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Five years ago, British Columbia's heat dome became one of the deadliest weather disasters in Canadian history.

(D-Keine/E+/Getty Images) Not as bad as we feared. ScienceAlert stories are written, fact-checked, and edited by humans, never generated by AI. Don't miss a story, subscribe here.

When a powerful EF-4 tornado tore through Rolling Fork, Mississippi, on March 24, 2023, social media became a critical tool for sharing weather warnings, damage reports and recovery information. But a new study from University of Nebraska–Lincoln media scholar Cory Armstrong found that the same disaster also exposed persistent communication gaps facing rura…

A flash flood can devastate a community for years in a matter of minutes. These disasters account for roughly 85% of floods and cause thousands of deaths annually worldwide, with water levels capable of shooting up 30 feet (9 meters) and receding to normal levels in the span of a single, unpredictable day, according to the National Weather Service.

A revolution in forecasting natural disasters is underway, say researchers in Switzerland who are training AI models using vast troves of NASA climate data to produce potentially lifesaving data at lightning speed.

Human-caused global warming thinned glaciers and thawed mountain permafrost, likely helping to destabilize the Himalayan slope that collapsed last month and unleashed catastrophic flooding across Nepal, according to a report released Thursday.

It's official: El Niño is back. By late fall 2026, forecast models give a 2-in-3 chance of a strong-to-very-strong El Niño affecting the weather, climate and ocean temperatures across the planet.

Tornadoes are among the most destructive weather phenomena on Earth. Their small scale, short life cycle and sudden onset make them extremely difficult to predict. This challenge is amplified for weak tornadoes embedded within midlatitude westerly flows, which often hide in plain sight with faint signals. Improving the simulation capability for these events…