A landslide in the Himalayan region of Kashmir buried at least 10 people while they were sleeping, police said on Monday, as unseasonal rains swept India, damaging crops and raising fears of flash floods in the mountainous north.

Hundreds of people fled their homes as Kashmir's main rivers began to swell and weather forecasters predicted further downpours in the region that was struck by devastating floods seven months ago.

A hillside collapsed onto a house in a village about 40 kms (25 miles) from the capital Srinagar, where three families were sleeping on Monday morning, according to Mushtaq Ahmad, a neighbor. Army and police used diggers and shovels to locate any survivors."It was a huge landslide, the entire house is covered in earth," Ahmad said. "The chance of finding everyone alive is unlikely."

A 61-year-old woman was killed and eight others were injured on Monday when a wild rhinoceros attacked people at a busy market in central Nepal. The woman is a resident of Hetauda town, Hetauda's Superintendent of Police Prakashjung Karki said.

She was critically injured in the attack, died in course of treatment at Hetauda Hospital, Karki was quoted as saying by the Himalyan Times. A cow was also injured in the attack in Hetauda market.

The animal entered the human settlement from Chitwan National Park early on Monday.

The rhino is hiding in a bush near the Rapti River and the personnel from Armed Police Force and Nepal Police are trying to take it under control, Karki said.

It's uncommon of rhinos to kill people in Nepal even as deforestation often forces them to enter nearby villages. The number of one-horned rhinos that dominated the plains of Nepal in the past has gone down owing to poaching and human encroachment of their habitat.

A cow in Northeast Texas has apparently defied great odds and given birth to four calves that have been named Eeny, Meeny, Miny and Moo.

Jimmy Barling said Monday that DNA tests will be done on tissue samples from the three bull calves and the one heifer calf to satisfy those who may question the births from one mother.

"We knew she was pregnant, but we didn't know she was going to do this," the 76-year-old Barling said. "This was a shock. This blew our minds."

A powerful earthquake rattled the South Pacific nation of Papua New Guinea on Monday, prompting officials to issue a tsunami warning for vast swathes of the Pacific and as far north as Russia.

The magnitude-7.7 earthquake struck at a depth of 65 kilometers (40 miles), about 50 kilometers (30 miles) southeast of the town of Kokopo in northeastern Papua New Guinea, the U.S. Geological Survey said.

The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said hazardous tsunami waves could hit coasts located within 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) of Kokopo, with waves between 1 to 3 meters (3 to 10 feet) possible for Papua New Guinea.

Event Time
2015-03-29 23:48:34 (UTC)
Times in other timezones

Nearby Cities
54km (34mi) SE of Kokopo, Papua New Guinea
282km (175mi) ENE of Kimbe, Papua New Guinea
309km (192mi) SE of Kavieng, Papua New Guinea
367km (228mi) WNW of Arawa, Papua New Guinea
789km (490mi) NE of Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea

Scientific data

Eric Worrall writes: The Guardian has published an unusually interesting article about the danger to our civilisation, of a new Tambora scale volcanic eruption.
According to Bill McGuire, professor emeritus of geophysical and climate hazards at UCL;

"In April 1815, the biggest known eruption of the historical period blew apart the Tambora volcano, on the Indonesian island of Sumbawa, 12,000km from the UK. What happened next testifies to the enormous reach of the biggest volcanic blasts.

The Tambora volcano had shown no signs of life for 1,000 years; a single eruption in the previous five millennia provided the only indication that magma was still churning far beneath. It is very likely that the residents of the island considered the volcano extinct, and possible even that they did not know the impressive 4,300m (14,107ft) mountain - at the time, probably the highest in the East Indies - was a volcano at all. This all changed, however, with the rumblings and earthquakes of 1812, a full three years before the climactic blast. Over time, the seismic shocks were superseded by steam blasts and small ash explosions, engendering increasing trepidation on the island and signalling that something bigger might be imminent. It was. On 5 April 1815, a titanic explosion hurled a cloud of ash to a height of more than 30km."
...

The consequences for the developed societies of the northern hemisphere were dire. A dry, sulphurous, fog draped itself across the landscape of eastern North America, causing temperatures to plunge and bringing unprecedented summer cold. In New York State, snow fell in June, while the bitter cold and killing frosts wiped out crops and halved the length of the growing season across much of the region. On the other side of the Atlantic, Europe saw summer temperatures down by 2C compared to the average for the decade; the unseasonal cold accompanied by incessant rains and - into the following winter - by unusually powerful storms. Analysis of climate records reveals that 1816, the so-called "year without a summer", was the second coldest in the northern hemisphere of the past six centuries."

Read the rest of the article here.

Twelve people were killed and 11 houses buried after a landslide triggered by heavy rain in Indonesia's main island of Java, an official said Sunday.

The landslide hit Tegal Panjang village in Sukabumi district in west Java late Saturday after a particularly heavy downpour, according to national disaster agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho.

"We found all 12 bodies," he said in an update, revising the earlier death toll of 10 and two missing.

He said heavy rain caused a cliff to collapse and hit the village, burying 11 houses.

It brings new meaning to the phrase 'shark attack'.

While most people will be familiar with images of seals being violently smashed out of the water snatched in the jaws of a shark, it appears some are exacting their revenge on the ocean predators.

Scientists have reported multiple cases of cape fur seals attacking blue sharks off the coast of South Africa.

The seals, which are normally prey for great white sharks, have been seen attacking and killing medium-sized blue sharks, devouring their guts before leaving the rest of the carcass.

Divers also report seeing the fur seals attacking other species of shark and rays.

An unseasonable wildfire driven by strong winds prompted an evacuation of a ski lodge in southern Montana.

The blaze a few miles west of the community of Red Lodge had grown to 700 acres by Saturday night, US Forest Service spokesman Jeff Gildehaus said.

The fire was first reported on open private land around 12.30pm, but it was driven by winds gusting 35 to 50 mph into the Custer National Forest, where the Red Lodge Mountain Resort ski area is located.

It was zero per cent contained as of early Saturday night.

One person is dead and another person suffered critical injuries after an apparent rockslide at Point Reyes National Seashore Saturday evening, according to a park employee.

Emergency medical crews with the Marin County Fire Department responded at 5:55 p.m. to a report of a rescue in the area of Arch Rock in the West Marin park, Marin County fire Battalion Chief Mike Giannini said.

Two hikers were walking along Bear Valley Trail when they reached the end of the trail, the Arch Rock overlook, John Dell'Osso, a spokesman for the U.S. National Park Service said.

The cliff unexpectedly gave way and they fell an estimated 60 feet below. They were covered in rubble and rock, Dell'Osso said.