UN: Russian fires are ‘world disaster’

UPDATE: Desdemona failed to notice that this story is from 1998 and thanks readers for the QA. BBCOctober 10, 1998 The scale of the damage caused by recent forest fires in Russia’s Far East amounts to a world-wide ecological disaster, a United Nations team has said. The Russian news agency, Itar-Tass, said the team was […]

US expert: China oil spill far bigger than stated

By CARA ANNA, Associated Press Writer, and AP researcher Yu BingJuly 30, 2010 BEIJING — China’s worst known oil spill is dozens of times larger than the government has reported – bigger than the famous Exxon Valdez spill two decades ago – and some of the oil was dumped deliberately to avoid further disaster, an […]

Palm oil giant accused of rainforest destruction caught ‘red-handed’

Indonesia’s largest palm oil and pulp group, Sinar Mas, is continuing to destroy rainforests and peatland despite promises to end the practice Ecologist29th July, 2010 A major supplier of palm oil and pulp (paper) to multinationals, including food giant Cargill, has been caught clearing orang-utan habitats and carbon-rich peatlands. The Sinar Mas group, which has […]

25 dead as forest fires rage across Russia

By MANSUR MIROVALEV, The Associated Press. Associated Press writers Khristina Narizhnaya and Lynn Berry in Moscow and Karl Ritter in Stockholm contributed to this report.  Fri, Jul. 30, 2010 MOSCOW – Forest fires raged across Russia on Friday, destroying villages, surrounding one southern city and killing at least 25 people, including three firefighters. Prime Minister […]

Worst floods in 81 years ravage Pakistan — 430 killed, 400,000 stranded

By RIAZ KHAN AND ROSHAN MUGHALASSOCIATED PRESS WRITERS PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Boats and helicopters struggled to reach hundreds of thousands of villagers cut off by floods in northwest Pakistan on Friday as the government said 430 people had been killed in the deadliest such disaster to hit the region since 1929. … Three days of […]

Image of the Day: Russia Forest Fires and Smoke Viewed from Orbit, 30 July 2010

During an historic heat wave and severe drought, more than 90,000 hectares (200,000 acres) are burning out of control. July has been the hottest month ever recorded in Moscow, fields and forests have dried up, and much of this season’s wheat harvest has been ruined. Fires and smoke in eastern Siberia, 30 July 2010, viewed […]

Wildfires sweep central Russia in hottest summer on record – 150 new fires daily, thousands evacuated

By Alfred Kueppers and Conor Humphries; editing by Matthew Jones/David StampFri Jul 30, 2010 6:57am EDT VORONEZH, Russia (Reuters) – Forest fires swept across central Russia on Friday, killing at least eight people and forcing the evacuation of thousands during the hottest summer since records began 130 years ago. Fanned by strong winds, raging fires […]

Graph of the Day: Eurasian Arctic River Discharge to the Arctic Ocean, 1936-2008

Total annual river discharge to the Arctic Ocean from the six largest rivers in the Eurasian Arctic for the observational period 1936–2008 (updated from Peterson et al. 2002) (red line) and from the four large North American pan-Arctic rivers over 1970–2008 (blue line). The least squares linear trend lines are shown as dashed lines. Provisional […]

Scientist says hundreds may die as smog blankets Moscow

By Gleb Bryanski, additional reporting by Alexei Anishchuk and Amie Ferris-Rotman; editing by Angus MacSwanTue Jul 27, 2010 5:37pm EDT NOVO-OGARYOVO, Russia (Reuters) – A prominent scientist said hundreds of people could die as smog from peat fires blanketed a sweltering Moscow for a second day on Tuesday. Moscow region chief Boris Gromov asked Prime […]

Russia farmers suffer ‘catastrophe’ in baking summer

By Mokrye Kurnali, Russia (AFP) July 25, 2010 Russian farm owner Ilshat Gumerov stands in the middle of his fields under the mercilessly hot sun with a look of despair on his face. His 700-hectare land in the central Volga region of Tatarstan has not been touched by a drop of rain in weeks amid […]

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