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Tag: Waterways

  • Hungary’s ‘water guardian’ farmers fight back against desertification

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    KISKUNMAJSA, Hungary — Oszkár Nagyapáti climbed to the bottom of a sandy pit on his land on the Great Hungarian Plain and dug into the soil with his hand, looking for a sign of groundwater that in recent years has been in accelerating retreat.

    “It’s much worse, and it’s getting worse year after year,” he said as cloudy liquid slowly seeped into the hole. ”Where did so much water go? It’s unbelievable.”

    Nagyapáti has watched with distress as the region in southern Hungary, once an important site for agriculture, has become increasingly parched and dry. Where a variety of crops and grasses once filled the fields, today there are wide cracks in the soil and growing sand dunes more reminiscent of the Sahara Desert than Central Europe.

    The region, known as the Homokhátság, has been described by some studies as semiarid — a distinction more common in parts of Africa, the American Southwest or Australian Outback — and is characterized by very little rain, dried-out wells and a water table plunging ever deeper underground.

    In a 2017 paper in European Countryside, a scientific journal, researchers cited “the combined effect of climatic changes, improper land use and inappropriate environmental management” as causes for the Homokhátság’s aridification, a phenomenon the paper called unique in this part of the continent.

    Fields that in previous centuries would be regularly flooded by the Danube and Tisza Rivers have, through a combination of climate change-related droughts and poor water retention practices, become nearly unsuitable for crops and wildlife.

    Now a group of farmers and other volunteers, led by Nagyapáti, are trying to save the region and their lands from total desiccation using a resource for which Hungary is famous: thermal water.

    “I was thinking about what could be done, how could we bring the water back or somehow create water in the landscape,” Nagyapáti told The Associated Press. “There was a point when I felt that enough is enough. We really have to put an end to this. And that’s where we started our project to flood some areas to keep the water in the plain.”

    Along with the group of volunteer “water guardians,” Nagyapáti began negotiating with authorities and a local thermal spa last year, hoping to redirect the spa’s overflow water — which would usually pour unused into a canal — onto their lands. The thermal water is drawn from very deep underground.

    According to the water guardians’ plan, the water, cooled and purified, would be used to flood a 2½-hectare (6-acre) low-lying field — a way of mimicking the natural cycle of flooding that channelizing the rivers had ended.

    “When the flooding is complete and the water recedes, there will be 2½ hectares of water surface in this area,” Nagyapáti said. “This will be quite a shocking sight in our dry region.”

    A 2024 study by Hungary’s Eötvös Loránd University showed that unusually dry layers of surface-level air in the region had prevented any arriving storm fronts from producing precipitation. Instead, the fronts would pass through without rain, and result in high winds that dried out the topsoil even further.

    The water guardians hoped that by artificially flooding certain areas, they wouldn’t only raise the groundwater level but also create a microclimate through surface evaporation that could increase humidity, reduce temperatures and dust and have a positive impact on nearby vegetation.

    Tamás Tóth, a meteorologist in Hungary, said that because of the potential impact such wetlands can have on the surrounding climate, water retention “is simply the key issue in the coming years and for generations to come, because climate change does not seem to stop.”

    “The atmosphere continues to warm up, and with it the distribution of precipitation, both seasonal and annual, has become very hectic, and is expected to become even more hectic in the future,” he said.

    Following another hot, dry summer this year, the water guardians blocked a series of sluices along a canal, and the repurposed water from the spa began slowly gathering in the low-lying field.

    After a couple of months, the field had nearly been filled. Standing beside the area in early December, Nagyapáti said that the shallow marsh that had formed “may seem very small to look at it, but it brings us immense happiness here in the desert.”

    He said the added water will have a “huge impact” within a roughly 4-kilometer (2½-mile) radius, “not only on the vegetation, but also on the water balance of the soil. We hope that the groundwater level will also rise.”

    Persistent droughts in the Great Hungarian Plain have threatened desertification, a process where vegetation recedes because of high heat and low rainfall. Weather-damaged crops have dealt significant blows to the country’s overall gross domestic product, prompting Prime Minister Viktor Orbán to announce this year the creation of a “drought task force” to deal with the problem.

    After the water guardians’ first attempt to mitigate the growing problem in their area, they said they experienced noticeable improvements in the groundwater level, as well as an increase of flora and fauna near the flood site.

    The group, which has grown to more than 30 volunteers, would like to expand the project to include another flooded field, and hopes their efforts could inspire similar action by others to conserve the most precious resource.

    “This initiative can serve as an example for everyone, we need more and more efforts like this,” Nagyapáti said. “We retained water from the spa, but retaining any kind of water, whether in a village or a town, is a tremendous opportunity for water replenishment.”

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    The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

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  • Iran seizes an oil tanker in the Strait of Hormuz

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    TEHRAN, Iran — TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Iran seized a foreign oil tanker as it traveled the strategic Strait of Hormuz, state media said Friday.

    Mojtaba Ghahramani, a provincial chief of the justice department, said the oil tanker was carrying some 4 million liters, or 25,000 barrels, of smuggled fuel when the Revolutionary Guard naval forces seized the vessel, the official IRNA news agency reported.

    Ghahramani said the forces also detained 16 foreign crew members of the tanker, adding that the seizure was a remarkable “blow “ to smugglers. He did not disclose the nationality of the crew or the flag of the tanker.

    Iran occasionally seizes oil-carrying vessels over similar charges in the region. In November, Iran seized a ship as it traveled through the narrow Strait of Hormuz over what it said were violations, including carrying an illegal consignment.

    The West has blamed Iran for a series of limpet mine attacks on vessels that damaged tankers in 2019, as well as for a drone attack on an Israeli-linked oil tanker that killed two European crew members in 2021. Those attacks began after U.S. President Donald Trump, in his first term in office, unilaterally withdrew from Iran’s 2015 nuclear deal with world powers.

    Iran also seized the Portuguese-flagged cargo ship MSC Aries in April 2024.

    Following years of tensions between Iran and the West, coupled with the situation in the Gaza Strip, Iran saw a full-scale 12-day war in June with Israel, whose strikes led to the deaths of senior military commanders and nuclear scientists. Iran’s retaliatory missile barrage killed 28 in Israel.

    Tehran has long threatened to close off the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf through which 20% of all traded oil passes. The U.S. Navy has long patrolled the Mideast through its Bahrain-based 5th Fleet to keep the waterways open.

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  • Rain-soaked California still at risk of floods and high surf

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    WRIGHTWOOD, Calif. — A strong storm system that brought relentless winds, rain and snowfall to California this week was expected to ease Friday, but there was still a risk of high surf along the coast, flash flooding near Los Angeles and avalanches in the Sierra Nevada.

    Waves near the San Francisco Bay Area could reach up to 25 feet (7.6 meters) Friday, parts of Southern California were at risk of flooding, and avalanches could hit the Lake Tahoe area, officials warned. Residents were told to be ready to evacuate the mountain town of Wrightwood about 80 miles (130 kilometers) northeast of Los Angeles because of mudslides.

