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A massive magnitude 7.7 earthquake has hit Panama, damaging buildings and causing widespread shaking. About 4.6 million people felt moderate to severe tremors as a result of the quake, according to the US Geological Survey, which has said that the effects of the quake were "likely to be widespread". It struck just before 15:00 local time (20:00 GMT) on Friday, with an epicentre about 6.2 miles (

In a polar epishelf lake, freshwater floats on seawater, creating a unique ecosystem Jérémie Bonneau tries to free a probe called a mooring from the ice of the Milne Fiord epishelf lake in 2018. The lake was ice-covered year-round and was the last of its kind in Canada until it drained into the ocean in 2020. (Yulia Antropova/Water and Ice Research Laboratory/Carleton University) Canada's

The Atlantic has never gone this late without a hurricane since modern satellite tracking began in 1966. For decades, satellites have watched nearly every swirl of clouds over the Atlantic. In this modern era of storm tracking, the basin has set a record for the latest first hurricane of the season. Since no hurricane formed this season by Sept. 12, it marked the latest date without a hurrica

Scientists have warned that New Orleans could become an island by 2070, and that relocating its population may be necessary if sea levels rise to higher projections. Louisiana is known for being a particularly low-lying region, which makes it no surprise that New Orleans, a city of around 360,000 people, is vulnerable to sea-level rise. The wetlands that surround the city act as a buffer against

Learn how satellite radar captured the moment a Manhattan-sized ice island broke away from Greenland’s Petermann Glacier and why scientists are keeping a close watch. Manhattan-sized piece of ice breaking away from Petermann Glacier (Image Courtesy of the ESA and Copernicus Sentinel/ CC-BY-SA3.0 IGO)  As summer progresses, one of the Arctic’s most significant ice-loss events

Researchers warn that U.S. data centers could devour vast amounts of energy and water unless stronger guardrails shape the industry’s growth. When Cornell University systems engineer Fengqi You started modeling the environmental footprint of data centers three years ago, the A.I. boom was just beginning. Even then, You and his colleagues noticed something missing from the conversation

Getty Images Mould found at the site of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster appears to be feeding off the radiation. Could we use it to shield space travellers from cosmic rays? In May 1997, Nelli Zhdanova entered one of the most radioactive places on Earth – the abandoned ruins of Chernobyl's exploded nuclear power plant – and saw that she wasn't alone. Across the ceilin

Bathymetry of the seafloor around the Southeast Indian Rift where two tectonic plates abruptly opened a portal to the magmatic underworld in April 2024. (Royer et al., Nature, 2026) Most of our planet's crust is forged in a thalassic factory human eyes never see. Across 65,000 kilometers (40,400 miles) of the ocean floor, a system of mid-ocean ridges marks the boundaries where Earth's

A patch of water south of Greenland and Iceland has cooled by nearly 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit since 1900. A new study suggests that it shows a crucial system of ocean currents is weakening, which could alter Earth’s climate The "cold blob," shown in blue near the top, is also called the Atlantic "warming hole." NASA SVS The ocean has been heating up over the past century, largely due to hum