JULY 2004:
*The worst monsoon flooding in 15 years pushed the death toll to nearly
400 in Bangladesh and more than 1,100 in South Asia.
*Record wildfires are blazing across the American West, caused by the worst drought in at least 500 years.
*At least 46 children have died in Peru during one of the coldest spells in the Andes in 30 years.
*The number of suicides in Japan has risen to its highest level since records began.
More than 34,000 Japanese took their own lives in 2003.
*The temperature in central Tokyo hit a record 39.5 degrees celsius (103.1-degrees F)
as a heatwave continued to scorch many parts of Japan. The mercury reading for Tokyo's financial district at 12.58pm was the highest in the capital since the agency began recording data in 1923.
*A plague of locusts that has invaded Mauritania is the worst in 25 years.
*The long and crippling drought in New South Wales,Australia continues to create new records - this time forcing the earliest ever declaration of a gazetted bushfire danger period.
*More than 10 million people in southeastern Asia were hit by what officials are calling the most severe monsoon floods for a decade. In Sylhet, Bangladesh, the flooding is the worst since 1988, when two-thirds of the country was submerged.
*This is the worst British Columbia drought in 4 centuries.
Prolonged drought conditions have created a once-in-400-year fire threat for coastal forests.
*Typhoon Mindulle brought several days of heavy rain to southern Taiwan, triggering the worst floods the country has seen in 25 years.
*Arizona is in one of their worst droughts on record. It's definitely
the worst drought for a five-year period in the hundred years of their recorded
history.
*Sunspots are reaching a 1000 year high - the Sun is more active
now than at anytime in the past 1,000 years, according to an analysis of ice cores and sunspots by Swiss-based researchers.
*Rainfall in June has broken records across Texas. In the northern part of the state, it has rained for 18 days in a row.
*A tornado in Madison, Wisconsin was the first tornado to
strike there in more than a decade.
*West and Central Africa is on the brink of the largest polio
epidemic in recent years, experts have warned.
*Cuba is suffering through their worst drought in history.
The severe drought enveloping eastern Cuba has eroded 40
percent of the farmland.
*Farmers in Queensland,Australia are still struggling from the effects of the nation's worst drought in a century.
JUNE 2004:
*Lightning struck forests and tundra almost 15,000 times over
a few days, setting a record for the most bolts in a
single day and sparking 47 new wildfires.
*Britain's sea birds are heading for their worst breeding season on record, a BBC investigation has found.
*Cuba's worst drought in a decade has dried
up reservoirs and stunted crops.
*The drought in the Western U.S. could be the region's
worst in 500 years, and the arid conditions there may persist for several
decades.
*The Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region in north China and neighboring northeastern provinces are sustaining the severest drought since New China was founded in 1949.
*Flights were delayed at Houston's Bush Intercontinental Airport because of a record 9cm of rain that fell June 14th.
At Berlin, Wisconsin, the Fox River rose to a record 4.7m after prolonged rainfall over the past several weeks.
*After five years of drought in southwest Kansas they have
had their driest May on record.
*This is Utah's worst drought in 6 years.
*June in Darwin, Australia, is normally dry, but this year, the first two days brought more rain than the city normally sees in the entire month.
*Sydney, Australia's main source of drinking water, Warragamba
Dam, has dropped to its lowest level in more than 20 years.
*Drought has gripped some parts of the West for as many as seven consecutive years, causing one of the worst dry spells in decades.
MAY 2004:
*South Korea registered a 5.6 earthquake, its strongest quake in 26 years.
* A cyclone that swept through western Myanmar, leaving at least
140 people dead and 18,000 more homeless, was the worst
storm to hit the impoverished and remote area in more than 30 years.
*Two weeks of torrential rain have caused flooding so severe in the Dominican Republic that they are calling this the worst natural disaster to have affected their nation in the last 100 years.
*The strongest tornado in eight years hit southwestern Ontario, Canada.
APRIL 2004:
*The Western U.S. states are grimly facing the possibility of an exceptionally devastating fire season. The Pacific Northwest forests now face dangerous conditions following a warm spring that melted the snowpack a month earlier than usual.