    Atmospheric rivers carried massive plumes of moisture from the tropics during one of the busiest travel weeks of the year. The storms were blamed for at least two deaths earlier in the week.

    The system brought the wettest Christmas season to downtown Los Angeles in 54 years, the National Weather Service said.

    Roads in the 5,000-resident town of Wrightwood were covered in rocks, debris and thick mud on Thursday. With power out, a gas station and coffee shop running on generators were serving as hubs for residents and visitors.

    “It’s really a crazy Christmas,” said Jill Jenkins, who was spending the holiday with her 13-year-old grandson, Hunter Lopiccolo.

    Lopiccolo said the family almost evacuated the previous day, when water washed away a chunk of their backyard. But they decided to stay and still celebrated the holiday. Lopiccolo got a new snowboard and e-bike.

    “We just played card games all night with candles and flashlights,” he said.

    Davey Schneider hiked a mile and a half (1.6 kilometers) through rain and floodwater up to his shins from his Wrightwood residence Wednesday to rescue cats from his grandfather’s house.

    “I wanted to help them out because I wasn’t confident that they were going to live,” Schneider said Thursday. “Fortunately, they all lived. They’re all okay — just a little bit scared.”

    Arlene Corte said roads in town turned into rivers, but her house was not damaged.

    “It could be a whole lot worse,” she said. “We’re here talking.”

    With more rain on the way, more than 150 firefighters were stationed in the area, said San Bernardino County Fire spokesman Shawn Millerick.

    “We’re ready,” he said. “It’s all hands on deck at this point.”

    A falling tree killed a San Diego man Wednesday, news outlets reported. Farther north, a Sacramento sheriff’s deputy died in what appeared to be a weather-related crash.

    Areas along the coast, including Malibu, were under a flood watch until Friday afternoon, and wind and flood advisories were issued for much of the Sacramento Valley and the San Francisco Bay Area.

    Southern California typically gets half an inch to 1 inch (1.3 to 2.5 centimeters) of rain this time of year, but this week many areas could see between 4 and 8 inches (10 to 20 centimeters), with even more in the mountains, National Weather Service meteorologist Mike Wofford said.

    More wind and heavy snow was expected in the Sierra Nevada, where gusts created “near white-out conditions” and made mountain pass travel treacherous.

    Gov. Gavin Newsom declared emergencies in six counties to allow state assistance.

    The state deployed resources and first responders to several coastal and Southern California counties, and the California National Guard was on standby.

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    Associated Press writers Sophie Austin in Oakland, California, and Hannah Schoenbaum in Salt Lake City contributed.

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  • Flash flooding in northern California leads to soaked roads, water rescues and one death

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    REDDING, Calif. — Heavy rain and flash flooding soaked roads in northern California, leading to water rescues from vehicles and homes and at least one confirmed death, authorities said.

    In Redding, police said they received numerous calls for stranded motorists on Sunday who tried to drive through flooded areas. One person in Redding died, Mayor Mike Littau posted online. He did not provide further information.

    Redding has about 93,000 people and is about 160 miles (257 kilometers) north of Sacramento.

    Between 3 and 6 inches (7.6 centimeters and 15.2 centimeters) had fallen by Sunday night in parts of two counties, the National Weather Service said.

    In the mountain pass area of Donner Summit, firefighters in Truckee extended a ladder to stranded residents at a house along the South Yuba River, the fire department posted online Sunday. No injuries were reported.

    The weather service office in Sacramento had said a series of warm atmospheric rivers would bring moderate to heavy rain to the Valley, foothills, and mountains the week of Christmas.

    Atmospheric rivers are long, narrow bands of water vapor that form over an ocean and flow through the sky, transporting moisture from the tropics to northern latitudes.

    Earlier this month, warm weather and air and unusual weather conditions tracing back as far as tropical cyclone flooding in Indonesia helped supercharge stubborn atmospheric rivers that drenched Washington state with nearly 5 trillion gallons (19 trillion liters) of rain in a week, threatening record flood levels, meteorologists said.

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  • Colorado River water negotiators appear no closer to long-term agreement

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    LAS VEGAS — The seven states that rely on the Colorado River to supply farms and cities across the U.S. West appear no closer to reaching a consensus on a long-term plan for sharing the dwindling resource.

    The river’s future was the center of discussions this week at the annual Colorado River Water Users Association conference in Las Vegas, where water leaders from California, Nevada, Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming gathered alongside federal and tribal officials.

    It comes after the states blew past a November deadline for a new plan to deal with drought and water shortages after 2026, when current guidelines expire. The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation has set a new deadline of Feb. 14.

    Nevada’s lead negotiator said it is unlikely the states will reach agreement that quickly.

    “As we sit here mid-December with a looming February deadline, I don’t see any clear path to a long-term deal, but I do see a path to the possibility of a shorter-term deal to keep us out of court,” John Entsminger of the Southern Nevada Water Authority told The Associated Press.

    More than 40 million people across seven states, Mexico and Native American tribes depend on the water from the river. Farmers in California and Arizona use it to grow the nation’s winter vegetables such as broccoli, cabbage and carrots. It provides water and electricity to millions of homes and businesses across the basin.

    But longstanding drought, chronic overuse and increasing temperatures have forced a reckoning on the river’s future. Existing water conservation agreements that determine who must use less in times of shortage expire in 2026. After two years of negotiating, states still haven’t reached a deal for what comes next.

    The federal government continues to refrain from coming up with its own solution — preferring the seven basin states reach consensus themselves. If they don’t, a federally imposed plan could leave parties unhappy and result in costly, lengthy litigation.

    Not only is this water fight between the upper and lower basins, individual municipalities, tribal nations and water agencies have their own stakes in this battle. California, which has the largest share of Colorado River water, has over 200 water agencies alone, each with their own customers.

    “It’s a rabbit hole you can dive down in, and it is incredibly complex,” said Noah Garrison, a water researcher at the University of California, Los Angeles.

    During a Thursday panel of state negotiators, none appeared willing to bend on their demands. Each highlighted what their state has done to conserve water, from turf-removal projects to canal lining in order to reduce seepage, and they explained why their state can’t take on more. Instead, they said, others should bear the burden.

    Entsminger, of Nevada, said he could see a short-term deal lasting five years that sets new rules around water releases and storage at Lakes Powell and Mead — two key reservoirs.

    Lower Basin states pitched a reduction of 1.5 million acre-feet per year to cover a structural deficit that occurs when water evaporates or is absorbed into the ground as it flows downstream. An acre-foot is enough water to supply two to three households a year.

    But they want to see a similar contribution from the Upper Basin. The Upper Basin states, however, don’t think they should have to make additional cuts because they already don’t use their full share of the water and are legally obligated to send a certain amount of water downstream.

    “Our water users feel that pain,” said Estevan López, New Mexico’s representative for the Upper Colorado River Commission.

    Upper Basin states want less water released from Lake Powell to Lake Mead.

