Natural Disaster | featured news

An earthquake centered in Afghanistan's east killed at least four people and injured almost 70, after wet weather weakened the country's traditional mud-brick homes, officials said on Wednesday.

On April 10, 2011, tornadoes ripped across Wisconsin, tearing roofs off houses, toppling trees and snapping power lines. In many places, the high winds were greeted with silence as some Cold War-era warning sirens failed because of lost power and other issues — just when they were needed the most.

A strong earthquake struck China’s mountainous Sichuan province Saturday morning, leaving at least 113 people dead and more than 3,000 injured. Chinese authorities assessed the magnitude of the quake at 7.0, while the U.S. Geological Survey reported 6.6.

Superstorm Sandy didn't just rattle the East Coast, it also jiggled the ground across the country ever so slightly, scientists reported Thursday. Earthquake sensors located as far away as the Pacific Northwest detected the storm's energy as it surged toward the New York metropolitan region last year. The network typically records the sudden release of energy in the Earth's crust, but it can pick up shaking triggered by ocean waves, mine cave-ins and tornadoes.

Middle America was overwhelmed by weather Thursday, with snow in the north, tornadoes in the Plains, and torrential rains that caused floods and transportation woes - and a sinkhole in Chicago.

Powerful aftershocks rocked the border between Iran and Pakistan Wednesday, a day after a major earthquake tore through the region, collapsing buildings and killing at least 39 people and injuring more than 170. The Pakistani town of Mashkel was “totally destroyed,” according to a local journalist at the scene.

Iran has been struck by its most powerful earthquake for more than 50 years, with tremors felt across Pakistan, India and the Middle East. The epicentre of the 7.8-magnitude quake was near the south-eastern city of Khash, close to Pakistan.

A vast storm system that spawned tornadoes and killed three people marched toward the East Coast on Friday, delivering spring snow and ice to New England and promising to drench some of the country’s most populous cities. On Thursday, storms tore through the Great Plains, Midwest and South.

A destructive storm system draped itself across half the country Thursday, from the Gulf Coast to Canada and with a wingspan from Maine to the Dakotas.

A powerful earthquake struck close to Iran's only nuclear power station on Tuesday, killing 32 people and injuring 850 as it destroyed homes and devastated two small villages, Iranian media reported.