In Washington, the state already has fought 70 small fires this year, up from the usual 20, and forests are as dry as they typically are in late July or early August.
In Oregon, the snowpack in the Cascades fell from 120 percent of average in early March to just 53 percent of average on May 1.
*Parts of Thailand suffered the worst flash flood to hit in a decade.
*Peru has begun rationing water to its capital, Lima, following one of the worst droughts in a decade.
*Record-high temperatures baked Southern California as April turned to May.
*The strains on the southern San Andreas Fault are at their highest levels in some 1,500 years.
MARCH 2004:
*Arizona is facing its worst drought on record. The mountain snowpack was at half or less of the normal March level in many areas of the western U.S.
*One of the worst dust storms to hit northern China in years swirled into Beijing on March 29th.
*Southern Manitoba, Canada was deluged with a record-setting rain storm.
*On March 27th Brazil was lashed by the first hurricane ever spotted in the South Atlantic Ocean.
*On March 6th the central provinces of North and South Chungcheong in South Korea received the heaviest single-day snowfall since 1904 when the country began collecting weather data.
FEBRUARY 2004:
*A "classic nor'easter" dumped record amounts of snow on Nova Scotia and
Prince Edward Island.
*About 80 towns and cities around Australia have reached
record maximum temperatures for February. They have had
the most extraordinary run of hot weather, breaking record
temperatures all over the country.
*Perth, Australia had its hottest night in seven years.
*Worst snow storm in Lebanon in 25 years.
*5.4 earthquake in the Australian outback was the largest on record in the sparsely populated area.
*Romania has been hit by blizzard conditions, the worst snow storms there in 40 years.
*Parts of southeastern Europe were blanketed by the biggest snow fall in two decades.
JANUARY 2004:
*French authorities are battling the worst Legionnaires disease outbreak in the country's history.
*Temperatures fell to their lowest in more than a century in New York City on the 16th.
*Some of the coldest weather in 50 years blew into the Northeastern U.S. on the 15th.
*At New Hampshire's Mount Washington the temperature on the 14th dipped to a record 44 below with a wind chill of minus 100. Syracuse, N.Y., hit a record low of minus-18.
*The current drought is possibly the worst drought to hit Southern Africa
in nearly a century. At least 15 million people face shortages.
*Swiss glaciers have been melting faster than in previous years thanks to the warm weather of 2003 in Europe. For the first time since annual measurements began in 1880, all 96 of the glaciers evaluated this year have become shorter. In previous years, a few were unchanged or had even grown longer thanks to snow that had accumulated during the prior winter.
*The coldest day in a decade for some U.S. cities (January 10th).
*The worst cyclone in living memory has devastated the tiny
South Pacific island of Niue.
*The tiny south-western Queensland, Australia town of Birdsville has recorded its hottest January day on record.
DECEMBER 2003:
*Heta is the first tropical cyclone to threaten the Pacific archipelago of Samoa in more than a decade.
*Winnipeg hospitals saw a record number of cases of
a "superbug" this past year.
*Victoria, Australia had one of the hottest Decembers on record.
*The world's most lethal quake in at least 10 years laid waste most of Bam's mud brick buildings in Iran in seconds.
*The most powerful quake (6.5) to strike California since a 7.1 quake rocked the desert near Joshua Tree more than four years ago in 1999. The last one of a similar size in the coastal area was in 1952.
*The first winter cyclone in Southern India in 18 years.
*North Carolina experienced its strongest earthquake in more than a century.
*The most powerful quake to hit the Taitung area of Taiwan in over the past 30 years.
*Lapland saw one of its hottest summers this year with temperatures as high as 30 Celsius. Its weather has become increasingly unpredictable, with 1999 the coldest winter in the last century when the mercury plummeted to -51 C.
*Tropical storm Odette is the first recorded tropical storm to brew in the Caribbean Sea in
December. (Hurricane season officially ends Nov. 30.)
NOVEMBER 2003:
*Worst thunderstorm in 100 years in Melbourne, Australia.