    But Tom Buschatzke, director of the Arizona Department of Water Resources, said he hasn’t seen anything on the table from the Upper Basin that would compel him to ask Arizona lawmakers to approve those demands.

    Within the coming weeks, the Bureau of Reclamation will release a range of possible proposals, but it will not identify a specific set of operating guidelines the federal government would prefer.

    Scott Cameron, the bureau’s acting commissioner, implored the states to find compromise.

    “Cooperation is better than litigation,” he said during the conference. “The only certainty around litigation in the Colorado River basin is a bunch of water lawyers are going to be able to put their children and grandchildren through graduate school. There are much better ways to spend several hundred million dollars.”

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  • A drying-up Rio Grande basin threatens water security on both sides of the border

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    ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — One of North America’s longest rivers, the Rio Grande — or Rio Bravo as it’s called in Mexico — has a history as deep as it is long. Indigenous people have tapped it for countless generations, and it was a key artery for Spanish conquistadors centuries ago.

    Today, the Rio Grande-Bravo water basin is in crisis.

    Research published Thursday says the situation arguably is worse than challenges facing the Colorado River, another vital lifeline for western U.S. states that have yet to chart a course for how best to manage that dwindling resource.

    Without rapid and large-scale action on both sides of the border, the researchers warn that unsustainable use threatens water security for millions of people who rely on the binational basin. They say more prevalent drying along the Rio Grande and persistent shortages could have catastrophic consequences for farmers, cities and ecosystems.

    The study done by World Wildlife Fund, Sustainable Waters and a team of university researchers provides a full accounting of the consumptive uses as well as evaporation and other losses within the Rio Grande-Bravo basin. It helps to paint the most complete — and most alarming — picture yet of why the river system is in trouble.

    The basin provides drinking water to 15 million people in the U.S. and Mexico and irrigates nearly 2 million acres of cropland in the two countries.

    The research shows only 48% of the water consumed directly or indirectly within the basin is replenished naturally. The other 52% is unsustainable, meaning reservoirs, aquifers and the river itself will be overdrawn.

    “That’s a pretty daunting, challenging reality when half of our water isn’t necessarily going to be reliable for the future,” said Brian Richter, president of Sustainable Waters and a senior fellow with the World Wildlife Fund. “So we have to really address that.”

    By breaking down the balance sheet, the researchers are hopeful policymakers and regulators can determine where water use can be reduced and how to balance supply with demand.

    Warnings of what was to come first cropped up in the late 19th century when irrigation in Colorado’s San Luis Valley began to dry the snowmelt-fed river, resulting in diminished flows as far south as El Paso, Texas. Now, some stretches of the river run dry for months at a time. The Big Bend area and even Albuquerque have seen dry cracked mud replace the river more often in recent years.

    Irrigating crops by far is the largest direct use of water in the basin at 87%, according to the study. Meanwhile, losses to evaporation and uptake by vegetation along the river account for more than half of overall consumption in the basin, a factor that can’t be dismissed as reservoir storage shrinks.

    The irrigation season has become shorter, with canals drying up as early as June in some cases, despite a growing season in the U.S. and Mexico that typically lasts through October.

    In central New Mexico, farmers got a boost with summer rains. However, farmers along the Texas portion of the Pecos River and in the Rio Conchos basin of Mexico — both tributaries within the basin — did not receive any surface water supplies.

    “A key part of this is really connecting the urban populations to what’s going on out on these farms. These farmers are really struggling. A lot of them are on the brink of bankruptcy,” Richter said, linking water shortages to shrinking farms, smaller profits and less ability to afford labor and equipment.

    The analysis found that between 2000-2019, water shortages contributed to the loss of 18% of farmland in the headwaters in Colorado, 36% along the Rio Grande in New Mexico and 49% in the Pecos River tributary in New Mexico and Texas.

    With fewer farms, less water went to irrigation in the U.S. However, researchers said irrigation in the Mexican portion of the basin has increased greatly.

    The World Wildlife Fund and Sustainable Waters are working with researchers at the University of New Mexico to survey farmers on solutions to the water crisis.

    Jason Casuga, the chief engineer and CEO of the Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District, said he is not surprised by the findings and was particularly interested in the data on how much water is lost to riparian areas along the river. He talked about his crews clearing thick walls of thirsty invasive salt cedar trees, describing it as an unnatural ecosystem that stemmed from human efforts to manage the river with levees and reservoirs.

    While cities and farmers try to conserve, Casuga said there are few rules placed on consumption by riparian areas.

    “We’re willing to accept hundreds and hundreds of acres of invasive species choking out native species. And I’m hoping a study like this will cause people to think and ask those kinds of questions because I think our bosque is worth fighting for. As a culture in New Mexico, agriculture is worth fighting for,” he said.

    The responses to overuse and depletion are as varied as the jurisdictions through which the river flows, said Enrique Prunes, a co-author of the study and the manager of the World Wildlife Fund’s Rio Grande Program.

    He pointed to Colorado, where water managers have threatened to shut off groundwater wells if the aquifer that supports irrigated farms cannot be stabilized. There, farmers who pump groundwater pay fees that are used to incentivize other farmers to fallow their fields.

    New Mexico’s fallowing program is voluntary, but changes could be in store if the U.S. Supreme Court signs off on proposed settlements stemming from a long-running dispute with Texas and the federal government over management of the Rio Grande and groundwater use. New Mexico has acknowledged it will have to curb groundwater pumping.

    New Mexico is behind in its water deliveries to Texas under an interstate compact, while Mexico owes water to the U.S. under a 1944 binational treaty. Researchers said meeting those obligations won’t get easier.

    Prunes said policymakers must also consider the environment when crafting solutions.

    “Rebalancing the system also means maintaining those basic functions that the river and the aquifers and the groundwater-dependent ecosystems have,” he said. “And that’s the indicator of resilience to a future of less water.”

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  • Amazon’s ‘flying rivers’ weaken, scientists warn of worsening droughts

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    BOGOTA, Colombia — Droughts have withered crops in Peru, fires have scorched the Amazon and hydroelectric dams in Ecuador have struggled to keep the lights on as rivers dry up. Scientists say the cause may lie high above the rainforest, where invisible “flying rivers” carry rain from the Atlantic Ocean across South America.

    New analysis warns that relentless deforestation is disrupting that water flow and suggests that continuing tree loss will worsen droughts in the southwestern Amazon and could eventually trigger those regions to shift from rainforest to drier savanna — grassland with far fewer trees.

    “These are the forces that actually create and sustain the Amazon rainforest,” said Matt Finer, a senior researcher with Amazon Conservation’s Monitoring of the Andean Amazon Project (MAAP), which tracks deforestation and climate threats across the basin and carried out the analysis.

    “If you break that pump by cutting down too much forest, the rains stop reaching where they need to go.”

    Most of the Amazon’s rainfall starts over the Atlantic Ocean. Moist air is pushed inland by steady winds that blow west along the equator, known as the trade winds. The forest then acts like a pump, effectively relaying the water thousands of miles westward as the trees absorb water, then release it back into the air.

