JOHANNESBURG - More than a fifth of the planet's bird species face extinction as humans venture further into their habitats and introduce alien predators, an environmental group said on Wednesday.

While there have been some success stories of species that reappeared or recovered, the overall situation of the world's birds is worsening, BirdLife International said in its annual assessment of the feathered fauna.

"The total number (of bird species) considered to be threatened with extinction is now 1,212, which when combined with the number of near threatened species gives a total of exactly 2,000 species in trouble -- more than a fifth of the planet's remaining 9,775 species," BirdLife said.

Several species from Europe appear in the list for the first time, including the European roller, for which key populations in Turkey and European Russia have declined markedly.

BirdLife, a global alliance of conservation groups, said 179 species were categorised as critically endangered, the highest level of threat. They include the Azores bullfinch, one of Europe's rarest songbirds that has fewer than 300 left. [...]

Australia's agricultural heartland is experiencing its worst drought in 60 years, the National Climate Centre said, while the government said the dry-spell is affecting economic growth.

The four-year drought was the third worst on the dry continent in recorded history after one between 1895 and 1903 and the 1938 to 1946 drought, senior climatologist Grant Beard told AFP.

"We are talking about four years of pretty bleak conditions in the current situation... the other ones we are talking about went longer," he said.

Low rainfall and extremely high temperatures have created the worst drought in six decades in Australia's Murray Darling region, Beard said. The area generates about one-third of the nation's agricultural output.

"In terms of the Murray Darling basin, the drought there is the worst since the 1940s," he said of the water catchment area which stretches south from Queensland to New South Wales and Victoria and east into part of South Australia.

"Temperatures have also been quite above average at record or near record levels," Beard said. "Particularly, the last five months it's been extraordinarily warm across a large part of the country."

The drought affects the eastern coastal states of New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland, as well as South Australia and the lush southern island of Tasmania. Many parts of Australia have not a single drop of rain in April, according to the Bureau of Meteorology.

The New South Wales government has declared 90 percent of the state in drought and on Tuesday introduced tough new water restrictions on homes as dam levels dropped below 40 percent capacity.

Treasurer Peter Costello said Wednesday the dry spell was starting to cut into economic growth as agricultural incomes had not fully recovered from the 2002-03 drought.

"The impact of drought now evident in four quarterly falls in agricultural production is now affecting the measure of overall economic growth," he said.

Torrential rains and hailstorms overnight have left vast areas to the north and north-east of Bulgaria plunged underwater, with many houses ruined and farmland destroyed.

Villages and towns in the region of Lukovit and Russe have announced a state of emergency. Rivers there are raging up to the brim and threaten to spill over dam walls, local officials alarmed.

Besides the ruined harvest, many domestic stock were killed of drowning in the barns.

Damaged municipalities claimed more than 15 M to recover from the natural disaster, but the state body for fight against natural disasters and accidents has so far allotted BGN 1.4 M only. [...]

WARSAW - Three people were killed and several injured late Monday when a violent storm struck the Wroclaw region of southwest Poland, local police said.

Two men in their 20s and a 14-year-old boy were killed by falling tree branches, police spokesman Pawel Petrykowski said.

Several car drivers were injured in similar accidents, the PAP news agency quoted him as saying.

The high winds also struck power lines in Wroclaw, immobilising electric trams in the town and affecting traffic.

Most train services in the region were halted late Monday.

A string of storms hit Poland Monday, where record temperatures up to 35 degrees centrigrade (95 degrees fahrenheit) have been recorded in recent days.

ZAGREB - Three people died in Croatia over the weekend after record high temperatures reaching up to 33 degrees Celsius (91 degrees Fahrenheit) which hit the Balkans country, hospital sources said Tuesday.

Two people died in the eastern town of Osijek and one in the northern town of Varadzin, all three of heart attacks caused by the heath, hospital sources said quoted by the Jutarnji List daily.

One person died in the capital Zagreb where temperatures reached 32 degrees Celsius Monday.

According to the country's meteorological service the temperatures are to get back to normal and drop by an average of six degrees Celsius on Tuesday.

Saltpond (Ghana) - Parts of Saltpond, the capital of the Mfantseman District, got flooded on Tuesday as a result of a heavy downpour, destroying property worth millions of cedis. The worst affected areas were: Eguabado, Kuranchikrom, Prabiw, Appiakwa and the market area.

The flood destroyed houses and personal belongings. There was however no casualty.

Mr Robert Quainoo-Arthur, acting District Chief Executive, Mr Francis Donkoh, Assemblyman for Nkubem Electoral Area and Nana Baah VII, Chief of Saltpond Lower Town inspected some of the houses affected and consoled the victims.

Nana Baah told the Ghana News Agency that the flood was the worst experienced by the town in over 20 years.

LOS ANGELES - A landslide destroyed at least 15 luxury homes in the upscale Southern California seaside community of Laguna Beach on Wednesday, causing panic but no serious injuries, authorities said.Police said 15 to 18 homes were destroyed or seriously damaged and about 20 others were destabilized by the slide that happened just before 7 a.m. as residents were getting up and preparing to go to work or school. Some escaped in their pajamas.

Some of the ocean-view homes -- many of them valued at more than $2 million -- slid intact down the hillside. Others cracked in half or were left tilting precariously on dirt piles as roads buckled, sidewalks disappeared and utility poles crashed onto cars.

Firefighters said no one was trapped and injuries were mainly cuts, scrapes and bruises as residents fled.

About 350 homes in the Bluebird Canyon area were evacuated while officials determined the possibility of further slippages in the area, about 54 miles (87 km) southeast of Los Angeles.

The landslide followed the heaviest winter rains in over a century in Southern California. Bluebird Canyon was also the site of a devastating landslide in 1978 in which dozens of homes were destroyed and damage ran into the millions of dollars. [...]

BEIJING - Heavy rain has triggered floods and mudslides in southern China, leaving at least 200 people dead or missing, a resident and state media said on Wednesday.Torrential rain hit a mountainous region of Hunan province in the early hours on Wednesday and 22 people died in floods, the official Xinhua news agency said. Two officials were killed during rescue work.

Thirty-five people, including five students, were missing, Xinhua said.
However, a local resident with knowledge of the casualties and damage said at least 200 people died or were missing after torrential rains hit Xinshao and Lianyuan counties, Shaoyang city and three other cities in Hunan province since Tuesday.

"Villagers, cadres and rescuers were washed away by floods," the resident, who asked not to be identified, told Reuters.

"More than 10,000 people were left homeless after their homes were either washed away, flooded or toppled," he said.

Mountain torrents in Xinshao were the worst in the county's history, Xinhua said.

At least 47 villages were devastated by the torrents and 54,600 villagers affected, Xinhua quoted Shen Guirong, director of the county government's publicity department, as saying.

About 3,560 homes were destroyed, Shen said, and electricity and telecommunications services were cut off in some villages.

BUSSELTON, Australia - Dozens of volunteers in wetsuits and woolly hats braved chilly seas Thursday to push scores of false killer whales that had beached themselves on Australia's western coast back out to sea.

One of the dolphin-sized mammals died, but rescuers refloated 74 others.

Two groups of the marine mammals ran aground on separate beaches at Busselton, 225 kilometres south of the Western Australia state capital of Perth.

Volunteers responding to the state government's call for help pushed one group of about 15 whales back into the ocean and were holding them in shallow waters while the animals regained their strength.

The rest of the whales were herded back into the water a short time later, said Greg Mair of Western Australia's Department of Conservation and Land Management.

Whales have stranded themselves in the area before, and scientists are at a loss to explain why.

Volunteer Deidre Beckwith said she was shocked at the scene when she arrived at the beach.

The whales "are very heavy, and they keep moving against us. They are confused,'' Beckwith told the Australian Associated Press. "It was extraordinary to see it, but it is nice to be able to help them. We just hope they survive.''

One five-metre-long whale died before it could be pushed to sea.

False killer whales, or pseudorca crassidens, have a history of beaching on the Australian west coast. In 1986, 114 beached near Augusta, south of Busselton. Of those, 96 were returned to sea and the remainder died.

In April, a pod of 19 pilot whales were stranded on a beach near Busselton for more than a day before most of them were coaxed back to sea. Six died.

Manitoba was under tornado and flood watches on Thursday after a day of exceptionally heavy rain and eyewitness reports of two tornadoes touching down in the province's southwestern corner Wednesday night.

Heavy rains have been pummelling the same region of the province, giving some communities more rainfall in a single day than they usually see in half a year.

"This is very, very unusual," said provincial flood forecaster Alf Warkentin. "This kind of storm is going to be, according to our statistics, a 100-year event kind of thing."

A band of heavy rain stretching from the upper third of North Dakota to Manitoba's Riding Mountain National Park dropped between 150 and 175 millimetres of rain. Some isolated regions have reported receiving as much as 300 millimetres of rain.

The weather office in Melita reported 33 millimetres of rain in just one hour Wednesday. A trailer park in the community was flooded, as were many farmers' fields. [...]

Satellite images reveal how the environment has changed dramatically in recent decades.

An atlas of environmental change compiled by the United Nations reveals some of the dramatic transformations that are occurring to our planet.

It compares and contrasts satellite images taken over the past few decades with contemporary ones.

These highlight in vivid detail the striking make-over wrought in some corners of the Earth by deforestation, urbanisation and climate change.

The atlas has been released to mark World Environment Day.

The United Nations Environmental Programme (Unep) produced One Planet Many People: Atlas of our Changing Environment in collaboration with other agencies such as the US Geological Survey and the US space agency (Nasa).

Transformed world

Among the transformations highlighted in the atlas are the huge growth of greenhouses in southern Spain, the rapid rise of shrimp farming in Asia and Latin America and the emergence of a giant, shadow puppet-shaped peninsula at the mouth of the Yellow River that has built up through transportation of sediment in the waters.

The effects of retreating glaciers on mountains and in polar regions, deforestation in South America and forest fires across sub-Saharan Africa are also shown in the atlas.

This year's World Environment Day, which will be hosted by San Francisco in California, will focus on ways of making cities more environmentally friendly and resource-efficient.

"The battle for sustainable development, for delivering a more environmentally stable, just and healthier world, is going to be largely won and lost in our cities," said Klaus Toepfer, Unep's executive director.

"Cities pull in huge amounts of resources including water, food, timber, metals and people. They export large amounts of wastes including household and industrial wastes, waste water and the gases linked with global warming.

"Thus their impacts stretch beyond their physical borders affecting countries, regions and the planet as a whole."

World Environment Day was established by the United Nations General Assembly in 1972 to mark the opening of the Stockholm Conference on the Human Environment. It is celebrated each year on 5 June.

Water is being rationed in half of Spain to save it for domestic use, as parts of the country suffer the worst drought for 60 years.

Weeks before the tourist season starts, swimming pools are empty, city fountains are turned off and golf courses ordered to reduce watering.

Some reservoirs in the south-east are more than three-quarters empty. With no fresh rain expected in the affected areas until the autumn, authorities have decided they must protect domestic supplies through the busy summer season.

Eastern Spain is the worst hit, with the north-eastern province of Huesca deciding not to fill public swimming pools this summer and public parks and golf courses throughout Catalonia ordered to ration use of non-recycled water.

Barcelona has turned off its public fountains for most of the day as the authorities impose restrictions.

The Costa Brava in the north-east and the region south of Alicante, both big tourist centres, are among the worst-affected areas. Public showers on the south-eastern beaches of Murcia have been shut off.

Spain attracts more than 50 million foreign visitors a year, including 14 million Britons, most of whom will arrive over the next four months.

In 27 towns along the east coast near Alicante a stable population of 150,000 is pushed up to 1.1 million in August.

Water pressure has been reduced in some areas and 95% of towns in Catalonia, which is experiencing its worst drought since 1945, have imposed restrictions. A handful of villages in the interior of Catalonia and Huesca are having to distribute water in jerry cans.

Crops in some areas are being left to wither as irrigation, which accounts for three-quarters of Spain's water, is heavily restricted in order to save water for domestic use.

Farmers near the south-eastern city of Elche say they have been told they can only water their crops for eight minutes a day. But authorities say there is just enough domestic water available to get through the summer.

"Problems of supply may get to households at the end of September," El País newspaper warned in an editorial.

But little rain is expected before then. And there are concerns about next summer.

Spain's Socialist-dominated parliament last week cancelled plans by the previous People's party government to divert water from northern rivers such as the Ebro to the parched south-east.

"Now everybody loses. The only winner is the Mediterranean Sea ... which is where all our left-over water will go," complained Mariano Rajoy, the leader of the People's party.

Spain will, instead, build desalination plants along the east coast to turn salt water into fresh water.

Environmentalists, who were opposed to diverting water from the north, have complained that desalination is not the best solution and want restrictions on building for tourism in the south-east.

Spain is estimated to be building around 180,000 holiday homes a year, with up to 40% for British buyers. Water consumption in the Balearic islands had increased 15-fold between 1980 and 1995, a recent WWF report said.

The environment minister, Cristina Narbon, has announced an emergency €370m (£249m) package to stave off the effects of the drought and prevent domestic rationing.

