Disasters

"If a major hurricane approaches Central Florida this season, Maria knows it’s dangerous to stay inside her wooden, trailer-like home. In past storms, she evacuated to her sister’s sturdier house. If she couldn’t get there, a shelter set up at the local high school served as a refuge if needed. But with accelerating detentions and deportations of immigrants across her community of Apopka, 20 miles (32 kilometers) northwest of Orlando, Maria, an agricultural worker from Mexico without permanent U.S. legal status, doesn’t know if those options are safe."

"A train derails and spills at least 1,000 gallons of hazardous materials in the U.S. about once every two months. Nearly half of those derailments resulted in evacuations; more than a quarter resulted in a fire or explosion since 2015, an analysis of federal derailment data showed. And many communities along the rail lines aren’t prepared to keep people safe when it happens."

"The smoke from the wildfires that burned through Los Angeles in January smelled like plastic and was so thick that it hid the ocean. Firefighters who responded developed instant migraines, coughed up black goo and dropped to their knees, vomiting and dizzy."

"Hurricane Erin churned slowly toward the eastern U.S. on Tuesday, stirring up treacherous waves that already have led to dozens of water rescues and shut down beaches along the coast in the midst of summer’s last hurrah. While forecasters remain confident the center of the monster storm will remain far offshore, the outer edges are likely to bring damaging tropical-force winds, large swells and life-threatening rip currents into Friday."

"The prolonged Nordic heatwave in July was supercharged by the climate crisis and shows “no country is safe from climate change”, scientists say."

"In El Paso, heat deaths hit record highs in 2023 and 2024. Advocates say not enough is being done to protect the region’s most vulnerable people."

"The recently passed spending bill sets logging targets that federal officials don’t have the capacity to meet"  "The new law sets aggressive timber harvesting goals and slashes spending for the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management. Environmental advocates and industry insiders say those goals are contradictory and unworkable."

"The Pennsylvania county where an explosion at a U.S. Steel plant south of Pittsburgh killed two people and injured more than 10 others announced Thursday that it is stepping up air quality monitoring in the area of the sprawling facility that has a troubled environmental record."

"Officials in the northern Caribbean warned Thursday of heavy rains and dangerous swells as Tropical Storm Erin approached the region."

"Companies such as SpaceX and Blue Origin may be able to forgo reviews required under National Environmental Policy Act"