Storms are expected to follow into next week, with some dry weather predicted by Tuesday
Storm-battered California got more wind, rain and snow on Saturday, raising flooding concerns, causing power outages and making travel dangerous.
Bands of rain and wind started in the north and spread south, with more storms expected to follow into early next week, the National Weather Service said.
Continue reading...Sixteenth tropical cyclone to affect the Philippines this season caused deadly floods and landslides
Tropical Storm Nalgae swept through the Philippines on Saturday with sustained winds of 60mph.
Heavy rain caused the most damage, with significant flooding and landslides. Dozens of people have died and 170,000 sought shelter in evacuation centres.
Continue reading...Hurricane causes blackout across Puerto Rico while typhoon forces 8m to flee homes in Japan
It has been very active across the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans in recent days with more than five storms officially named.
Hurricane Fiona in the Caribbean was the first storm of the tropical Atlantic season to strengthen into a major hurricane. Fiona made landfall on Sunday across south-western Puerto Rico, where it dumped 762mm (30in) of rain with sustained gusts of 115mph.
Continue reading...Residents warned of heavy rain, potential landslides, severe flooding and power outages
Tropical Storm Fiona was expected to become a hurricane as it neared Puerto Rico on Saturday, threatening to dump up to 20 inches (51cm) of rain as people braced for potential landslides, severe flooding and power outages.
The storm previously battered various eastern Caribbean islands, with one death reported in the French territory of Guadeloupe. Regional prefect Alexandre Rochatte told reporters on Saturday that the body was found on the side of a road after floods washed away a home in the capital of Basse-Terre.
Continue reading...Lack of activity has confounded forecasts so far but a cluster of thunderstorms could change that
The Atlantic hurricane season has so far confounded forecasts of an active year, with only three named storms so far, none of which were hurricane strength. In fact, until now this August joins 1997 and 1961 in having no named storms.
However, there are three months left of the season and activity is starting to stir in the tropics. A cluster of thunderstorms in the central Atlantic has the potential to organise sufficiently to become the first named storm since Colin in early July. Should this occur, it may move westwards and approach the Leeward Islands, bringing the threat of heavy rainfall towards the end of this week, but there is little suggestion it will develop into a significant storm at this stage.
Continue reading...People already displaced by Saturday's earthquake in Haiti evacuated temporary shelters on Monday night due to a tropical storm.
Tropical Storm Grace was projected to hit some of the areas worst affected by the earthquake with up to 38cm (15in) of rain, bringing the risk of flash floods and landslides.
Continue reading...Tropical depression makes landfall over areas already hit by Saturday’s quake that killed at least 1,419
Medical teams and aid workers were racing to save lives and provide food and shelter on Monday amid fears that the official death toll from Saturday’s earthquake could rise further and a tropical depression bore down on the crisis-stricken Caribbean country.
The official death toll rose on Monday to 1,419, and at least 6,000 were injured by the 7.2-magnitude quake – a tremor even more powerful than the 7.0-magnitude earthquake that killed more than 200,000 Haitians in 2010 and levelled much of Port-au-Prince.
Continue reading...Politicians must respond to the latest warnings that climate science has underestimated risks
Last week’s shockingly high temperatures in the northwestern US and Canada were – and are – very frightening. Heat and the fires it caused killed hundreds of people, and are estimated to have killed a billion sea creatures. Daily temperature records were smashed by more than 5C (9F) in some places. In Lytton, British Columbia, the heat reached 49.6C (121F). The wildfires that consumed the town produced their own thunderstorms, alongside thousands of lightning strikes.
An initial study shows human activity made this heat dome – in which a ridge of high pressure acts as a lid preventing warm air from escaping – at least 150 times more likely. The World Weather Attribution Group of scientists, who use computer climate models to assess global heating trends and extreme weather, have warned that last week exceeded even their worst-case scenarios. While it has long been recognised that the climate system has thresholds or tipping points beyond which humans stand to lose control of what happens, scientists did not hide their alarm that an usually cool part of the Pacific northwest had been turned into a furnace. One climatologist said the prospect opened up by the heat dome “blows my mind”.
Continue reading...A searing heatwave that settled over western Canada has been blamed for contributing to the deaths of dozens of people in the Vancouver area
Continue reading...British Columbian village sets new record, with most of western Canada subject to heat warning
Canada has set its highest temperature on record after a village in British Columbia reached 46.1C (115F) on Sunday.
The temperature in Lytton, in the south of Canada’s western-most province, surpassed the previous national high of 45C (113F), set in Saskatchewan in 1937.
Continue reading...Hanna is first hurricane of 2020 Atlantic season and could bring 6in to 12in of rain through Sunday night
Hurricane Hanna rumbled toward the Texas Gulf coast on Saturday, lashing the shore with wind gusts and rain and threatening to bring storm surge and tornadoes to a part of the country trying to cope with a spike in coronavirus cases.
Related: 'A summer unlike any other': heatwaves and Covid-19 are a deadly combination
Continue reading...Blizzard dumps nearly 80cm of snow on Canadian city of St John’s as government says military reserves may be called up
Canada’s federal government will help Newfoundland on the Atlantic coast dig itself out in the wake of a massive winter blizzard that buried cars and left thousands without power.
The storm on Friday and Saturday dumped as much as 76.2cm (30 inches) of snow on St John’s, the capital of Newfoundland, and packed wind gusts as high as 130km/h (81mph). The snowfall was an all-time record for the day for St John’s international airport.
Continue reading...The storm has been downgraded to category 2, but is expected to remain ‘powerful’ with winds of up to 105mph
Hurricane Dorian was slowly moving up the United States’ south-eastern coast on Wednesday, after pummeling the Bahamas with deadly force.
Related: 'Pray for us': Bahamas residents tell of terror as Hurricane Dorian hit
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