*According to the United Kingdom (UK) meteorological office, 2003 has been one of the driest years on record.
*The biggest known outbreak of hepatitis A in U.S. history has occurred at a Chi Chi's restaurant near Pittsburgh.
*After 10 days of dramatic activity, the most powerful solar
flare ever seen has exploded on the Sun's surface. The Sun's current spate of activity is the most dramatic and intense ever witnessed on the Sun's surface. Powerful solar flares are given an "X" designation. Last week there were X7 and X10 events that took place back-to-back. There was an X8 and an X3 event on Sunday. On Monday, there was an X3 flare followed by smaller ones.
Tuesday's flare went off the scale, researchers say it was well above X20. The major flares have come from sunspot region 486, now officially the most active solar region in recorded solar observational history.
*Sunspot activity is the highest in 1,000 years, scientists say.
The sun has been acting unusually lately, with more sunspots
recorded since the 1940s, than in the previous millennium.
OCTOBER 2003:
*Victoria, Australia recorded its coolest October in 27 years.
*Three of the biggest sunspot groups to appear in years crossed the
Sun's face and one of them spewed one of the most
powerful coronal mass ejections (CMEs) ever recorded.
*Two raging wildfires in the Los Angeles suburbs merged to form the biggest conflagration in the region in a generation.
*California's deadliest outbreak of wildfires in more than a decade.
*Vienna, Austria, has its earliest snowfall in more than 60 years.
*It was a freakish summer of record heat and little rain in Iberia.
SEPTEMBER 2003:
*Landslides in September devastated the Pullathomas/ Glengad area of Erris in Ireland. They rank among the worst natural disasters ever to befall a west of Ireland community.
*The ozone hole over the South Pole is as large as it has ever been, and is also lasting longer this year. The thinnest area is the largest every measured, roughly two thirds of the hole's total size. The hole is also deeper. This year the hole peaked twice, once in mid-September and again in late September.
*A meteorite that crashed in eastern India was part of the most spectacular meteor shower in the country's recent history.
*Hurricane Juan was the worst storm to hit the Nova Scotian peninsula in decades.
*Afghanistan has suffered through months of the worst sandstorms in living memory.
*Europe this year experienced its hottest summer for at least 500 years
*Hurricane Isabel is the most powerful storm in four years to menace the mid-Atlantic coast.
*This was the worst fire season they've had in 50 years in British Columbia, Canada.
* The hole in the ozone layer over Antarctica has hit record proportions for this time of year and could get bigger still within the next few days, possibly breaking the all-time record for size. It was the largest that it has ever been during August.
*Typhoon Maemi ravaged South Korea with their strongest winds in a century and most powerful typhoon ever.
*Maemi was the strongest typhoon to hit the Okinawan islands in southern Japan in 35 years and one of the 10 strongest to hit anywhere in Japan.
*The worst flooding in 20 years in northern China.
*From 1995 through 1999, there were 41 hurricanes in the Atlantic, Caribbean, and the Gulf of Mexico, the most on record in a five-year period.
*The most powerful hurricane to hit Bermuda in 50 years slammed into the island chain.
*In Costa Rica, the Arenal Volcano spewed lava, rocks and ash in its strongest eruption in more than two years.
*Dujuan was the strongest typhoon to hit China in a quarter of a century.
*Worst drought in 40 years in Russia.
AUGUST 2003:
*In the last two decades the Earth's average temperature has been the highest for about two thousand years. Based on the study of temperature data from up to 1,000 years ago, the late 20th century has been the warmest period on record.
*The heat wave that scorched Europe in August was one of the deadliest hot-weather
disasters in a century.
*Italian meteorologists have described this summer as the nation's hottest in more than 50 years.
*Western and southern Afghanistan have suffered through months of the worst sandstorms in living memory.
*A massive 7.9 earth tremor hit a sparsely populated part of New Zealand's South Island.
It was the largest earthquake to strike the area in decades. *British Columbia has been under a state of emergency since Aug. 2 in the worst fire season in 50 years.
*Croatia is gripped by its worst drought in 50 years.
