Residents shovel thick layers of ice after a surprise hailstorm hit Puebla, Mexico on 24 May 2024. Photo: Reuters

Hailstorm covers Mexican city with thick ice amid heat wave

24 May 2024 (Reuters) – The unexpected storm surprised locals as hail accumulated up to several feet in some areas, transforming streets into icy rivers. The hailstorm caused widespread damage to some homes, blocking roads and knocking down trees. In the aftermath of the storm, residents were seen shoveling ice and mud in amazement at […]

A man wades through an area flooded by heavy rains, in Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul state, Brazil, 3 May 2024. Photo: Carlos Macedo / AP Photo

From flooding in Brazil and Houston to brutal heat in Asia, extreme weather seems nearly everywhere in 2024 – “We’re departing the climate of the 20th century right now and we just can’t handle these events”

By Seth Borenstein, Suman Naishadham, Sibi Arasu, and Fabiano Maisonnave 7 May 2024 (AP News) – In sweltering Brazil, flooding killed dozens of people and paralyzed a city of about 4 million people. Voters and politicians in India, amid national elections, are fainting in heat that hit as high as 115 degrees (46.3 degrees Celsius). […]

Research into Southern California’s history of ocean dumping was spurred by the discovery of mysterious and corroded barrels dumped off the coast of Los Angeles. Photo: David Valentine / ROV Jason

DDT found in deep-sea fish raises troubling concerns for food web – “Nothing is untouched”

By Rosanna Xia 6 May 2024 (Los Angeles Times) – For several years now, one question has held the key to understanding just how much we should worry about the hundreds of tons of DDT that had been dumped off the coast of Los Angeles: How, exactly, has this decades-old pesticide — a toxic chemical spread across […]

Screenshot of a Twitter (X) post showing a photo of Gov. Ron DeSantis signing legislation that erases the words “climate change” from state statutes on 15 May 2024. Photo: Ron DeSantis / UPI

Gov. Ron DeSantis signs law erasing “climate change” from Florida policy – “This purposeful act of cognitive dissonance is proof that the governor and the state legislature are not acting in the best interests of Floridians, but rather to protect profits for the fossil fuel industry”

By Sheri Walsh 16 May 2024 (UPI) – With summer’s extreme heat and this year’s hurricane season rolling into Florida next month, Gov. Ron DeSantis signed legislation Wednesday that will erase climate change from state policy effective 1 July 2024. The new law will erase the words “climate change” from state statutes and make energy […]

Low water levels at the Miguel Aleman dam in May 2024. Photo: Luis Antonio Rojas / The Washington Post

Mexico City’s water “Day Zero” may come even for the wealthiest residents – “No one could have foreseen this would happen in the city”

By Kasha Patel 25 May 2024 MEXICO CITY (The Washington Post) – Raquel Campos’ water issues started in January, when her condo building’s manager sent residents a message saying that the city hadn’t delivered water to its cistern. Four days later, taps in the upscale residence went dry. Campos has lived in the wealthy Polanco […]

A vendor selling used remote controls for various home appliances takes a nap in Nhat Tao market, the largest informal recycling market in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, Sunday, 28 January 2024. Photo: Jae C. Hong / AP Photo

E-waste is overflowing landfills, rising five times faster than formal recycling – At one sprawling Vietnam market, workers recycle some of it – “We are currently generating e-waste at an unprecedented rate”

By Aniruddha Ghosal and Jae C. Hong 2 May 2024 HO CHI MINH CITY, Vietnam (AP) – Dam Chan Nguyen saves dead and dying computers. When he first started working two decades ago in Nhat Tao market, Ho Chi Minh City’s biggest informal recycling market, he usually salvaged computers with bulky monitors and heavy processors. […]

Residents wade through flood waters after a seasonal river burst its banks following heavy rainfall in Kitengela municipality of Kajiado County, near Nairobi, Kenya, 1 May 2024. Photo: Thomas Mukoya / REUTERS

Kenya flood toll rises to 181 as houses and roads are destroyed – More than 190,000 people forced from their homes – “We have lost nearly all our family members. This is the darkest moment for us.”

NAIROBI, 1 May 2024 (Reuters) – Floods and landslides across Kenya have killed 181 people since March, with hundreds of thousands forced to leave their homes, the government and Red Cross said on Wednesday, as dozens more were killed in neighbouring Tanzania and Burundi. Torrential rain and floods have destroyed homes, roads, bridges, and other […]

Hectares of primary forest lost each year in Indonesia, 2001-2023. For a second year, Indonesia saw an uptick in forest losses. Between 2002 and 2023, the country lost 11 percent of its primary forest — that is, mature natural forests that have not been touched in recent years. Data: Global Forest Watch. Graphic: M.K. Wildeman / AP

Deforestation in Indonesia spiked in 2023, but resources analyst sees better overall trend

By Victoria Milko 28 April 2024 JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) – From trees felled in protected national parks to massive swaths of jungle razed for palm oil and paper plantations, Indonesia had a 27% uptick in primary forest loss in 2023 from the previous year, according to a World Resources Institute analysis of deforestation data. But […]

Counts (S) of anadromous adults in eight populations of the Santa Monica Mountains BPG. Counts are adjusted by +1 so that zero counts show up on the log scale Graphic: Boughton, 2022 in SWFSC 2022

Steelhead trout, once thriving in Southern California, are declared endangered – “The negative trend toward extinction has not reversed”

By Ian James 23 April 2024 (Los Angeles Times) – Southern California’s rivers and creeks once teemed with large, silvery fish that arrived from the ocean and swam upstream to spawn. But today, these fish are seldom seen. Southern California steelhead trout have been pushed to the brink of extinction as their river habitats have […]

A diver examines bleached coral off the Keppel Islands, Australia, at the southern end of the Great Barrier Reef, 5 March 2024. Photo: Renata Ferrari / AIMS / Reuters

The widest-ever global coral crisis will hit within weeks, scientists say – “Now we’re at the point where we’re in the disaster movie”

By Catrin Einhorn 15 April 2024 (The New York Times) – The world’s coral reefs are in the throes of a global bleaching event caused by extraordinary ocean temperatures, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and international partners announced Monday. It is the fourth such global event on record and is expected to affect more […]

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