Rising heat in Saudi Arabia threatens millions of Muslim pilgrims – but cutting fossil fuels would keep it safer
Global heating has “fundamentally altered” the climate of Mecca and is exposing millions of hajj pilgrims to extreme and dangerous heat even in months outside summer, new analysis has found.
Carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels means scorching temperatures of 40C (104F) are now regularly experienced in May, the study showed. In past decades, such peaks would only have occurred in summer. The researchers said that hajj, the annual Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca, would take place amid dangerous heat almost all year round by the end of the century without a rapid transition away from fossil fuels.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
05/28/2026 - 12:47
London authority’s new Tory-led administration delivers significant blow to Labour’s flagship housebuilding scheme
Enfield council in north London has withdrawn from the government’s new towns programme, in a significant blow to Labour’s flagship housebuilding scheme.
The move by the new minority Conservative-led administration could present one of the first tests of Rachel Reeves’s planning changes, designed to curb the use of judicial reviews against new infrastructure.
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05/28/2026 - 12:44
Clean power remains essential. But until it arrives, Britain must stop LNG made scarce by the Iran war setting gas and electricity prices
The US-Israel war on Iran will drive household energy costs in Britain to their highest level in two years over the summer. This has given fresh impetus to calls for the energy secretary, Ed Miliband, to change course. The cabinet minister is vulnerable because he promised cheaper bills if Britain embraced his clean, green power plan.
Critics, including Labour’s former prime minister Sir Tony Blair, are circling. Yet Mr Miliband ought to ignore the naysayers. Until global carbon emissions, including Britain’s, are reduced to net zero, the planet will continue to fry and temperature records will continue to be broken.
Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.
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05/28/2026 - 12:01
Water company blames increased demand in extreme heat, but customers want answers about lack of storage reservoirs
“Spitting, fuming, angry and powerless” is how Pat Prestage describes her emotions after a water outage that has affected thousands of homes in Kent during the heatwave.
On Wednesday, 8,000 South East Water customers in Whitstable lost water, with 14,000 more in Tankerton, Ashford, and its surrounding areas facing an intermittent supply or low pressure. South East Water’s incident manager, Matthew Dean, said on Thursday that 22,000 people had had water supply problems.
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05/28/2026 - 10:58
As summers become hotter, air conditioner sales are booming. If you’re looking to invest, here’s what to consider
When a heatwave struck the UK this week, Jon Connorton, a software developer, began monitoring temperatures inside his east Hampshire terrace house. With some rooms reaching close to 40C, it was time to deploy the air conditioner. “We just wheel it out in emergencies,” he said. “We were having trouble sleeping.”
Connorton and his wife have a portable air conditioner. These plug-in devices cool interior air by removing heat from it and blowing that heat outside, typically via a large hose slung from a window or door.
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05/28/2026 - 10:53
Bodies of two teenagers recovered by emergency workers following separate incidents in Kent and Oxford
The number of water-related deaths during the UK’s recent heatwave has risen to 11 after the bodies of two teenage boys were recovered in Kent and Oxford.
Emergency workers recovered the body of a 14-year-old boy from the River Thames near Donnington Bridge, Oxford, at about 5.30pm on Wednesday. Thames Valley police said the boy’s family had been informed and that his death was being treated as “unexplained but not suspicious”.
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05/28/2026 - 10:22
The insect may learn to associate the chemical Deet with a ‘blood meal’, researchers say
It is a spray used worldwide to protect humans from mosquito bites, but now research suggests Deet can become attractive to the insects if they associate it with feeding.
Deet – which has the chemical name N,N-diethyl-meta-toluamide – is widely used in insect repellants, with the UK Health Security Agency recommending products with 50% Deet as the first choice to protect against mosquito bites.
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05/28/2026 - 10:00
For those of us working in Aboriginal health, the outbreak doesn’t come as a surprise. We must invest in housing that keeps remote communities safe
The diphtheria outbreak should shock Australia. Not simply because a disease once considered virtually eradicated has returned, but because of where it is spreading and why.
More than 220 cases have been recorded in 2026, primarily across the Northern Territory and northern Australia. The overwhelming majority of patients are Aboriginal people, including those living in remote and very remote communities.
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05/21/2026 - 23:00
npj Ocean Sustainability, Published online: 22 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s44183-026-00207-z
The surf ecosystem as an emerging framework for managing coastal and marine resources
World Ocean Explorer Wins Gold Medal Serious Simulation Award from Serious Play Annual International Competition
10/26/2023 - 14:35
For Immediate Release October 19, 2023
Sedgwick, Maine USA World Ocean Explorer, a 3D virtual aquarium and educational simulation, was recently cited for excellence, winning a Gold Medal Award in the 2023 International Serious Play Awards Program.
World Ocean Explorer is an innovative 3D virtual aquarium designed for educational exploration of the world’s oceans. With interactive exhibits and a lobby space, visitors can immerse themselves in realistic marine environments, including a DEEP SEA exhibit funded by Schmidt Ocean Institute, showcasing unprecedented deep-sea discoveries off Australia. Targeted at 3rd graders and beyond, this immersive experience offers a range of perspectives on the ocean environment and can be explored through guided tours or user-controlled interfaces. Visit DEEP SEA at worldoceanexplorer.org/deep-sea-aquarium.html.
Serious Play Conference brings together professionals who are exploring the use of game-based learning, sharing their experience, and working together to shape the future of training and education. For more information on Serious Play Award Program visit seriousplayconf.com/international-serious-play-award-programs.
World Ocean Explorer is a transformative virtual aquarium designed to deepen understanding of the world ocean and amplify connection for young people worldwide. Organized around the principles of Ocean Literacy and the Next Gen Science Standards, World Ocean Explorer brings the wonder and knowledge of ocean species and systems to students in formal and informal classrooms, absolutely free to anyone with a good Internet connection. As an advocate for the ocean through communications, World Ocean Observatory believes there is no better investment in the future of the sustainable ocean than through a new approach to educational engagement that excites, informs, and motivates students to explore the wonders of our marine world and to understand the pervasive connection and implication for our future, inherent in the protection and conservation of all aspects of our ocean world.
World Ocean Explorer presents an astonishing 3-dimensional simulated aquarium visit, organized to reveal the wonders of undersea life, with layers of detailed data and information to augment the emotional connection made to the astonishing beauty and complexity of the dynamic ocean. Within each of the virtual exhibits, students visit exemplary theme-based sites with myriad opportunities to understand the larger perspectives of scientific knowledge as organized and visualized to dramatize the impact and change on ocean life as a result of natural and human-generated events. Through immersion among displays, mixed media and 3D models, the experience of an aquarium visit will be brought into classrooms or home school environments as a free, accessible, always available opportunity for teaching and learning. All of this will be available to a world audience without physical limitation or cost. World Ocean Explorer, a project of the World Ocean Observatory, receives support from the Seth Sprague Educational and Charitable Foundation, Visual Solutions Lab, the Climate Change Institute, the Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation, and The Fram Museum Oslo. To learn more about the current and future exhibits of World Ocean Explorer, visit worldoceanexplorer.org.
media contact
Trisha Badger, Managing Director, World Ocean Observatory | [email protected] +12077011069
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