The beaches of Namibia have been filled with thousands of seal fetuses. The problem was first detected in August, when observers began to see an unusual number of abortions and prematurely killed pups on the beaches of Pelican Point. Current estimates indicate about 5,000 have died in Pelican Point alone, although the precise reasons are still unknown.

Staring out into the darkness, she and her husband Ivan saw "an enormous ball of light in the sky to the west. It was moving north to south, and was quite big."

After the Arctic Ocean recorded its second-lowest summer ice minimum last month, conditions have grown worse across the region. Large parts of the Arctic Ocean, which historically should be covered in new sea ice by now, remain largely ice free. 

The finding is prompting concerns that a new feedback loop that accelerates climate change may have already been triggered.

Heavy rains toppled trees and buried roads on Prince of Wales Island Monday. Local and state transportation crews are responding to at least seven landslides blocking roads on the Southeast Alaska island.

Zeta broke the record for the previous earliest 27th Atlantic named storm that formed Nov. 29, 2005. It’s also the 11th hurricane of the season. An average season sees six hurricanes and 12 named storms.

Finding the deep-diving species so far inland was incredible. Rescuers made a sterling effort to save the 21ft-long animal found in a tributary of the River Clyde near Glasgow Airport. Two died after stranding on shores of the Firth of Clyde and another in the Western Isles.

The animal was part of a pod which rescuers hoped would swim to deeper water before a major military exercise.

Large amounts of precipitation triggered landslides across Prince of Wales Island, blocking roads and damaging at least one bridge.

Scientists believe a massive glacial dam release - or jökulhlaup - recently occurred in Southeast Alaska. But they probably would not have known about it if they had not been tipped off by an observant commercial fisherman.

This spike of bear cannibalism is reported at the South-Kamchatka nature reserve in Kamchatka.The spike of cannibalism in brown bears is currently linked to the lower number of sockeye salmon getting to the lake from the Sea of Okhotsk.