* A giant gerbil invansion is the worst rodent disaster to hit the region of Xinjiang China in 10 years.
*The possibility of major landslides occurring in the area of Kanagawa Prefecture in Japan is at its highest in recent years.
*French vineyards have begun harvesting grapes a week early because their sugar content has been increased prematurely by the strong sunlight.
*Record-high temperatures have been set in numerous cities across France.
*This year's heat wave is France's worst ever on record.
*Turin endured a frazzling 41.6C, the highest temperature noted in the north-western Italian city since records began there in 1750.
*Neutstadt, in southern Germany, had a record high temperature overnight .
*This is the worst heat wave to cover Southern and Eastern Europe in 150 years.
*The United Kingdom recorded its hottest day ever.
*The waters of the Mediterranean Sea have reached their highest temperatures for 45 years - 32C.
*London overnight set a new heat record at 35.5 degrees Celsius, half a degree hotter than the highest temperature previously recorded in the capital on August 3, 1990.
*There were more record temperatures in northern France, where the city of Lille reached 36.4 degrees, beating the 36.1 degrees recorded in 1959; while the town of Beauvais topped 38.7 degrees, a whole degree-and-a-half hotter than the 37.2 degrees recorded in 1947.
*Swiss authorities said there were signs that mountain ice caps were melting at 4,000 metres' altitude, in what a Zurich university professor called a "really exceptional situation".
*Norway has also seen record-high temperatures.
*Italy's maize crop is expected to be the worst in five years, entirely due to drought.
*FRANCE RECORDED ITS HIGHEST TEMPERATURES IN MORE THAN HALF A CENTURY.
*THE FRENCH SUMMER HAS BEEN DECLARED THE HOTTEST SINCE WORLD WAR II.
*TEMPERATURES IN SLOVENIA ARE AT THEIR HIGHEST FOR A CENTURY.
*IN GERMANY A RECORD NIGHT-TIME HIGH WAS RECORDED.
*TEMPERATURES IN THE SOUTHERN REGION OF ANDALUCIA, SPAIN HAVE RISEN ABOVE 40C (104F), WITH SOME TOWNS RECORDING THEIR HIGHEST-EVER TEMPERATURES.
*AT LEAST ONE MILLION PEOPLE IN SOUTHERN PAKISTAN HAVE BEEN LEFT MAROONED OR HOMELESS AS A RESULT OF FLOODS CAUSED BY THE WORST MONSOON RAINS IN A DECADE.
*FIERCE BLAZES SWEEPING ACROSS TWO-THIRDS OF PORTUGAL'S MAINLAND REGIONS ARE SAID TO BE THE WORST IN LIVING MEMORY. One fire alone last week destroyed 11,000 hectares, making it the LARGEST INDIVIDUAL FIRE FOR 15 YEARS.
*THIS IS THE DRIEST THEIR FORESTS HAVE EVER BEEN SINCE THEY STARTED RECORDING THOSE SORTS OF STATISTICS IN BRITISH COLUMBIA.
* THE WORST FIRES IN 50 YEARS IN BRITISH COLUMBIA.
*MONGOLIAN ZUDS (a long dry summer followed by an extremely cold winter) HAVE NEVER BEFORE BEEN SO BAD AND SO OFTEN. Three years in a row winter temperatures have plunged dramatically low.
JULY 2003:
*The highest sea level in 100 years was recorded around Japan.
*MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA HAS INSTITUTED THE TOUGHEST WATER-USE RESTRICTIONS IN 20 YEARS.
*PAKISTAN HIT BY THE WORST FLOODS IN A DECADE.
*WESTERN AND SOUTHERN AFGHANISTAN ARE SUFFERING THROUGH TWO MONTHS OF THE WORST SANDSTORMS IN LIVING MEMORY.
*EUROPE SUFFERING THE WORST DROUGHT IN YEARS, brought on by a prolonged heat wave that has kept temperatures well above 86 degrees for weeks.
In Italy, France, Germany, Portugal, Austria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Serbia, Croatia and Romania harvests are expected to be up to 60 percent below normal yields for some crops.