But while one half of Spain gasps for water, the other is well stocked. Spain's green north-west has abundant supplies and the Costa del Sol in the south was not expected to suffer serious problems this year.

A week of torrential rains and heavy flooding has killed at least 204 people in China and left 79 others missing, but forecasters warned the worst was yet to come, state media said.

The heavy downpours, which began in many parts of China last week, have affected more than 17 million people, including many who have lost property or been forced to flee flooded areas, Xinhua news agency said.

Official statistics showed that 614,000 hectares of farmland were destroyed as flooding affected several provinces, Xinhua said.

Tens of thousands of livestock have also been killed.

Strong rainfall is expected to pound the Yangtze River, China's longest river, in the coming 10 days and trigger more floods and landslides, according to China's Meteorological Bureau.

Local governments across the country have been ordered to mobilise resources to battle the floods, with the focus on ensuring major rivers and reservoirs are not breached.

Vice Premier Hui Liangyu told a meeting of the State Flood Control and Drought Relief Headquarters that measures should be taken to reduce human casualties and keep property loss to a minimum, Xinhua said.

The worst-affected province was Hunan in central China where 75 people were reported dead and 46 others missing, said Xinhua. [...]

MULTAN, Pakistan: At least five people have died of heat stroke in southern Punjab as the mercury swelled to 44 degrees Celsius on Saturday, officials said.

A railway pensioner, Allah Bakhsh, died in Multan, two people died in Mailsi and Muzaffargarh, while a student of class two and Shabbir Ahmed, a recently married man, died in Sargodha, Dr Muhammad Ali told Daily Times. Dr Ali, Nishtar Hospital’s chief medical officer, said more than 20 people were taken to the emergency ward of the hospital after falling unconscious due to the severe heat. [...]

A U.S. booster rocket that came down into waters off Newfoundland's Grand Banks in April was carrying up to 2.25 tonnes of highly toxic chemicals.

They were in leftover fuel inside part of a Titan IVB rocket that launched over the East Coast from Florida on April 29, according to a newly released government report.

The document, prepared by the Public Safety and Emergency Preparedneess Canada, says two chemicals in the fuel – dimethylhydrazine and nitrogen dioxide – are poisonous and corrosive.

The report, obtained under the Access to Information Act, says inhaling vapours from the chemicals can kill a person.

However, Environment Canada told the Canadian Press it doesn't believe the chemicals pose a long-term danger to the Grand Banks.

The 10,000-kg booster rocket fell into the North Atlantic near the Hibernia platform on the Grand Banks.

Before the rocket's launch, its flight plan drew objections from Newfoundland and Labrador premier Danny Williams, Canadian oil companies and others.

The launch was delayed several times amid fears that the rocket could land on an oil platform, killing people and possibly causing an ecological disaster.

(CP) - Roads and airstrips across the Western Arctic are sagging, cracking and washing away as climate change slowly melts the permafrost beneath them.

And as engineers try to adapt transportation networks and buildings to warmer weather, some say the consequences of doing nothing are already apparent just a short drive out of Yellowknife.

"It literally looks like an earthquake zone," says Northwest Territories transportation planner Jayleen Philps about an old stretch of Highway 4.

Maintenance on the 700-metre section stopped after a new road was built around it in 1999.

Now, cracks in the asphalt can swallow a fist and the shoulders have washed away. The surface, parts of which have sunk by more than a metre, is more roller-coaster than road.

"It gives you a vision of the amount of maintenance that would be required," says Philps.

Research suggests climate change is occurring up to three times faster in the North than anywhere else on the globe. The northwest corner of the N.W.T. is heating up especially quickly.

Those warmer temperatures threaten permafrost, the permanently frozen subsoil water that is widespread across all three territories and the northern reaches of most provinces.

It can provide a stable base for roads and homes, but that stability is lost once the permafrost melts.

In Yellowknife, an insulating liner had to be installed four metres under a 100-metre section of runway with a history of sagging.

In Inuvik, freezing rain that used to fall as snow has caused a tenfold increase in the volume of de-icer and gravel used at the airport.

Workers have had to terrace embankments along the Dempster Highway south of Inuvik to keep sections from collapsing. Even then, the roadbed has been sinking and new construction includes insulation under the asphalt.

Portions of the road from Yellowknife to Fort Providence have been abandoned and rebuilt over more stable permafrost.

The season for ice bridges and ice roads - crucial to industry for moving in supplies - has shrunk from an average 75 days before 1996 to about 47 days.

Transport Canada says 42 airports in the zone are likely to be most affected. [...]

RIO DE JANEIRO - Three days of heavy rains have left 24 people dead and more than 29,000 homeless in Brazil's northeastern state of Pernambuco, authorities said Saturday.

A total of 134 homes were destroyed completely and 1,200 more were damaged by downpours that soaked the state June 1-2, said state civil defense major Luiz Filho.

Ten of the state's 185 urban jurisdictions were in states of emergency, he said.

Fairbanks AK - Continued arctic warming may be causing a decrease in the number and size of Arctic lakes. The issue is the subject of a paper published in the June 3 issue of the journal "Science."

The paper, titled, "Disappearing Arctic Lakes" is the result of a comparison of satellite data taken of Siberia in the early 1970s to data from 1997-2004. Researchers, including Larry Hinzman with the Water and Environmental Research Center at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, tracked changes of more than 10,000 large lakes over 200,000 square miles.

"This is the first paper that demonstrates that the changes we are seeing in Alaskan lakes in response to a warming climate is also occurring in Siberia," said Hinzman, who has also compared satellite data of tundra ponds on the Seward Peninsula near Council, Alaska and found that the surface pond area there had decreased over the last 50 years.

In this latest study, comparing data from 1973 with findings from 1997-98, the total number of large lakes decreased by around 11 percent. While many did not disappear completely they shrank significantly. The overall loss of lake surface area was a loss of approximately 6 percent. In addition, 125 lakes vanished completely and are now re-vegetated. [...]

By century's end, much of southern Louisiana may sink into the Gulf of Mexico. The Texas coastline, including Galveston, could soon follow.

That's the sobering - and controversial - conclusion of a new report published by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration that finds the northern Gulf of Mexico is sinking much faster than geologists thought.

The report centers on the humble benchmark, a small metal disk bolted to the ground, that provides a standard elevation above sea level for land surveying and mapping as well as determining flood-prone areas.

But there's one problem with benchmarks: They don't give reliable elevation readings if they're sinking along with everything else.

That's what the geologists who wrote the NOAA report say is happening in Louisiana: The yardstick is broken. Instead of minimal geologic subsidence along most of the Louisiana coast, as previously thought, the state's entire coastal region is sinking at least 5 feet every century.

And although a number of local officials disagree with the report's conclusions about Texas, here's a scary thought: Similar forces could well be at work just a few miles south of Houston.

"Subsidence doesn't stop at the Texas border," said Roy Dokka, a co-author of the NOAA report and a Louisiana State University geologist.

A colleague of Dokka's in Houston, the editor of the Houston Geological Society Bulletin, is more blunt in his assessment of the report. "Galveston," says geologist Arthur Berman, "is history."

Flooding a major threat

The report already has ignited debate in Louisiana. If that state's coast continues to sink, its multibillion-dollar plan to protect coastal cities and wetlands from flooding has targeted the wrong problem, erosion. Every building on land certified as safe from flooding may, in fact, be in danger if Louisiana's benchmarks are flawed. And levees thought to protect New Orleans from a Category 3 hurricane might fail even if a moderate Category 2 storm struck the Big Easy.

Texas could have similar problems if its benchmark elevations are flawed. The National Hurricane Center bases its storm-surge models on benchmarks, as do emergency planners trying to determine when key evacuation routes might flood.

Houston felt the problem acutely during Tropical Storm Allison when benchmarks indicated that certain areas, such as some Texas Medical Center buildings, should not have flooded even in the torrent of rain produced by that storm.

"We know that a lot of benchmarks in Texas are inaccurate," said Gary Jeffress, a mapping specialist at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi. [...]

A White House official who once led the oil industry's fight against limits on greenhouse gases has repeatedly edited government climate reports in ways that play down links between such emissions and global warming, according to internal documents.

In handwritten notes on drafts of several reports issued in 2002 and 2003, the official, Philip A. Cooney, removed or adjusted descriptions of climate research that government scientists and their supervisors, including some senior Bush administration officials, had already approved. In many cases, the changes appeared in the final reports.

The dozens of changes, while sometimes as subtle as the insertion of the phrase "significant and fundamental" before the word "uncertainties," tend to produce an air of doubt about findings that most climate experts say are robust.

Mr. Cooney is chief of staff for the White House Council on Environmental Quality, the office that helps devise and promote administration policies on environmental issues.

Before going to the White House in 2001, he was the "climate team leader" and a lobbyist at the American Petroleum Institute, the largest trade group representing the interests of the oil industry. A lawyer with a bachelor's degree in economics, he has no scientific training.

The documents were obtained by The New York Times from the Government Accountability Project, a nonprofit legal-assistance group for government whistle-blowers. [...]

But critics said that while all administrations routinely vetted government reports, scientific content in such reports should be reviewed by scientists. Climate experts and representatives of environmental groups, when shown examples of the revisions, said they illustrated the significant if largely invisible influence of Mr. Cooney and other White House officials with ties to energy industries that have long fought greenhouse-gas restrictions. [...]

As long as we're talking about ice in distant climes, global warming seems like something that's happening elsewhere and to somebody else -- or some other set of creatures.

When we hear the term "global warming," we usually imagine collapsing Antarctic ice shelves, melting Alaskan glaciers, or perhaps starving polar bears wandering bewildered across an ice-free, alien landscape. Warnings about climate change tend to focus on the Earth's polar regions, in part because they are warming twice as fast as the rest of the planet and the dramatic changes underway there can be easily captured and conveyed.

We may not be able to see the 80% decline in the Antarctic krill population -- the tiny, shrimp-like creatures that are a critical food source for whales, seals, and sea birds -- but we can easily see satellite photos of state-sized chunks of ice shields separating from the continent. We can grasp the enormity of planetary glacial melting simply by comparing photos of glaciers taken just a decade apart.

But as long as we're talking about ice in distant climes, global warming seems like something that's happening elsewhere and to somebody else -- or some other set of creatures.

So when you hear about global warming, the odds are good that you never think of the yellow-bellied marmot. Probably, you've never even heard of the critters, but the big rodents, common not to the distant Arctic but to Rocky Mountain meadows, have been acting like so many canaries lately -- coal-mine canaries, that is. They may be the first among many species in the Lower 48 to die off, thanks to close-to-home global warming effects that we hear little about. They are dying of confusion.

As a term, global warming is so benign-sounding -- we all like "warmth," after all -- that it masks what's actually going on. Yes, temperatures overall are rising, low-lying islands are disappearing under the sea, and epic wildfires are becoming more routine. But some places like Europe could get much colder in a globally "warmed" world, if warm ocean currents shift away from them; while across the planet, however counterintuitive this might seem, floods are likely to be as commonplace as drought.

"Climate disruption" is probably a more accurate description of what we are experiencing than mere "warming." Although the radical break in climate patterns now underway will lead to rising oceans and expanding deserts, the most insidious changes may be more subtle -- and as unnoticed as the disappearance of the marmots may be.

The intricate and precisely timed collaborations of plants, animals, birds, and insects, fine-tuned over endless thousands of years of evolution, is inevitably short-circuited when the weather goes whacky over periods of time that are the geological equivalent of a wink. When environmental events and biological events that once fit together lose their synchronicity, the consequence can be extinction. Even the Pentagon realizes that, if dependable local weather patterns become erratic, chaos can ensue as, for instance, crops begin to fail. Some of the less adaptable wild creatures, great and small, who share our American backyards are already coping with the kind of eco-havoc we can as yet only imagine for ourselves. For them, a more accurate description of what is happening might be Eco-Topsy-Turvy or, perhaps, Climate Helter-Skelter. [...]

A report co-written by University of Texas biologist Camille Parmesan and University of Colorado ecologist Hector Galbraith for the Pew Center for Global Climate recently assessed 40 scientific studies linking climate change with observed ecological changes. A growing body of evidence, they found, shows that sudden climate change is not just about Eskimos in bikinis. Significant changes are underway even in temperate regions. The geographic ranges of many plant and animal species are either contracting altogether or shifting northwards, causing species like the Red Fox to compete with the Arctic Fox for food and territory.

Flowering patterns, breeding behaviors, and the timing of migrations are all undergoing change. The distribution of plants, insects, animals, and even soil bacteria is shifting rapidly in response to recent alterations in weather patterns. The question is: Can plants and creatures adapt fast enough to survive such rapid changes? Can evolution run on "fast-forward"? [...]

