Scientists say calamities on same scale as disaster that has killed 169 will become more common if emissions not cut
The unusually intense, prolonged and extensive flooding that has devastated southern Brazil was made at least twice as likely by human burning of fossil fuels and trees, a study has shown.
The record disaster has led to 169 deaths, ruined homes and wrecked harvests, and was worsened by deforestation, investment cuts and human incompetence.
Continue reading...Thousands have evacuated their homes, as more frequent severe weather in the country raises fears over climate change
Two people have died, others are missing and thousands have been forced to evacuate their homes in southern Germany after torrential rain caused widespread flooding.
A 22-year-old firefighter died when the inflatable boat his rescue crew was in capsized on the river near Pfaffenbach an der Ilm, 30 miles (50km) from Munich. The body of a woman who had gone missing on Saturday was found by rescue workers in the cellar of her house in Upper Bavaria.
Continue reading...Heavy rain that trapped people in their homes and reportedly caused a train derailment is forecast to continue
A volunteer firefighter died during a rescue operation during heavy rain and flooding in the south of Germany, local police said on Sunday.
Four emergency workers were attempting to reach people trapped by the flood waters near Pfaffenhofen in the region of Bavaria when their boat capsized.
Continue reading...Winter downpours also made 20% wetter and will occur every three years without urgent carbon cuts, experts warn
The seemingly “never-ending” rain last autumn and winter in the UK and Ireland was made 10 times more likely and 20% wetter by human-caused global heating, a study has found.
More than a dozen storms battered the region in quick succession between October and March, which was the second-wettest such period in nearly two centuries of records. The downpour led to severe floods, at least 20 deaths, severe damage to homes and infrastructure, power blackouts, travel cancellations, and heavy losses of crops and livestock.
Continue reading...Death toll in southern state of Rio Grande do Sul increasing daily as authorities plan four ‘tent cities’ for 77,000 displaced people
Three weeks after one of Brazil’s worst-ever floods hit its southernmost state, killing 155 people and forcing 540,000 from their homes, experts have warned that water levels will take at least another two weeks to drop.
The death toll across Rio Grande do Sul is still increasing daily, and more than 77,000 displaced people remain in public shelters, prompting the state government to announce plans to build four temporary “tent cities” to accommodate them.
Continue reading...Thousands of homes and farming land damaged in Ghor province, a week after over 300 people killed in flash floods
At least 60 people have been killed in a fresh bout of heavy rain and flooding in central Afghanistan, according to an official.
Dozens others remained missing, said Abdul Wahid Hamas, spokesperson for Ghor’s provincial governor, on Saturday. He said the province had suffered significant financial losses, with thousands of homes and properties damaged and hundreds of hectares of agricultural land destroyed in the floods on Friday, including in the province’s capital city, Feroz Koh.
Continue reading...SES issues minor flood warnings for the Hawkesbury River at North Richmond and the Colo River
Sydney’s Warragamba dam began spilling over for the second time in a month on Sunday after heavy downpours across New South Wales.
WaterNSW has confirmed the dam began spilling at 7.30am after widespread rain across the city’s catchments.
Continue reading...Survivors pick through debris-littered streets and damaged buildings as rescue workers dispatched amid warning some areas cut off by flooding
More than 300 people were killed in flash floods that ripped through multiple provinces in Afghanistan, the UN’s World Food Programme said, as authorities declared a state of emergency and rushed to rescue the injured.
Many people remained missing after heavy rains on Friday sent roaring rivers of water and mud crashing through villages and across agricultural land in several provinces, causing what one aid group described as a “major humanitarian emergency”.
Continue reading...Death toll may rise as search continues for victims under mud and rubble and as more rain approaches
At least 50 people, mainly women and children, have been killed in flash flooding in the northern Afghanistan province of Baghlan.
The number was confirmed by Hedayatullah Hamdard, the head of the provincial natural disaster management department, who said it could increase in the coming days.
Continue reading...Animal dubbed ‘Caramelo’ was trapped for days, balancing on two strips of slippery asbestos after flooding hit the Porto Alegre area
Emergency workers have rescued a horse that had been trapped for days on a rooftop after severe floods in southern Brazil, as the death toll from the disaster rose to 107 people.
The animal, dubbed Caramelo on social media, had been balancing on two narrow strips of slippery asbestos in Canoas, a city in the Porto Alegre metropolitan area that is one of the hardest-hit areas in the state, much of which has been isolated by floodwaters.