*CROATIA'S MAJOR RIVERS, THE SAVA, DRAVA, KUPA AND DANUBE, WERE REPORTED AT THEIR LOWEST LEVELS EVER.
*SERBIA'S MAJOR RIVERS ARE AT THEIR LOWEST LEVELS IN 100 YEARS.
*IN THE DANUBE DELTA, 10 PERCENT OF THE WETLANDS HAVE DRIED UP, while about 40 percent of the delta's water has evaporated. VOLUME OF THE DANUBEWAS, at 3,066 cubic yards a second, THE LOWEST IN 160 YEARS.
*IN ITALY WHERE A HEAT WAVE AND ACCOMPANYING DROUGHT HAVE LASTED WEEKS, THE NATIONAL GRID WAS OVERLOADED BY THE USE OF AIR CONDITIONERS, CASUING SUMMER BLACKOUTS FOR THE FIRST TIME IN OVER 20 YEARS.
*THE PO RIVER, WHICH FEEDS MANY LESSER RIVERS IN NORTHERN ITALY, IS AT NEAR RECORD LOW LEVELS.
*IN FRANCE WILDFIRE ARE RAGING SIMUTANEOUSLY IN SEVERAL SOUTHERN REGIONS AND WERE SPREADING AT A PACE UNSEEN SINCE SPECIAL FIRE-FIGHTING SERVICES WERE CREATED AFTER WORLD WAR II. Southern and eastern France have been hard hit by drought, without significant rainfall in about two months.
*FAR-EASTERN RUSSIA IS EXPERIENCING ONE OF THE MOST SEVERE FOREST FIRE SEASONS ON RECORD.
*IMBUDO WAS THE STRONGEST TYPHOON TO HIT CHINA IN YEARS.
*IMBUDO WAS THE STRONGEST TYPHOON TO HIT THE PHILIPPINES IN FIVE YEARS.
*THE WORST FLOODS SINCE 1991 IN CHINA'S HUAI AND CHU RIVER VALLEYS.
IN SOME PLACES WATER LEVELS ARE AT RECORD HIGHS.
*THE BLIZZARD THAT HIT NEW ZEALAND OVER THE WEEKEND OF JULY 5 IS BEING REPORTED AS THE WORST IN 50 YEARS.
*WORST BLIZZARD IN DECADES IN NEW ZEALAND. North Island's east coast reported the worst snowfalls in 40 years.
*THE WORLD IS EXPERIENCING RECORD NUMBERS OF EXTREME WEATHER EVENTS, such as droughts and tornadoes, with global warming the cause. CNN reports that this represents a clear and alarming trend towards wilder weather.
*FOR THE NORTHERN HEMISPHERE, THE INCREASE IN TEMPERATURE IN THE 20TH CENTURY WAS LIKELY TO HAVE BEEN THE LARGEST IN ANY CENTURY DURING THE PAST 1,000 YEARS.
JUNE 2003:
*SWITZERLAND EXPERIENCED ITS HOTTEST JUNE IN AT LEAST 250 YEARS while in the south of France average temperatures were between 5 and 7 degrees Celsius (9 to 13 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than the long term average. England and Wales also experienced their hottest month since 1976.
*THE RIVER PO IN ITALY IS AT A RECORD LOW - 24 FEET BELOW ITS NORMAL LEVEL. In Venice, rainfall in the first six months of the year was 40% lower than average.
*RECORD HIGH TEMPERATURES IN ITALY IN JUNE.
*TEXAS HAS HAD THE SECOND-DRIEST SPRING IN A CENTURY.
*WORST GRASSHOPPER INFESTATION EVER SEEN IN WESTERN CANADA. It's the last kick from a drought that devastated crops last year.
*IN IDAHO AND UTAH, DROUGHT HAS LED TO THE WORST INFESTATION OF THE CROP-EATING MORMON CRICKET IN SIXTY YEARS.
*IN PARTS OF THE EASTERN AND SOUTHERN U.S., IT'S BEEN THE WETTEST SPRING ON RECORD. And this is one of the worst allergy seasons they've had in perhaps 50 years.
