Beverly Hammersmith loves horses. "Horses are the reason I get up in the morning," said Hammersmith.
That's true for her horses Fern and Lore. It was also true for her horse, Zip. A few weeks ago Hammersmith was woken up by a series of yips and then something that sounded like a scream. It was Zip.
"I looked out the window and I could see him trying to walk. And he was laying on his back," said Hammersmith.
The horse was trying to fight off what Hammersmith says was a pack of coyotes. Zip caught and broke his leg on a wire fence. There were bite marks on the horse. Within the hour, a veterinarian humanely euthanized the horse.
The bodies of two Cambodian men were sent back to the Kingdom yesterday from Thailand, where they were struck dead by lightning while working at a sugarcane plantation in Aranh district in Sa Kaeo province.
Chhun Chhit, police chief at the Malai border checkpoint, said the victims were identified as Eng Det, 25, and his nephew Eng Na, 20, both from Banteay Meanchey province's Malai district.
"According to the report we received from Aranh district authorities, the victims were struck dead by lightning while they were clearing grass in the sugarcane plantation," he said.
Eng Sokchea, 45, the brother of Deth and father of Na, who also works at the same plantation, said the incident took place at about 3:15pm on Tuesday.
The 5.8 magnitude quake hit off Bowen in state's north triggering evacuations in Cairns and Townsville but no serious injuries or damage reported
One of the more powerful earthquakes to strike Australia in recent years sent tremors along more than 1,000 km of the Queensland coastline on Thursday.
The 5.8 magnitude quake struck off the coast of Bowen in north Queensland around 2.30pm, triggering evacuations of buildings in Cairns and Townsville but with no reports of serious injuries or damage.
An interview recorded with Greg Williamson, the mayor of Mackay, by the Daily Mercury newspaper captured the sound of a shaking floor when the quake struck, prompting Williamson to ask: "Is that an actual earthquake?"
A strong storm in Canada Wednesday was easily the most interesting feature in satellite imagery, grabbing the attention of meteorologists and weather geeks alike.
This extratropical storm intensified Tuesday over Hudson Bay, eventually reaching peak strength Wednesday, before weakening Thursday.
A visible satellite image showed the storm's classic mature phase as a cold occlusion, with relatively cool air completely wrapped around the low center, and a trailing band of clouds ahead of the cold front, resembling an apostrophe or the number 9.
Here is what the frontal structure of this storm looked like Wednesday, courtesy of NOAA's Weather Prediction Center.
Comment: Elsewhere within the past year some record-breaking and rare storm events include:
July 2016: Hurricane drought in Gulf of Mexico hits a new record of three years - the longest streak in the past 130 years, since formal record-keeping began in 1886.
April 2016:Cyclone Fantala became the Indian Ocean's most powerful storm on record
February 2016: Cyclone Winston caused devastation in Fiji as the most-potent cyclone on record in the Southwest Pacific
January 2016:Hurricane Pali became the earliest-forming hurricane in either the Central or Northeastern Pacific, forming unusually close to the equator
January 2016:Hurricane Alex, a rare January storm in the Atlantic and the first storm of the 2016 Atlantic hurricane season
October 2015:Hurricane Patricia became the strongest-known storm in the Northeast Pacific
Wide-scale disruption from warming oceans is increasing, but they could change our understanding of the climate
First seabirds started falling out of the sky, washing up on beaches from California to Canada.
Then emaciated and dehydrated sea lion pups began showing up, stranded and on the brink of death.
A surge in dead whales was reported in the same region, and that was followed by the largest toxic algal bloom in history seen along the Californian coast. Mixed among all that there were population booms of several marine species that normally aren't seen surging in the same year.
Plague, famine, pestilence and death was sweeping the northern Pacific Ocean between 2014 and 2015.
This chaos was caused by a single massive heatwave, unlike anything ever seen before. But it was not the sort of heatwave we are used to thinking about, where the air gets thick with warmth. This occurred in the ocean, where the effects are normally hidden from view.
Nicknamed "the blob", it was arguably the biggest marine heatwave ever seen. It may have been the worst but wide-scale disruption from marine heatwaves is increasingly being seen all around the globe, with regions such as Australia seemingly being hit with more than their fair share.
It might seem strange given their huge impact but the concept of a marine heatwave is new to science. The term was only coined in 2011. Since then a growing body of work documenting their cause and impact has developed.
Comment: These unprecedented marine heatwaves could be attributed to increased quantities of CO2,methaneoutgassing and heat are coming up from below, i.e. passing up through the oceans from within the planet, heating and acidifying the planet's oceans.
We are also seeing an increasing number of bizarre, odd (perhaps even mutated species), previously unknown and mysterious creatures being discovered recently, together with increases in abnormal animal and marine behavior. All over the world such 'strange' and 'unusual' incidents are quickly becoming the norm, as are mass fish die offs.
Are these more 'signs of the times'? If so, what do they mean?
