Government officials in Ecuador are now reporting 525 deaths were caused by Saturday’s earthquake—but they fear the tally could climb much higher.
Late last week, a series of powerful earthquakes struck southern Japan over several days, the most powerful—Magnitude 7.3—occurring early on April 16.
On April 18, 1906, a magnitude 7.8 earthquake centered near the city of San Francisco struck, toppling hundreds of buildings and starting city-wide fires that burned for days.
Recent images of the ongoing cleanup work and the ghost towns being reclaimed by nature within the 1,000-square-mile (2,600-square-kilometers) exclusion zone in Ukraine.
Five years ago a magnitude 9.0 earthquake struck off Japan’s northeastern shore—the most powerful earthquake ever recorded to have hit Japan.
Thirty years ago, the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant disaster took place, releasing massive amounts of radioactive material into the atmosphere. Today, Sami reindeer herders in central Norway are still affected by the fallout, as their herds feed on contaminated lichen and mushrooms.
On Sunday, an enormous pile of excavated soil and other construction waste crashed down on an industrial park in Shenzhen, China, in a landslide burying dozens of buildings, and leaving more than 90 people listed as missing.
AP photographer Binsar Bakkara recently visited newly-formed ghost villages near Indonesia’s Mount Sinabing, documenting the crumbling houses left behind that serve as “eerie reminders of how life suddenly stopped when the volcano erupted and everyone was forced to evacuate their homes.”
Earlier this month, on November 5, two dams retaining tons of iron-mining waste in Brazil burst, releasing a massive flood of toxic sludge that has flowed downstream into Rio Doce, spending two weeks making its way several hundred miles downstream, finally reaching the Atlantic Ocean.
On November 5, two dams retaining tons of iron-mining waste near the Brazilian town of Bento Rodrigues burst, releasing a massive flood of thick, red toxic mud that flattened buildings and trees, smothered the small town, killed at least four, and left another 28 still missing.
Over the weekend, thousands of people were evacuated as fast-burning wildfires in California overwhelmed several small towns, killing at least one person and destroying hundreds of homes and businesses. A state of emergency was declared by governor Jerry Brown in the areas hardest hit by the Butte and Valley fires.
“Unprecedented rain in Japan unleashed heavy floods on Friday that tore houses from their foundations, uprooted trees, and forced more than 100,000 people from their homes,” according to Reuters.
A decade ago, Hurricane Katrina triggered floods that inundated New Orleans and killed more than 1,800 people as storm waters overwhelmed levees and broke through floodwalls on August 29, 2005.
According to the National Interagency Fire Center, there are currently about 30,000 firefighters and support personnel battling nearly 100 wildfires in 10 western states.
The number of migrants fleeing into Europe this year—largely Syrian refugees—has already reached 235,000, topping the total number of migrants for all of last year, 219,000.
Late on the night of August 12, a series of ferocious explosions tore through an industrial area in Tianjin, China.
Three months have now passed since massive twin earthquakes struck Nepal, killing more than 8,800 people, injuring more than 22,000.
Around Athens and in other parts of southern Greece, about 50 forest fires have broken out in recent days, fanned by strong winds and high temperatures.
Wildfires have already burned more than 1.6 million acres in Alaska this season, and blazes in Washington, Oregon, and bone-dry California have scorched thousands more.
Heavy rainfall and flooding in the Georgian capital of Tbilisi left at least 12 people dead on Sunday, ravaging the city's zoo and setting animals free into the streets of Tbilisi.
A passenger ship carrying 458 people sank in a storm on Monday night in the Yangtze River in China.
Devastating storms that brought tornadoes and 11 inches of rainfall to the Great Plains, Midwest, and northern Mexico, continue to cause serious flooding in Texas and parts of Oklahoma.
A pipeline burst yesterday, spilling an estimated 21,000 gallons (79,500 liters) of crude oil into the Pacific Ocean near Santa Barbara.
On May 18, 1980, an earthquake struck below the north face of Mount St. Helens in Washington State, triggering the largest landslide in recorded history, and a major volcanic eruption that scattered ash across a dozen states.
A collection of winning and honored images from this year’s nature-photo competition
A collection of amazing recent images made with the Hubble Space Telescope
Mourners of Pope Francis gathered at the Vatican, scenes from the the second weekend of Coachella 2025, a humanoid-robot half-marathon in China, and much more
Images of the people, animals, and landscapes of the Earth’s arctic and subarctic regions, photographed by Olivier Morin