Breaking Waves: Ocean News

Floods, heatwaves and supercharged hurricanes occurred in hottest climate human society has ever experienced The devastating impacts of the climate crisis reached new heights in 2024, with scores of unprecedented heatwaves, floods and storms across the globe, according to the UN’s World Meteorological Organization. The WMO’s report on 2024, the hottest year on record, sets out a trail of destruction from extreme weather that took lives, demolished buildings and ravaged vital crops. More than 800,000 people were displaced and made homeless, the highest yearly number since records began in 2008. Continue reading...

New White House fact sheet has removed references to Chuckwalla and Sáttítla national monuments Never miss global breaking news. Download our free app to keep up with key stories in real time. The White House is fueling speculation over plans to eliminate two large national monuments in California established by former president Joe Biden. Less than a week before leaving office, Biden designated the 624,000-acre (250,000-hectare) Chuckwalla national monument in southern California and the 224,000-acre Sáttítla Highlands national monument in northern California. Native American tribes consider these lands sacred and had urged Biden to protect them from drilling, mining, clean-energy development and other industrial activity. Continue reading...

Meteorologist Eric Holthaus on growing concern of dust storms and why recent storms were a preview of future Over the weekend, more than 120 tornadoes rampaged across at least 11 states in a three-day severe weather outbreak that killed more than 40 people. In addition to the tornadoes, the storm system brought extremely strong winds to drought-stricken parts of the plains states, kicking up dust storms and wildfires from Texas to Kansas. The combined impact has now become one of the deadliest non-hurricane weather disasters in decades in the US. At the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (Noaa) Storm Prediction Center – the nerve center of severe weather forecasting in the US – scientists worked around the clock for days to anticipate the storms and give ample warning to those in their path. The center now has five staff vacancies, including two of its three senior roles in fire forecasting. Still, overworked meteorologists there passed one of the biggest tests yet of the newly diminished National Weather Service. Continue reading...

Advocates warn firings and funding freezes already risk poisoning drinking water and decimating fish population Donald Trump’s and Elon Musk’s attacks on federal agencies and funding freezes will be “cataclysmic” for the environment of the sensitive Great Lakes region if not reversed, industry and environmental advocates in the region warn. Initial actions taken since Trump returned to the White House in January – and put Musk in charge of slashing the federal government – already risk poisoning drinking water, decimating fish populations, and risking the jobs and health of tens of millions of people who rely on the lake system, they add. Continue reading...