Humans are not exempt. If ecosystem relationships become disconnected and ecological processes break down, we will eventually suffer as well. Adaptability and the inclination to take over neighboring yards when ours are used up or fall apart can keep us from consequences for only so long. Although we live in a culture that encourages and enables us to think, feel, and act as if we were above and beyond nature (or, perhaps, beside it -- nature being what we visit by car on weekends), we are, in fact, embedded in the natural/physical world. Like it or not, the fluids that sustain our lives come from watersheds. Our food is a synthesis of soil, sunlight, and rain. We depend on the biological diversity, ecological processes, and powerful global currents of wind and water that are the operating systems of all life on Earth. Signs that these operating systems are faltering should be a wake-up call for us to begin real planning to kick our fossil-fuel addiction, while creating laws, policies, and projects that aim at ecological preservation and restoration.

But we don't act and doubt reigns supreme. The cynical Bushites say they want to make a culture that values life while they sow whatever doubt they can about the reality of global climate disruption. Worse yet, they are intent on obstructing the rest of the world from taking collaborative steps to reduce human influence on the planetary climate that is the very basis of all life, including that of fetuses and persistently vegetative legislators. [...]

If inaction risks drought, flood, monster storms, pestilence, epidemics, extinctions, ecological dysfunction, refugees, war, and more squalor (as even the Pentagon suspects may be the case), not to mention all that potential underwater real estate in Manhattan, Miami, and New Orleans, then we would be prudent and wise to take precautionary actions now. That we continue to ignore the signs all around us is not just a political failure, though it certainly is that. It is undoubtedly also a failure of empathy and awareness. I suspect we will not find the political will to stop the damage we are doing until we begin to see ourselves within the picture frame and realize that it is in our self-evident self-interest to act boldly and soon.

So, get in the picture. Put on those Ray-Bans and stand in the purple mountain meadow next to that yellow-bellied marmot -- the one blinking in the snow-reflected sun. Face the camera. Say "cheese!" Now that's a shot you can show your grandchildren when they ask you, "What's a marmot?" -- or "What's a meadow?"

GRAPELAND - Residents were cleaning up on Tuesday after a severe thunderstorm spawned a weak tornado that tore through the heart of an East Texas town.

No injuries were reported in the late Monday afternoon tornado. The twister left a damage path six miles long and one-half mile wide from southwest to northeast across the small town of about 1,500 residents, according to the National Weather Service. [...]

ARTOIS, Calif.- A tornado and a funnel cloud were sighted Monday afternoon in central Glenn County, but there were no reports of damage. [...]

JUNEAU, Wis. -A possible tornado in the town of LeRoy caused isolated damage to a pole shed and grain silo Sunday evening. [...]

LAKE GOGEBIC, Mich. -- A tornado touched down on Lake Gogebic Sunday, tossing a pontoon boat 30 feet into the air and depositing it far off shore. [...]

Idaho - Wild weather continued to hit parts of Idaho over the weekend, including a report of a tornado Saturday night in Jefferson County. [...]

(Texas) - Howard County officials were busy watching the weather Sunday night after a tornado reportedly touched down in the northern part of the county.

A dispatcher with Howard County Sheriff's Office said they had reported seeing several funnels clouds form with the storm.

The National Weather Service issued a tornado warning for Howard County and Borden County through 10 p.m. Sunday. Parts of those counties also reported nickel to golf ball size hail. [...]

Saratoga County, N.Y. - It was a bit later than usual, but the summer's first bout of powerful thunderstorms arrived in force Monday, knocking out power, causing some flash floods and creating some firewood in the form of fallen trees. [...]

Dire warnings were issued Tuesday for three areas of southern Alberta where communities are bracing for rising river levels -- 10 years to the day that flooding devastated the region.

According to Alberta Environment, heavy rain continues to batter southern Alberta and up to 70 mm of rainfall is expected by the end of the day Tuesday.

"Precipitation totals are between 100 and 170 mm since Sunday night," says a statement released by the department. [...]

Sofia Mayor Stefan Sofianski has announced a state of emergency as of Tuesday noon because of the heavy rains and floods soaking the capital city for the last few days.

After many towns and cities to the north of Bulgaria were plunged under water for the whole last week, the bad weather has creeped to the south making many rivers spilling over their banks.

Thousands of houses and farmland were engulfed by the mass inundations that have reached the outskirts of Sofia city as well. [...]

Lisbon - More than 200 firefighters backed by a water-dropping helicopter and nearly 60 vehicles were on Tuesday battling a large wind-fueled wildfire in drought-hit Portugal, emergency services workers said. [...]

Portugal, which is suffering though its worst drought in decades, is currently sweltering through a heatwave.

The national weather office has issued a heat warning for eight of the country's 18 regions because of forecasts that temperatures there would hover near 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) over the next few days.

Miami — Tropical Storm Arlene developed Thursday as the Atlantic hurricane season's first named storm, edging closer to western Cuba and prompting authorities in parts of battered Florida to remind coastal residents to beware.

Arlene had maximum sustained winds of 64 kilometres an hour after strengthening from a tropical depression that formed Wednesday, the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said.

At 2 p.m. EDT, the storm's centre was about 250 kilometres south-southeast of the western tip of Cuba. It was moving north about 13 km/h, and this motion could bring the storm's centre near western Cuba as early as Thursday night, forecasters said.

The large storm's wind and rain extended 250 kilometres the north and east from its poorly organized centre, meaning parts of the Florida Keys could start getting rain later Thursday, forecasters said.

Arlene was expected to enter the Gulf of Mexico by Friday, and residents from the Florida Panhandle to Louisiana were told to keep an eye on the storm. [...]

VIENNA, Austria - It's nearly summertime _ and the living is chilly across much of Europe.

Fresh snow fell Wednesday on parts of Austria _ so much in some places that authorities closed roads to cars without tire chains _ and temperatures dipped below freezing in corners of Croatia and Scotland, fouling moods and spoiling picnic plans.

The unseasonably cold June has even caused headaches in Italy, a country that's normally balmy at this time of year: Officials say cooler-than-usual temperatures and hailstorms have inflicted millions of euros (dollars) in damage on crops.

In agricultural areas near Verona in northeastern Italy _ one of the hardest-hit areas _ between 30 and 40 percent of peaches and apples were lost after the hail pummeled trees, according to Coldiretti, an Italian farmers' association.

Heavy rains and strong winds flooded some of Rome's cobblestone streets overnight, uprooting trees and forcing authorities to close several roads to traffic. The gusts continued Wednesday, rustling Pope Benedict XVI's white vestments during his open-air audience in St. Peter's Square and forcing the pontiff to take off his skullcap.

Parts of Austria's Alps were blanketed with up to 40 centimeters (nearly 16 inches) of fresh snow early Wednesday, and the country's automobile club said numerous tow trucks were called to aid stranded motorists. No injuries were reported.

Although the snow was limited to higher elevations, temperatures have dipped to 7 degrees Celsius (44 degrees Fahrenheit) in Vienna. Austrians call the late spring chill "Schafskaelte," or sheep's cold _ invoking the image of sheep shivering in the fields after being shorn of their first wool of the season.

To be sure, not all of Europe was chilly. In three of Portugal's northern districts, firefighters were on maximum alert Wednesday as a heat wave sharply increased the risk of forest fires.

But in Croatia, a few centimeters (inches) of snow fell overnight on the southern mountain of Biokovo, where the mercury plunged to minus-3 degrees C (37 degrees F) Wednesday morning, officials said.

Strong winds that reached 100 kilometers per hour (60 miles per hour) in the area around the town of Makarska on the southern coast prompted police to warn drivers and cancel ferry service between the town and the popular resort island of Brac.

Rescue teams in southern Croatia were searching for a German tourist who fell off his sailboat Tuesday when it got caught in storm at sea. They managed to save his wife. A surfer also went missing in northern Croatia after heavy winds whipped up waves.

It's been a far colder than usual in parts of Germany, where overnight temperatures recently have dropped as low as 2 degrees C (35 degrees F) in the east, and in neighboring Switzerland, where high winds swept away several tents at a fairground last weekend.

Many parts of Britain also have had an unusually cold June.

Temperatures fell below freezing on Tuesday, with thermometers in the village of Aboyne, Scotland, recording minus-1.1 degrees C (30 degrees F), the Meteorological Office said, predicting more chilly nights this week.

The Royal Air Force base at Benson in Oxfordshire notched its lowest June temperature ever at minus-0.3 degrees C (31.46 degrees F) on Tuesday, beating the zero degrees C (32 degrees F) mark recorded in June 1962.

BEIJING - The death toll from a flash flood that hit a primary school in northeast China rose to 64 on Saturday, as information began trickling out from the remote area a day after the tragedy.

The torrent Friday in Heilongjiang province swept 62 students to their deaths, plus two villagers, the official Xinhua News Agency reported.

Water from heavy rains swept down a mountain and inundated the Chang'an Primary School at about 2 p.m. Friday, reports have said.

Some 352 students, all between 6 and 14 years old, and 31 teachers were in the school when the waters struck, the reports said.

Initial reports said 29 people were killed, and authorities announced the dramatically higher death toll Saturday afternoon.

Meanwhile in the country's south, officials were shoring up the banks of rivers already swollen by weeks of rain - with more rain on the way. [...]

In China's far southern provinces of Yunnan and Hainan, however, drought has scorched crops, threatened livestock and left millions without enough drinking water, Xinhua said.

Summer is fast approaching, but the threat of avalanches lingers in many Western mountain ranges where it's been an unusual season for one of nature's more unpredictable phenomena.

Since late October, at least 27 people have died in the United States in avalanches, which is about the average. (An Alaskan student died earlier this month climbing Mount Logan in Canada's Yukon. )

What's unusual is that two of the deaths occurred in developed ski areas, including the most recent one last month in Colorado and another in January when a teenager was swept off a ski lift near Las Vegas.

In the previous 19 years, just three of the 416 known avalanche deaths in the nation - well below 1 percent - occurred within ski areas, according to the National Avalanche Center, in part because resort operators patrol their slopes. [...]

Last month's slide at Arapahoe Basin near Breckenridge, Colo., occurred in the morning when snow usually is more stable. But in this case warm overnight temperatures had melted the snowpack, creating heavy wet slabs of snow, according to Scott Toepfer of the Colorado Avalanche Information Center.

In southern Nevada, an expert said there may have been no way to predict the slide that killed a 13-year-old snowboarder at Mount Charleston.

"When this avalanche released, it was unprecedented," said Doug Abromeit, director of the U.S. Forest Service's National Avalanche Center in Ketchum, Idaho, who investigated the slide.

While forecasting avalanches is nearly as unlikely as predicting an earthquake, there are conditions that accompany slides, according to Bruce Tremper, director of the U.S. Forest Service Avalanche Center in Salt Lake City.

Almost all avalanches occur on slopes of 35 to 45 degrees and are most likely after a heavy snowfall is followed by clear weather that lets ice crystals form, producing an unstable layer below the next heavy snow.

Wind also forms drifts and cornices that are avalanche-prone.

While most avalanches occur from late fall through early spring, two climbers were killed in an avalanche on Mount Rainier last June. Two years earlier, three climbers perished in a June slide at Alaska's Denali National Park. A Colorado slide killed a climber as late as July 5, 1997. [...]

PENSACOLA BEACH, Fla. - A strengthening Tropical Storm Arlene soaked parts of Florida as its center moved toward the northern Gulf Coast, stirring memories of last year's devastating hurricane season.

Forecasters said Arlene, the Atlantic hurricane season's first named tropical storm, could become a weak hurricane before making landfall in the Deep South late Saturday, with the worst weather arriving east of the storm's center.

Arlene was then expected to move along the Mississippi-Alabama line, possibly reaching Tennessee by Sunday afternoon.

Tropical storm warnings and hurricane watches were posted from Florida to Louisiana, as Arlene's top sustained winds reached 60 mph, up from 45 mph earlier in the day. The wind speed was likely to increase, but forecasters said the biggest impact would be heavy rain.

Residents in flood-prone areas along the Gulf Coast were urged to move to higher ground. In the vulnerable marshes south of New Orleans, bulldozers were moved into place in case water from a storm surge breaks through a levee.

In Pensacola Beach, where many residents are still living in government trailers because of damage from last year's Hurricane Ivan, residents eyed the forecast warily.

Margie Wassner, 57, said she planned to ride out Arlene with friends inland in Pensacola.

"It's pretty scary to me. I just kept hoping that we wouldn't have anything, but I don't know. It's awfully early in the year to be having this," she said.

Jeff Jackson, a real estate agent in Gulf Shores, Ala., worried that Arlene's rain could undo some of the beach erosion repairs under way in his town since February.

"Coming so close to Ivan, it's got people a little edgy," he said.

Arlene passed Cuba's westernmost tip early Friday, bringing heavy rain, gusty winds and rough seas to the region. A Russian exchange student died after being pulled from the rolling waves off Miami Beach early Friday, officials said.

At 5 p.m. EDT, Arlene's poorly defined center was about 345 miles south-southeast of Pensacola. The storm was moving north at about 17 mph, the National Hurricane Center said. Wind and rain extended 150 miles to the north and east from the storm's center.

The Florida Panhandle was battered last year by Ivan, one of the four hurricanes to strike the state within a few weeks. Florida was also struck by Charley, Frances and Jeanne, and together the four storms caused about 130 deaths in the United States and were blamed for $22 billion in insured damage.

