The central United States braced for violent thunderstorms on Monday that could bring more hail, heavy rain and tornadoes to the region stricken by a deadly twister over the weekend. The National Weather Service said severe storms would likely pummel the Ozarks and the middle Mississippi Valley, with northwest Arkansas, far southeast Kansas, southern Missouri, most of Oklahoma and northern Texas facing the greatest risk.

"A very moist atmosphere will become quite unstable again today," the forecasters said. "This combined with strong favorable winds aloft will result in a risk of a few strong tornadoes, very large hail and damaging winds in the most intense storms."

A massive storm front hammered the region on Sunday with fist-sized hail, blinding rain and tornadoes, including a half-mile-wide twister that struck near Oklahoma City.

One man was killed at a mobile home park in the town of Bethel Acres near Oklahoma City and 21 people were injured in storms throughout the state, said Keli Cain, a spokeswoman for the Oklahoma Office of Emergency Management.

232 days - it took over 30 years for Anchorage to set a new record for the longest snow season on record. The National Weather Service measured 2/10ths of an inch just after 9 p.m. Friday and 1/10th Saturday morning - breaking the old record of 230 days set in 1981-1982. Anchorage police responded to 22 crashes, 4 with injuries and 37 vehicles in distress between midnight and noon Saturday. Police say roads were wet and not icy midday and "motorists should use caution if the temperatures drop below freezing. Other parts of the city had much higher amounts of snow, however official measurements must be consistent and observed at the Sand Lake forecast office. The recent snowfall also broke the daily record for liquid precipitation, lowest maximum temperature for May 17, and a host of other records. NWS says Saturday evening's forecast calls for "mostly cloudy with isolated snow showers in the evening...then partly cloudy after midnight - lows in the upper teens to mid 20s and north wind to 15 mph." For Sunday, the forecast will be mostly sunny, highs in the 40s, and light winds, according to NWS. -NBC

Tornadoes touched down in three states on Sunday, ripping roofs off homes and turning trees to matchsticks, as severe weather swept the region. A large "violent and extremely dangerous" tornado was spotted on the southwest side of Wichita, Kansas, the National Weather Service said. A second confirmed tornado was seen near Edmond, Oklahoma, said the weather service. Another tornado was spotted in nearby Luther, Oklahoma, but it was not immediately clear whether that was the same twister. A third tornado touched down near Wellston, Oklahoma, taking out power lines and damaging several homes, according to video from CNN affiliate KFOR. The affiliate's helicopter pilot estimated the funnel cloud to be about a half-mile wide. "It's tearing up everything," the pilot said. "Just ripping everything up in its sight."


Aerial video from KFOR and CNN affiliate KOCO showed severe damage near Wellston and near Carney, Oklahoma. Roofs were ripped from homes, branches stripped from trees and roads were filled with debris. Tornadoes were also reported east of Dale, west of Paden, and near Prague in Oklahoma. Part of Interstate 40 in Shawnee, Oklahoma, was shut down in both directions Sunday night after a tornado touched down, overturning multiple tractor-trailers. Still more tornadoes were spotted in Iowa, near Earlham, Huxley and east of Dallas Center, according to the weather service. It did not mince words, telling people to take cover there, as elsewhere. "You could be killed if not underground or in a tornado shelter.

A massive emergency response is under way in the Granbury area, where at least six people were killed and dozens injured by up to three tornadoes as a relentless storm system raked across North Texas on Wednesday evening.

At a press conference Thursday morning, Hood County Sheriff Roger Deeds said all six people who died were adults, although he did not have their names or other details. He said 37 others were injured, and about 110 homes were damaged or destroyed.

Deeds said the death toll could rise as seven people remain unaccounted for and nearby rural areas just outside the Rancho Brazos subdivision had not been searched thoroughly. But he said he didn't expect anyone else to be found in the rubble. Search-and-rescue efforts were to wrap up by 10 a.m., just before a scheduled media tour of the hardest hit neighborhood.

Police and sheriff's deputies had the neighborhood blocked off this morning. Debris littered the roads approaching the subdivision, and volunteers with the Red Cross were out in force, seeking to help those in need find shelter and other provisions.

At an emergency shelter set up by the American Red Cross at First Christian Church, about 20 people woke up in beds that were not their own. Volunteer Jeff Watson said the extent of the damage to the families' homes was still unclear, but after breakfast, volunteers will conduct interviews to determine what other services the relief organization should be offering in the coming hours and days.