*WORST DROUGHT IN 40 YEARS IN INDIA.
MAY 2003:
*562 TORNADOES WHICH HIT THE UNITED STATES IN MAY THIS YEAR WAS A RECORD - far higher than the previous monthly peak of 399 in June 1992.
*GLOBAL AVERAGE LAND AND SEA SURFACE TEMPERATURES IN MAY 2003 WERE THE SECOND HIGHEST SINCE RECORDS BEGAN IN 1880.
*STRONGEST EARTHQUAKE TO HIT JAPAN IN TWO YEARS.
*THE MOST DEVASTATING EARTHQUAKE TO HIT ALGERIA IN 20 YEARS.
*WORST FLOODING IN SAMOA IN 20 YEARS.
*MANITOBA, CANDA IS EXPERIENCING SCORCHING WILDFIRES AND ONE OF ITS MOST COMBUSTIBLE SPRINGS EVER.
*SRI LANKA SUFFERED ITS WORST FLOODING IN 50 YEARS.
*RECORD NUMBER OF TORNADOES IN THE U.S. IN THE MONTH OF MAY.
*SOME OF THE HEAVIEST RAINFALL IN MORE THAN A HUNDRED YEARS SWAMPED PARTS OF THE SOUTHERN U.S.
*THE TENNESSEE RIVER IS AT ITS HIGHEST LEVEL IN FOUR DECADES AFTER DAYS OF TORRENTIAL RAIN.
*THE CHATTAHOOCHEE RIVER IN GEORGIA ROSE TOWARD ITS HIGHEST LEVEL SINCE AT LEAST 1961.
*CENTRAL ALABAMA SET A RECORD FOR RAINFALL IN A TWO-HOUR PERIOD WITH NEARLY 11 INCHES FALLING.
*THE MOST DEVASTATING SERIES OF TORNADOES TO EVER STRIKE MISSOURI.
*THE WORST FLOODING IN DECADES HIT ARGENTINA, RECORD FLOOD LEVELS.
*AUSTRALIA SUFFERED ITS WORST-RECORDED ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTER WHEN BRUSHFIRES FUELED BY A SEVERE DROUGHT BLACKENED ALMOST 10% OF THE COUNTRY DURING THE SUMMER OF 2002/03.
APRIL 2003:
*RECORD-TYING 4.9 EARTHQUAKE STRUCK ALABAMA and was felt in 7 eastern states.
*THE MOST SEVERE FLOODING FOR SEVERAL DECADES IN ARGENTINA.
*ONE OF THE WORLD'S WETTEST PLACES, IN THE NORTHERN HILLS OF INDIA, IS SUFFERING FROM A SHORTAGE OF WATER. The area once recorded more than 1,000 inches (2,540 centimetres) of rain in just one year - a global record. Cherrapunji received less
rain in the whole of 2001 - only 363 inches (922 cm) - than it got in just one month in 1861.
*THE EARLIEST ATLANTIC HURRICANE SEASON IN MEMORY. Ana was the first storm of 2003 and one of only two tropical or subtropical storms to form in April since record keeping began.
*WATER TEMPERATURES IN A NEWFOUNDLAND CANADA BAY ARE THE COLDEST MEASURED IN DECADES and a massive cod kill has occurred there.
MARCH 2003:
*THE AUSTRALIAN TERRITORY OF TASMANIA RECEIVED RECORD-SETTING RAINFALL.
*BRITAIN HAD THE SUNNIEST MARCH IN 40 YEARS. England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland experienced record-breaking hours of sunshine in March. the first two months of 2003 were the UK's second sunniest since records began in 1960.
*DENVER, COLORADO HAD ITS BIGGEST BLIZZARD IN 90 YEARS.
*A FOREST FIRE NEAR THE SOUTH COAST OF WESTERN AUSTRALIA IS BEING REPORTED AS THE LARGEST IN MEMORY.
*RECORD-SHATTERING COLD TEMPERATURES THREATEN TO FREEZE MASSIVE LAKE SUPERIOR'S SURFACE FOR THE FIRST TIME IN MORE THAN TWO DECADES. Lake Superior last froze completely in 1979, and this year's ice cover is the most since 1996-97.
