Natural Disasters News

July 26, 2024

Top Headlines

Researchers Enhance Tool to Better Predict Where and When Wildfires Will Occur

July 22, 2024 — A newly enhanced database is expected to help wildfire managers and scientists better predict where and when wildfires may occur by incorporating hundreds of additional factors that impact the ...

Iceland's Volcano Eruptions May Last Decades

June 26, 2024 — Scientists predict from geochemical data that Iceland is entering a new volcanic era that will last for decades, possibly centuries. Under an hour's drive from the country's capital city, the ongoing eruptions pose considerable risks for economic ...

Effective Hurricane Risk Messaging

June 17, 2024 — Forecasters can use images in social media to better communicate weather related hazards of hurricanes, according to a pair of new ...

An Earthquake Changed the Course of the Ganges: Could It Happen Again?

June 17, 2024 — A major earthquake 2,500 years ago caused one of the largest rivers on Earth to abruptly change course, according to a new study. The previously undocumented quake rerouted the main channel of the Ganges River in what is now densely populated ...

Latest Headlines

updated 9:45pm EDT

Video Analysis of Iceland 2010 Eruption Could Improve Volcanic Ash Forecasts for Aviation Safety

June 13, 2024 — Video footage of Iceland's 2010 Eyjafjallaj kull eruption is providing researchers with rare, up-close observations of volcanic ash clouds -- ...

Estimating the Energy of Past Earthquakes from Brecciation in a Fault Zone

June 13, 2024 — In the same way that the number of rings in a tree can tell us its age, the characteristics of rocks such as breccia can tell us about the history of a region. The breccia around Ichinokawa Mine ...

The Rotation of Earth's Inner Core Has Slowed, New Study Confirms

June 13, 2024 — The new study provides unambiguous evidence that the inner core began to decrease its speed around 2010, moving slower than the Earth's ...

Cascadia Subduction Zone, One of Earth's Top Hazards, Comes Into Sharper Focus

June 7, 2024 — A new study has produced the first comprehensive survey of the many complex structures beneath the seafloor in the Cascadia Subduction Zone, off ...

Breaking Ground: Could Geometry Offer a New Explanation for Why Earthquakes Happen?

June 5, 2024 — Researchers are adding a new wrinkle to a long-held belief about what causes earthquakes in the first ...

Mapping Lava Flows With Groundbreaking Field Instrument

June 4, 2024 — Researchers develop a tool for measuring the viscosity of lava that could increase our understanding of molten rock as well as better improve models of its movement, giving authorities crucial ...

Understanding the Mechanisms for Local Amplification of 2024 Tsunamis in Iida Bay

May 28, 2024 — Researchers uncover the unique mechanisms that resulted in severe tsunamis in Iida Bay caused by the 2024 Noto Peninsula Earthquake. The recent ...

Novel Mobile Air Monitoring Technology Yields Greater Insight Into Post-Disaster Pollution Levels

May 30, 2024 — A team has found that high resolution mass spectrometry could be a valuable tool for identifying and assessing air-borne contaminants produced by ...

Safeguarding Urban Infrastructure from Subsidence and Liquefaction Risks

May 30, 2024 — During an earthquake, soil can weaken through subsidence and liquefaction. These processes can cause buildings to collapse as the soil becomes unable to support their weight. Researchers have now ...

Wind Farms Are Cheaper Than You Think -- And Could Have Prevented Fukushima, Says Global Review

May 28, 2024 — Offshore wind could have prevented the Fukushima disaster, according to a review of wind ...

Nationwide Flood Models Poorly Capture Risks to Households and Properties, Study Finds

July 24, 2024 — Government agencies, insurance companies and disaster planners rely on national flood risk models from the private sector that aren't reliable at smaller levels such as neighborhoods and ...

Earth Scientists Describe a New Kind of Volcanic Eruption

May 27, 2024 — By analyzing the dynamics of 12 back-to-back explosions that happened in 2018, researchers describe a new type of volcanic eruption mechanism. The explosions were driven by sudden pressure increases ...

Social Networks Can Influence Perception of Climate-Change Risk

May 22, 2024 — Short but severe episodes of flooding from hurricanes in Texas and Florida triggered a nationwide increase in flood insurance sign-ups depending on how socially connected a county was to the flooded ...

