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Jun 30, 2012

2012 London Olympic Torch Route: Final Week

Final week (Image credit: LOCOG)The 2012 London Olympics games are just a few days away! Over the past nine weeks, OurAmazingPlanet has taken a virtual sight-seeing journey along the torch route. The torch has wound its way throughout the United Kingdom, first entering the country in Cornwall, then winding through...

Jun 30, 2012

Rare Colorado Tornado Is Second-Highest in US History

Most of the time, Chris Kirby chases storms, but sometimes they come to him. During a drive through the mountains this Saturday afternoon (July 28) near his home in Aurora, Colo., to photograph mountain goats and test radio equipment, he got quite a surprise: a rare, high-elevation tornado. Kirby, who's...

Jun 30, 2012

Why India Just Suffered the World's Biggest Blackout

India endured the world's largest power failure today (July 31), with a blackout that affected 700 million people, including the nation's capital of New Delhi. Trains and subway systems stopped, while private businesses and hospitals geared up their generators, the New York Times reported. Today's blackout followed another large outage...

May 31, 2012

Spectacular Texas Thundercloud Caught on Video

An ominous cloud formation that developed in the Texas panhandle last week looks like a CGI effect straight out of a summer blockbuster. This tornadic thunderstorm, which formed near the town of Adrian during the evening of May 21 and gave rise to at least one twister, offered passersby with...

May 31, 2012

Tundra Shrubs Turn into Trees as Arctic Warms

Tundra is by definition a cold, treeless landscape. But scientists have found that in a part of the Eurasian Arctic, willow and alder shrubs, once stunted by harsh weather, have been growing upward to the height of trees in recent decades. The reason for the change: the warming Arctic climate,...

May 31, 2012

2012 London Olympic Torch Route: Week 4 Sights

2012 London Olympics torch run (Image credit: LOCOG)The 2012 London Olympics torch run has visited Cornwall, Wales, and Northern Ireland, as well as a few English towns and cities. Now, in its fourth week, the relay winds its way through Scotland, from Glasgow to the remote Shetland Islands, Edinburgh to...

May 31, 2012

Best Earth Images of the Week - June 8, 2012

Alien arrival (Image credit: Oregon Department of Parks and Recreation)A Japanese dock that ripped from its moorings during the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami and washed ashore in Oregon this week brought with it an estimated 100 tons of sea life. Oregon State University (OSU) scientists said Thursday that there...

May 31, 2012

The Dirtiest Things in a Hotel Room Revealed

Want to stay away from germs during your next hotel stay? Then don’t turn on the TV or lights — new research shows that TV remotes and light switches are among the most contaminated items in hotel rooms. Researchers from the University of Houston took bacteria samples from several items...

May 31, 2012

Summer Solstice: 8 Sunny Ways to Celebrate

Wednesday, June 20, is the summer solstice, the official beginning of summer in the Northern Hemisphere. It's also the longest day of the year by a fraction of a second. Ancient pagans once celebrated the summer solstice as a day of healing and fertility. But why leave all the fun...

May 31, 2012

Iceland Offers Rare Glimpse of Tectonic Meeting Place

On a recent sunny afternoon in Iceland, a group of scientists filed off a bus and took in a view of geological grandeur that, nearly everywhere else on Earth, would require a deep-diving submersible. They were standing in Thingvellir, a sweeping valley surrounded by majestic cliffs; the valley is one...

May 31, 2012

Dino Dealer Says He's Not a 'Smuggler,' Calls Fossil 'Political Trophy'

A Florida fossil dealer who prepared the skeleton of a tyrannosaur and attempted to sell it at auction, questions assertions that the fossils were taken illegally from Mongolia, and says the dispute over its ownership has brought financial ruin on his family. Imagine watching your house burn down with everything...

May 31, 2012

Tropical Storm Debby Forms in Gulf

Tropical Storm Debby, the fourth named storm of the 2012 Atlantic hurricane season, has formed in the Gulf of Mexico. Debby formed late yesterday afternoon when it was about 220 miles (335 kilometers) south-southeast of the mouth of the Mississippi River. As of this morning, the storm was about 170...

May 31, 2012

Rescuing Marine Animals Brings Disease Risk, CDC Says

A dead harbor porpoise that washed up in Maine in January turned out to be carrying a disease-causing bacteria that could have sickened the people who handled the animal, according to a report today (June 28) from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The case serves as a reminder...

Apr 30, 2012

Studying Climate Change's Impact on Organisms and Ecosystems

This ScienceLives article was provided to LiveScience in partnership with the National Science Foundation. You have probably heard about the great scientific and social dilemma called global warming or climate change. The climate has changed many times in the past, but this time it is changing rapidly because of chemicals...

Apr 30, 2012

Rare Tyrannosaurus Skeleton to Be Auctioned

A nearly complete skeleton of a towering Tyrannosaurus bataar is set to go on auction on Sunday (May 20). The skeleton measures some 8-feet (2.4-meters) tall and 24-feet (7.3-meters) long. This is the first full Tyrannosaurus specimen to go on auction since Sue, a Tyrannosaurus rex, sold for $8.3 million...