Greenhouse gas emissions continue to increase global temperatures, putting 2020 on track to rank among the hottest 10 years ever, perhaps even in the top five. Scientists are even more alarmed that average temperatures over the last 12 months show one of the hottest years ever recorded in their data set. The most-above average temperatures were recorded in Siberia, Alaska and Antarctica. 

Meanwhile, at least 11 distinct environmental events or disasters occurred last month in May in 18 countries during the Coronavirus pandemic. Disasters include heavy rains in Uzbekistan that caused a dam to collapse, impacting 70,000 people, floods across East Africa, killing several and displacing tens of thousands, Cyclone Amphan in the Bay of Bengal, which displaced three million people and heavy rains in Ecuador and Colombia, to name just a few. (Reuters & AA News)