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Amazing double rainbow Seen over Spingfield MO just after a deadly tornado Rips through Joplin.
It's been one long series of natural disasters this year - and now it looks like another is on the way.
The focus may soon be shifting from the epic flooding in the Mississippi Valley to Westwern states where enormous winter snows have piled up on mountain ranges.
More than 90 sites from Montana to New Mexico and California to Colorado have record snowpack totals on the ground for late May.
The focus may soon be shifting from the epic flooding in the Mississippi Valley to Westwern states where enormous winter snows have piled up on mountain ranges.
More than 90 sites from Montana to New Mexico and California to Colorado have record snowpack totals on the ground for late May.
© APUnbelievable snow: It's late May and a vehicle faces 23 feet of snow at Rock Cut on Trail Ridge Road in Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado
© David Zucchino, Los Angeles TimesLouisiana wildlife officials Fred Kimmel, left, Travis Dufour, center, and Derrick Brasseaux check a soybean field for signs of wild animals fleeing rising floodwaters.
That unsurprising fact of nature has added a new complexity to the daily efforts of Travis Dufour, a Louisiana state wildlife biologist. He spends his days in a pickup truck, bouncing along levees and farm roads in search of displaced deer, black bears, alligators, wild turkeys, feral hogs and the occasional armadillo.
Mostly, Dufour rides herd on deer. It's his job to keep deer and people - and especially motor vehicles - from colliding as deer flee the impending Great Flood of 2011.
© BBC News / Met Office
BA, KLM, Easyjet, Loganair and Eastern Airways have all cancelled flights on Tuesday, as ministers said some flights over the Atlantic were delayed.
The threat of further disruption led US President Barack Obama to fly out of the Republic of Ireland a day early to get to London for a state visit.
© Halldora Kristen Unnarsdottir / APGrimsvotn volcano
© Stefan Wermuth/ReutersPresident Barack Obama and first lady Michelle on Airforce One at Dublin airport.
The US president flew to London on Monday evening just hours after he received a rapturous reception in central Dublin from more than 25,000 people during a speech in which he pledged that America would continue to stand by peace-makers in Northern Ireland.
A White House spokesman confirmed that concerns over the ash cloud from the Grimsvötn volcano forced the presidential entourage to make a swifter than expected exit from the Republic.
© AFP/Getty ImagesAn image released by Nasa on Sunday shows smoke billowing from the Grimsvotn, Iceland's most active volcano.
The Grimsvotn volcano began erupting on Sunday, causing flights to be cancelled at Iceland's main Keflavik airport after it sent a plume of ash smoke and steam 12 miles into the air.
However experts said the eruption was unlikely to have the dramatic impact that the Eyjafjallajökull volcano had in April last year, when flights were cancelled over the UK and much of Europe for several days.
Paul Mott, forecaster at Meteogroup, said ash from the volcano could potentially reach the UK by Tuesday.
The deadly tornado that ripped through Joplin, Mo., Sunday evening, killing at least 89 people, intensified with unprecedented speed, according to storm trackers.
The supercell thunderstorm that produced the devastating twister formed over Kansas. The National Weather Service received its first report of the tornado at 5:34 p.m. local time, from west of the Missouri-Kansas border.
Seven minutes later, there were reports of a tornado within Joplin's city limits, about 7 miles (11 kilometers) east of the first sighting.
"Every storm is a little different, but this storm went from what was just a funnel cloud to a very strong, very large and very wide and obviously very damaging tornado in a very short time," in under 10 minutes, said Andy Boxell, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Springfield, Mo.
"It's something that I've not seen personally, and certainly it's a rare thing to see," Boxell told OurAmazingPlanet.
Powerful storm blew into metro, killing 1, injuring 30 and putting North Side under curfew.
Two days of threatening skies turned furious over the Twin Cities on Sunday, unleashing at least three tornado touchdowns in the metro area, killing one person in Minneapolis, injuring at least 30 others, knocking out power to thousands and leading to a curfew and school closings in north Minneapolis.
The massive, slow-moving storm also caused major damage in other metro communities, most significantly St. Louis Park and Fridley.
In the hardest-hit area, Minneapolis' Jordan neighborhood, downed trees, snapped power lines and pieces of roofs littered streets and yards. The smell of natural gas led police to call people out of some homes. Roads were blocked and residents scrambled to find loved ones; close to 200 or so people displaced by the storm made their way to an emergency shelter at the Northeast Armory, near Broadway and Central Avenue.
Mayor R.T. Rybak described the damage as "widespread and significant" after he and City Council President Barbara Johnson viewed it from a helicopter.
Two days of threatening skies turned furious over the Twin Cities on Sunday, unleashing at least three tornado touchdowns in the metro area, killing one person in Minneapolis, injuring at least 30 others, knocking out power to thousands and leading to a curfew and school closings in north Minneapolis.
The massive, slow-moving storm also caused major damage in other metro communities, most significantly St. Louis Park and Fridley.
In the hardest-hit area, Minneapolis' Jordan neighborhood, downed trees, snapped power lines and pieces of roofs littered streets and yards. The smell of natural gas led police to call people out of some homes. Roads were blocked and residents scrambled to find loved ones; close to 200 or so people displaced by the storm made their way to an emergency shelter at the Northeast Armory, near Broadway and Central Avenue.
Mayor R.T. Rybak described the damage as "widespread and significant" after he and City Council President Barbara Johnson viewed it from a helicopter.
La Crosse, Wis.- Gov. Scott Walker is in La Crosse to tour the damage caused by Sunday's tornado.
Walker says his heart goes out to everyone affected by the storm and says he's grateful no one was seriously injured. Walker toured damaged neighborhoods by car Monday afternoon.
At least 200 homes and businesses were damaged by the tornado, which was part of the same big storm system that spawned the deadly tornadoes around the Midwest.
National Weather Service meteorologist Glenn Lussky said preliminary assessments from field crews show the powerful storm was in fact a tornado and possibly an EF1.
Walker says his heart goes out to everyone affected by the storm and says he's grateful no one was seriously injured. Walker toured damaged neighborhoods by car Monday afternoon.
At least 200 homes and businesses were damaged by the tornado, which was part of the same big storm system that spawned the deadly tornadoes around the Midwest.
National Weather Service meteorologist Glenn Lussky said preliminary assessments from field crews show the powerful storm was in fact a tornado and possibly an EF1.
Comment: Enhanced Fujita Scale: EF1 is an indicator on a scale of EF0-EF5. An EF1 scale Storm has sustained winds of 86 - 110MPH or 138 - 178km/h.
More info can be obtained here.
Comment: This eruption may well merit caution, but remember that we've been here before and been bamboozled before:
'Ashteria' is a Pretext to Shut Down International Air Travel