'Fossilizing' Cracks in Infrastructure Creates Sealing That Can Even Survive Earthquakes

May 22, 2024 — In a new study, a team of researchers used research on fossilizing techniques to create a new method for sealing cracks and fractures in rocks and bedrock using a 'concretion-forming ...

Highly Sensitive Fiber Optic Gyroscope Senses Rotational Ground Motion Around Active Volcano

May 21, 2024 — Researchers have built a prototype fiber optic gyroscope for high resolution, real-time monitoring of ground rotations caused by earthquakes in the active volcanic area of Campi Flegrei in Naples, ...

Warming Climate Intensifies Flash Droughts Worldwide

May 21, 2024 — Sudden, severe dry spells known as flash droughts are rising in intensity around the world, with a notable exception in mountainous Central Asia, where flash drought extent is shrinking, according to ...

Subduction Zone Splay Faults Compound Hazards of Great Earthquakes

May 20, 2024 — Groundbreaking research has provided new insight into the tectonic plate shifts that create some of the Earth's largest earthquakes and ...

Clues from Deep Magma Reservoirs Could Improve Volcanic Eruption Forecasts

May 10, 2024 — New research into molten rock 20km below the Earth's surface could help save lives by improving the prediction of volcanic ...

Take Cover! Survey Shows Tornado Warnings Widely Misunderstood

May 9, 2024 — A study showed that about half of those surveyed in the mid-South could not accurately identify a tornado ...

Heavy Snowfall and Rain May Contribute to Some Earthquakes

May 8, 2024 — Episodes of heavy snowfall and rain likely contributed to a swarm of earthquakes over the past several years in northern Japan, researchers find. Their study shows climate conditions could initiate ...

Researchers Show That Slow-Moving Earthquakes Are Controlled by Rock Permeability

May 7, 2024 — A research group explores how the makeup of rocks, specifically their permeability -- or how easily fluids can flow through them -- affects the frequency and intensity of slow slip events. Slow ...

Lake Tsunamis Pose Significant Threat Under Warming Climate

May 6, 2024 — The names might not be familiar -- Cowee Creek, Brabazon Range, Upper Pederson Lagoon -- but they mark the sites of recent lake tsunamis, a phenomenon that is increasingly common in Alaska, British ...

Do Earthquake Hazard Maps Predict Higher Shaking Than Actually Occurred?

May 1, 2024 — A research team studied earthquake hazard maps from five countries and found that all the maps seemed to overpredict the historically observed earthquake shaking intensities. In analyzing the ...

Details of Hurricane Ian's Aftermath Captured With New Remote Sensing Method

Apr. 29, 2024 — Using aerial imagery data and LiDAR, a study remotely identified the hardest-hit areas of Southwest Florida's Estero Island in the aftermath of Hurricane Ian. Researchers estimated the extent of ...

Researchers Introduce New Way to Study, Help Prevent Landslides

Apr. 26, 2024 — Landslides are one of the most destructive natural disasters on the planet, causing billions of dollars of damage and devastating loss of life every year. A global team of researchers has provided ...

Marginalized Communities Developed 'Disaster Subculture' When Living Through Extreme Climate Events

Apr. 23, 2024 — An assistant professor conducted a study in which he lived among one of the poorest, most marginalized communities in Seoul, South Korea. In the ethnographic study, he asked residents how they dealt ...

Scientists Trigger Mini-Earthquakes in the Lab

Apr. 19, 2024 — Earthquakes and landslides are famously difficult to predict and prepare for. By studying a miniature version of the ground in the lab, scientists have demonstrated how these events can be triggered ...

CO2 Worsens Wildfires by Helping Plants Grow

Apr. 16, 2024 — By fueling the growth of plants that become kindling, carbon dioxide is driving an increase in the severity and frequency of wildfires, according to a new ...

Rock Permeability, Microquakes Link May Be a Boon for Geothermal Energy

Apr. 11, 2024 — Using machine learning, researchers have tied low-magnitude microearthquakes to the permeability of subsurface rocks beneath the Earth, a discovery that could have implications for improving ...

Cloud Engineering Could Be More Effective 'Painkiller' for Global Warming Than Previously Thought

Apr. 11, 2024 — Cloud 'engineering' could be more effective for climate cooling than previously thought, because of the increased cloud cover produced, new research ...