Disasters

"Airlines canceled flights in Phoenix and doctors urged people to be careful around concrete, playground equipment and vehicle interiors Monday as a punishing heat wave threatens to bring temperatures approaching 120 degrees to parts of the Southwestern U.S."

"Human activity is worsening the problem in an already rainy area, and there could be damage worthy of a disaster movie if a storm hits the industrial section".

"The grasslands of U.S. Great Plains have seen one of the sharpest increases in large and dangerous wildfires in the past three decades, with their numbers more than tripling between 1985 and 2014, according to new research."

"A raging forest fire enveloped a stretch of road in central Portugal this weekend, killing more than 60 people, including at least 30 motorists who were trapped in their cars."

"California is ordering immediate spillway inspections at about 70 aging dams that it believes might not be sound enough to protect downstream communities in a flood, a state dam regulator said Wednesday."

"The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will delay implementation of an Obama-era chemical safety rule for nearly two years while it reassesses the necessity of the regulation."

"Neil Shook was relaxing at home in Woodworth, N.D., on a Saturday afternoon just over a week ago. 'My wife was outside and she yelled at me to come outside and take a look at this,' he recalls. A massive brown cloud covered the horizon to the west."

"Cities lining the U.S. coasts should brace for a lot more flooding — from 'nuisance' floods that shut down streets during high tides to deluges that take lives and wipe out infrastructure."