This video compiles footages of strange phenomena of all kinds, including awesome natural events or beautiful phenomena from around the world in the last few weeks.

In just the last couple of weeks, we've seen:

Volcanic eruptions in Sicily and Indonesia and elsewhere - 'Sky trumpet sounds' in Iceland, and loud booms shaking homes all over the US - Large earthquake in New Zealand, and an ongoing heatwave in Australia - Giant boulders falling off a mountain Italy and record flooding across Europe - More 'spinning ice-river' circles, this time in Norway - Strange cloud cover producing pretty sunsets and unusual light refraction, including a spectacular sun halo over Moscow - More mass animal deaths - More meteor fireballs falling from the sky, and 'hole-punch clouds'! - More UFO sightings - Massive electrical storms, including a super-electrical storm in Rio de Janeiro that produced an interesting omen: a thunderbolt struck the giant statue of Jesus above the city!... There were also major electrical storms in Europe... and this in the middle of winter! - Tornado outbreaks in the UK, which are unusual even in the summer - Thousands of wildfires breaking out in some of the coldest places on the planet - UK's wettest January in 250 years as the island continues to be pummeled with storm after storm...


I covered events from earlier in January and late December 2013 here.

Check out the rest of this series here.

A good omen, a bad diet, or merely some kind of mutation caused by some unknown factor?

These were some of the reactions among wholesalers in Japan when one of a shipment of red king crabs turned out to be lavender.

"I've been dealing with crabs for 25 years, but this is the first time to see that color," Kenetsu Mikami, president of Marusan Ocean Foods, told the Japanese-language Hokkaido Doshin. "It could be a good omen."

The crabs were caught off Russia in the Bering Sea and shipped to Hokkaido. Red king crabs are found in the Bering Sea and near the Aleutian Islands, along the coast of the Gulf of Alaska, and south to British Columbia, Canada. Also, there are populations from Hokkaido, Japan, to Cape Olyutorsk, Russia. They're widely consumed around the world.

CSIRO scientists are working to classify a new species of giant jellyfish after one washed up on a beach in southern Tasmania. The 1.5 metre jellyfish was found by a family walking on a beach at Howden, south of Hobart, last month.

There have been several reported in waters off the state and the research body has also captured specimens. CSIRO scientist Lisa-ann Gershwin told ABC Local Radio while the species has been seen before, it is technically unclassified and new to science.

"It's a whopper. We do get large jellyfish and this one just happened to be this absolutely enormous specimen," she said.

"I do hear from time to time people tell me 'we found this one that was really big', but this one really is, really big.

A porpoise washed up on a Bexhill beach following heavy winds and stormy conditions - making it the second in a week.

The five foot long animal was found dead lying on the shingle of South Cliff beach just before 11am on Saturday.

This comes after dog walkers discovered a decomposing baby porpoise the week before.

A spokesman for Sussex Wildlife Trust said it was impossible to know if the two deaths were linked but Bexhill Coastguard reported that the deaths were likely to be down to the bad weather.

Danny Groves, from the Whale and Dolphin Conservation, added: "The large numbers of whales, dolphins and porpoises found dead or stranded around the world's coastlines each year are often helpless, and usually die within a few hours or days if not attended to in the right way.

"Cause of death could be for a number of reasons - old age, illness or due to man-made threats such as injury from boat propellers or entanglement in fishing nets and gear.

"Nets and fishing gear are the biggest killer of whales and dolphins across the globe, causing terrible injury and typically death by suffocation."

The latest porpoise to be washed up was removed by the council.

I am sad to be bringing you yet another story of animal abuse. This one comes from Falls City, a small community in Oregon, located about 30 miles southeast of San Antonio, with a population of under 700.

The owners of Jocelyn's Alpacas Ranch have each been indicted on 18 animal abuse charges after more than 200 starving or dead alpacas were found on their Falls City farm in December 2013.

Alpacas are rare and exotic creatures that have been considered a treasure of the Andes Mountains for more than 6,000 years. They look like small llamas or long-necked camels with no humps. Easily domesticated, alpacas are friendly, gentle and curious.

And yet they suffered this terrible abuse. The Polk County Itemizer-Observer reports that Jocelyn and Robert Silver were arraigned two weeks ago on identical charges, which include one count of felony first-degree animal neglect, one count of second-degree animal neglect and 16 counts of misdemeanor first-degree animal neglect.

Polk County Sheriff's Office began looking into conditions on the farm after receiving complaints from neighbors and the Animal Legal Defense Fund in early December. An initial investigation of the property found evidence of malnutrition in the animals.

"In this pasture there was no green forage growing anywhere," wrote Deputy John Kincaid in an affidavit requesting a search warrant. "The trees in this pasture appeared to be devoid of bark (as high as the animals could reach)."

Once a warrant was granted for a "herd health check" with a licensed veterinarian, investigators found even more evidence of mistreatment, including dozens of dead alpacas and many others that were emaciated and weak.

What a horrible, horrible tragedy, but such tales are not uncommon.

Why have a significant number of dead albatross washed up on Ripiro Beach?

Regular beach patroller Noel Hilliam says he saw 12 dead albatross washed up along about five kilometres of beach south of Glinks gully about two weeks ago.

"I've never seen anything like this before. You sometimes see the odd one but never this."

He says the birds appeared to have been dead for some time and were "looking pretty battered."

