Disasters

"Good news hasn’t been easy to come by at Alberta’s emergency management centre. ... Finally, on Sunday, there was some relief."

"A catastrophic wildfire that has forced all 88,000 residents to flee Fort McMurray in Alberta, Canada exploded tenfold in size on Thursday, cutting off evacuees in camps and shelters north of the city."

"With a few neighborhoods already in ruins, worsening fire conditions Wednesday pushed walls of flames toward thousands of more homes in the northeastern Alberta town, in the heart of Canada's oil sands region."

"Federal prosecutors in Brazil filed a 155 billion-real ($43.5 billion) civil lawsuit on Tuesday against iron miner Samarco and its owners, Vale SA and BHP Billiton, for a collapsed tailings dam in November that killed 19 people and polluted a major river."

"ISLE DE JEAN CHARLES, La. — Each morning at 3:30, when Joann Bourg leaves the mildewed and rusted house that her parents built on her grandfather’s property, she worries that the bridge connecting this spit of waterlogged land to Louisiana’s terra firma will again be flooded and she will miss another day’s work."

"Fort McMurray fire officials are prepared for another challenging day Wednesday as firefighters try to save the oilsands city from a massive wildfire that has destroyed homes and businesses, and forced the largest wildfire evacuation in Alberta’s history."

"Hawaii, Alaska and the Southwest face an above-average threat of wildfires this summer, but most of the country should see normal or below-normal problems, forecasters said Sunday."

"A CSX freight train derailed in northeastern Washington [DC] on Sunday, spilling hazardous material near a subway station and disrupting commuter rail and long-distance Amtrak passenger trains but causing no injuries, authorities said."

"Government says 330 million people are suffering from water shortages after monsoons fail".

"A grandmother and four of her grandchildren were killed and another person also died in floods in Texas caused by storms that unleashed tornadoes, damaging hail and torrential rains on several central U.S. states, officials said on Saturday."