    Brazilian climate scientist Carlos Nobre was among the early researchers who calculated how much of the water vapor from the Atlantic would move through and eventually out of the Amazon basin. He and colleagues coined the “flying rivers” term at a 2006 scientific meeting, and interest grew as scientists warned that a weakening of the rivers could push the Amazon into a tipping point where rainforest would turn to savanna.

    That’s important because the Amazon rainforest is a vast storehouse for the carbon dioxide that largely drives the world’s warming. Such a shift would devastate wildlife and Indigenous communities and threaten farming, water supplies and weather stability far beyond the region.

    The analysis by Finer’s group found that southern Peru and northern Bolivia are especially vulnerable. During the dry season, flying rivers sweep across southern Brazil before reaching the Andes — precisely where deforestation is most intense. The loss of trees means less water vapor is carried westward, raising the risk of drought in iconic protected areas such as Peru’s Manu National Park.

    “Peru can do everything right to protect a place like Manu,” Finer said. “But if deforestation keeps cutting into the pump in Brazil, the rains that sustain it may never arrive.”

    Nobre said as much as 50% of rainfall in the western Amazon near the Andes depends on the flying rivers.

    Corine Vriesendorp, Amazon Conservation’s director of science based in Cusco, Peru, said the changes are already visible.

    “The last two years have brought the driest conditions the Amazon has ever seen,” Vriesendorp said. “Ecological calendars that Indigenous communities use — when to plant, when to fish, when animals reproduce — are increasingly out of sync. Having less and more unpredictable rain will have an even bigger impact on their lives than climate change is already having.”

    Farmers face failed harvests, Indigenous families struggle with disrupted fishing and hunting seasons and cities that rely on hydroelectric power see outages as the rivers that provide the power dry up.

    MAAP researchers found that rainfall patterns depend on when and where the flying rivers cross the basin. In the wet season, their northern route flows mostly over intact forests in Guyana, Suriname and northern Brazil, keeping the system strong.

    But in the dry season — when forests are already stressed by heat — the aerial rivers cut across southern Brazil, where deforestation fronts spread along highways and farms and there simply are fewer trees to help move the moisture along.

    “It’s during the dry months, when the forest most needs water, that the flying rivers are most disrupted,” Finer said.

    Finer pointed to roads that can accelerate deforestation, noting that the controversial BR-319 highway in Brazil — a project to pave a road through one of the last intact parts of the southern Amazon — could create an entirely new deforestation front.

    For years, scientists have warned about the Amazon tipping toward savannah. Finer said the new study complicates that picture.

    “It’s not a single, all-at-once collapse,” he said. “Certain areas, like the southwest Amazon, are more vulnerable and will feel the impacts first. And we’re already seeing early signs of rainfall reduction downwind of deforested areas.”

    Nobre said the risks are stark. Amazon forests have already lost about 17% of their cover, mostly to cattle and soy. Those ecosystems recycle far less water.

    “The dry season is now five weeks longer than it was 45 years ago, with 20 to 30% less rainfall,” he said. “If deforestation exceeds 20 to 25% and warming reaches 2 degrees Celsius, there’s no way to prevent the Amazon from reaching the tipping point.”

    Protecting intact forests, supporting Indigenous land rights and restoring deforested areas are the clearest paths forward, researchers say.

    “To avoid collapse we need zero deforestation, degradation and fires — immediately,” Nobre said. “And we must begin large-scale forest restoration, not less than half a million square kilometers. If we do that, and keep global warming below 2 degrees, we can still save the Amazon.”

    Finer said governments should consider new conservation categories specifically designed to protect flying rivers — safeguarding not just land but the atmospheric flows that make the rainforest possible.

    For Vriesendorp, that means regional cooperation. She praised Peru for creating vast parks and Indigenous reserves in the southeast, including Manu National Park. But, she said, “this can’t be solved by one country alone. Peru depends on Brazil, and Brazil depends on its neighbors. We need basin-wide solutions.”

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    The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

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  • Western states seek to end long-running water dispute over dwindling Rio Grande

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    ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A simmering feud over management of one of North America’s longest rivers reached a boiling point when the U.S. Supreme Court sent western states and the federal government back to the negotiating table last year.

    Now the battle over waters of the Rio Grande could be nearing resolution as New Mexico, Texas and Colorado announced fresh settlement proposals Friday designed to rein in groundwater pumping along the river in New Mexico and ensure enough river water reliably makes it to Texas.

    New Mexico officials say the agreements allow water conservation decisions to be made locally while avoiding a doomsday scenario of billion-dollar payouts on water shortfalls.

    Farmers in southern New Mexico increasingly have turned to groundwater as hotter and drier conditions reduced river flows and storage. That pumping is what prompted Texas to sue, claiming the practice was cutting into water deliveries.

    It will be up to the special master overseeing the case to make a recommendation to the Supreme Court.

    If endorsed by the court, the combined settlements promise to restore order to an elaborate system of storing and sharing water between two vast, adjacent irrigation districts in southern New Mexico and western Texas.

    Still, tough decisions await New Mexico under its new obligations.

    In 1939, when New Mexico was a young, sparsely populated state, it ratified a compact with Texas and Colorado for sharing the waters of the Rio Grande. The agreement defined credits and debits and set parameters for when water could be stored upstream.

    From the San Luis Valley in Colorado to below Elephant Butte Reservoir in New Mexico, the compact called for gages to monitor the river, ensuring downstream obligations were met.

    Meeting the nearly century-old metrics has become harder as snowpacks shrink in the mountains that feed the Rio Grande. Thirsty soil soaks up more snowmelt and runoff before it reaches tributaries, warmer temperatures fuel evaporation, and summer rainy seasons that once boosted flows and recharged reservoirs are more erratic.

    The equation is further complicated by growing populations. The Rio Grande provides drinking water for about 6 million people and helps to irrigate millions of acres of cropland in the U.S. and in Mexico.

    While the Colorado River gets all the headlines, experts say the situation along the Rio Grande is just as dire.

    The proposed settlements would provide a detailed accounting system for sharing water with Texas.

    New Mexico could rely on credits and debits from year to year to navigate through drought and wet periods, though it could be responsible for additional water-sharing obligations if deliveries are deferred too long.

    The international group Sustainable Waters is wrapping up an extensive study on how the river’s water is being used.

    Brian Richter, the group’s president, said that over the last couple of decades, New Mexico has lost more than 70% of its reservoir storage along the river while groundwater has been extracted faster than it can be replenished. Add to that New Mexico has fallen behind in its water deliveries to Texas.

    Richter called it a triple whammy.

    “We’re definitely in a precarious situation and it’s going to become more challenging going forward,” he said. “So I think it’s going to require sort of a major reenvisioning of what we want New Mexico’s water future to look like.”

    The parties in the case say the proposed agreements will facilitate investments and innovation in water conservation.

    “The whole settlement package really provides for the long-term vitality, economic vitality, for the communities in both New Mexico and Texas,” said Hannah Riseley-White, director of the Interstate Stream Commission.