Continue reading...Climate chaos is threatening food production, trade and lives, says World Meteorological Organization
Hunger and disease are rising in Latin America after a year of record heat, floods and drought, a report by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) has shown.
The continent, which is trapped between the freakishly hot Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, probably suffered tens of thousands of climate-related deaths in 2023, at least $21bn (£17bn) of economic damage and “the greatest calorific loss” of any region, the study found.
Continue reading...Devastating floods in Rio Grande do Sul state have about left 90 dead with survivors seeking food and shelter
Heavy rains that began last week have caused rivers to flood, inundating whole towns and destroying roads and bridges across the southern Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul.
The local civil defence agency said the death toll had risen to 90, while 131 people were unaccounted for with 155,000 homeless. A state of emergency has been declared in 397 of Rio Grande do Sul’s 497 towns and cities as rescue efforts continue.
The Taquari River in Rio Grande do Sul. Photographs: Maxar Technologies/AFP/Getty Images
Continue reading...At least 361 injured and 131 missing in southern part of country from what governor called his state’s ‘biggest climate catastrophe’
The death toll from what authorities call the worst climate disaster ever to strike southern Brazil has risen to 90, after ferocious rain flooded huge stretches of Rio Grande do Sul state, displacing more than 155,000 people and forcing the closure of the main airport in the country’s fifth biggest city.
Photographs of the Porto Alegre airport, one of Brazil’s busiest, showed its main terminal had been completely inundated and a cargo plane parked in an expanse of water next to a pair of semi-submerged boarding stairs.
Continue reading...Officials in Rio Grande do Sul state say more than 80,000 have been displaced by record water levels
Seventy-five people are now known to have died in the flooding in Brazil’s southern Rio Grande do Sul state, while more than 100 people remain missing, local authorities said on Sunday.
The state’s civil defence authority said 101 people were unaccounted for and more than 80,000 had been displaced after record-breaking floods swept across the state, which borders Uruguay and Argentina.
Continue reading...A flood watch remains in effect through Sunday afternoon after forecasters predict additional rainfall in Harris county
High waters flooded neighborhoods around Houston on Saturday following heavy rains that resulted in crews rescuing more than 400 people from homes, rooftops and roads engulfed in murky water. Others prepared to evacuate their properties.
A flood watch remained in effect through Sunday afternoon after forecasters predicted additional rainfall Saturday night and the likelihood of major flooding in Harris county, the nation’s third-largest county which includes Houston, and nearby areas.
Continue reading...Hundreds of cities across Rio Grande so Sul hit by floods with thousands displaced and infrastructure destroyed
The death toll from rains in Brazil’s southernmost state of Rio Grande do Sul has risen to 57, local authorities said on Saturday afternoon, while dozens still have not been accounted for.
The state’s civil defence authority said 67 people were still missing and more than 69,000 had been displaced as storms affected nearly two-thirds of the 497 cities in the state.
Continue reading...Officials say a landslide hit Luwu regency in South Sulawesi on Friday after torrential rain pounded the area
A flood and a landslide have hit Indonesia’s Sulawesi island, killing at least 14 people, according to officials.
The landslide hit Luwu regency in South Sulawesi on Friday just after 1am local time, Abdul Muhari, spokesperson of Indonesia’s disaster mitigation agency (BNPB), said in a statement.
Continue reading...More than 23,000 people forced to leave homes after heavy rains in southern Rio Grande do Sul prompt record-breaking floods
Heavy rains in the southern Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul have killed 37 people, with another 74 still missing, as record-breaking floods devastated cities and forced thousands to leave their homes.
It was the fourth such environmental disaster in a year, following floods in July, September and November that killed 75 people in total.
Continue reading...Kenya Red Cross rescues more than 90 people from hotels and lodges as heavy rainfall continues
Scores of tourists have been evacuated by air from Kenya’s Maasai Mara national reserve after more than a dozen hotels, lodges and camps were flooded as heavy rains battered the country.
Tourist accommodation facilities were submerged after a river in the Maasai Mara broke its banks on Wednesday morning. The reserve, in south-west Kenya, is a popular tourist destination because it features the annual wildebeest migration from the Serengeti in Tanzania.
Continue reading...Banks may follow suit after UK weather-related claims on home insurance reach new high
Britain’s biggest building society has stopped granting mortgages on some properties where there is a high risk of flooding but said this affected only “a very limited number” of homes.
Nationwide’s head of property risk, Rob Stevens, said the lender used mapping technology to identify which homes were vulnerable to flooding, and it would decline to grant a mortgage to buy a property it deemed to be at high risk.
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