LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – California fire officials on Sunday reported significant headway battling the two largest of dozens of lightning-sparked blazes raging in and around the greater San Francisco Bay area since mid-August, though 60,000 people remained unde... More »
LONDON/GENEVA (Reuters) – Pine trees are bursting into flames. Boggy peatlands are tinderbox dry. And towns in northern Russia are sweltering under conditions more typical of the tropics. Reports of record-breaking Arctic heat – registered at more than 100 Fah... More »
(Reuters) – Australia’s Boral Ltd (BLD.AX) said on Monday delays to building projects due to bushfires will likely cause a plunge in its second-half results, while revealing an investigation had found inflated earnings at its North American window-making busin... More »
SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australia’s Prime Minister Scott Morrison will on Tuesday front parliament for the first time in three months as he seeks to repair his standing with voters angry by his response to the country’s bushfire crisis and a scandal over sports fun... More »
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Musicians and performers at the Grammy Awards paid tribute to Kobe Bryant on Sunday at his former home arena, the Staples Center in Los Angeles, hours after the NBA great was killed some 40 miles (65 km) away in a helicopter crash. Brya... More »
KANGAROO VALLEY (Reuters) – Hard-hit businesses in Australia’s blaze-ravaged Kangaroo Valley are calling for tourists to return now that the wildfires are under control, and fear firms and jobs will be lost unless the all-clear message is heard. The tourism in... More »
SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australia on Monday boosted emergency funding for small businesses hit by bushfires that have ravaged the country for months, as the mounting costs of the disaster cast doubt on the government’s ability to deliver a promised budget surplus. ... More »
MELBOURNE (Reuters) – Serena Williams put aside her concerns about the air quality at Melbourne Park as she breezed into the second round of the Australian Open on Monday to remain on course for a record-equaling 24th Grand Slam title. Buoyed by securing her f... More »
(Reuters) – The bushfire smoke that hampered the buildup to the Australian Open highlights the need for Tennis Australia to be doing much more to combat climate change, the country’s national environmental lobby group said. The Australian Open, the season open... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – China’s yuan led a rally in trade-sensitive currencies on Monday and the Australian dollar recovered some recent losses as the imminent signing of a preliminary U.S.-China trade deal boosted sentiment. The U.S.-China Phase 1 agreement, due t... More »
(Reuters) – The U.S. government is planning to permanently halt its civilian drone program due to the devices being made at least partly in China, the Financial Times reported on Sunday. The U.S. Department of the Interior is considering halting about 1,000 dr... More »
WELLINGTON (Reuters) – The length of time Serena Williams held her arms aloft after clinching her first WTA title in almost three years spoke volumes on Sunday as the American prepares for the latest tilt at a 24th Grand Slam title in Melbourne next week. The ... More »
(Reuters) – The ATP will donate $500,000 to the WWF Australian Wildlife and Nature Recovery Fund as part of the bushfire relief efforts, the governing body of men’s tennis said on Sunday. The donation from players was announced by Novak Djokovic and Rafa Nadal... More »
MERIMBULA, Australia/SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australian authorities urged another mass evacuation across the heavily populated southeast on Thursday as a return of hot weather fanned huge bushfires threatening several towns and communities. Victoria state Premier D... More »
(Reuters) – Australian insurer Suncorp Group (SUN.AX) said on Thursday it has received since September 2,600 bushfire-related claims worth up to A$345 million ($237.05 million), of which nearly a third was recorded in the first few days of the month. Suncorp o... More »
SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australia’s rampaging bushfires continue to affect top-level sporting events with a women’s soccer match scheduled for Newcastle on Friday postponed because of the poor air quality and expected soaring temperatures. Hundreds of fires have sc... More »
YANDERRA, Australia (Reuters) – It was oppressively hot, above 40 Celsius (104 Fahrenheit), and the wind was picking up. Bushfires were devastating nearby towns and now threatened Yanderra, a small village with just over 600 people located south of Sydney. Dia... More »
MADRID (Reuters) – The past decade is almost certain to be the hottest on record, weather experts warned on Tuesday, painting a bleak picture of vanishing sea ice, devastating heatwaves and encroaching seas in a report launched at a climate summit in Spain. An... More »
SAO PAULO (Reuters) – Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro claimed on Friday that Hollywood star Leonardo DiCaprio financed fires being set in the Amazon rainforest, without presenting any evidence, the right-wing leader’s latest broadside in casting blame over ... More »