Hurricane season began June 1 and ends Nov. 30.

January 2005 was a stormy month--in space. With little warning, a giant spot materialized on the sun and started exploding. Between January 15th and 19th, sunspot 720 produced four powerful solar flares. When it exploded a fifth time on January 20th, onlookers were not surprised.

They should have been. Researchers realize now that the January 20th blast was something special. It has shaken the foundations of space weather theory and, possibly, changed the way astronauts are going to operate when they return to the Moon.

Sunspot 720 unleashed a new kind of solar storm.

Scant minutes after the January 20th flare, a swarm of high-speed protons surrounded Earth and the Moon. Thirty minutes later, the most intense proton storm in decades was underway.

"We've been hit by strong proton storms before, but [never so quickly]," says solar physicist Robert Lin of UC Berkeley. "Proton storms normally develop hours or even days after a flare." This one began in minutes.

Proton storms cause all kinds of problems. They interfere with ham radio communications. They zap satellites, causing short circuits and computer reboots. Worst of all, they can penetrate the skin of space suits and make astronauts feel sick.

"An astronaut on the Moon, caught outdoors on January 20th, would have had almost no time to dash for shelter," says Lin. The storm came fast and "hard," with proton energies exceeding 100 million electron volts. These are the kind of high-energy particles that can do damage to human cells and tissue.

"The last time we saw a storm like this was in February 1956." The details of that event are uncertain, though, because it happened before the Space Age. "There were no satellites watching the sun."[...]

"CMEs can account for most proton storms," says Lin, but not the proton storm of January 20th. According to theory, CMEs can't push material to Earth quickly enough.

Back to the drawing board: If a CME didn't accelerate the protons, what did?

"We have an important clue," says Lin. When the explosion occurred, sunspot 720 was located at a special place on the sun: 60o west longitude. This means "the sunspot was magnetically connected to Earth."

He explains: The sun's magnetic field spirals out into the solar system like water from a lawn sprinkler. (Why? The sun spins like a lawn sprinkler does.) The magnetic field emerging from solar longitude 60o W bends around and intersects Earth. Protons are guided by magnetic force fields so, on January 20th, there was a superhighway for protons leading all the way from sunspot 720 to our planet. [...]

After centuries in Canada, the roaming magnetic North Pole has crossed into international waters, en route to Siberia

YELLOWKNIFE, N.W.T. - Sometime in the last year, a longtime friend turned its back on Canada and was last spotted heading for Siberia.

For centuries, the magnetic North Pole was ours, a constant companion that wandered the rolling tundra and frozen seas of our Arctic.

But no more.

A Canadian scientist who recently returned from a trip to measure the Pole's current location says it has now left Canadian territory and crossed into international waters.

"I think the Pole has probably just moved past the 200-nautical-mile limit," said Larry Newitt, head of the Natural Resources Canada geomagnetic laboratory in Ottawa. "It's probably outside of Canada, technically. But we're still the closest country to it."

In May, Newitt and his instruments landed on a patch of frozen ocean at 82.5 degrees North to make a more precise measurement of the magnetic Pole's position.

The pole, which, unlike the geographic North Pole, is in constant movement, has been within modern Canadian borders since at least the 1600s -- the time of Shakespeare and Sir Isaac Newton.

In 1904 it was measured just off the northern tip of Nunavut's King William Island by Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen, and since then has moved in a north to northwesterly direction at a stately 10 kilometres per year.

But in 2001, scientists discovered that it was picking up the pace, suddenly charging ahead -- and toward the edge of Canadian territory -- at more than 40 kilometres per year.

This year, bad weather prevented Newitt from reaching the actual location of the pole, and he hasn't completed the analysis of his observations. But he got close enough to make two measurements, and says it appears the pole is farther away than expected, and moving even faster than before.

"We landed at two places at around 83 North, and it certainly appears the pole is probably closer to 84 North," he said. "That means that the pole is still continuing to accelerate."

If the pole continues its current course, it will shoot across the top of Earth and end up in Siberia by mid-century.

But the pole's movements are difficult to forecast, since its location depends on a terrestrial magnetic field that is produced by extremely complex forces deep inside Earth. Those forces, at their simplest, drive a churning mass of molten iron that rises and falls on convective currents more than 3,000 kilometres below the planet's surface. The movement of that iron conducts and produces the magnetic field, whose poles are located fairly close, although still often thousands of kilometres away from, the geographic poles.

Curiously, the speed with which the pole moves could be related to dramatic events like the massive earthquake that caused last December's devastating tsunami. That quake was big enough to alter the shape of Earth and jar the planet into a slightly different axis of rotation. It also had enough power to jolt the molten iron that powers the magnetic field, and could be partly responsible for magnetic "jerks" that are propelling the magnetic North Pole, Newitt said.

BEIJING, Sunday, June 12 (AP) - A torrential flood hit a school in northeast China and swept 91 people - most of them children - to their deaths, while a fire in the south raced through the top floors of a hotel and killed 31 people, the state media reported Sunday.

The authorities in Beijing were struggling to handle the disasters thousands of miles apart, trying to overcome faulty communication in the flood zone and vowing to send an emergency team of investigators to the hotel fire.

Friday's flood inundated a school in Shalan, in China's northeastern province of Heilongjiang. Eighty-seven of the victims were students and the rest were villagers, the official New China News Agency said. Some 352 students - all between 6 and 14 years old - and 31 teachers were in the school, the agency said.

In China's far south, a fire engulfed the top three floors of a hotel, killing 31 people, the state media said. The fire broke out at noon on Friday at the Huanan Hotel in Shantou, a city in Guangdong Province about 180 miles northeast of Hong Kong. It swept through the top stories of the four-story building, the reports said.

A flood that swept through a primary school in China's north-west may have killed as many as 200 people.

Local resident Liu Zixia, whose own daughter drowned in the flood, says there are 90 refrigerators at the local funeral home and most of them contain the bodies of two children.

The official death toll is 92, including 88 children, with 17 people missing.

The Shanghai Morning Post says villagers staged sit-ins over the weekend and blocked major roads to protest at the inefficiency of the rescue operation.

It says many villagers had already found their children's bodies by the time the rescue teams arrived.

BOGOTA, June 11 (Xinhuanet) -- At least 35 people have died in floods and mudslides caused by winter weather in Colombia since April, the local press reported Saturday.

The six latest deaths occurred in the coffee-producing Axis region in the city of Manizales, and in Villa Maria, which were hit by mudslides, official sources said.

The most serious case occurred in Manizalez, capital of Caldas Department, where a mudslide buried two houses, with four persons, including two children, inside.

In the rural area of Villa Maria, two people died after a mudslide toppled two houses while 30 others were evacuated.

In Manizales, two houses collapsed and 50 more were evacuated because of a possible explosion of a vehicle that carried gas tanks.

Weather experts forecast that the rain season in the Andean country will last until late June.

A dramatic rise in river levels is threatening an endangered species of bird that nests on the shores of Lake Diefenbaker in Saskatchewan.

There are an estimated 115 piping plover nests buried in the sand at the Saskatoon-area lake, but more than half of them could be wiped out by rising water levels in the days ahead, said Glen McMaster of the Saskatchewan Watershed Authority.Piping plovers scoot along the sand.

"This water is going to be rising so quickly that many of these nests will be flooded," said McMaster, an ecologist with the watershed authority's habitat protection branch.

The problem stems from the recent torrential rainfalls in Alberta, which are pushing water along the South Saskatchewan River into the lake.

Earlier this week, forecasters predicted that lake levels could rise as much as three metres by the end of June. [...]

Leading environmentalist Professor Tim Flannery has warned that Australia is now entering long-term climate change, which could cause longer and more frequent droughts.

He also predicts that the ongoing drought could leave Sydney's dams dry in just two years.

Professor Flannery, who is the director of the South Australian Museum, has told ABC TV's Lateline that global warming is threatening Australia's chance of returning to a regular rainfall pattern.

"Three major phenomena are depriving Australia of its rainfall," he said.

"One of them is just simply the shifting weather patterns as the planet warms up, so the tropics are expanding southwards and the winter rainfall zone is sort of dropping off the southern edge of the continent."

He says the second phenomena is disturbances in the ozone layer.

"That is causing wind speeds around Antarctica to increase and, again, drawing that winter rainfall to the south," he said.

The third phenomena, which Professor Flannery says is the most worrying, is the recurring El Nino weather pattern.

"That's occurring as the Pacific Ocean warms up, and we're seeing much longer El Ninos than we've seen before and often now back-to-back el Ninos with very little of the La Nina cycle, the flood cycle, in between," he said.

Professor Flannery says that all adds up to back-to-back droughts, and if he had a say he would ration water use.

"If you think there's only a 10 per cent chance that this rainfall deficit's going to continue for another few years, you'd be pulling out all stops to preserve water," he said.

"Because every litre you use now on your car, or your garden or whatever else, you might want to drink in a year's time." [...]

BHUBANESWAR, India - The death toll due to the heatwave sweeping most of central and southern India climbed to at least 65 on Sunday with 30 new deaths reported from eastern Orissa state, officials said.

At least 54 people have died in Orissa where vast swathes of the rural landscape have seen temperatures soaring to 49 degrees Celsius (120.2 degrees Fahrenheit) The worst affected districts were Titlagarh and Talcher with the elderly and children making up most of the dead, said a state government official who requested anonymity.

He said authorities were investigating whether more people may have died as unofficial reports have put the death toll at over 100 in the state.

Forecasters say the heat wave is likely to last another two days.

The other heat-related deaths were reported in western Maharashtra and southern Andhra Pradesh states where more than 1,400 people died due to severe heat conditions in 2003.

India's seasonal monsoon rains hit the southernmost state of Kerala last week but it would take another fortnight for them to reach the sun-scorched central and northern states, according to weather forecasters.

As people in Ontario and Quebec suffer through the first heat wave of the season, Environment Canada is projecting abnormally high temperatures this summer across the country.

"The dice are loaded to give you a warmer summer, so get used to it," said David Phillips, a spokesman for the agency.The darker the colour on this map, the more likely an area is to see above-average temperatures this summer, according to Environment Canada.

"We're going to see a lot of this, this summer."

It's been more than five days since Southern Ontario and parts of Quebec first faced temperatures that approached or topped 30 C – which felt like 41 because of the humidity.

That's about 10 degrees hotter than normal.

Environment Canada said that on Sunday, temperatures reached 30 C in Toronto, 31 C in Ottawa and 32 C in Montreal. [...]

A cyclone hit a village in eastern Georgia, tearing roofs off houses, tossing people into the air and injuring 13, emergency response officials said Monday.

Tamaz Apakidze, an official in the emergencies department of the Georgian Interior Ministry, said that the cyclone Sunday in the village of Iormuganlo in the Sagaredzhoisky region, about 80 kilometres (50 miles) north-east of the capital Tbilisi, threw about 40 people several meters (yards) into the air.

Six of the injured were hospitalised. Several dozen domestic animals were killed and houses were severely damaged, he said.

"It happened all of a sudden, and lasted three or four minutes, according to witness accounts," Apakidze said.

Dozens of houses, kilometres (miles) of roads and a bridge were destroyed in a deluge in the same region of Georgia, said Georgy Natsvlishvili, a deputy from the Sagaredzhoisky region.

He said the heavy rains had prevented officials from visiting the affected villages to make a fuller accounting.

TAIPEI : Floods caused by torrential rains have claimed three lives and forced authorities to evacuate hundreds of residents from low-lying areas in Taiwan, officials said.

A 65-year-old woman was buried alive by a mudslide at Tsochen, a mountainous town in the southern county of Tainan, the National Fire Agency said Monday. It added that the body of a 24-year-old motorcyclist who was washed away in the southern county of Pingtung on Sunday had been found.

Another man was killed in Pingtung when he tried to disconnect a plug in his flooded home and was electrocuted.

Thousands of homes in Pingtun were cut off by the floods and the military evacuated hundreds of people including an elderly people's home.

Agriculture authorities said dozens of southern mountainous villages were at risk of landslides. The Central Weather Bureau warned of persistent torrential rain over the next few days.

Two airports in Pingtung were closed and landslides blocked roads. Some schools in Pingtung and the nearby county of Kaohsiung were closed.

TAIPEI - As flooding overwhelmed towns and rural areas in the south, the death toll from four days of torrential rains rose to five, rescue officials said yesterday.

Officials at the Emergency Response Center counted three more victims late Monday, including a 15-year-old boy who was swept off his bicycle in Tainan County.

Other victims were a 73-year-old man buried by landslides in Pingtung County, and a 34-year-old Pingtung resident who died of electrocution after water swept through his home, center officials said.

On Sunday, a 65-year-old woman was killed when a landslide triggered by rains buried her house in Tainan County, and a 24-year-old motorist was swept away by floods in Kaohsiung County, the officials said.

Many residential areas in the south have been submerged in flood waters since Saturday. Several towns in Pingtung County have registered up to 100cm of rain over the past four days, the Central Weather Bureau said.

The heavy rains also wreaked havoc on traffic, with landslides cutting off roads near Alishan, officials said.