    New Mexico would have two years to adopt a plan to manage and share water along its southernmost stretch of the Rio Grande. The state can still pump some groundwater while monitoring aquifer levels.

    “The burden is on New Mexico,” said Stuart Somach, lead attorney for Texas in the Rio Grande dispute.

    In Albuquerque, it looks grim.

    It’s common to have stretches of the Rio Grande go dry farther south, but not in New Mexico’s largest city. Prior to 2022, it had been four decades since Albuquerque had seen the muddy waters reduced to isolated puddles and lengthy sandbars.

    Aside from a changing climate, water managers say the inability to store water in upstream reservoirs due to compact obligations exacerbates the problem.

    Many of the intricacies of managing the Rio Grande are as invisible to residents as the water itself.

    Sisters Zoe and Phoebe Hughes set out to take photos during a recent evening, anticipating at least a sliver of water like usual. Instead they found deep sand and patchwork of cracked, curled beds of clay.

    “It’s so dystopian. It’s sad,” Phoebe Hughes said, adding that the river isn’t so grand now.

    Looking for a silver lining, the two collected pieces of riverbed clay, hoping they could fashion it into something. Other curious visitors played in the sand and walked dogs.

    Downstream, Elephant Butte stands at less than 4% of capacity. The reservoir is an irrigation lifeline for farmers, fuels a hydropower station and serves as a popular recreation spot.

    The settlements call for reducing groundwater depletions to a rate of 18,200 acre-feet per year. While that’s about one-sixth of the drinking water supplied to New York City each day, for the arid West, it’s a monumental amount.

    New Mexico officials expect to achieve most of those reductions from buying water rights from willing sellers, meaning more than 14 square miles (36 square kilometers) of farmland would be retired.

    Many details — and the price tag — have yet to be worked out, the general counsel for the New Mexico state engineer’s office told state lawmakers this month. The Legislature in 2023 set aside $65 million toward the settlements and related infrastructure projects, and the state is tapping additional federal dollars. But it will still need more funds, experts say.

    Riseley-White said it will take a combination of efforts, including long-term fallowing programs, water conservation and more efficient irrigation infrastructure.

    “There isn’t one answer. It’s going to be necessarily an all-of-the-above approach,” she said, acknowledging that there will be less water in the future.

    Attorney Sam Barncastle, who worked for years on behalf of irrigators, worries small farming operations and backyard gardeners could ultimately be pushed out.

    “Farmland does not come back once it’s gone,” she said.

    The overall idea is to avoid abruptly curtailing water for users, but farmers in southern New Mexico have concerns about how much water will be available and who will be able to use it.

    New Mexico is the nation’s No. 2 pecan producer, and the sprawling orchards would die without consistent water. The state also is home to world-renowned chilies — a signature crop tightly woven into New Mexico’s cultural identity.

    Ben Etcheverry, a board member of the New Mexico Chile Association, said farmers have transitioned to drip irrigation to save water and energy but are continually told they have to do more with even less water and pay higher rates.

    “It just becomes a game of whack-a-mole while we try to do better,” he said. “Every time we do better, it seems they turn it into a punishment.”

    ___

    Lee reported from Santa Fe.

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  • Cambodia hopes a new canal will boost trade. But it risks harming the Mekong that feeds millions

    Cambodia hopes a new canal will boost trade. But it risks harming the Mekong that feeds millions

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    PREK TAKEO, Cambodia — The Mekong River is a lifeline for millions in the six countries it traverses on its way from its headwaters to the sea, sustaining the world’s largest inland fishery and abundant rice paddies on Vietnam’s Mekong Delta.

    Cambodia’s plan to build a massive canal linking the Mekong to a port on on its own coast on the Gulf of Thailand is raising alarm that the project could devastate the river’s natural flood systems, worsening droughts and depriving farmers on the delta of the nutrient-rich silt that has made Vietnam the world’s third-largest rice exporter.

    Cambodia hopes that the $1.7 billion Funan Techo canal, being built with Chinese help, will support its ambition to export directly from factories along the Mekong without relying on Vietnam, connecting the capital Phnom Penh with Kep province on Cambodia’s southern coast.

    At an Aug. 5 groundbreaking ceremony, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet said the canal will be built “no matter what the cost.” By reducing costs of shipping to Cambodia’s only deep-sea port, at Sihanoukville, the canal will promote, “national prestige, the territorial integrity and the development of Cambodia,” he said.

    Along with those promises comes peril. Here is a closer look.

    The Mekong River flows from China through Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. It supports a fishery that accounts for 15% of the global inland catch, worth over $11 billion annually, according to the nonprofit World Wildlife Fund. Flooding during the wet season makes the Mekong Delta one of the world’s most productive farm regions.

    The river already has been disrupted by dams built upstream in Laos and China that restrict the amount of water flowing downstream, while rising seas are gnawing away at the southern edges of the climate-vulnerable Mekong Delta.

    Brian Eyler, director of the Washington-based Stimson Center’s Southeast Asia Program, warns that high embankments along the 100-meter (328 feet)-wide, 5.4-meter (17.7 feet)-deep canal will prevent silt-laden floodwater from flowing downstream to Vietnam. That could worsen drought in Vietnam’s rice bowl and Cambodia’s floodplains, an area stretching over roughly 1,300-square kilometers (501 square miles).

    A drier Mekong Delta is a concern for Vietnam’s agricultural sector, which powers 12% of its economy. The southwestern provinces of An Giang and Kien Giang would likely be most impacted. The delta’s latticework of rivers crisscrossing green fields is vital for Vietnam’s own plans of growing “high quality, low emission rice” on 1 million hectares of farmland by 2030. The aim is to cut earth-warming greenhouse gases, lower production costs and increase farmers’ profits.

    Water from the river is “essential” not just for Vietnam’s more than 100 million people but also for global food security, said Nguyen Van Nhut, director of rice export company Hoang Minh Nhat.

    Vietnam’s exports of 8.3 million metric tons (9.1 U.S. tons) of rice in 2023 accounted for 15% of global exports. Most was grown in the Mekong Delta. The amount of silt being deposited by the river has already dropped and further disruptions will worsen salinity in the area, hurting farming, Nhat said.

    “This will be a major concern for the agriculture sector of the Mekong delta,” he said.

    Cambodia says the canal is a “tributary project” that will connect to the Bassac River near Phnom Penh. President Hun Sen claimed on social media platform X that this means there would be “no impact on the flow of the Mekong River.”

    But blueprints show the canal will connect to the Mekong’s mainstream and in any case the Bassac consists entirely of water from the Mekong, Eyler said.

    Cambodian authorities are downplaying the potential environmental impacts of the project. “This is their logic-defying basis for justifying no impact to the Mekong River,” he said.

    A document submitted in August 2023 to the Mekong River Commission — an organization formed for cooperation on issues regarding the Mekong — does not mention using water from the canal for irrigation, though Cambodia has since said it plans to do so. The Stimson Center added it was “logical” that irrigation would be needed during dry months, but that would require negotiating an agreement with the other Mekong countries.