(Reuters) – A major wildfire burning in Los Angeles near the famed Getty Center art museum was likely sparked by a tree branch falling on power lines in high winds, fire officials said on Tuesday. The Los Angeles Fire Department said the preliminary determinat... More »
(Reuters) – When a fast-moving wildfire licked up to the fringes of the sprawling Getty Center complex on Tuesday, the staff of the Los Angeles museum betrayed no sign of panic, confident that its priceless art was safe and secure within its walls. Mindful of ... More »
JAKARTA (Reuters) – Indonesia warned its citizens of more choking smoke from forest fires on Tuesday as several provinces closed schools due to worsening air quality. An El Nino weather pattern this year has intensified annual dry-season fires, often caused by... More »
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Firefighters have tightened their grip on a deadly Los Angeles wildfire burning with subdued fury on Sunday after extremely dry desert winds that had stoked the flames gave way to moister, gentler breezes blowing in from the Pacific. Th... More »
JAKARTA (Reuters) – Thousands of Indonesians prayed for rain in haze-hit towns on the islands of Sumatra and Borneo on Wednesday, as forest fires raged at the height of the dry season, the state Antara news agency reported. Fires have burnt through parts of Su... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – Big insurance losses from hurricanes, wildfires and other natural disasters over the past two years are set to push reinsurance renewal rates higher in January, ratings agencies said. After falling for several years due to competition and fe... More »
BIARRITZ, France (Reuters) – Iran has an opportunity to come back into compliance with the nuclear deal and resume dialogue about its nuclear activities, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Monday. U.S. President Donald Trump said earlier he would mee... More »
BIARRITZ, Belgium (Reuters) – France on Monday issued a short statement at the end of a meeting of G7 leaders on several issues, but it was not a communique along the lines of those usually drawn up at the annual summit, reflecting divisions. The issues were t... More »
BIARRITZ, France (Reuters) – French President Emmanuel Macron paved the way at a G7 summit for a diplomatic solution to the standoff between Washington and Tehran over a 2015 nuclear deal, but there was little else to show from a meeting at which allies were s... More »
BIARRITZ, France (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump, responding to a question about climate change after skipping a G7 session on the issue, said on Monday that American wealth is based on energy and he will not jeopardize that for dreams and windmills. T... More »
TOKYO (Reuters) – A crisis over burning forest in the Amazon is “incredibly tragic”, actor Leonardo DiCaprio said on Monday, urging governments to do more, amid growing international outrage over the damage to the world’s largest tropical rain forest. A record... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – Hedge fund Tangency Capital has raised a further $165 million to invest in the property reinsurance market, bringing its size to $265 million as the hurricane season gets under way, one of its co-founders told Reuters on Wednesday. Insured l... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – PG&E Corp investor BlueMountain Capital Management LLC on Friday named 13 people it hopes to install as directors at the embattled power utility weeks after the company filed for bankruptcy in the wake of California’s catastrophic wildfire... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Legislation to provide $81 billion in new disaster aid for U.S. states, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands was put on hold by the Senate on Thursday amid attacks from both Republicans and Democrats. The Republican-controlled House o... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday approved an $81 billion bill to help widespread recovery efforts from hurricanes and wildfires this year. By a vote of 251-169, the House passed the measure to help Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virg... More »
Insured property losses from wildfires that raged through Northern California wine country this month, killing at least 42 people and destroying thousands of businesses and homes, could total $2 billion to $3 billion, a risk-modeling firm said on Thursday. More »
A new package of U.S. disaster assistance sailed through the House of Representatives on Thursday, despite President Donald Trump expressing impatience with having to devote federal resources for hurricane-ravaged Puerto Rico's recovery. More »
Wildfires threaten a suburb of Christchurch on New Zealand’s South Island taken after sunset, February 15, 2017. REUTERS/Mark Hannah Photography More than 1,400 residents of New Zealand’s Christchurch city returned home on Friday as firefighters contained a ma... More »
LOS ANGELES A virtual Noah’s Ark of wild beasts and livestock has been relocated to save them from a massive wildfire burning north of Los Angeles in a region that is home to exotic animal sanctuaries and horse ranches. Officials and volunteers at the Wildlife... More »
(This version of the story corrects number of troops in paragraph 1 to 1,000 from 10,000- headline altered to reflect change) PADAMARAN, Indonesia (Reuters) – Indonesia said on Friday it will send more than 1,000 troops to fight fires in southern Sumatra, as s... More »
