Heavy rains continued falling over Australia’s east coast on July 5, 2022, forcing more than 50 000 people to evacuate their homes, up from 30 000 on July 4. While some parts of the region saw a year’s worth of rain within just 3 days, this heavy rainfall event is still not over.
A sharp spike in the frequency of noctilucent clouds was detected at the end of June 2022. This is the largest NLCs spike in the last 15 years.
A large rockslide hit the municipality of Chavín de Huántar, Huari Province of Peru’s Áncash region on June 30, 2022, affecting some 150 homes. The slide took place on the Cruz de Shallapa hill.
As the energy crisis in Europe continues deepening, the EU countries that depend on Russian gas have signaled a shift back to coal and started triggering emergency plans that could lead to natural gas rationing ahead of the 2022/23 winter season.
Very high concentrations of aerosols originating from the plume of volcanic gas and ash produced by the massive eruption at Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai volcano on January 15, 2022, are now causing stunning, fiery colors in the sky over New Zealand.
On June 13, 2022, ESA releases its third and new full data set made by the Gaia observatory located at L2 Lagrangian point – about 1.5 million km or 930 000 miles from Earth. Among other things, this catalog includes chemical compositions, stellar temperatures, colors, masses, ages, and the speed at which stars move towards or away from us.
Arctic’s seasonal sea ice loss began more slowly in May 2022 than in the recent years as air temperatures were closer to the 1981 to 2010 average. The month ended with the highest sea ice extent since 2013 – the 14th lowest in the satellite record.
At least 25 people have been killed and more than 2.6 million were affected in southern China since the start of this year’s flood season. In Hunan, China’s major rice-producing region, at least 96 160 ha (237 616 acres) of crops have been destroyed in the first 8 days of the month. Another 76 300 ha (187 8000 acres) of crops were damaged in neighboring Jiangxi.
Potential Tropical Cyclone One brought record-breaking rains to South Florida over the weekend, causing widespread flooding. The disturbance also hit Cuba, leaving at least 3 people dead.
A newly-discovered asteroid designated 2022 KP6 flew past Earth at a distance of just 0.045 LD / 0.00012 AU (17 426 km / 10 828 miles) at 15:05 UTC on May 25, 2022.
This is the 60th known asteroid to fly past Earth within 1 lunar distance since the start of the year and the 2nd closest after 2022 FD1 on March 25 at 0.00010 AU. It is also the 17th closest asteroid flyby on record (since 1900).
