El Niño is fueling a dangerous cascade of wildfires across the tropics, with the Amazon rainforest now experiencing widespread burning and scientists warning that the worst may still be ahead. NASA researchers are uncovering dozens of previously undetected fires, suggesting the destruction could be even more extensive than satellite records show.
Breaking Waves: Ocean News
10/17/2026 - 18:40
Move comes after Trump administration announced restrictions that could slash water supplies
Arizona has joined Nevada in its legal battle against the Trump administration’s proposed cuts to their shares of the shrinking Colorado River.
The move comes after the interior department announced restrictions this summer that could slash the water supplied to lower basin states – Arizona, California and Nevada – over the next two years depending on the river’s condition.
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10/17/2026 - 14:00
Exclusive: Research confirms official advice about high-risk properties and warns worsening conditions will make more homes unsafe
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Almost every home destroyed in New South Wales during the black summer bushfires of 2019-20 was inside the 100 metre buffer zone used to identify properties most at risk, new research has found.
The findings are an endorsement of the risk maps used by authorities, but the research warns that as global heating generates ever-worsening fire conditions, firefighters may have to extend the recommended distances between homes and vegetation to keep properties safe.
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10/17/2026 - 07:00
As Mark Cocker approaches a landmark for the world’s oldest column in an English-language newspaper, he is still inspired by powerful encounters with nature
In the autumn of 1987, Mark Cocker sat in a field near Norwich and watched a jay burying acorns for the long winter ahead. He described the scene in his first country diary for the Guardian. Thirty-nine years on, some of those jay-planted acorns will be mature oaks now, and Cocker is completing his 1,000th diary for the world’s oldest column in an English-language newspaper.
In his next diary, he will reflect on the changing birdlife around Flint Clough, in the Peak District, where he first marvelled at rare birds aged 12 after devouring bird books in his bedroom. As a boy, he would find cuckoo, golden plover, ring ouzel and twite, a once-common bird which is now virtually extinct in England.
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10/17/2026 - 06:00
Environmental watchdog Mighty Earth reveals two-year effort to postpone and weaken EU Deforestation Regulation
US corporate lobbyists launched a two-year “blitz” to postpone and weaken the world’s most progressive legislation to protect forests, according to a new investigation by the environmental watchdog Mighty Earth.
Major US firms and trade associations, including Cargill, Bunge, Mondelēz and the US Soybean Export Council, as well as numerous other US firms and organizations, sought to influence the EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) in more than 350 meetings, the advocacy group found.
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10/17/2026 - 04:00
As a surge in beekeepers has led to increased numbers of honeybees, researchers record them pushing bumblebees and other rival species away from flowers
Honeybees are outcompeting wild pollinators for resources by aggressively bumping into them and chasing them away from flowers, research has shown.
The study, by researchers from Anglia Ruskin University, found that areas where there were higher concentrations of honeybees had fewer wild pollinators, such as bumblebees, solitary bees and hoverflies.
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10/17/2026 - 04:00
Data shows 2026 could be worst harvest on record, as growers suggest painting faces on vegetables instead of carving
In the lead-up to Halloween, front porches across the country feature fat, proudly carved pumpkins, lit from within by tea lights.
But this year there is likely to be a shortage due to drought, experts have warned, with the squashes much smaller than usual.
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10/11/2026 - 23:00
npj Ocean Sustainability, Published online: 12 October 2026; doi:10.1038/s44183-026-00248-4
Adaptations to sustain fish consumption rarely quantify nutritional outcomes. We introduce a simple ‘fish meals’ approach that translates catch into per capita dietary protein intake recommended by the World Health Organisation. The approach is applied to an adaptation to help small-scale fishers catch tuna more efficiently – installing anchored fish aggregating devices (aFADs) in nearshore waters – and is readily scalable to other fish-based interventions to support nutrition security.
World Ocean Explorer Wins Gold Medal Serious Simulation Award from Serious Play Annual International Competition
10/26/2023 - 14:35
For Immediate Release October 19, 2023
Sedgwick, Maine USA World Ocean Explorer, a 3D virtual aquarium and educational simulation, was recently cited for excellence, winning a Gold Medal Award in the 2023 International Serious Play Awards Program.
World Ocean Explorer is an innovative 3D virtual aquarium designed for educational exploration of the world’s oceans. With interactive exhibits and a lobby space, visitors can immerse themselves in realistic marine environments, including a DEEP SEA exhibit funded by Schmidt Ocean Institute, showcasing unprecedented deep-sea discoveries off Australia. Targeted at 3rd graders and beyond, this immersive experience offers a range of perspectives on the ocean environment and can be explored through guided tours or user-controlled interfaces. Visit DEEP SEA at worldoceanexplorer.org/deep-sea-aquarium.html.
Serious Play Conference brings together professionals who are exploring the use of game-based learning, sharing their experience, and working together to shape the future of training and education. For more information on Serious Play Award Program visit seriousplayconf.com/international-serious-play-award-programs.
World Ocean Explorer is a transformative virtual aquarium designed to deepen understanding of the world ocean and amplify connection for young people worldwide. Organized around the principles of Ocean Literacy and the Next Gen Science Standards, World Ocean Explorer brings the wonder and knowledge of ocean species and systems to students in formal and informal classrooms, absolutely free to anyone with a good Internet connection. As an advocate for the ocean through communications, World Ocean Observatory believes there is no better investment in the future of the sustainable ocean than through a new approach to educational engagement that excites, informs, and motivates students to explore the wonders of our marine world and to understand the pervasive connection and implication for our future, inherent in the protection and conservation of all aspects of our ocean world.
World Ocean Explorer presents an astonishing 3-dimensional simulated aquarium visit, organized to reveal the wonders of undersea life, with layers of detailed data and information to augment the emotional connection made to the astonishing beauty and complexity of the dynamic ocean. Within each of the virtual exhibits, students visit exemplary theme-based sites with myriad opportunities to understand the larger perspectives of scientific knowledge as organized and visualized to dramatize the impact and change on ocean life as a result of natural and human-generated events. Through immersion among displays, mixed media and 3D models, the experience of an aquarium visit will be brought into classrooms or home school environments as a free, accessible, always available opportunity for teaching and learning. All of this will be available to a world audience without physical limitation or cost. World Ocean Explorer, a project of the World Ocean Observatory, receives support from the Seth Sprague Educational and Charitable Foundation, Visual Solutions Lab, the Climate Change Institute, the Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation, and The Fram Museum Oslo. To learn more about the current and future exhibits of World Ocean Explorer, visit worldoceanexplorer.org.
media contact
Trisha Badger, Managing Director, World Ocean Observatory | director@thew2o.net +12077011069
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