    The Mekong River Commission told The Associated Press all major projects on the Mekong River “should be assessed for their potential transboundary impacts.” It said it was providing technical support to “increase transparency and cooperation among concerned countries.”

    Sun Chanthol, the Cambodian deputy prime minister who oversees the project, didn’t respond to a request for comments.

    Cambodia has rejected criticism of the canal, which is widely seen as an effort by the country’s ruling elite to curry support for Prime Minister Hun Manet, who succeeded his father Hun Sen, who led Cambodia for 38 years.

    The canal is to be built jointly by Chinese state-owned construction giant China Road and Bridge Corporation and Cambodian companies. But it is enveloped in nationalistic rhetoric. The canal would provide Cambodia a “nose to breathe through” by reducing its dependence on Vietnam, Hun Sen has said.

    Vietnam has avoided openly criticizing its neighbor, instead communicating its concerns quietly. Vietnamese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Pham Thu Hang said at a press conference in May that Hanoi had asked Cambodia to share information and assess the environmental impacts of the project to “ensure the harmony of interests” of Mekong countries.

    Many Cambodians remain suspicious of Vietnam’s intentions, believing it may want to annex Cambodian territory. Given the contentious past between the two countries, bigger and richer Vietnam is taking care not to appear to be impinging on Cambodian sovereignty, said Nguyen Khac Giang, an analyst at Singapore’s ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute.

    “Although in Vietnam, there are big concerns,” he said.

    Lost in Cambodia’s nationalistic rhetoric are the concerns of people like Sok Koeun, 57, who may lose her home.

    The tin-roofed cottage where she has lived with her family since 1980 is right where the canal is due to be built. The river provides her with fish to feed her family when she struggles to get by selling sugarcane juice and recycling plastic cans.

    No one has been in touch, she says, to answer her mounting questions: Will she get compensated? Will she get land? Or cash? Where will they go?

    “I only learned about it (the canal) just now,” she said.

    ___

    The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

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  • Sports boats set out on a voyage to electrify the waters in the same way Tesla electrified the roads

    Sports boats set out on a voyage to electrify the waters in the same way Tesla electrified the roads

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    AFLOAT THE SAN JOAQUIN RIVER — Grant Jeide looked like another dude riding the rollicking waves left in the wake of a 23-foot (7-meter) boat ripping through the water at speeds of up to 40 miles per hour on a river in Northern California’s Delta earlier this summer.

    But Jeide was performing his aquatic acrobatics behind a different breed of boat — one powered by electricity instead of gasoline. Unencumbered by the din and acrid smell of a combustion engine, the boat’s passengers could chat with Jeide as he surfed behind them while they savored the afternoon breeze wafting along the river.

    “It’s like a playground back there, you feel like you could just ride all day,” exclaimed Jeide, part of the sales team at Arc Boats, a 3-year-old startup embarking on a voyage to electrify the waters in the same way that Tesla led the charge to electrify the roads.

    As Tesla did with its first car 16 years ago, Arc Boats is starting with luxurious vessels likely to appeal to a small and affluent audience that isn’t reluctant to spend large sums of money to own the latest advances in technology.

    They’re people like Jonathan Coon, a self-proclaimed geek who got rich after starting 1-800 Contacts in his college dorm room back in the 1990s and can afford to splurge on the sleek, high-powered vessels that Arc Boats is designing and building.

    After spending more than $300,000 on a luxury cruiser called Arc One a couple of years ago, Coon is forking over another $258,000 to become the first customer in line to get Arc Sport — a model made for popular aquatic pastimes such as wakeboarding and water skiing.

    It’s something that Coon wouldn’t have considered buying just a few years ago after renting gas-powered boats and riding on the gas-powered boats of friends and hearing about all the hassles that went into maintaining them, along with the cost to fuel up vessels that usually only get a few miles per gallon.

    “My view on boats had always been that the best kind of boat is someone else’s boat because they can be such nightmares,” Coon, 54, said during an interview from Austin, Texas, where he is overseeing the development of a lakeside community. “But that’s not the case now. These guys just nailed every little detail on an electric boat that’s just fun to use.”

    Arc Boats CEO Mitch Lee is a long-time nerd, too. He grew up in San Jose, California — the cradle of Silicon Valley — where he began trading in currency exchanges when he was just 8 years old. After moving on to Northwestern University to study mechanical engineering, Lee created a personal finance app called Penny that he sold in 2018 to Credit Karma, which is now owned by Intuit.

    That deal helped provide Lee with the money to start Arc Boats in Southern California with Ryan Cook, a friend he met at Northwestern. Electrifying boats has been in the back of Lee’s mind since Tesla rolled out its first car — the Roadster — in 2008 and he wondered if the technology would eventually work on the boats he grew to love as the son of parents who loved to water ski.

    The success of Tesla’s expanding line-up of vehicles and the electric cars made by other automakers finally created a supply chain of batteries and other parts needed to electrify boats, too. Arc Boats, founded in 2021, now employs more than 100 employees, including former engineers who worked for Elon Musk at two of his breakthrough companies — Tesla and rocket ship maker SpaceX.

    After selling only a handful of the Arc One luxury cruisers, Lee foresees being able to ramp up production to sell hundreds of the Arc Sport model across the U.S. annually.

    Besides its home state of California, Arc Boats is targeting other water-loving hot spots such as Texas, Idaho, Minnesota, Michigan and other parts of the country with lots of lakes and people who want to have fun on them. The first Arc Sport is supposed to be delivered to Coon before the end of this year.

    “There’s a lot of enthusiasm for a product like this, because it solves all these core pain points that gas boat owners have today,” Lee, 35, said while piloting an Arc Sport on the San Joaquin River near Bethel Island, California. “It’s quieter. It’s far more reliable. It’s way cheaper to operate. You’re not inhaling fumes off of the back of the boat. And we’re doing an interview on a boat where all you hear is the sound of the water.”

    A wide range of other boat makers trying to shift away from gas-combustion engines and fuel tanks that can easily cost $300 to $600 to fill for a day traversing a lake or river are making similar arguments. Some, like Sweden’s Candela and another California startup, Navier, are selling electric-powered hydrofoil speedboats that probably wouldn’t work as well for water skiing or wakeboarding.

    A variety of other electric boats, in a range of different styles, are being made by a list of others, including Vision Marine, Ingenity, RS Electric, Duffy Boats and Rand Boats.

    Compared to electric cars, the market for electric boats is a drop in the bucket. Worldwide sales of electric boats stood at just $5 billion in 2021, and even with steady double-digit annual growth, are only projected to reach roughly $17 billion by 2031, according to Allied Market Research. In contrast, global sales of electric automobiles surpassed $250 billion last year.

    Lee is trying to steer Arc Boats in the same direction that Tesla followed after barely making a dent in the auto market during its formative years. Just like Tesla’s vehicles, the Arc Sport will be equipped with a variety of technology that will make the boat akin to a floating computer.

