with flames devouring farmland and environmentally sensitive forests alike. In midst of the calamity, the country’s president, Evo Morales, suspended his […]

Krimej village indigenous Chief Kadjyre Kayapo, of the Kayapo indigenous community, pauses on the path opened by illegal loggers on the border between Menkragnotire indigenous lands and the Biological Reserve Serra do Cachimbo in Altamira, Para state, Brazil, Saturday, 31 August 2019. He wears a traditional headdress and a necklace reading “Jesus Christ” in Kayapo language. Much of the deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon is done illegally -- land grabbers burn areas to clear land for agriculture and loggers encroach on national forests and indigenous reserves, and Kayapo says he does not want loggers and prospectors on his land. Photo: Leo Correa / AP Photo

Indigenous leaders in Brazil’s Amazon try to thwart loggers and miners – “What is being done here is an atrocity against us”

By Leo Correa 1 September 2019 ALTAMIRA, Brazil (AP) – An indigenous leader in Brazil’s Amazon says he will do what he can to stop loggers and prospectors encroaching on his people’s land. Kadjyre Kayapo, his son and other companions searched in recent days for signs of trespassing in the lush rainforest of the Kayapo […]

Satellite view of Hurricane Dorian over the Bahamas, 2 September 2019. Video: Matt Reagan / The Weather Channel

Hurricane Dorian triggers massive flooding across Bahamas – “Water is about to reach the roof”

By Ramón Espinosa and Dánica Coto 2 September 2019 FREEPORT, Bahamas (AP) – Hurricane Dorian unleashed massive flooding across the Bahamas on Monday, pummeling the islands with so much wind and water that authorities urged people to find flotation devices and grab hammers to break out of their attics if necessary. The fearsome Category 4 […]

Kelu Chennai Kelu “Where Is My Water CM”, a protest by Arappor Iyakkam at Valluvar Kottam in Chennai on 30 June 2019. Photo: A. Prathap / BCCL Chennai

Thefts, fights, and murder: Water scarcity is making Chennai an angry city – “To see water scarcity leading to violence amongst neighbours is truly distressing. This is not the Chennai I know.”

By Karthikeyan Hemalatha 27 August 2019 (The Weather Channel India) – In her 71 years, R Mangayarkarasi has seen a lot change in Chennai. She was there in the 1950s, when the Adyar River was brimming with water. In the 1990s she witnessed encroachments swallow up the lake that gave ‘Lake View Road’ its name. […]

Map showing active fire detections in the Amazon rainforest in Brazil as observed by Terra and Aqua MODIS satellites between 15 August 2019 and 22 August 2019. Photo: Joshua Stevens / NASA Earth Observatory

NASA satellites confirm Amazon rainforest is burning at a record rate

By Passant Rabie 27 August 2019 (Space.com) – As raging fires continue to sweep through the Amazon rainforest in Brazil, NASA satellites and astronauts aboard the International Space Station are tracking the flames from above. Their view confirmed that this is the most active fire year in Brazil since 2010. Fire detections by NASA’s Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) […]

Satellite view of Hurricane Dorian making landfall on the Bahamas, 1 September 2019. This view is one of the strongest landfalls ever captured on satellite. Photo: Dakota Smith / NCAR

Hurricane Dorian strikes Bahamas with record fury as Category 5 storm – “The winds are howling like we’ve never, ever experienced before”

By Ramón Espinosa 1 September 2019 McLEAN’S TOWN CAY, Bahamas (AP) – Hurricane Dorian struck the northern Bahamas as a catastrophic Category 5 storm Sunday, its record 185 mph winds ripping off roofs, overturning cars and tearing down power lines as hundreds hunkered down in schools, churches and shelters. Dorian slammed into Elbow Cay in […]

Top: Opal Reef in the northern Great Barrier Reef before, during and after the 2016 mass bleaching event. (left to right: September 2015, April 2016, November 2016). Bottom: Double Cone Island in the Whitsundays area of the Great Barrier Reef in 2014, post-cyclone Debbie in 2017 and mid-2018 (left to right). Photo: Taylor Simpkins / Australian Institute of Marine Science

Great Barrier Reef outlook downgraded to “very poor” as threats mount – “We’ve had ten years of warnings, ten years of rising greenhouse emissions, and ten years watching the Reef heading for a catastrophe”

By Peter Hannam 30 August 2019 (The Sydney Morning Herald) – The Great Barrier Reef is at “a critical point” with the marine park’s outlook downgraded on Friday from “poor” to “very poor” due to coral bleaching and deforestation. Climate change resulting in rising sea temperatures was blamed in the federal government’s five-year Great Barrier Reef […]

Pope Francis greets the faithful as he arrives for the weekly general audience at the Vatican, 28 August 2019. Photo: Remo Casilli / REUTERS

Pope urges politicians to take “drastic measures” on climate change – “We have caused a climate emergency that gravely threatens nature and life itself, including our own”

By Philip Pullella; Editing by Jane Merriman 1 September 2019 VATICAN CITY (Reuters) – Pope Francis challenged governments on Sunday to take “drastic measures” to combat global warming and reduce the use of fossil fuels, saying the world was experiencing a climate emergency. Francis issued his appeal, a written message for Sunday’s World Day of […]

Global annual net CO2 emissions and negative carbon emissions required to achieve the Paris climate goal of 1.5°C. This animation uses the functional form from Raupach et al., 2014 for positive emissions, adding residual, hard-to-mitigate emissions of 5 percent of the current level, and negative emissions using the ramp of a cosine function. Σ indicates the cumulative emissions 2019-2100. Graphic: Robbie Andrew

It’s getting harder and harder to limit global warming to 2°C – “It is partly this hope in future technologies that delays action”

By Robbie Andrew 23 April 2019 (Robbie Andrew) – The road to 2°C is steep; the road to 1.5°C is a cliff. While it is theoretically possible that we can keep global warming under 1.5°C above pre-industrial temperatures, that task is monumental. In fact, models struggle to generate future scenarios that keep warming below 1.5°C, but can […]

Greta Thunberg arrives by racing yacht in Manhattan, 28 August 2019. Photo: Greta Thunberg

Greta Thunberg, teen climate change activist, sails into New York City – “Our war on nature must end”

28 August 2019 (BBC News) – Teenage environmental activist Greta Thunberg has arrived in New York after a 15-day, 3,000-mile (4,800km) voyage across the Atlantic. She will be participating in UN climate summits in New York City and Chile. The 16-year-old Swede sailed from Plymouth in the UK on a zero-emissions yacht in order to […]

Social media & sharing icons powered by UltimatelySocial