More than 20 places across New South Wales have already surpassed their highest August rain on record
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More than 20 places across New South Wales have already surpassed their highest August rain on record, with more than a week left of the month to go.
Upper Allyn township, in the Hunter, has already recorded its highest August rain in 38 years, according to the Bureau of Meteorology. As of 9am Friday, the town had received 277mm of rain, exceeding the previous record of 202mm, which was set back in 1987. The average for August was 46mm.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
08/22/2025 - 21:49
08/22/2025 - 19:02
Flames and a tower of smoke rose above an automotive supply company 50 miles north-east of Baton Rouge
An explosion and fire Friday at an automotive supply company in southeast Louisiana sent flames into the air and a tower of thick black smoke billowing above rural communities, forcing nearby residents and an elementary school to evacuate.
Officials said no injuries had been reported in the fire at Smitty’s Supply just north of the town of Roseland, but that everyone living within a one-mile (1.6km) radius must evacuate. Roseland, which is home to about 1,100 people, is roughly 50 miles (80km) north-east of Baton Rouge.
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08/22/2025 - 13:43
Lawsuit brought by two non-profit law firms have had previous wins in Montana and Wisconsin
Fifteen young climate advocates, aged eight to 17, on Friday sued the state of Wisconsin over its pro-fossil fuel policies.
The case provides the opportunity for state officials to “make the correct step to decarbonize Wisconsin” because of the “climate harms they’ve caused youth”, said Kaarina, 17, who is the lead plaintiff in the lawsuit.
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08/22/2025 - 13:28
Multiple fires have ignited this week with searing heat expected to last days and extend to Pacific north-west
Multiple wildfires have ignited across California as the state continues to scorch in a multi-day heatwave that is expected to last through the weekend.
The largest this week, named the Pickett fire, exploded in size on Thursday as it burned in a remote area of Napa county, and covered more than 3,200 acres (850 hectares) by Friday afternoon. Evacuation orders and warnings have been issued on Thursday for hundreds of residents around Calistoga, a small city in the region known for its wine, as firefighters faced challenging conditions, working through dangerously high temperatures and rugged terrain. The fire’s perimeter is just 5% contained.
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08/22/2025 - 13:00
Study analyzed health impacts of fossil fuels from exploration to end use, and found communities of color bear brunt of harm
Air pollution from oil and gas causes more than 90,000 premature deaths and sickens hundreds of thousands of people across the US each year, a new study shows, with disproportionately high impacts on communities of color.
More than 10,000 annual pre-term births are attributable to fine particulate matter from oil and gas, the authors found, also linking 216,000 annual childhood-onset asthma cases to the sector’s nitrogen dioxide emissions and 1,610 annual lifetime cancer cases to its hazardous air pollutants.
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08/22/2025 - 10:11
Erin went from a tropical storm to a category 5 in about 24 hours, underscoring the danger of hurricane season amid a diminished Fema and National Weather Service
This season’s first hurricane – and the first of the Trump administration’s new era of meteorological austerity – has been making its closest pass to the US this week.
On Friday morning, weaker than days earlier, it was still a large storm, heading north-east, and affecting the US east coast with threats of coastal flooding.
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08/22/2025 - 09:00
Analysis of legal hunting in Montana and Idaho shows that eliminating one wolf protected just 7% of a single cow
Legalized wolf hunting in the western US has had only a minimal impact on preventing livestock loss, a new study led by the University of Michigan suggests.
The research, published in Science Advances, compared data from Montana and Idaho, two states where public wolf hunts have been permitted, with Oregon and Washington, where hunting remains illegal.
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08/22/2025 - 07:00
Experts call change likely to pose problems for Americans with limited internet access ‘troubling to say the least’
Current and former Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema) officials are concerned over a new agency rule requiring disaster victims to have an email address in order to apply for federal aid.
The policy change, first reported by Wired and confirmed by a Fema official to the Guardian, was “troubling to say the least”, said Jeremy Edwards, former spokesperson for Fema and the White House under Joe Biden’s presidency.
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08/22/2025 - 04:12
More than 300 dead after downpours in mountainous regions and several killed in Indian city of Mumbai
Heavy monsoon rains have continued to pummel the Indian subcontinent over the past week, bringing devastating flooding and landslides and leaving hundreds of people dead in what has already been one of the deadliest monsoon seasons in recent years.
Moist air surging inland from the Bay of Bengal and the Arabian Sea was driven into Pakistan and north-west India late last week by strong southwesterly monsoon winds. Combined with developing areas of low pressure, this triggered a succession of torrential downpours.
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08/22/2025 - 01:00
The best of this week’s wildlife photographs from around the world
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