Television stations showed footage of rescue workers wading through swollen rivers, and people cleaning up their homes. Ferry services between southern Taiwan and the small island of Hsiao Liuchiu resumed after a three-day hiatus, allowing hundreds of tourists to return to China.

The Central Weather Bureau said torrential rains would continue to batter the south at least until the weekend, before expanding to central Taiwan. [...]

A woman died after flood hit Dusheti district in Mtskheta-Mtianeti region of northern Georgia late on June 15, Governor of the region Vasil Maglaperidze told Imedi television.

"Two hours of heavy rains caused mud flood in Dusheti itself, as well as in the villages of the Dusheti district. The scale of this disaster is much larger than of flooding which occurred in Dusheti couple of days ago," Maglaperidze said.

One man died and at least 40 houses were flooded overnight on June 14 after heavy rains there.

(China) - A rare inundation killed three people and left four others injured in northwestern Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region on Monday afternoon, the local government said yesterday morning. The huge flood following a one-hour rainstorm destroyed buildings and irrigation works in Huocheng County of Ili Kazak Autonomous Prefecture. The four injured were hospitalized and are out of danger.

(Toronto) - Ambulance calls have spiked as the extreme heat alert entered its fourth day yesterday, the longest period of dangerous heat since Toronto implemented response plans to deal with such emergencies five years ago.

AccuWeather predicted temperatures would hit 28 C today before cooling off to 23 C tomorrow.

Toronto paramedics responded to 613 calls on Sunday, an increase of 75 calls over the average of the previous four Sundays, said Dean Shaddock, a community medicine program co-ordinator with the ambulance service.

Shaddock was speaking at a news conference called yesterday by the city's medical officer of health to warn people about the health dangers of the hot, humid conditions. [...]

(Spain) - The drought conditions are it seems worsening rapidly in the Segura valley in the north of Spain. A continued lack of rain in the area has driven local reservoirs down to the current level of just 15.9% capacity. Minister for the Environment, Cristina Narbona, has commented that this year is proving the driest nationally for the past 60 years, and has warned too that it could be the first of an extended dry period. Nationally the reservoirs are now at 57.1% capacity – a fall of 1.1% over the last week.

The "plan for action" to tackle climate change for the G8 summit next month has been drastically watered down following Tony Blair's visit to Washington, according to a leaked draft.

The new text has been stripped of commitments to fund programmes that appeared in a previous leak of the communiqué, which was dated 3 May. In the new document, of 14 June, some key phrases appear only in square brackets, indicating that their inclusion is in dispute, while other important sentences have been taken out altogether.

In this week's version, even the phrase "our world is warming" has been placed in square brackets. The sentence, referring to the rise in the earth's temperature: "We know that the increase is due in large part to human activity" has been relegated to square brackets, as has: "The world's developed economies have a responsibility to show leadership."

Catherine Pearce, the international climate campaigner at Friends of the Earth, said: "The new text is really attacking the whole science on climate change. The previous text was weak but at least it recognised the science. The US administration has hacked the text to pieces. I just don't know where we can go from here."

Stephen Tindale, the executive director of Greenpeace and a former adviser to Tony Blair, said: "President Bush is an international menace. Blair says climate change is the gravest threat we face but it seems his friend in the White House refuses even to admit the world is warming." [...]

Ms Pearce said: "Every reference to the urgency of action or the need for real cuts in emissions has been deleted or challenged. Nothing in this text recognises the scale or urgency of the crisis of climate change. If they can't do better than this, the outcome of G8 summit will be worse than hot air: it will be a backward step in international climate change policy, simply adding to climate injustice." [...]

The May text had a number of commitments for expenditure of unspecified amounts, which have disappeared from the new version. So have previous G8 commitments, for instance, to fund developing countries to "assess opportunities for bio-energy" and "a fund to enable developing countries to participate in relevant international research projects" are gone. Also deleted are previous monetary commitments to "the development of markets in sustainable energy" in poor countries and funding for "fully operational regional climate centres in Africa".

Analysts said the new text amounted to a serious blow for Tony Blair, who has made progress on climate change one of the two big themes for the meeting of world leaders due to be held at Gleneagles Hotel in July - the other being help for Africa. A spokeswoman for Downing Street, said: "We don't comment on any leaked document. We are focussed on the action that gets delivered at the G8 and we not provide a commentary on on-going discussions."

The Bush administration has consistently questioned the mainstream climate science that shows the world is warming due to human activity. It wants to wait for unspecified technological breakthroughs to solve the problem.

Hurricanes are likely to get more extreme as a result of climate change, say scientists.

Computer models of the Earth's water cycle suggest that hurricanes will intensify as warmer temperatures draw more ocean water into the atmosphere.

The research follows a record number of hurricanes affecting Florida and typhoons striking Japan last year.

Kevin Trenberth, a researcher at the National Centre for Atmospheric Research in Colorado, who led the research, said warmer seas and increased atmospheric water vapour would add energy to the showers and thunderstorms that fuel hurricanes. "Computer models also suggest a shift ... toward extreme hurricanes," he said.

Most of the hurricanes that strike the US coastline are formed in the tropical north Atlantic, where sea-surface temperatures over the past decade have been the warmest on record.

"Over the 20th century, water vapour over the global oceans increased by 5% and that probably relates to about a 5% increase in intensity and probably a 5% increase in heavy rainfalls," says Dr Trenberth, whose research is published today in Science. "That relates directly to the flooding statistics."

Present models suggest a 7% increase in the moisture in the atmosphere for every degree celsius that the earth warms. As the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere increases and global temperatures rise, so the amount of water in the atmosphere goes up.

However, the effect of climate change on hurricane numbers and landfalls is uncertain, said Dr Trenberth.

Models disagreed on how global warming might affect the wind sheer that can either support or discourage hurricane formation.

The number of hurricanes and typhoons tends to hold steady from year to year. When activity increases in the Atlantic, it often decreases in the Pacific, and vice versa. So, it is hard to make long term predictions on the number of storms or how they will move.

"There is no sound theoretical basis for drawing any conclusions about how anthropogenic climate change affects hurricane numbers or tracks, and thus how many hit land," said Dr Trenberth.

(CNN) -- Millions of people could lose their homes and livelihoods as the world's deserts expand because of climate change and unsustainable human activities, an environmental report warned on Friday.

The report, part of a series examining the state of the world's biological resources, was released on the eve of "World Day to Combat Desertifcation," which marks the 11th anniversary of a UN agreement to tackle spreading deserts.

But Zafar Adeel of the United Nations University International Network on Water, Environment and Health, an expert on water management and a leading author of the report, warned that more needed to be done to combat desertification.

"Desertification has emerged as a global problem affecting everyone," said Adeel. "There are serious gaps in our understanding of how big deserts are, and how they are growing."

Drylands, which range from "dry sub-humid" to "hyper-arid" regions, make up more than 40 percent of the world's land surface and are home to two billion people. The largest area stretches from Saharan Africa across the Middle East and Central Asia into parts of China.

Most of Australia is also classified as drylands, along with much of the western U.S., parts of southern Africa, and patches of desert in South America.

The report said that that up to 20 percent of those areas had already suffered some loss of plant life or economic use as a consequence of desertification.

It said that global warming was likely to exacerbate the problem, causing more droughts, heat waves and floods.

But human factors have also played their part, with over-grazing, over-farming, misuse of irrigation and the unsustainable demands of a growing population all contributing to environmental degradation.

Adeel warned that some of the world's poorest populations were likely to be among the worst affected, with large swathes of Central Asia and the areas to the north and south of the Sahara in danger of becoming unsuitable for farming.

"Without strong efforts to reverse desertification, some of the gains we've seen in development in these regions may be reversed," he said.

Desertification has also been linked to health problems caused by dust storms, poverty and a drop in farm production, with infant mortality in drylands double the rate elsewhere in developing nations.

But the problem causes dangerous changes to the environment on a global scale, the report warned, with dust storms in the Gobi and Sahara deserts blamed for respiratory problems in North America and damage to coral reefs in the Caribbean. Scientists estimate that a billion tons of dust from the Sahara are lifted into the atmosphere each year.

While very difficult to reverse, the report said that specific local strategies should be employed to tackle spreading deserts. Alternative livelihoods such as ecotourism and fish farming could provide an alternative to intensive crop farming, while better management of crops and irrigation and the adoption of alternative energy sources such as solar power would all contribute to environmental sustainability.

The first Millennium Ecosystem Assessment report, released in March, warned that approximately 60 percent of the ecosystem supporting life on Earth was being degraded or used unsustainably and that the consequences of degradation could grow significantly worse in the next half century.

Residents hit by flash floods that struck North Yorkshire are beginning a massive clean-up operation.

Villages were cut off, roads washed away and nine people were reported missing during a night of heavy storms.

Two RAF helicopters were scrambled to rescue the missing people when they were tracked down in the market town of Helmsley, which was worst hit.

The flooding followed a weekend of high temperatures across the UK which left four people dead from drowning.

In Yorkshire, drivers were forced to abandon their cars and climb trees to escape rising waters after the River Rye burst its banks.

Boscastle fears over flash floods

The flood waters forced many residents to leave their homes and spend the night in the town hall.

The downpour over the North York Moors cut off a number of villages, with Thirsk, Carlton and Sutton-under-Whitestonecliffe among those affected.

Early on Monday, North Yorkshire Police said the A170 and B1257 roads remained closed. The bridge leading into Helmsley was described as looking perilous.

A spokesman said the roads would remain closed for "quite some time", although the flood waters had reached their peak just after 0130 BST and were "going down satisfactorily".

The storms first hit the area at about 1700 BST on Sunday. [...]

Residents of Drumheller are bracing for severe flooding Monday as water from the Red Deer River is expected to spill over the dikes and into the Alberta town.

Around 2,700 people had been evacuated Sunday night from the town, located northeast of Calgary, as crews raised the height of emergency dikes in areas most at risk for flooding.

Although Alberta Environment officials said the flows would be less than earlier forecasts had predicted, the town is still expected to be hit by the overflow of water.

Alberta has not seen a flood of this magnitude in 200 years, Environment Minister Guy Botillier told reporters in Red Deer on Sunday.

"In terms of the water flow and the magnitude and the intensity, what we are going to be facing in this area is going to be something that we've never witnessed before," he said.

Debris that dammed up in a tributary of the river is expected to ease some of the damage on Drumheller and spare Red Deer the severe flooding that had been predicted.

Few homes are situated right on the river in Red Deer and only about 15 families had been evacuated from their houses. [...]

Red Deer and Drumheller are the next southern Alberta communities to face flooding, while Edmonton and Drayton Valley to the north have now been issued flood warnings.

Alberta officials said the Red Deer River is expected to crest around
midnight in Red Deer and then after noon on Monday in Drumheller.

Evacuations are already underway in Drumheller, while some areas of
Red Deer have been issued evacuation alerts, meaning residents must be ready to leave their homes on an hours notice. [...]

Heavy rains and flooding prompted Calgary to announce a state of
emergency for the first time ever on Saturday.

Alberta has not seen a flood of this magnitude in 200 years,
Environment Minister Guy Botillier told reporters in Red Deer on Sunday.

Close to 2,000 Calgarians were forced from their homes Saturday night after the Glenmore reservoir spilled into the Elbow River.

BEIJING - Scorching temperatures baked northern China while the death toll from flooding in the rain-soaked south continued to rise as rivers swelled and threatened to break their banks, state media said.

Seven people were dead and one missing in severe rainstorms in the Guangxi autonomous region in southern China, while another three died in rains pounding Fujian province in the southeast, Xinhua news agency reported Tuesday.

Both places were covered by a rain belt hovering over much of south China with up to 203 millimeters (eight inches) of rain falling over the last three days in the worst-hit areas, it said.

The level of the Mingjiang river in Guangxi was up to three meters (10 feet) over the warning level, while other major rivers in southern provinces were approaching alert levels.

Torrential rains were forecast to continue through Friday in the Guangxi and Guizhou regions and were expected to stretch eastwards into Jiangxi, Guangdong, Fujian and Zhejiang provinces, the China News Service said.

At least 255 people have been reported dead due to heavy rains and flooding in parts of China since May.

Meanwhile, the death toll from a flash flood in northeastern China's Heilongjiang province on June 10 rose to 117, including 105 schoolchildren, as searchers found the remains of another eight people, Xinhua said.

Thousands of people perish every year from floods, landslides and mudflows in China, with millions left homeless. Officials have said this year's floods could be worse than usual.

A heatwave meanwhile scorched the northern half of the country, sending the mercury soaring above 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) in many places.

In Beijing temperatures reached 38 degrees while areas of Hebei, Shanxi and Shaanxi provinces sweltered in temperatures of 42 degrees, Xinhua said.

Worst hit is the farming town of Goulburn, population 25,000, southwest of Australia's biggest city, Sydney. Its main dam, Pejar, is a cracked-earth dustbowl holding less than 10 percent of its 1,000-megalitre (220-million-gallon) capacity.

The town will become the first in Australia to run out of water in six months, if it gets no substantial rain and if emergency action for new water supplies fails to work.

