What's hitting the world right now.
Live disasters, the El Niño watch and the climate in plain words, straight from official public sources: NOAA, NASA, the U.S. Geological Survey, the Smithsonian, and GDACS, the disaster alert system of the United Nations and European Commission.
The whole planet, right now.
Two NOAA weather satellites hang 22,236 miles above the equator, each watching its side of the Earth. These are their newest pictures of the whole planet, taken every 10 minutes. Hurricanes, big storm systems and wildfire smoke all show up here.
NOAA’s picture isn’t loading right now. Tap to see it on NOAA’s site.
NOAA’s picture isn’t loading right now. Tap to see it on NOAA’s site.
Pictures: NOAA/NESDIS GOES-East and GOES-West GeoColor (public domain). On the night side you see city lights and cloud tops from infrared, not true color. The satellite map uses NASA’s most recent full day of pictures (VIIRS, through NASA GIBS). Fires: every fire NASA’s VIIRS cameras spotted in the last 24 hours, from NASA FIRMS, refreshed every 3 hours. Spots that showed heat on 5 or more of the last 7 days are marked in gray as steady heat sources, since those are almost always steel mills, refineries, gas flares or volcanoes. Weather satellites: worked out live in your browser from CelesTrak’s orbits, good to within a few miles.
If you're in an affected area, follow your local authorities and official warnings first. We pass along what official alert systems report; we don't issue warnings. In the U.S., that's the National Weather Service and, for tsunamis, tsunami.gov.
Current events, biggest first
Reading the world's alert systems…
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Red GDACS expects a severe impact; international help may be needed. Orange A significant impact is likely (GDACS), or a U.S. volcano at USGS watch level. Watching Being tracked. Earthquakes: magnitude 5.5 and up, last 7 days, colored by the USGS impact rating when there is one.
A very strong El Niño is building.
The climate is warming. Here's what that means, calmly.
No panic, just facts from NOAA, NASA and the World Meteorological Organization, each with something you can do about it.
Want to help when disaster hits?
Money to established relief groups helps most: they buy what's needed close to the disaster, and it arrives faster than donated goods. These are long-standing, highly rated organizations. We're not paid by any of them.
International Red Cross and Red Crescent
Local volunteers already on the ground in almost every country.
Give to the IFRC ↗Direct Relief
Medicine and supplies to clinics in disaster zones, in the U.S. and abroad.
Give to Direct Relief ↗GlobalGiving disaster funds
Funds for each major disaster, passed to vetted local groups.
See GlobalGiving funds ↗Charity Navigator
Look up any charity before you give. Scammers show up after every big disaster.
Check a charity ↗For a specific disaster, ReliefWeb lists the aid groups working there. Each red alert on this page links to it.
Stop getting red-alert emails
The official alert systems
GDACS
The Global Disaster Alert and Coordination System, used by aid agencies worldwide.
Open GDACS ↗Earthquakes
Every significant earthquake worldwide, usually within minutes.
Open the USGS map ↗Tsunami warnings
Official tsunami warnings for the U.S., the Pacific and the Caribbean.
Open tsunami.gov ↗ReliefWeb
Situation reports and ways to help, from the UN's humanitarian office.
Open ReliefWeb ↗Weather services around the world
Official warnings come from each country's own weather service. Start with the WMO map, which shows them all in one place.
- WMO Severe Weather Information Centre ↗Official warnings from national weather services worldwide, on one map
- National Hurricane Center (NOAA) ↗Atlantic and eastern Pacific hurricanes
- Joint Typhoon Warning Center ↗Typhoons and cyclones in the Pacific and Indian Oceans
- ECMWF forecast charts ↗The European model, one of the world's most accurate
- Meteoalarm ↗Official weather warnings for all of Europe
- Japan Meteorological Agency ↗Typhoons, earthquakes and tsunami warnings for Japan
- India Meteorological Department ↗Monsoon and cyclones in the Bay of Bengal and Arabian Sea
- Australia Bureau of Meteorology ↗Cyclones, fire weather and its own El Niño outlook
- Environment Canada ↗Warnings for our neighbors to the north
- UK Met Office ↗Forecasts and warnings for the United Kingdom
Data: GDACS (a cooperation of the United Nations and the European Commission) and the U.S. Geological Survey. La Porte Weather Now is not affiliated with either and does not issue warnings.