The township of Marysville in central Victoria has been almost completely destroyed by bushfires and there are grave fears for the town of Kinglake, where at least 12 people are known to have died. Aerial pictures taken by the ABC show street after street of completely destroyed homes in Marysville. Most are just piles of […]
By Andrew Torchia SHANGHAI (Reuters) – Millions of people and cattle in north China face shortages of drinking water because of a severe drought, the government said on Saturday, promising to speed up disbursement of billions of dollars of subsidies to farmers. State television quoted disaster relief officials as saying 4.4 million people and […]
Fire authorities are stretched to their limit fighting dozens of fires across Victoria and New South Wales, which have destroyed dozens of homes. A change in wind direction is making life extremely difficult for firefighters in Victoria, as they race to limit the number of houses that are lost. … Victoria’s Premier John Brumby said […]
We can expect waves of animal refugees because of climate change…before the waves of human refugees. Here’s an unexpected moment shared with a weaning koala clearly suffering in the heatwave. It was early evening on a day when finally we had some relief from the heat of the middle of the day when the youngster […]
The steady retreat of glaciers on China’s Qinghai-Tibet plateau during the past 40 years is troubling, scientists in the Asian nation said Wednesday. Xin Yuanhong, senior engineer in charge of a three-year field study, said the glaciers at the headwaters of the Yangtze, China’s longest river, now cover 406 square miles, down from 482 square […]
Despite Brazilian Policy, Park in Amazon Falls Prey to Farming, Logging and a Lack of Government Resources By Joshua Partlow, Washington Post Foreign Service BOM FUTURO NATIONAL FOREST, Brazil — Antonio Elson Portela had already passed acres of charred stumps and rows of corn and coffee plants when he drove up behind a flatbed truck […]
TAIPEI (Reuters) – Coral reefs off the southeast coast of Taiwan have turned black with disease possibly due to sewage discharge, threatening fragile undersea ecosystems and tourism, a study released Friday said. The discovery on a problem long suspected but seldom documented shows that coral is suffering widely in waters up to five meters (16.4 […]
By LYDIA POLGREEN DAKAR, Senegal — A bizarre swarm of caterpillars is munching its way through the forests, cocoa and coffee fields of Liberia, threatening crops and forcing thousands to leave their homes because the bugs have contaminated the drinking water from rivers and lakes. Entomologists have identified the pests as a moth usually found […]
by Marc Moncrief Victorians should cancel whatever plans they may have had for tomorrow and take whatever steps necessary to prepare for what Premier John Brumby is calling the "worst day in the history of the state". With temperatures set to soar to the mid-40s throughout Victoria, Mr Brumby said the conditions were worse […]
Tracking endangered wildlife in politically troubled, impoverished Zimbabwe might not seem the ideal holiday spot but it’s in hot demand in the travel industry’s latest niche market — "tourism of doom". The term was coined by sector specialists for the growing number of travelers flocking to far-flung corners of the planet to see endangered natural […]