The worst drought in 100 years is forcing Australians to close the tap on profligate water use and turn treated waste, most of which flows into the sea, into drinking water. Some waste water is already recycled to irrigate gardens and sports fields and this is set to increase.

The cleanup is underway in Manitoba's Red River region in the wake of a major thunderstorm on Sunday.

A number of hydro lines were downed, trees were uprooted and the winds were so strong that train cars were pushed from their tracks.

Environment Canada is looking into several reports of tornado sightings.

In parts of Winnipeg winds were clocked at around 140 km/h. A number of homes, businesses and garages sustained damage but remarkably no one was hurt.

The National Weather Service is still trying to determine whether Saturday's severe thunderstorm that downed utility poles, knocked out power for 1,400 and ripped off part of a restaurant's roof west of Delray Beach was a tornado.

A meteorologist isn't expected until today to inspect the storm-hit area along West Atlantic Avenue just west of Florida's Turnpike, where authorities feared a tornado touched down during the 5:19 p.m. storm. [...]

The Tube is hotter and more humid than Hong Kong and Miami, an Evening Standard investigation has found. The combination of soaring temperatures and moist air means London commuters are enduring worse conditions than residents in sub-tropical zones. [...]

BEIJING, June 22 -- A heatwave gripped 13 provinces and regions across the country yesterday with the mercury hitting 42 C in some parts, meteorolical officials said. China's north, central, east, southwest and northwest regions were all sizzling hot.

Lethbridge, Alta. - Just days after heavy rains pummelled the area, severe weather again spawned tornadoes, hail and rain in southwestern Alberta.

Environment Canada reported several tornadoes were spotted near Vauxhall, Taber and Coalhurst on Tuesday.

There were no reports of damage or injuries.

Charmaine Weasel Fat said a tornado touched down in her father's field on the Blood reserve on Tuesday evening.

The funnel kicked up the dirt in the field, about 400 metres south of their home.

Ms. Weasel Fat and five other adults to grab the baby and leave the area.

"We just jumped in our vehicle and took off down the road," she said.

"You could see the dirt flying left and right and it was coming toward us. It was scary."

The funnel cloud came within six kilometres north of Taber, said Brad Mason, the town's emergency services director.

Vauxhall's fire chief Chuck Pozzo said if there was a tornado, it wasn't close to town.

He said he had no reports of damage.

"There was lots of hail, some the size of golf balls," he said. [...]

China has evacuated 100,000 residents of a southern city to escape a swollen river in one of three provinces where heavy rains have triggered landslides and floods killing more than 44 people.

Floodwaters forced the mass evacuation overnight of residents in low-lying areas of the industrial city of Wuzhou, where the Xijiang river had reached 25.74 meters by Tuesday night, more than eight meters higher than the warning level, state media said.

Notices on the mass evacuation were posted on walls, warning sirens blared in the dark of night and Wuzhou residents began to load up cars, trucks and carts with valuables and flee the area for higher ground.

"In the face of these floods, the attitude of the government is to make sure that no one is killed,'' Ren Kuikang, chief of the Wuzhou flood control and drought relief office, told state television.

With much of the south now under threat, Premier Wen Jiabao urged local governments to step up the fight against the flooding, which kills hundreds in the country each summer and causes millions of yuan in damage to homes and crops.

Earlier this month, a flash flood swept through a low-lying primary school in northeastern Heilongjiang province, killing 117 people, 105 of them children.

Flooding in Guangxi had killed 24 people and left 23 missing, Xinhua said, citing provincial flood control officials.

More than 330,000 people had been evacuated to higher ground in the region, where the flooding has caused 1.67 billion yuan (HK$1.57 billion) in economic losses, damaged 328,000 hectares of crops and toppled more than 20,000 houses, it said.

Flooding damaged another 50,000 houses regionwide.

Authorities had expected the Xijiang river, which has risen at a rate of 10 centimeters per hour, to peak Wednesday night at a hydrographic station in Wuzhou.

Heavy rains have killed nine people since Saturday in Guangdong, where a landslide disrupted traffic on a rail line linking the mainland with Hong Kong, Xinhua said.

Rainstorms in eastern Guangdong caused cave-ins on part of the Beijing-Kowloon railway line, forcing dozens of trains to either delay or turn back while repairs were made, it said.

Water levels on two other rivers in Guangxi - the Qianjiang and Xunjiang - were above warning levels and the province had suffered nearly US$45 million (HK$351 million) in economic losses as of Monday due to the recent deluges, Xinhua said.

While the south is suffering a deluge, much of northern China is sweating through a heat wave, which has driven temperatures to nearly 40 degrees in Beijing and convinced the southwestern city of Chongqing to open air raid shelters to provide shady relief.

YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK, Wyo. -- Lightning struck near a boardwalk Tuesday where a crowd had gathered to watch an eruption of the Old Faithful Geyser, injuring 11 people, one seriously.

The lightning bolt hit the ground in front of the geyser, near the Old Faithful Visitor Center, said park spokeswoman Cheryl Matthews. It did not strike anyone directly.

The most badly injured was a 12-year-old boy. Two doctors and a nurse were among the visitors and resuscitated him, and he was flown to a hospital in Idaho Falls.

The other 10 people were cared for at the scene, Matthews said.
The lightning was part of an intense mid-afternoon storm that also produced heavy rain and hail.

Five popular High Sierra camps in Yosemite National Park will remain closed all summer because of heavy snow, which is still piled up to 15 feet deep, the park announced Tuesday.

It's only the second time since 1916 that the camps have not been able to open, according to a spokeswoman for the concession company that operates them. The first was in the El Niño year of 1996.

The closing does not affect campgrounds on the Yosemite Valley floor, where most park visitors stay. But it is a blow to the more than 4,300 hikers who won High Sierra camp reservations in an annual lottery. [...]

MORONGO VALLEY, Calif. (AP) - The first major wildfire of the summer raced across more than 5,500 acres of tinder-dry desert brush, destroying at least seven homes, threatening hundreds of others and sending residents of this sparsely populated Mojave Desert community fleeing for their lives.

A second fire, about 35 miles away, burned across more than 2,000 acres but did not threaten any structures, authorities said. The larger blaze started when a single home went up in flames Wednesday afternoon and those flames quickly spread into nearby desert brush and tall field grass.

Elsewhere, fire crews fought back fast-moving flames approaching Arizona communities near the Tonto National Forest. Two lightning-sparked brush fires blackened 12,500-acres, forcing the evacuation of 175 people from homes in the area. No injuries were reported. [...]

Paris - With tens of thousands of deaths in a sizzling summer of 2003 still fresh on people's minds, Europe suffered in a new heat wave Tuesday, the first day of summer, while farmers warned of a historic drought.

In Paris, the health ministry ordered authorities in three counties to activate their heat wave plans after they were informed that "the current wave could present a health risk for the population as of June 21."

Record temperatures for mid-June have been registered in northern France, with the thermometer registering 35.7 degrees Celsius (97 F) on the outskirts of Paris Monday.

The heat has already killed a 41-year-old marathon runner who died in hospital after collapsing during the 24th kilometer (15th mile) of a race at the picturesque Mont Saint Michel in Normandy on Sunday.

Also worried were farmers in Portugal, where rising temperatures are likely to worsen an already stinging drought - the worse the country has seen in 60 years.

According to the national water institute, as of mid-June 50 percent of mainland Portugal is suffering from extreme drought, and another 30 percent is witnessing a "severe" drought. [...]

Severe drought state could occur within 2 weeks

June, at least according to the Specialty Tea Institute, is National Iced Tea Month.

Unfortunately, that's about the only thirst-quenching thing going for a month that's been so dry only a flood insurer could love it.

Indeed, with no more rain this month - and chances are close to nil for at least the next several days - Houston would set a record for the driest June since annual data collection began in 1889.

At Bush Intercontinental Airport just 0.08 inches have fallen, about the thickness of a nickel. The record for June is 0.12 inches, set in 1934 during the Dust Bowl era.

And although it hasn't been the hottest month ever, daily highs and lows have been, on average, 2 or 3 degrees above normal for the region. [...]

FORT WALTON BEACH, Fla. (AP) -- A foot-tall cross washed away from a ground-floor condominium unit during Hurricane Ivan's storm surge last September was washed back ashore when Tropical Storm Arlene hit the Panhandle earlier this month.

As Island Echoes condominium workers watched Arlene roll in June 11, they noticed an object that had been swept in by the oncoming water.

"I looked down and said, 'Pick up the cross,' " recalled general manager Phyllis Shanks.

For all she knew the cross could have come from anywhere, but a closer look showed "1E" inscribed on the bottom of its pedestal. Shanks then suspected it must have come from the Island Echoes because other nearby condos number their units differently.

Unit owners Dean and Ruth Lindsey, of Carmel, Ind., were stunned when they got an e-mail from Shanks about the cross being found.

"It was amazing," Ruth Lindsey said. "It's the most miraculous thing I've ever seen."

The couple leave it in the condo when they return to Indiana after spending the winter in the Florida Panhandle and will do so again. They say summer tourists who rent the unit are respectful of it.

"Maybe that cross will protect us," Ruth Lindsey said. "We just assumed everything was gone. All the furniture (in the condo) was smashed against the wall."

Ecudaor - Before the arrival of Spanish colonisers some 500 years ago, Indians in what is now Ecuador dipped their arrowheads in venom extracted from the phantasmal poison frog to doom their victims to convulsive death, scientists believe.

More recently, epibatidine -- the chemical which paralysed and killed the Indians' enemies -- has been isolated to produce a pain killer 200 times more powerful than morphine, but without that drug's addictive and toxic side effects.

Pharmaceutical companies have not yet brought epibatidine to market but hope to discover other chemicals with powerful properties in frogs, which are a traditional source of medicine and food for many of Ecuador's Indians.

They may want to hurry because the treasure trove of the world's frogs and toads is disappearing at a catastrophic rate. And it's not just potential medicines which could be vanishing but creatures of beauty.

"Frogs and toads are becoming extinct all over the world. It's the same magnitude event as the extinction of the dinosaurs," said Luis Coloma, a herpetologist, or scientist dedicated to studying reptiles and amphibians, in Ecuador -- the country with the third greatest diversity of amphibians

LONDON - People living in southern and central England were warned on Wednesday to stay indoors and avoid afternoon exercise for the next three days as the heatwave triggered a dangerous summer smog.

The Department of the Environment said the smog -- caused by heat and sunlight acting on air pollution to produce atmospheric ozone -- would last until Saturday when more changeable weather is expected to return.

KELSO, Calif. - Firefighters struggled to surround a 52,000-acre wildfire in a southeast California wilderness preserve that includes horse corrals from the 1870s, historic mines and sites with ancient Indian pictographs.

Meanwhile, Arizona residents who fled a wind-blown blaze began returning home Friday as a more than 60,000-acre blaze turned away from their upscale community northeast of Phoenix.

And in southern Nevada, 19 blazes charred nearly 54,000 acres of parched grass, desert shrubs and mountain pines, casting a pall of smoke over the Las Vegas Strip.

The wildfire in the rugged Mojave National Preserve was only 10 percent contained late Friday with no estimate on when it might be brought under control, said Capt. Greg Cleveland, a spokesman for the Southern California Incident Management Team.

Lightning strikes had sparked five separate fires earlier in the week in the preserve near the Nevada state line, Cleveland said. Several of the fires then merged, prompting residents in the region's Fourth of July Canyon and Round Valley areas to evacuate. The exact number of evacuees was not immediately known.

The fires destroyed five homes, six trailers and other structures and damaged some historic ranch homes, Cleveland said. Officials could not immediately say if any of the archaeological sites also were damaged. More than 500 firefighters battled the flames.

Elsewhere in California, firefighters were encircling two fires totaling more than 5,000 that also ignited earlier in the week. One, a 3,022-acre fire, destroyed six houses and one other structure in the Morongo Valley.

In Arizona, many residents of an upscale community north of Phoenix found their homes intact but others saw houses and cabins reduced to piles of ash with only the chimneys standing. [...]

In Nevada, authorities said they could not predict when most of the 19 fires burning there might be brought under control. The
National Weather Service warned of hazardous fire conditions after predicting triple-digit temperatures, low humidity and gusty winds for Friday.

"It's extremely bad weather for fire behavior," said Heather Davis, a weather service forecaster in Las Vegas. She said 10- to 20-mph winds were expected to gust to 35 mph through Saturday.

CLAUDE, TX -- A massive crack in the earth opened up last week in Claude, Texas and its creating a stir among geologists.

Geologists said Tuesday the crack was a joint in the earth's crust. They believe the opening is the result of a weak point in the joint where one spot slips away from the other.

Some parts measure more than 30-feet deep and it drained what use to be a pond. Experts say earth cracks are common but the size of the crack in Claude is not.

BEIJING - China braced for the start of the rainy season along the flood-prone Yangtze river as the death toll from torrential downpours this year jumped to 567 with at least 165 more missing.

Although the relentless rains in southern parts of the country were expected to ease, water levels on the Pearl river remained at record highs as they surged toward the regional capital of Guangzhou, flood control officials said.