The sheriff added that many residents quickly left the area after the storm to stay with friends or relatives, so it was difficult to know where everyone went. Those from the damaged areas were encouraged to register at the Red Cross's Safe & Well program so officials and families would know who was all right.

Deeds said 250 people were taken from the Granbury area, about 90 of them from the Rancho Brazos subdivision. Sixteen were taken to Fort Worth hospitals and 38 to the local hospital in Granbury. Fourteen were admitted there.

Many feared drowned as boat carrying Rohingya Muslims hits rocks during evacuation ahead of cyclone Mahasen

A boat carrying about 100 Rohingya Muslims has capsized off western Burma with many feared drowned at the start of a mass evacuation from low-lying regions ahead of cyclone Mahasen, a UN official said on Tuesday.

The boat struck rocks off Pauktaw township in Rakhine state and sank late on Monday, Barbara Manzi, head of the Burma office at the UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), told Reuters.

She said an unknown number of people were missing.

The UN warned last week that the tropical cyclone could bring "life-threatening conditions" to thousands of people living in camps in the west of Burma after their homes were destroyed in violence between majority Buddhists and minority Muslims last year.

Residents 'devastated' after ice from Dauphin Lake pushed ashore

A local state of emergency has been declared in a western Manitoba municipality after homes in Ochre Beach were destroyed and seriously damaged by a wave of lake ice.

Area officials told CBC News the wind pushed built-up ice off Dauphin Lake on Friday evening and caused it to pile up in the community, located on the lake's southern shore.

The piles of ice, which were more than nine metres tall in some cases, destroyed at least six homes and cottages, according to the Rural Municipality of Ochre River.

Another 14 homes suffered extensive damage, with some structures knocked off their foundations.

Clayton Watts, Ochre River's deputy reeve, said it's a miracle no one was hurt.

Of the more than 130,000 people forced to flee their homes in rioting between Buddhists and Muslims over the last year in western Myanmar, around half are living in low-lying camps near the sea, the United Nations says.

Human rights organizations have issued repeated warnings that the displaced people are at risk of disease and hunger during the rainy season, which begins this month and continues until around September.

"We're definitely very concerned," said Vivian Tan, a spokeswoman for the United Nations refugee agency. "We are working around the clock, trying to get as many people out of low-lying areas and into decent shelters."

Projections on Saturday by the United States Navy Marine Meteorology Division estimated that the cyclone would reach land around Wednesday. According to the same calculations, the center of the storm will be just south of Chittagong, a major city in Bangladesh, and rain and strong winds would also hit areas in Rakhine State in Myanmar, where the camps are.

Although the storm could change direction or lessen in intensity, aid groups say even heavy rains would create very difficult conditions for the displaced families, who are camped out in muddy fields vulnerable to tidal surges.

Myanmar is prone to violent tropical storms. A cyclone in 2008 killed more than 150,000 people in the country's Irrawaddy River delta. Another storm in 2010 in western Myanmar, in roughly the same areas as those under threat now, displaced tens of thousands and killed more than 100.

The country endures the extremes of weather from record breaking snowfall to raging wildfires.

The start of May has been a strange one for the USA. It seems that nature can't decide if it's winter or summer.

Heavy rain has flooded parts of Key West in southern Florida. Two days of torrential downpours have led to flooding and in the last 24 hours, 109mm more rain fell across the island.

The rain has flooded homes and businesses and forced the closure of a number of roads.

Whilst rain is the problem in Florida, elsewhere winter is still winning. Heavy snow has smothered parts of the Plains and the Midwest.

Some of the worst weather was in the state of Minnesota, where the snow set new records.

All lightning on Earth may have its roots in space, new research suggests.

Lightning flashes on Earth about 100 times per second, but what triggers lightning in thunderstorms remains mostly unknown. Especially odd is the fact that decades of analysis suggest electrical fields within thunderclouds have only a tenth or so of the strength needed to spark a lightning bolt.

More than 20 years ago, physicist Alex Gurevich at the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow suggested lightning might be initiated by cosmic rays from outer space. These particles strike Earth with gargantuan amounts of energy surpassing anything the most powerful atom smashers on the planet are capable of.

When cosmic rays slam into air molecules, they can make them spit out huge numbers of electrons. This shower of electrons would collide into still more air molecules, generating more electrons. All in all, cosmic rays could each set off an avalanche of electrons, a chain reaction Gurevich calls a runaway breakdown.