Natural Disasters News

September 29, 2023

Top Headlines

Alarming Results from World First Study of Two Decades of Global Smoke Pollution

Sep. 20, 2023 — The world's first study of the increase in pollution from landscape fires across the globe over the past two decades reveals that over 2 billion people are exposed to at least one day of potentially ...

Crucial Third Clue to Finding New Diamond Deposits

Sep. 19, 2023 — Researchers studying diamond-rich rocks from Western Australia's Argyle volcano have identified the missing third key ingredient needed to bring valuable pink diamonds to the Earth's surface where they can be mined, which could greatly help in the ...

100-Year Floods Could Occur Yearly by End of 21st Century

Sep. 13, 2023 — Most coastal communities will encounter '100-year floods' annually by the end of the century, even under a moderate scenario where carbon dioxide emissions peak by 2040, according to a new study. And as early as 2050, regions worldwide could ...

Largest Historic Fire Death Toll Belongs to Aftermath of 1923 Japan Earthquake

Sep. 12, 2023 — Fires that raged in the days following the 1 September 1923 magnitude 7.9 Kant earthquake killed roughly 90% of the 105,000 people who perished in and around Tokyo, making it one of the deadliest ...

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Exploring the Effect of Water on Seismic Wave Attenuation in the Upper Mantle

Sep. 27, 2023 — The mechanism facilitating the smooth movement of the oceanic lithosphere over the underlying asthenosphere (upper mantle) remains poorly understood. ...

New Super-Fast Flood Model Has Potentially Life-Saving Benefits

Sep. 12, 2023 — Researchers have developed a new simulation model, which can predict flooding during an ongoing disaster more quickly and accurately than currently ...

Scientific Ocean Drilling Discovers Dynamic Carbon Cycling in the Ultra-Deep-Water Japan Trench

Sep. 11, 2023 — Hadal trenches, with their deepest locations situated in the so-called hadal zone, the deepest parts of the ocean in water depth >6km, are the ...

Two out of Three Volcanoes Are Little-Known. How to Predict Their Eruptions?

Aug. 31, 2023 — What is the risk of a volcano erupting? To answer this question, scientists need information about its underlying internal structure. However, ...

New Study Examines Historical Drought and Flooding on the Amazon River

Aug. 24, 2023 — Despite the rapid increase in severe flooding, a new article indicates recent floods and droughts in the Amazon River Basin may have not yet exceeded the range of natural hydroclimatic ...

Atmospheric Circulation Weakens Following Volcanic Eruptions

Aug. 23, 2023 — An international team of scientists found that volcanic eruptions can cause the Pacific Walker Circulation to temporarily weaken, inducing El Niño-like conditions. The results provide important ...

Death Tolls from Climate Disasters Will 'Balloon' Without Investment in Africa's Weather Stations

Aug. 14, 2023 — Investment in 'hydromet systems' using technologies from AI to SMS would provide a nine-to-one ROI in saved lives and assets across African ...

Dry Lightning Can Spark Wildfires Even Under Wetter Conditions

Aug. 14, 2023 — Dry lightning can still be disastrous even when conditions aren't so dry, a study has found. These cloud-to-ground strikes during little to no rainfall were previously thought to pose wildfire ...

Study Ties Fracking to Another Type of Shaking

Aug. 10, 2023 — New research confirms fracking causes slow, small earthquakes or tremors, whose origin was previously a mystery to scientists. The tremors are produced by the same processes that could create large, ...

Scientists Crack the Code of What Causes Diamonds to Erupt

Aug. 7, 2023 — Scientists have discovered that the breakup of tectonic plates is the main driving force behind the generation and eruption of diamond-rich magmas from deep inside the ...

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Summaries
Headlines

Carbon Dioxide -- Not Water -- Triggers Explosive Basaltic Volcanoes

Aug. 7, 2023 — Geoscientists have long thought that water -- along with shallow magma stored in Earth's crust -- drives volcanoes to erupt. Now, thanks to newly developed research tools, scientists have ...

Research Reveals Hawai'i's Undersea Volcano, Kama'ehu, Erupted Five Times in Past 150 Years

Aug. 3, 2023 — Kama?ehuakanaloa (formerly L??ihi Seamount), a submarine Hawaiian volcano located about 20 miles off the south coast of the Big Island of Hawai'i, has erupted at least five times in the last 150 ...

