Chileans can't seem to catch a break these days.
Less than a week after Chile's Puyehue volcano erupted, forcing thousands to evacuate, a freak storm hit another part of the Andean nation, injuring nine. The tornado-like storm struck the town of Villarrica in southern Chile with winds of 75 to 110 miles, reported CBS.
Storms
© National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
Forecasters say maximum sustained winds for the first hurricane of the 2011 season increased Thursday to about 115 mph (185 kph).
The U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami predicts that the storm's center will stay well offshore.
The center of the storm was about 440 miles (708 kilometers) south-southeast of Cabo Corrientes. Adrian is moving west-northwest at 9 mph (14 kph).
© BBC
Barn and The barn and car were badly damaged
Barn and The barn and car were badly damaged
It ripped the roof off the barn. A car was also destroyed when a wall collapsed on it.
Farmer Fergie Kelly, said the workers were trimming cows' feet in the barn near Eglinton, when they heard a bang.
"We thought there was a bomb that went off. We ran out of the shed.
© AP
Air Force Reserve cadets from around the country were at the Joint Forces Training Center for two weeks of work, said Army National Guard Maj. Deidre Musgrave. All were responsive and stable after the lightning hit about 2 p.m., she said.
Forrest County emergency operations director Terry Steed told a National Weather Service forecaster that nobody was directly hit when lightning hit a power pole near tents. All were taken to hospitals as a precaution, said Mike Edmonston, a senior meteorologist in Jackson.
Camp Shelby near Hattiesburg is the nation's largest state-owned military training center. Its 136,000 acres cut out of southern Mississippi's rolling hills and pine forests includes mock cities designed to look like Iraq and Afghanistan to give soldiers realistic training.
© n/a
Heavy rains have inundated parts of 12 provinces in central and southern China and affected 4.81 million people so far since the flood season arrived, Shu Qingpeng, deputy head of the Office of State Flood Control and Drought Relief Headquarters, told a Wednesday press conference.
In the worst-hit southwestern province of Guizhou, floods have killed 21 people and left 32 missing in the past few days, forcing nearly 100,000 people to evacuate.
More than 3,000 rescuers are working to locate the missing and fight the floods in the province's Wangmo County, where all the deaths and most of the missing were reported after downpours lashed the county Monday morning.
© Joe Gamm, The Amarillo Globe News, via AP
James Dickinson, left, and Alton Pickup of the United States Forest Service Task Force attempt to slow the spread of a wildfire in Randall County, Texas, on May 25.
James Dickinson, left, and Alton Pickup of the United States Forest Service Task Force attempt to slow the spread of a wildfire in Randall County, Texas, on May 25.
Never mind the debate over global warming, its possible causes and effects. We've got "global weirding."
That's how climatologist Bill Patzert describes the wide range of deadly weather effects that have whipped the nation this year, killing hundreds of people and doing billions of dollars in damage to homes, businesses, schools and churches.
"Sometimes it gets wild and weird," says Patzert, a research scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.
© Agence France-Presse / Thony Belizaire
Children make their way to school through a flooded area in Port-au-Prince
Children make their way to school through a flooded area in Port-au-Prince
The worst rains to hit the impoverished country this year -- at the start of the hurricane season -- paralyzed the capital, where most of the deaths took place, according to officials at Haiti's civil protection agency.
Thunderstorms were pounding several north Caribbean islands early Tuesday, but there was little chance of the large low pressure area developing into a hurricane, according to the US-based National Hurricane Center (NHC).
Several days of rain had already swelled rivers, however, and the NHC warned of "flash floods and mudslides over portions of Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Jamaica and Cuba."
Haiti was most at risk of devastation from the wet weather, due to its crumbling infrastructure and ramshackle shelters for tens of thousands left homeless after the catastrophic 7.0 magnitude earthquake in January 2010.
Health officials here also fear an uptick in fatalities from a cholera outbreak that erupted last October. The diarrheal illness thrives in crowded areas where people rely on contaminated water.
The ski season is off to a great start, as a cold snap this week will send temperatures plummeting across south-east Australia.
Vehicles battled the flood waters as streets were turned into rivers
The provincial civil affairs bureau said the rain-triggered floods had hit 11 cities and counties in the Guizhou province since Friday, affecting at least 270,000 people.
At least 35 people are missing in the floods, which have toppled thousands of homes, washed away hundreds of cars and destroyed roads and bridges.
Having lived in California for 14 years, I have never seen a storm like this during June. It is unheard of. Typically the rainy season has ended long ago, by this time of year.
The size of this monster storm is nearly 1,000 miles in diameter and is nearly perfectly symmetrical! Parts of California are currently getting pummeled with bands of record breaking rainfall for this time of year, while the storm is forecast to continue spinning its way east towards the coast.
© Navall Research Laboratory