    The boat comes with display screens, sensors, Wifi, a hydraulic system for raising and lowering the roof, a 226-kilowatt battery and software that can be updated over the air. Lee envisions those software updates making it possible to provide people who own the Arc Sport with upgrades as the technology improves and potentially makes it possible for the boat to autonomously dock.

    The Arc Sport’s hefty price tag is also an echo of the Tesla Roadster, which sold for $80,000 to $125,000. Now Tesla sells sedans in the $40,000 range, with ambitions to lower the price even more.

    “Over time, we expect our technology to get less expensive,” Lee said of the Arc Sport as he prepared to show off the boat’s 500-horsepower motor. “There are a lot of tailwinds here.”

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  • Bus carrying dozens of Indian pilgrims drives off a Nepal highway

    Bus carrying dozens of Indian pilgrims drives off a Nepal highway

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    A bus carrying dozens of Indian pilgrims has driven off a highway in Nepal, leaving 14 killed, 16 injured and several more missing

    KATHMANDU, Nepal — At least 14 people were killed, 16 other injured and several more believed to be missing after a bus carrying dozens of Indian pilgrims drove off a key highway Friday in Nepal, officials said.

    The bus veered off Prithvi Highway and rolled toward a fast-flowing river, stopping on the rocky bank. The top part of the bus was ripped, but the wreckage did not plunge into the Marsyangdi river.

    Armed Police Force spokesperson Shailendra Thapa said that, among those pulled out of from the bus, 14 were declared dead and 16 were injured in the accident.

    Officials could not yet say how many more were missing or the exact number of people on the bus when it crashed, but they estimated there were some four dozen on board at the time of the accident.

    Police and army rescuers were helping to pull people from the wreckage near Abukhaireni, a town about 120 kilometers (75 miles) west of the capital, Kathmandu.

    The bus from neighboring Indian town of Gorakhpur was heading toward Kathmandu from the resort town of Pokhara on Friday when it drove off the highway midway in the journey.

    In July, two buses were swept by landslides not too far from Friday’s accident site. Of the 65 people on board those two buses, only three survived and only about half the bodies were recovered. The wreckage of those buses have not been found yet but authorities have continued to search.

    Bus accidents in Nepal are mostly due to poorly maintained roads and vehicles and much of the country is covered by mountains with narrow roads.

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  • Arizona, Nevada and Mexico will lose same amount of Colorado River water next year as in 2024

    Arizona, Nevada and Mexico will lose same amount of Colorado River water next year as in 2024

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    WASHINGTON (AP) — Arizona, Nevada and Mexico will continue to live with less water next year from the Colorado River after the U.S. government on Thursday announced water cuts that preserve the status quo. Long-term challenges remain for the 40 million people reliant on the imperiled river.

    The 1,450-mile (2,334-kilometer) river is a lifeline for the U.S. West and supplies water to cities and farms in northern Mexico, too. It supports seven Western states, more than two dozen Native American tribes and irrigates millions of acres of farmland in the American West. It also produces hydropower used across the region.

    Years of overuse combined with rising temperatures and drought have meant less water flows in the Colorado today than in decades past.

    The Interior Department announces water availability for the coming year months in advance so that cities, farmers and others can plan. Officials do so based on water levels at Lake Mead, one of the river’s two main reservoirs that act as barometers of its health.

    Based on those levels, Arizona will again lose 18% of its total Colorado River allocation, while Mexico’s goes down 5%. The reduction for Nevada — which receives far less water than Arizona, California or Mexico — will stay at 7%.

    The cuts announced Thursday are in the same “Tier 1” category that were in effect this year and in 2022, when the first federal cutbacks on the Colorado River took effect and magnified the crisis on the river. Even deeper cuts followed in 2023. Farmers in Arizona were hit hardest by those cuts.

    Heavier rains and other water-saving efforts by Arizona, California and Nevada somewhat improved the short-term outlook for Lake Mead and Lake Powell, which is upstream of Mead on the Utah-Arizona border.

    Officials on Thursday said the two reservoirs were at 37% capacity.

    They lauded the ongoing efforts by Arizona, California and Nevada to save more water, which are in effect until 2026. The federal government is paying water users in those states for much of that conservation. Meanwhile, states, tribes and others are negotiating how they will share water from the river after 2026, when many current guidelines governing the river expire.

    Tom Buschatzke, director of Arizona’s Department of Water Resources and the state’s lead negotiator in those talks, said Thursday that Arizonans had “committed to incredible conservation … to protect the Colorado River system.”

    “Future conditions,” he added, “are likely to continue to force hard decisions.”

    ___

    Associated Press reporter Amy Taxin contributed from Santa Ana, Calif.

    ___

    The Associated Press receives support from the Walton Family Foundation for coverage of water and environmental policy. The AP is solely responsible for all content. For all of AP’s environmental coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/climate-and-environment

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  • Demand for rare elements used in clean energy could help clean up abandoned coal mines in Appalachia

    Demand for rare elements used in clean energy could help clean up abandoned coal mines in Appalachia

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    MOUNT STORM, W.Va. — Down a long gravel road, tucked into the hills in West Virginia, is a low-slung building where researchers are extracting essential elements from an old coal mine that they hope will strengthen the nation’s energy future.

    They aren’t mining the coal that powered the steel mills and locomotives that helped industrialize America — and that is blamed for contributing to global warming.

    Rather, researchers are finding that groundwater pouring out of this and other abandoned coal mines contains the rare earth elements and other valuable metals that are vital to making everything from electric vehicle motors to rechargeable batteries to fighter jets smaller, lighter or more powerful.

    The pilot project run by West Virginia University is now part of an intensifying worldwide race to develop a secure supply of the valuable metals and, with more federal funding, it could grow to a commercial scale enterprise.

    “The ultimate irony is that the stuff that has created climate change is now a solution, if we’re smart about it,” said John Quigley, a senior fellow at the Kleinman Center for Energy Policy at the University of Pennsylvania.

    The technology that has been piloted at this facility in West Virginia could also pioneer a way to clean up vast amounts of coal mine drainage that poisons waterways across Appalachia.

    The project is one of the leading efforts by the federal government as it injects more money than ever into recovering rare earth elements to expand renewable energies and fight climate change by reducing planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions.

    For the U.S., which like the rest of the West is beholden to a Chinese-controlled supply of these valuable metals, the pursuit of rare earth elements is also a national security priority.

    Those involved, meanwhile, hope their efforts can bring jobs in clean energy to dying coal towns and clean up entrenched coal pollution that has hung around for decades.

    In Pennsylvania alone, drainage from coal piles and abandoned mines has turned waterways red from iron ore and turquoise from aluminum, killing life in more than 5,000 miles (8,000 km) of streams. Federal statistics also show about 470 square miles (about 1,200 square km) of abandoned and unreclaimed coal mine lands host more than 200 million tons of coal waste.

    The metals that chemists are working to extract from mine drainage here are lightweight, powerfully magnetized and have superior fluorescent and conductive properties.