Guangdong provincial governor Huang Huahua urged the government to fast-track relief efforts throughout the province, including Guangzhou, which was experiencing the worst rains in 90 years.

Across the border from Guangdong, heavy rains pounded Hong Kong, bringing flooding and landslides as well as traffic gridlock. Flights were delayed and ferry services cancelled while primary schools suspended classes.

Major flooding across China this year has so far wreaked economic losses valued at 22.9 billion yuan (2.76 billion dollars), with more than 44 million people affected, the civic affairs ministry's flood headquarters said.

At least 2.45 million people have been evacuated.

"From the overall situation, the losses brought on this year by flood disasters is on the same level as what we experienced in the 1990s, but still lighter than the big disaster years of 1991 and 1998," the ministry said. [...]

"According to past experience, at the end of June the rain belt moves northward toward the Yangtze river, but this year from what we have seen it is late and the rain belt has remained over Guangxi and Guangdong," a researcher surnamed Zhang at the National Climate Center told AFP. [...]

Thunderstorms and torrential rain were today threatening to turn this year's Glastonbury Festival into a wash-out.

Thousands of music fans arriving at the Worthy Farm site in Somerset last night were greeted with heavy downpours and even lightning as the glorious sunshine came to an abrupt end.

Weather forecasters have warned an expected crowd of around 150,000 to prepare for a mud bath – as rain threatens to waterlog the site and turn camp sites into bogs.

Festival organiser Michael Eavis said he was keeping his fingers crossed that there would be no repeat of the infamous mudfest of 1997.

He said: "It's really starting to rain now. I can hear thunder. But it's different from 1997 when the site was very muddy. We've had four or five days of good weather so the ground is firm.

"We've also spent a lot of money on the drainage, so the main site should be okay. I don't know if the weather might spoil it but we'll just have to see."

US rock duo White Stripes are headlining the event tonight on the main Pyramid stage. On the other is Fatboy Slim, and festival-goers can also see The Tears - former Suede bandmates Brett Anderson and Bernard Butler – on the John Peel stage.

Coldplay and Basement Jaxx will headline on Saturday and Sunday respectively at this year's festival.

The festival, which first began in 1970, boasts 11 stages and more than 200 performers, ranging from the well-established to untested and quirky newcomers.

PARIS - A violent electrical storm struck the Paris region on Thursday, flooding hundreds of houses, disrupting two lines on the metro system and causing delays at the city's two main airports.

Elsewhere, lightning struck an electrical centre in Switzerland, blocking about 100 trains in the second major breakdown to hit the Swiss railway system in two days.

The Paris fire department said it had received about 500 calls because of flooded basements, fallen trees and short circuits.

In the surrounding Essone and Yvelines regions, firemen were called out on hundreds of other emergencies.

In the old royal court city of Versailles, firemen attended about 300 emergency calls.

No casualties were reported, but a motorcyclist had to be rescued when he was engulfed by water under a Paris road tunnel.

Officials at Charles de Gaulle and Orly airports said all flights had to be suspended for more than hour, but they said the situation returned to normal later in the evening.

Determined to prevent a repetition of a heatwave disaster two years ago in which thousands of elderly people died, Health Minister Xavier Bertrand, said he would announce improvements in a nationwide emergency system next week, including a requirement that all establishments for the elderly should be provided with at least one air-conditioned room.

He also said his ministry would publish an additional six million copies of a leaflet telling elderly people how to avoid become heatwave victims. Three million copies of the document have already been distributed.

Heatwave protection was stepped up to the third of four levels in three eastern regions of France, putting hospitals on alert and requiring social workers to make contact with members of the public at risk from heat-stroke. [...]

PASCAGOULA, Miss. - Through mid-July, scientists from NOAA's National Coast Data Development Center and the agency's Fisheries Service at Stennis Space Center will look at data about dissolved oxygen from the "dead zone" areas in the Gulf of Mexico.

The scientists believe the zone forms in June and stretches 5,000-square-miles from the mouth of the Mississippi River toward the Texas coast.

The condition, known as hypoxia, occurs when the amount of dissolved oxygen in the water is too low to support most marine life. The scientists say the trend has increased dramatically since studies first began in the early 1980s.

Researchers believe the dead zone is caused by an influx of polluted freshwater from the Mississippi and Atchafalaya rivers. Freshwater floats over salt water and acts as a barrier to oxygen. Meanwhile, pollution flows from the rivers into the Gulf, creating algae plumes that further choke off the oxygen.

"The science community is determined to find the causes and impacts of hypoxia to marine life in the Gulf," said Gregory W. Withee, assistant administrator for NOAA Satellite and Information Service, NCDDC's lead agency.

The scientists, aboard the NOAA vessel, Oregon II, will study the Gulf waters from Brownsville, Texas, to the mouth of the Mississippi River. The team will measure seawater temperatures, salinity, chlorophyll and dissolved oxygen levels at more than 200 locations.

During its four-week study, the scientists will continually generate new maps and provide that data on the Internet. The first map will look at the continental shelf from Brownsville to Corpus Christi, Texas and the final maps will look at the Texas-Louisiana coast.

SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador - Heavy rains caused flooding and landslides in El Salvador and Honduras, leaving a total of 39 dead in both countries, including 21 people killed when a bus was carried away by flood waters.

Authorities were still searching for nine people missing after the bus was engulfed late Sunday 35 miles west of San Salvador. It was carrying home a total of about 40 players and fans of a nonprofessional soccer team called Los Leones. Ten passengers have been found alive.

In towns west and southwest of the capital, seven people were killed in landslides and three people were killed when their homes were carried away by flood waters.

In neighboring Honduras, officials said eight people died and 200 homes were damaged during three days of flooding.

ROME, ITALY -- Italy's health minister said Monday that a heat wave linked to at least seven deaths is putting the lives of 1 million elderly Italians at risk and announced steps to protect people older than 80 who live alone.

Health Minister Francesco Storace said Italian authorities want to avoid a repeat of the fatalities of the summer of 2003, when a prolonged heat wave in Europe was blamed for thousands of deaths. Many of those who died were elderly people who lived alone.

"We are alarmed," Storace said at a news conference outlining the measures, which include allowing health clinics access to lists of names of those most at risk--people older than 80 who live alone and who have had repeated recent hospitalizations.

The measures also include house calls on those at risk, TV and radio spots reminding people to drink lots of water and stay inside during the hottest hours, and a toll-free number offering advice on how to cope.

Northern Italy has been hit hardest by the heat wave, with temperatures in Milan, Florence and Turin rising above 95 degrees.

Islamabad -- A scorching heat wave sweeping Pakistan has killed at least 196 people, with 120 of the casualties occurring in the worst-hit Punjab province.

There seems to be no early end to the people's miseries as monsoon rains are nowhere in sight, Dawn Tuesday quoted weather and health officials as saying.

Ten deaths occurred in Sindh till Monday evening, taking the toll in the province to about 55.

The highest temperature of 52 degrees Celsius recorded during the heat wave was in Jacobabad in Sindh on Friday.

Conditions had eased in about a third of the area hit by the heat wave but the high temperatures would persist elsewhere till at least Wednesday evening.

June and July are traditionally the country's hottest months before seasonal rains bring relief before a mild autumn.

Hot weather in neighbouring Afghanistan had melted snow on the Hindukush mountains, flooding rivers there and in Pakistan's North-West Frontier Province, where about 300 families have been displaced by the swirling waters.

ILLINOIS - A heat wave across the region is believed to have caused the death of an elderly Alton woman over the weekend.

Mabel Fish, 70, was found dead in her home at 624 Shepherd St. in Alton on Saturday by a family member, police said. [...]

ONTARIO SUCKED up record levels of electricity to beat the heat yesterday as striking Hydro One workers continued targeting generators that are running flat out to feed air conditioners.

Late yesterday afternoon, electricity consumption soared past the previous provincial record, surpassing Ontario's home-grown supply and forcing power officials to import expensive electricity from neighbouring U.S. states and provinces.

The previous record for hourly consumption was set on Aug. 13, 2002, when 25,414 megawatts were consumed. By 6 p.m. yesterday, usage had edged above the 26,000-megawatt mark.

The difference between yesterday's consumption and the previous record represents almost enough electricity to power a city the size of London, Ont., according to one system official. "Although the system is strained, no question, we can meet demand," said Terry Young, spokesman for the Independent Electricity System Operator.

ANOTHER RECORD TODAY?

Yesterday's record, however, may not last long. The heat wave carries on through the week and air conditioners will work even harder to keep buildings cool. "We could be looking at another record (today)," Young said.

A new report by the IESO warns the province will continue to be reliant on its neighbours for power during the hot days until more local generation is up and running.

Ontario Power Generation managed to keep its available turbines cranking out hydro through the day, despite picket lines being set up outside two stations early in the morning.

Over 2,000 megawatts were being imported during the day. [...]

INDIANA - When a heat wave hits, people can hide inside with an air conditioner, or hit the mall in search of cooler climes.

For plants, trees and field crops, there is literally no place to go.

"If you drive around and take a look at any of the fields you'll see the corn is rolling up in the afternoon to protect itself," said Mike Hanley, manager of Jasper County's Kersey grain elevator near DeMotte. "Plants shut down in hot weather to protect themselves, just like we would, and don't grow."

Hanley said the dry spring and summer haven't helped plants, but the heat makes prospects worse.

"We know some damage has already been done by the heat, not just by it being dry. It cuts yields back, but as to how much damage has been done, it's a guessing game.

"Anybody that has irrigation is running it and that's a cost to farmers, too, that will come out of the bottom line later."

Ken Scheeringa, an associate state climatologist at Purdue University, said this year's dry spell qualifies as a "moderate drought," but is hardly the worst Indiana has seen.

"The worst drought period we found was about 1930-1931. For the past few years we've been in an alternating pattern that either it's a little wet or it's a little dry.

"We're just bouncing back and forth on both sides of normal," Hanley said.

Between March and now, Northwest Indiana as a whole is 4.5 inches below normal rainfall levels, he said. [...]

Few things grab your nose's attention on a hot summer afternoon down by the creek quicker than the putrid odor of a dead carp.

But imagine 20,000 dead carp.

That is what the good folks on western New York's famous Chautauqua Lake are contending with right now - in the height of summer vacation season with the big Fourth of July holiday weekend looming.

"There is some odor, but they're trying to keep ahead of the game," explained Russ Biss, natural resources supervisor for the Allegany, N.Y., office of the state department of environmental conservation. "The Chautauqua Lake Association has been very active out there, picking up fish."

The rafts of dead carp are being buried in trenches next to the local landfill. "They're the big fish - 10, 15, 20 pounds up to 30 inches long," said Biss. "They're probably stressed from spawning."

Add in the sustained heat wave of air temperatures in the 90s, plus an outbreak of koi herpes virus in the lake's carp stock, and there you have it: Piles of dead fish.

No significant carp dieoffs have been noted in Lake Erie so far this year, said Jeff Tyson, supervisor of the Sandusky-based Lake Erie Fisheries Research Station of the Ohio Division of Wildlife. But he added that noteworthy numbers died a couple of summers ago. An exact cause could not be determined at the time.

Tyson noted that significant dieoffs of freshwater drum, or sheepshead, have occurred this summer, but those deaths likely are linked to post-spawn stress. Stress seems to cause a sizable drum dieoff about every third summer, the biologist said.

Koi, an Asian species commonly called "goldfish," are an aquacultural color variation of common carp. They vary in color from reddish-orange to orange and white with colored patches. They are popular in residential fish ponds and other ornamental ponds.

New York's Biss said that Chautauqua Lake, 17 miles long and covering some 13,000 acres, had a smaller oubreak with dying carp last summer. But a few thousand dead fish then have blossomed to an estimated 20,000 so far this summer. Again most of the outbreak is in the lake's relatively shallow southern basin, where it empties into the Chadakoin River. Water temperatures there this week are in the mid 70s. [...]

MIAMI - A tropical depression in the southwestern Gulf of Mexico developed Tuesday afternoon into Tropical Storm Bret - the second to form this month.

The storm was expected to move inland overnight between Veracruz and Tampico, Mexico; a tropical storm warning was posted for the area.

Forecasters said the storm could gain strength before it goes ashore Wednesday morning. Rain totals were estimated between 3-6 inches with higher amounts over mountainous regions.

By Tuesday evening, Bret was located about 60 miles north-northwest of Veracruz. It was moving west-northwest at about 5 mph with maximum sustained winds near 40 mph. The threshold for a tropical storm is 39 mph.

Forecasters said that since 1851, there have been only 12 years where two or more tropical storms formed in June - the first month of the hurricane season that ends Nov. 30.

Tropical Storm Arlene hit the Florida Panhandle earlier this month.

TUKTOYAKTUK, N.W.T. - On an intensely bright late-spring day, Abraham Klengenberg descends the short slope to the gravel beach, pushes his red canoe into the placid Arctic Ocean and paddles out to tend his fishing net.

Klengenberg, a 54-year-old Western Arctic Inuk, doesn't go far. The ice has just receded from this part of the sea. As it went out, it stirred the bottom sediments, turning the frigid near-shore water into a banquet table for fish.