Fiber Optic Cables Detect and Characterize Earthquakes

Aug. 2, 2023 — The same fiber optic networks that provide internet can simultaneously act as earthquake sensors, as demonstrated in a new ...

California's Winter Waves May Be Increasing Under Climate Change

Aug. 1, 2023 — A new study uses nearly a century of data to show that the average heights of winter waves along the California coast have increased as climate change has heated up the ...

How to Distinguish Slow and Fast Earthquakes

July 31, 2023 — Slow earthquakes are slow-slip phenomena that last many days or months, and you barely notice them. In 2007, researchers proposed how the magnitude and duration of earthquakes vary, which can help ...

What Can Central Utah's Earthquake 'Swarms' Reveal About the West's Seismicity?

July 24, 2023 — Much of central Utah's seismic activity comes in groups of small earthquakes. A study by seismologists examines 2,300 quakes occurring 40 'swarms' dating back to 1981, opening a window ...

Long-Term Changes in Waves and Storm Surges Have Not Impacted Global Coastlines

July 21, 2023 — Changes in ocean wave and storm conditions have not caused long-term impacts on sandy coastlines in the past 30 years, a new study has ...

Natural Hazard Vulnerability Shows Disproportionate Risk

July 18, 2023 — Researchers developed a detailed assessment and map of vulnerability to natural disaster of the continental United ...

What Causes Mudslides and Floods After Wildfires? Hint: It's Not What Scientists Thought

July 17, 2023 — Scientists once assumed that flooding and mudslides after wildfires were linked to the waxy coating that builds up on charred soil, preventing water absorption. Researchers found that water flow came ...

Addressing Justice in Wildfire Risk Management

July 10, 2023 — The unequal distribution of wildfire risk in our society is influenced by various factors, such as social vulnerabilities and intersecting forms of inequality, including gender, age, ethnicity, or ...

Weeks Later, Potentially Harmful Chemicals Lingered in Homes Affected by Marshall Fire

July 6, 2023 — In the wake of Colorado's devastating Marshall Fire, a team of chemists and engineers undertook a first-of-its-kind study to explore homes that survived the blaze. Their results reveal the ...

Lasering Lava to Forecast Volcanic Eruptions

July 5, 2023 — Researchers have optimized a new technique to help forecast how volcanoes will behave, which could save lives and property around the ...

Earth's Inner Core: Earth's Solid Metal Sphere Is 'Textured'

July 5, 2023 — Scientists used seismic data discovered Earth's inner core displays a variety of textures that it acquired will it formed from within the fluid outer core. The data set was generated over the ...

Climate Disasters, Traumatic Events Have Long-Term Impacts on Youths' Academics

June 30, 2023 — Experiencing traumatic events such as natural disasters may have long-term consequences for the academic progress and future food security of youth -- a problem researchers said could worsen with the ...

Research Reveals Sources of CO2 from Aleutian-Alaska Arc Volcanoes

June 28, 2023 — Scientists have wondered what happens to the organic and inorganic carbon that Earth's Pacific Plate carries with it as it slides into the planet's interior along the volcano-studded Ring ...

Climate Change Will Increase Impacts of Volcanic Eruptions

June 28, 2023 — Volcanic disasters have been studied since Pompeii was buried in 79 A.D., leading the public to believe that scientists already know why, where, when and how long volcanoes will erupt. But a ...

Geologists Are Using Artificial Intelligence to Predict Landslides

June 28, 2023 — Many factors influence where a landslide will occur, including the shape of the terrain, its slope and drainage areas, the material properties of soil and bedrock, and environmental conditions like ...

Researchers Unearth the Mysteries of How Turkey's East Anatolian Fault Formed

June 28, 2023 — An international team has, for the first time, accurately determined the age of the East Anatolian fault, allowing geologists to learn more about its seismic history and tendency to produce ...

What Are the Characteristics of Foreshocks for Large Earthquakes?

June 28, 2023 — Seismologists agree that foreshocks are the most widely identified signal of an upcoming mainshock earthquake. But do these foreshock sequences have distinctive characteristics that separate them ...

Multiscale Rupture Growth Driven by a Complex Fault Network During the 2023 Türkiye and Syria Earthquake Doublet

June 26, 2023 — Researchers analyzed the source processes of the twin earthquakes that caused extensive damage in Türkiye and Syria on February 6, 2023. The results revealed that a complex fault network with bends, ...

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