"I'd like to know what caused it. Was it starvation, something they ate or a big storm?"

Mr Hilliam contacted the Department of Conservation but had not heard back from them at the time of print.

A live but exhausted southern royal albatross was found on the beach in mid January and taken to the Whangarei Native Bird Recovery Centre where, despite initially improving, it died.

Co-owner of the Whangarei Native Bird Recovery Centre, Robert Webb says he is concerned to learn there has been so many dead birds on the west coast beach.

At least 1,122 carcasses of Olive Ridley turtles were washed ashore on the beaches of Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh in January alone.

More than 145 dead turtles were found on the stretch between Marina Beach and Neelankarai, while 226 were found between Neelankarai and Marakkanam. In Andhra Pradesh, Nellore recorded 547 carcasses. Marine conservationists say there has been a sharp increase in the number of dead turtles found along the beaches of Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh.

The main problem, according to marine experts, is fishing nets. The turtles normally come to nest on beaches on the east coast from January to March. "The female turtles dig nests and lay around 60 to 120 eggs at a time. The same turtles may nest two or three times and stay close to the shore during this time. As they stay close to the shore, many easily get entangled in the fishing nets," said Supraja Dharini, chairperson of TREE Foundation, a non-governmental organization that works for the protection of endangered marine species. The foundation conducted the study of the beaches.

Dharini said not a single day passed in January without phone calls from volunteers about carcasses on beaches. "The main reason for this tragedy is that the turtles get caught in the trawl fishing nets of mechanised boats, gill nets or ray fishing nets. Turtles need to come to the surface of the sea to breathe. Once they are trapped in the net, they remain underwater and drown," said Dharini.

More than 400 dead dolphins were found last month on the Pacific Ocean beaches of northern Peru where twice that amount were encountered in 2012, officials said Monday.

Authorities never established the cause of the deaths in 2012. They are doing autopsies on the latest dolphins found during January in the Lambayeque region on the northern coast.

Technician Jaime de la Cruz of Peru's IMARPE marine life agency said about 220 dead dolphins were found in the last week of January, the rest during the previous three weeks.

Endangered and threatened sea turtles are reeling after winter storms ravaged the Florida Panhandle, causing more than a dozen deaths, The Miami Herald reports.

Over 130 sea turtles were rescued Thursday and Friday, as freezing rain and low tides posed serious threats to local wildlife, FWC wildlife biologist Alley Foley said. Marine mammals including dolphins and manatees can not warm themselves during these adverse conditions, with sea turtles suffering from hypothermia-like conditions.

"When it comes to wildlife, it seems the turtles had the most trouble," Foley said.

Many turtles found were green sea turtles. They will be taken to the Gulf World Marine Park in Panama City Beach and are expected to be released sometime this week after treatment.

The weather, which covered much of the Florida Panhandle with ice and snow and dropped water temperatures to as low as 37 degrees, was also an issue for rescue workers attempting to get to the struggling animals.

Scientists present links between unusual Alaska seal deaths and Fukushima fallout - Skin lesions, hair loss, lethargy - 'Pulsed release' when built-up radionuclides were set free as ice melted - "Wildlife health implications" due to radiation exposure discussed

Alaska Marine Science Symposium (pdf), Jan. 20-24, 2014 (emphasis added): 2011 Fukushima Fall Out: Aerial Deposition On To Sea Ice Scenario And Wildlife Health Implications To Ice-Associated Seals (Dr. Doug Dasher, John Kelley, Gay Sheffield, Raphaela Stimmelmayr) -

On March 11, 2011 off Japan's west coast, an earthquake-generated tsunami struck the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant resulting in a major nuclear accident that included a large release of airborne radionuclides into the environment. Within five days of the accident atmospheric air masses carrying Fukushima radiation were transiting into the northern Bering and Chukchi seas. During summer 2011 it became evident to coastal communities and wildlife management agencies that there was a novel disease outbreak occurring in several species of Arctic ice-associated seals. Gross symptoms associated with the disease included lethargy, no new hair growth, and skin lesions, with the majority of the outbreak reports occurring between the Nome and Barrow region. NOAA and USFWS declared an Alaska Northern Pinnipeds Usual Mortality Event (UME) in late winter of 2011. The ongoing Alaska 2011 Northern Pinnipeds UME investigation continues to explore a mix of potential etiologies (infectious, endocrine, toxins, nutritious etc.), including radioactivity. Currently, the underlying etiology remains undetermined. We present results on gamma analysis (cesium 134 and 137) of muscle tissue from control and diseased seals, and discuss wildlife health implications from different possible routes of exposure to Fukushima fallout to ice seals. Since the Fukushima fallout period occurred during the annual sea ice cover period from Nome to Barrow, a sea ice based fallout scenario in addition to a marine food web based one is of particular relevance for the Fukushima accident. Under a proposed sea ice fallout deposition scenario, radionuclides would have been settled onto sea ice. Sea ice and snow would have acted as a temporary refuge for deposited radionuclides; thus radionuclides would have only become available for migration during the melting season and would not have entered the regional food web in any appreciable manner until breakup (pulsed release). The cumulative on-ice exposure for ice seals would have occurred through external, inhalation, and non-equilibrium dietary pathways during the ice-based seasonal spring haulout period for molting/pupping/breeding activities. Additionally, ice seals would have been under dietary/metabolic constraints and experiencing hormonal changes associated with reproduction and molting.