An hour after the net is set, its marker buoys are under water, signalling it's heavy with five- to eight-kilogram whitefish and inconnu.

Soon, the catch is cleaned, split and hung over a simple drying rack. Later, it will be smoked.

Klengenberg - a wiry, weathered soft-spoken man - grew up in Tuktoyaktuk. His routine, like the sea's bounty, seems timeless and unchanging.

Except that now, to get to and from the beach, he must pick his way around and over large, angular chunks of stone known as riprap.

They were trucked in over the winter ice road from a quarry near Inuvik, about 100 kilometres to the southwest, at a cost of $600 to $1,000 a load.

Riprap now covers most of the shoreline of this ragged, dusty hamlet, a motley collection of houses, whose winter-blasted paint matches the greys and browns of treeless streets and yards. It's there to keep the land from being washed away as the sea level rises and storms hit with increasing ferocity.

Tuktoyaktuk housed one of the DEW Line radar sites installed in the 1950s to warn North America of aerial attacks from the Soviet Union. Its rows of jagged rock are an alarm signal for what most scientists insist is a far greater threat - climate change.

Carbon dioxide, methane and other "greenhouse" gases, produced mainly when humans burn fossil fuels such as oil and gas, are building up in Earth's atmosphere. Just like the glass in a greenhouse, they prevent the sun's heat from bouncing back into space.

The result is often called global warming, because Earth's average temperature is rising. Scientists prefer climate change, since the potential impacts go far beyond hotter summers and mild winters

It is, along with poverty in Africa, to dominate the agenda for next week's annual G-8 summit, July 6-8, where the leaders of Canada and seven other industrial nations are to meet at posh Gleneagles, Scotland.

Indications are the summit will generate little action on climate change. Although its host, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, has called it "probably, long-term, the single most important issue we face as a global community," the United States continues to reject targets and timetables for reducing emissions, and still insists there's no serious threat.

Few people in Tuktoyaktuk will be glued to their TV sets for summit coverage, but all of them know what they see outside their homes.

It's not just the rising water and more frequent storms. The ice breaks weeks earlier, and much faster, than it used to in spring, and forms more slowly each fall. The weather is less predictable. These are hazards for the many residents who still go out on the land to hunt seal, polar bears, muskox and caribou. The wind blows from the south more often. Long-time residents see grizzly bears, ravens, white-throated sparrows, chickadees and other creatures that never used to venture this far north. Shrubs are poking up beyond the tree line. Permafrost is starting to melt.

Tuktoyaktuk means, in the western Arctic language, "resembling a caribou." The animals are a major food source. The longer growing season produces more vegetation for them to eat. But the early thaw slows their trip to summer calving grounds on the Arctic coast, and calves born during migration are less likely to survive. Local researchers say one of the two local herds, the Porcupine, has dropped by 3 per cent a year for the past decade.

Klengenberg - like many people here a mix of Inuk and Caucasian blood - says he's not worried by the changes: "I just take it as it comes."

"Even Eskimos welcome the warmer summers," jokes his friend Charles Angun, 59, another lifelong resident who has gathered evidence that the sea ice is, on average, thinning.

Others in Tuk are less sanguine.

Jackie Jacobson, the 32-year-old mayor, points to a shoal that's barely visible in the water, 30 metres off the narrow, curved gravel spit that shelters the harbour. "When I was a kid, we would walk out to where the sand is," he says.

The spit itself is a small fraction of its former width and height. In a recent storm, waves crashed over it and across the harbour. "It's something when there's a storm and you see three- to four-foot rollers coming into the community," says Jacobson, big in size, energy and generosity, and wearing the North's trademark jeans, windbreaker and baseball cap.

He has pleaded with the cash-strapped Northwest Territories government for more riprap. He's received sympathy, but no rocks.

All this started happening 10 years ago, he says. "Scientists came up and said global warming is happening. Now you see the effects on the community."

In fact, signs are being noted around the world. [...]

Other signs seem more clearly tied to rising temperatures.

Increasing areas of the Arctic ice cap melt each summer, and the remaining ice is weaker.

In Alaska, buildings are sinking as permafrost melts.

Everywhere, glaciers are retreating. A study of 244 Antarctic glaciers found that 87 per cent have shrunk over the past 50 years. The Greenland ice sheet that spawns icebergs is sliding increasingly fast toward the sea on a new layer of melt-water.

Some of the most convincing evidence comes from complex scientific tests that measure tiny increments of change.

• Earth's temperature is rising. In the 20th century, the global average increased by about 0.6 degrees. The Arctic rose one degree. The warmest years have occurred in the past decade.
• The oceans have warmed by about half a degree in the past 40 years. Scientists say that's proof Earth now retains more energy from the sun than it emits into space. Some call this the "smoking gun" of climate change.
• Sea level has risen one to two millimetres a year since 1900. The average annual increase over the past 3,000 years was one-tenth as much.
• Subtle changes in temperature and salinity in the North Atlantic Ocean fit with predictions climate change will stop the northward flow of warm water that gives Britain and Europe their moderate climate. A British scientist this year found no sign of six of the eight columns of rising water that fuel the current. The eventual result might be an end to Europe's heat waves and colder weather.
• University of Alberta scientists have found increased diversity of microscopic plants and insects in the North, thanks mainly to a longer growing and ice-free season.

Some consequences are easy to forecast. The Arctic and Antarctic ice caps will keep melting. Because of that, and since water expands as it warms, sea levels will continue to rise, flooding coastlines and inundating low-lying islands.

But most potential impacts are complicated and, to some extent, unpredictable. Earth is governed by massive forces that work in a delicate balance: If one part of the system changes, everything does. [...]

THE STERKFONTEIN CAVES, South Africa (Reuters) -- Climate change in Africa gave rise to modern humans. Now experts fear that global warming linked to carbon emissions will have its worst impact on humanity's cradle.

"Africa is the most vulnerable continent to climate change," said Jennifer Morgan, director of the Global Climate Change Programme at conservation group WWF.

"Most African livelihoods depend on rain-based agriculture so droughts and floods will have a serious impact on the workforce," she said, adding that the continent's extreme poverty reduced its ability to cope.

Africa's plight will be high on the agenda of a Scottish summit of the Group of Eight industrialized nations next month which could herald increased aid flows to the region. [...]

Climate change in Africa prodded mankind's distant ancestors along their evolutionary path as forests gave way to grasslands, forcing early humans into an open environment where it appears stone tools and long strides first developed.

But while most past changes in weather patterns were gradual -- giving our prehistoric ancestors a chance to adapt -- the pace of global warming today could overwhelm modern Africa.

The United Nations projects that temperatures may rise by 1.4-5.8 Celsius by the year 2100.

A recent international report warned that millions of Africans could be driven from their homes by desertification. [...]

LONDON - Global temperatures in the future could be much hotter than scientists have predicted if new computer models on climate change are correct, researchers said on Wednesday. [...]

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) predicts a rise in global temperatures from a doubling of carbon dioxide could be in the range of 1.5-4.5 degrees Celsius by the end of the century. But according to calculations by Andreae and his team, the upper figure could be as high as 6 degrees.

"That's quite a lot," the professor from the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry in Mainz, Germany said in an interview. [...]

He admitted it was a situation of high scientific uncertainty. But if his calculations are correct, climate change in the 21 century could reach the upper extremes or exceed the IPCC estimates.

"Such a degree of climate change is so far outside the range covered by experience and scientific understanding that we cannot with any confidence predict the consequences for the Earth system," Andreae said in the journal.

Scientists have warned that severe climate change could lead to a rise in sea levels, flooding, severe droughts and the loss of crop and animals species.

SYDNEY - Two people were missing and about 3,300 people evacuated from rising floodwaters in eastern Australia on Thursday after storms lashed areas which had been suffering under the nation's worst drought in a century.

In the New South Wales state farming town of Lismore, about 600 km (370 miles) north of Sydney, 3,000 people began leaving their homes before floodwaters in the nearby Wilson River hit an expected peak of more than 10 meters (33 feet) late on Thursday.

Strong winds and flash flooding from storms overnight also caused widespread damage in neighboring Queensland state.

A search for a man and woman missing after their car was swept from a flooded causeway in Coomera on the Gold Coast tourist hub was suspended late on Thursday.

Lifeguards on jetskis had earlier joined police in searching for the couple, feared drowned.

Several other people were rescued from stranded cars and some homes were damaged but there were no injuries, officials said.

State Emergency Services spokesman Phil Campbell said at least another 325 people had been evacuated in small towns north of Lismore on the Tweed river near the border with Queensland.

Just two weeks ago farmers were dancing in the rain after downpours delivered the first heavy showers in more than four years to large areas of drought-ravaged eastern Australia. Australia is the world's second-largest wheat exporter after the United States and a major supplier to Asia and the Middle East. [...]

WASHINGTON - Hurricane activity has increased and is likely to remain high for a decade or more, the head of the National Hurricane Center said Wednesday.

From the 1970s to the mid-1990s the number of hurricanes was low, Max Mayfield told the Senate Commerce Science and Transportation Committee, but now frequency is increasing "and this period of heightened activity could last another 10 to 20 years."

Memories are still fresh of the four hurricanes that battered Florida last year. Forecasters predict 13 named storms, including seven hurricanes, could possibly threaten the U.S. Atlantic and Gulf coasts this year.

Indeed, Tropical Depression Bret is currently producing heavy rains in Mexico.

Mayfield said the cyclic increase in tropical storms is made more dangerous because of the growth in coastal populations in recent years. An estimated 85 percent of coastal residents have never experienced a major hurricane, he said. [...]

Asbury H. Sallenger of the U.S. Geological Survey added that the lack of experience with storms in recent years has resulted in construction of buildings that may not be able to stand up to them.

He pointed out the collapse of a five-story building in Orange Beach, Ala., when it was undermined by Hurricane Ivan.

Of special concern are the Florida Keys and New Orleans, where many people live in low-lying or below-sea-level areas that cannot be easily evacuated, Mayfield said. [...]

One of the first studies to examine how climate change might alter the land surface of Africa has been published by scientists from Oxford University.

Their research details how the immense dunefields of the Kalahari could be stirred up by global warming.

The investigation, reported in the journal Nature, warns that large areas of currently productive land could become engulfed by shifting sands.

"The social consequences of these changes could be drastic," they say.

The team, led by Professor David Thomas, urges politicians in the region not to pursue development policies that might exacerbate the coming problems, turning currently semi-arid areas into desert.

"We've seen in Botswana, for example, with European Union support, an enormous growth in livestock production using groundwater. That in itself has put great pressure on the Botswana landscape," Professor Thomas told BBC News.

"[The shifting sands] will make those Western-sponsored programmes very unsuccessful into the future." [...]

These dunes punctuate 2.5 million sq km of Africa - from the northern end of South Africa, right up through Angola, Botswana and Namibia, to western Zimbabwe and western Zambia.

They were built up thousands of years ago and are now reasonably well covered by vegetation.

But Professor Thomas and colleagues found that no matter which general climate model data they used, their simulator came out with projections for dramatic increases in dune "activity" - they will start to erode and move as precipitation falls and wind speeds increase.

The southern dunefields of Botswana and Namibia become activated by 2040, while the more northerly and easterly dunes in Angola, Zimbabwe and Zambia begin to shift significantly by 2070.

By the end of the 21st Century, all the dunes from South Africa to Zambia and Angola are likely to be reactivated.

Changing world

Tens or even hundreds of thousands of people would be affected by such changes, the team said.

"The Kalahari is a large area that supports a reasonably big rural population that lives by farming," Professor Thomas explained.

"It's these people who are vulnerable to their currently savannah-like environment becoming a rather more hostile, active, dune landscape than it is today.

He added: "There has been little work done on how the landscape is likely to evolve under climate change impacts.

"We've had a lot of work done on ice-cap melt and glacier retreat; there's been a lot of interest in changes around coastlines, particularly Europe and North America, and the low-lying islands of the Pacific, of course. But relatively little concern has been expressed with regard to the way the landscapes of Africa are likely to change in the 21st Century.

"What we're saying here is that these landscapes are potentially very dynamic and they can kick in with a form of activity that is rather hostile to farming."

The leaders of the major industrial countries, known as the G8, meet in Scotland on 6 July to discuss African development and climate change.

Last week, an alliance of 21 UK-based charities and environment groups issued a report which claimed any G8 strategy to alleviate poverty in Africa was doomed to failure unless urgent action was taken to halt climate change.

BRUSSELS - Torrential rain left parts of the main Paris-Brussels motorway underwater overnight, triggering huge traffic jams with motorists stuck for up to nine hours.

Flash flooding caused by storms was at its worst on the E19 motorway near Mons in southern Belgium, where a 600-metre stretch of highway was left under up to 1 metre of water.

The traffic jams, some dozens of kilometers long, started in the evening Wednesday.

Some drivers suffered breakdowns due to the wait and heat, or simply abandoned their vehicles, the Belga news agency reported Thursday.

Emergency teams were dispatched to pump water from the roadway until the early hours of the morning, when traffic flow returned to normal, it added.