Insurance Rates Are Soaring for US Homeowners in Climate Danger Zones

The First Street Foundation study points out that insurers could offer discounts to homeowners who take steps to fortify their homes, which would help make disasters less damaging. Moore said Florida once was a leader when it came to measures like building codes, although that has changed in recent years. The state also had lacked … Read more

Climate Change Is Bad for Your Health, Wherever You Are

Extreme heat kills roughly half a million people worldwide each year, but at the current rate of global warming it could be close to five times as deadly by 2050. Then there are the indirect health risks of climate change: Chaotic weather and higher temperatures generate deadly natural disasters, bring diseases into new areas, and … Read more

Emergency Planners Are Having a Moment

Also, in a disaster, there are no good decisions, there are only least-worse decisions. Every decision will come with a set of consequences. What the government really struggled to do was mitigate the consequences of decisions they felt that they had to take. My personal view is that what the UK’s going through at the … Read more

Who Tests If Heat-Proof Clothing Actually Works? These Poor Sweating Mannequins

Meet ANDI, the world’s sweatiest mannequin. Although he might look like a shop-floor stalwart from a distance, a closer glance reveals bundles of cabling and pipework concealed beneath his shell. He’s wired up with sensors, plumbed into a liquid supply, and dotted with up to 150 individual pores that open when he gets warm. It … Read more

How Your Body Adapts to Extreme Cold

Metabolic details matter to predict health in the modern world, Ocobock says. The same genetic programming that arose to protect someone in the Arctic—like high BMI and faster metabolism—could become liabilities. Many of Ocobock’s study subjects have been overweight and obese with normal cholesterol and blood sugar. Being “fat but fit,” which has been beneficial … Read more

Yes, the Climate Crisis Is Now ‘Gobsmacking.’ But So Is Progress

Scientists are running low on words to adequately describe the world’s climate chaos. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration could already say earlier this month that there was more than a 99 percent chance that 2023 was the hottest year on record. That followed September’s sky-high temperatures—an average of 0.5 degrees Celsius above the previous … Read more

Wildfires, floods and smoke: Canada’s top 2023 weather stories

Canadians saw the full might of Mother Nature in 2023, from floods to fires and smoke to storms. On Wednesday, Environment Canada, the country’s weather forecaster and researcher, announced the top 10 weather stories. “This is the year the Canadian landscape really took a hit from extreme weather,” senior climatologist Dave Phillips told reporters at … Read more

Snow Sports Are Getting More Dangerous

Many people meet Dale Atkins for the first time on their worst days—ice climbers who are stranded and injured, skiers that have been swallowed by an avalanche. Atkins, a skilled mountaineer as well as a climatologist and former weather and avalanche forecaster, is one of the experts on Colorado’s Alpine Rescue Team that local sheriffs … Read more