FEBRUARY 2003:
*MOST SEVERE EARTHQUAKE TO HIT XINJIANG CHINA SINCE 1949.
*THE WORST BLIZZARD IN SEVEN YEARS SHUT DOWN MUCH OF THE NORTHEASTERN U.S.
*SOME OF THE HEAVIEST SNOWFALLS ON RECORD IN THE NORTH EASTERN U.S.
*RECORD-SETTING RAINS FELL OVER SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA.
*GREENHOUSE GAS LEVELS IN THE ATMOSPHERE ARE AT THE HIGHEST LEVELS EVER RECORDED.
*WATER STORAGE LEVELS HAVE FALLEN BELOW 60%, TO THEIR LOWEST LEVELS IN FIVE YEARS, IN SYDNEY, THE BLUE MOUNTAINS AND THE ILLAWARRA REGIONS OF AUSTRALIA.
JANUARY 2003:
*DROUGHT IS CONTINUING TO HIT QUEENSLAND, AUSTRALIA HARD, WITH THE STATE RECORDING ITS DRIEST JANUARY ON RECORD.
*AN UNPRECEDENTED 6,233 BUSH AND GRASS FIRES WERE RECORDED ACROSS NEW SOUTH WALES, AUSTRALIA IN THE PAST 6 MONTHS.
*MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA HAD IT'S SECOND HOTTEST DAY ON RECORD.
*VICTORIA, AUSTRALIA SWELTERED UNDER ITS HOTTEST CONDITIONS IN 64 YEARS.
*RECORD COLD TEMPERATURES DESCENDED ACROSS THE EASTERN SEABOARD
OF THE U.S.
*RECORD SNOWFALL LEVELS IN NEWFOUNDLAND, CANADA.
*RECORD LOW LEVELS OF THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER.
*CANBERRA AUSTRALIA'S WORST BUSHFIRES THEY HAVE EVER SEEN.
*AUSTRALIA'S WORST BUSHFIRES IN MORE THAN 70 YEARS.
*FIJI HIT BY ITS MOST POWERFUL CYCLONE IN MORE THAN A DECADE.
*RECORD COLD TEMPERATURES HIT INDIA - there has been a month-long cold spell.
*THERE WERE RECORD LOW TEMPERATURES IN RUSSIA OVER SEVERAL DAYS.
*THERE ARE CONCERNS THAT THE BALTIC SEA MAY FREEZE OVER. The ice may cover it entirely for the first time since 1948. In addition to covering an unusually large area, the ice is also five to 20 centimetres thicker than average.
*LONDON GOT ITS HEAVIEST SNOWFALL IN 12 YEARS.
*SANTA ANA WINDS IN CALIFORNIA WERE STRONGER THAN ANY IN RECENT MEMORY.
*CYCLONE ZOE WAS THE MOST POWERFUL PACIFIC CYCLONE EVER RECORDED.
*ODD WEATHER IN EUROPE THIS WINTER HAS LEFT PASTS OF THE ALPS WITHOUT SNOW DUE TO UNSEASONABLY WARM TEMPERATURES WHILE LEAVING NORTHERN EUROPE WITH THEIR WORST COLD SNAP IN DECADES.
*IN FINLAND, HELSINKI HAS HAD A DRY COLD SNAP NOT SEEN IN THIS EXTREME IN THE PAST FOUR DECADES.
*ACROSS EASTERN TURKEY, TEMPERATURES DROPPED OVERNIGHT TO THEIR LOWEST IN 10 YEARS, reaching minus 40 degrees Celsius.
*BELGIUM IS SWAMPED BY THEIR WORST FLOODS IN NEARLY A DECADE.
*THE HEAVIEST RAINS IN A DECADE IN THE DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO.
*LAST YEAR MUCH OF AUSTRALIA WAS HIT BY THE LONGEST DROUGHT IN RECORDED HISTORY, which devastated crop yields and sparked continual bushfires which threatened major cities.
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