Governor Newsom calls on state legislature to approve $2.5bn in extra aid as experts predict wildfires could be costliest disaster in US history
Tell us about the financial consequences you are facing due to the California fires
Weather forecasters are predicting that the dry season in Los Angeles is likely to get worse in the coming weeks and that the drought which intensified last week across southern California will continue to worsen into March.
Meteorologist Eric Holthaus has written for the Guardian and says the rain forecast for the next three weeks in Los Angeles means the city’s record-dry start to its rainy season will keep getting worse.
This year’s rainy season is running at just 2% of normal for Los Angeles, which has only seen 0.16in of rain so far.
Weather models increasingly indicate that southern California will receive no rain at all during the rest of January, and potentially no rain during the first week or two of February as well.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
01/13/2025 - 19:18
01/13/2025 - 17:16
Concerns that dangerous fine particle pollution can become embedded in bloodstream and lungs
Los Angeles wildfires – live updates
Los Angeles wildfires: full report
The Los Angeles wildfires have claimed the lives of at least 24 people and have burned more than 100,000 structures. While the focus is understandably on avoiding the flames, another immediate danger lurks across the county and beyond, one more difficult to escape: smoke.
The most dangerous component of wildfire smoke is fine particle pollution, also known as PM2.5 or soot. These tiny particles, smaller than one 20th the width of a human hair, can, if inhaled, become embedded in the bloodstream and lungs. It is estimated that about one-third of all particulate matter pollution in the US now comes from wildfire smoke.
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01/13/2025 - 14:35
Honolulu officials had filed a lawsuit against the companies for an alleged decades long misinformation campaign
The supreme court has shot down the fossil fuel industry’s attempts to kill a Hawaii lawsuit, which is seeking to hold the sector accountable for an alleged decades-long misinformation campaign.
The Monday decision will allow the closely watched litigation, filed by officials from Honolulu, to proceed toward a trial. It is a procedural victory for the wave of climate accountability lawsuits filed against oil and gas companies in recent years.
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01/13/2025 - 13:24
Rhino ‘unintentionally’ punctured zebra’s stomach in enclosure they shared, zoo says
A male zebra died after a female rhino unintentionally punctured his stomach, a zoo in Essex has said.
The rhino, called Astrid, had been sparring with her son Tayo when she tried to move Ziggy out of the way last Friday. Colchester zoo said Ziggy died of his injuries within minutes.
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01/13/2025 - 11:00
The news from California is clear, but we don’t want to see it. It’s too confounding, big, complex. But we can sense the danger
When I send anxious texts to friends in Los Angeles – friends who have been evacuated or who are waiting to leave , friends escaping a fire zone, wondering if their life’s work has been destroyed, worrying about the smoke’s effect on an asthmatic child – I always begin with the same three words:are you OK?
But a continent away, watching photos and videos of a city I love being incinerated, overcome by waves of terror, grief and mourning, I have other questions.
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01/13/2025 - 10:40
What the president-elect calls a ‘giant hoax’ is changing the strategic calculus in the Arctic and for the Panama canal
Donald Trump’s desire to seize control of Greenland and the Panama canal is being shaped in part by a force that he has sought to deny even exists – the climate crisis.
Last week, Trump ramped up his demands that the United States annex both Greenland and the Panama canal, refusing to rule out economic or even military interventions to take them and threatening “very high” tariffs upon Denmark, of which Greenland is an autonomous territory, if it opposes him.
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01/13/2025 - 09:00
Australian mainland states permit killing of nearly 5 million annually as part of industry supplying meat and leather products
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Wildlife advocates are calling for a halt to the commercial harvesting of kangaroos in Victoria’s Grampians region after bushfires there.
Wildlife Victoria warned of “long-term impacts” on native plants and animals due to the fires, which burned through 76,000 hectares of national park and farmland, and called for a stop to the controversial practice until the impact on kangaroo populations could be fully assessed.
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01/13/2025 - 06:00
Forecasters say there won’t be winds as strong as last week’s record-setting gusts, but LA’s dry season will get worse
California wildfires – live updates
When it comes to forecasting the conditions for catastrophic California wildfires, there are two main ingredients: fuels (think grasses, shrubs, trees – basically anything that’s available for fires to burn) and winds.
When analyzing fuels, forecasters look mainly at the levels of drought, along with any recent rains that may help diminish the effect of longer-term drought. With winds, in southern California at least, it’s all about anticipating the Santa Anas – the fierce winds that blow offshore, from the deserts to the coast, bringing loads of dry air with them.
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01/13/2025 - 04:44
Growers blame weather challenges in UK and Europe, which Met Office says will become more frequent with climate breakdown
Broccoli, cauliflower and other brassicas may be in short supply this spring as the mild autumn and winter has caused the crops to come up early, growers have said.
Any shortages will prolong the so-called “hungry gap”, which runs from April to early June, when very few crops grown in the UK are ready to eat.
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01/13/2025 - 02:04
‘The animals that don’t die need total nursing care,’ wildlife rescuer says, ahead of a potential spike in cases in coming weeks
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Thousands of rainbow lorikeets and hundreds of flying foxes have been hospitalised in Queensland in the past year with a mysterious paralysis that can affect the animals’ ability to fly, swallow and even breathe.
Lorikeet paralysis syndrome has struck birds in Queensland and New South Wales since at least 2012, and a similar syndrome was identified in flying foxes five years ago.
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