The fact remains that there is a lot of hard evidence suggesting that, far from 'global warming', we're already in the process of entering a new ice age (which could end up being a lot bigger than the last one), accompanied by increasing cataclysmic activity such as major destructive storms, earthquakes, and volcanism, among other 'anomalous' goings-on all over the planet. So no wonder the animals are behaving strangely. Maybe they're trying to tell us something important. The question is, is anyone listening?
Nineteen U.S. senators are working to destroy free speech and silence dissent, defying the Constitution they swore to defend and uphold. Senators Harry Reid, Tim Kaine, Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders and fifteen other Democrats took to the Senate floor last month to demonize their 'enemies list' of fossil fuel companies, think tanks and journalists for having the temerity to disagree with their views. They are also proposing a Congressional Resolution to formally disapprove of the actions of those who disagree with them.
Climate change happens to be the subject of their action, but the topic is irrelevant.
As President Harry Truman, himself a Democrat, said, "Once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the voice of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the path of increasingly repressive measures, until it becomes a source of terror to all its citizens and creates a country where everyone lives in fear."
The Daily Signal reports, "This comes on top of U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch admitting that the Justice Department is discussing the possibility of pursing civil actions against climate change deniers, and that she has already referred it to the FBI to consider whether or not it meets the criteria for which federal law enforcement could take action."
Initial shortages not likely to impact Havasu, mayor says
Amid punishing drought, federal water managers projected Tuesday that — by a very narrow margin— the crucial Lake Mead reservoir on the Colorado River won't have enough water to make full deliveries to Nevada and Arizona in 2018.
A 24-month projection, issued on a day the largest reservoir on the closely controlled and monitored river was 36 percent full, showed the surface level of the lake behind Hoover Dam is expected to clear the trigger point this year to avoid a shortage declaration in 2017.
The margin is expected to be just under 4 feet, or almost 228 billion gallons of water. Mandatory shortages begin to take effect once levels dip below 1,075 feet.
For 2018, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation projects missing the mark by under a foot, which would trigger a shortage declaration, cuts to Arizona's water allocation by 11.4 percent, and cuts to Nevada's water flow by 4.3 percent.
That would be enough water to serve more than 600,000 homes a year in Arizona, and about 26,000 in Nevada.
At least 60 people have been injured in a train crash in southern France, local media report, citing rescue services. The incident occurred on a railway line between the cities of Nimes and Montpellier.
According to French TV channel BFM, at least 10 people were seriously injured in the train crash and about 50 more suffered minor injuries.
One person is in critical condition, BFM TV reports. The train did not derail but the first carriage was seriously damaged, according to the TV station.
At the same time, French railway company SNCF confirmed the injuries of only 13 people, saying that three crash victims suffered serious injuries and 10 more were slightly injured.
After moving from right to left the bolt of lightning suddenly flashes brightly and illuminates the entire night sky
This incredible footage shows a horizontal bolt of lightning illuminating the night sky before disappearing as quickly as it emerged. The sudden electrostatic discharge was captured over Tampa Bay, Florida and was seen travelling from right to left like a wave.
The video shows the bolt of light slowly vanishing as it streaks across the sky. It then flashes brightly and illuminates the night before disappearing for good.
The footage was posted to Reddit, where it picked up a number of comments from impressed viewers, helping it go viral. Many pointed out that the type of horizontal lightning captured on camera is an Anvil Crawler.
Kelsi Butt, 4, of Blackfoot, Idaho shows some of the wounds she suffered when a mountain lion grabbed her and tried to drag her away.
Little Kelsi Butt is now "more or less 100 percent back to normal," her dad says, four days after the 4-year-old's Aug. 12 encounter with a mountain lion.
The Butt family — dad Israel, mom Kera and their three children, son Kegan, 8, and daughters Maylie, 7, and Kelsi — were at a family reunion, camping with grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins, near Green Canyon Hot Springs, east of Rexburg, Idaho.
The weekend of outdoor fun took an unexpected turn Friday night, when Kelsi was attacked by a 90-pound, young male mountain lion that had been lurking in the wooded area.
"We usually have family reunions up there, camping at Hot Springs Campground," Israel Butt told Gephardt Daily, "but this year we decided to go higher up."
The area was a little more remote, with fewer people around than at the campground. Kelsi's mom thought she saw the cat earlier in the day and mentioned it to other family members. But the woods are full of wildlife, no one else had seen the animal, and cats generally avoid human beings anyway, so there seemed to be no cause for concern.
Comment: Elsewhere within the past year some record-breaking and rare storm events include:
July 2016: Hurricane drought in Gulf of Mexico hits a new record of three years - the longest streak in the past 130 years, since formal record-keeping began in 1886.
April 2016: Cyclone Fantala became the Indian Ocean's most powerful storm on record
February 2016: Cyclone Winston caused devastation in Fiji as the most-potent cyclone on record in the Southwest Pacific
January 2016: Hurricane Pali became the earliest-forming hurricane in either the Central or Northeastern Pacific, forming unusually close to the equator
January 2016: Hurricane Alex, a rare January storm in the Atlantic and the first storm of the 2016 Atlantic hurricane season
October 2015: Hurricane Patricia became the strongest-known storm in the Northeast Pacific