    One aim of the Department of Energy is to fund research that proves to private companies that the concepts are commercially viable and profitable enough for them to invest their own money.

    Hundreds of millions of dollars from President Joe Biden’s 2021 infrastructure law is accelerating the effort.

    Department officials hope that by the middle of the 2030s this infusion will have spawned full-fledged commercial enterprises.

    The two most advanced projects funded by the department are the one in West Virginia treating mine drainage and another processing coal dug up by lignite mining in North Dakota.

    The first could be an important source of a number of critical metals, such as yttrium, neodymium and gadolinium, used in catalysts and magnets. The latter could be a major source of germanium and gallium, used in semiconductors, LEDs, electrical transmission components, solar panels and electric vehicle motors.

    Researchers at each site are designing a commercial-scale operation, based on their pilot projects, in hopes of landing a massive federal grant to build it out.

    The alternative would be to develop new mines, disturb more land, get permits, hire workers, build roads and connect power supplies, tasks that take years.

    “With acid mind drainage, that’s already done for you,” said Paul Ziemkiewicz, director of the Water Research Institute at West Virginia University.

    Ziemkiewicz began the mine drainage project almost a decade ago, helped by federal subsidies. He had envisioned it as a way to treat runoff, recover critical minerals and raise money for more mine cleanups in West Virginia.

    But the Biden administration’s ambitious funding for clean energy and a domestic supply of critical minerals broadened that goal.

    At the facility, drainage from a one-time coal mine — now closed and covered by a grassy slope — emerges from two pipes, and dumps about 800 gallons per minute into a retention pond.

    From there the water is routed through massive indoor pools and a series of large tanks that, with the help of lime to lower the acidity, separate out most of the silicate, iron and aluminum. That produces a pale powdery concentrate that is about 95% rare earth oxides, plus water clean enough to return to a nearby creek.

    The Department of Energy is funding research on coal wastes in various states.

    “There are literally billions of tons of coal ash and coal waste lying around, across the country. And so if we can go back in and remine those, there’s decades worth of materials there,” said Grant Bromhal, the acting director of the Department of Energy’s Division of Minerals Sustainability.

    Not only coal, but old copper and phosphate mines also hold potential, Bromhal said.

    The country won’t be able to recover metals from all of them right away, but technologies the department is helping develop can satisfy a substantial part of demand in the next 20 to 30 years, Bromhal said.

    “So if we get into the tens of percents or 50%, I think that’s in the realm of possibility,” he said.

    Other solutions to obtain more of these metals are retrieving them from discarded devices and shifting sourcing to friendly nations and away from geopolitical rivals or unstable countries, analysts say. For now, there is only a handful of critical or rare earth mineral mines in the United States, although many more are being proposed.

    One final subsidy will be required from the federal government: buy the reclaimed metals at a price that guarantees a commercially viable operation, Ziemkiewicz said.

    That way China can’t simply buy up the product or use its market dominance to drive down prices and scare away private investors, he said.

    Quigley, a former environmental protection secretary of Pennsylvania and a one-time small-city mayor in coal country, hopes to see a facility like Ziemkiewicz’s come to the Jeddo mine tunnel system in northeastern Pennsylvania.

    The Jeddo has defied decades of efforts to treat its flow, which drains a vast network of abandoned underground mines.

    It is a massive source of pollution in the Chesapeake Bay watershed, producing an estimated 30,000 to 40,000 gallons per minute.

    Bringing the Little Nescopeck Creek back to life could put people to work cleaning up the stream and creating recreational opportunities from a newly revived waterway, Quigley said.

    “This could mean a lot to coal communities, to a lot of people in the coal region,” Quigley said. “And to the country.”

    ___

    Read more of AP’s climate coverage at http://www.apnews.com/climate-and-environment

    ___

    Follow Marc Levy at twitter.com/timelywriter

    ___

    The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

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  • Indian mother delivers baby on boat as her river island is inundated by floodwaters

    Indian mother delivers baby on boat as her river island is inundated by floodwaters

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    MORIGAON, India — A blue tarp covered a mother and her newborn daughter from the incessant rain on their boat journey. Jahanara Khatoon, 25, had just given birth on the boat on their way to a healthcare center, surrounded by the raging floodwaters of the Brahmaputra River.

    “I am very happy,” said her husband, Kamaluddin, who was also on the boat. “My wife wanted a boy, but Allah has given me a girl and I’m very satisfied. I don’t want to have any more children.”

    The couple had left their home on Phuliamari Char, one of the islands in the river, after it was inundated by floodwaters, taking shelter on a nearby island known as Chars.

    Increased rainfall in the region blamed on climate change has made the Brahmaputra River — already known for its powerful, unpredictable flow — even more dangerous for those who live near it or on the more than 2,000 islands in it.

    India, and Assam state in particular, is seen as one of the world’s most vulnerable regions to climate change because of increasingly intense rain and floods, according to a 2021 report by the Council on Energy, Environment and Water, a New Delhi-based climate think tank.

    Khatoon and Kamaluddin earn their living as farmers on their island in Assam state’s Morigaon district.

    A medical team was visiting flooded Chars to aid those who needed medical help, especially pregnant women. The team convinced Khatoon to travel with them to the nearest medical facility across the river.

    The baby couldn’t wait for Khatoon to get to the healthcare center. As her labor progressed, the team on the boat quickly got to work, holding up a tarp to protect from the rain as they helped with the delivery.

    Within 10 minutes the baby emerged to shouts of celebration.

    Diluwara Begum, an auxiliary nurse and midwife, lifted the newborn and whispered prayers into her ears.

    “This was my first time helping deliver a baby on a boat. It was a very different feeling. It feels good.” she said.

    The family has named the baby Karima, which means “Giving.”

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  • An Afghan military helicopter crash in western Afghanistan kills at least 1 person, the Taliban say

    An Afghan military helicopter crash in western Afghanistan kills at least 1 person, the Taliban say

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    ISLAMABAD — An Afghan military helicopter crashed on Wednesday in Ghor province in western Afghanistan, killing at least one person, the Taliban defense ministry said.

    The crash of the MI-17 was caused by a technical problem, according to a statement.

    The helicopter was on a rescue mission after a vehicle carrying civilians plunged into a river near the city of Feroz Koh, the provincial capital of Ghor, the ministry said in post on the social media platform X.

    Twelve passengers were injured in the crash, according to the statement. The crew tried to make an emergency landing but the helicopter hit a wall and crashed, it added.

    The statement did not identify the individual who was killed in the accident and it was not clear how many people were on board.

    Images posted on X show the crash site along a river, where dozens of people gathered to try to help the survivors.

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  • Crews carefully start removing first piece of twisted steel from collapsed Baltimore bridge

    Crews carefully start removing first piece of twisted steel from collapsed Baltimore bridge

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    BALTIMORE — Teams of engineers worked Saturday on the intricate process of cutting and lifting the first section of twisted steel from the collapsed Francis Scott Key Bridge, which crumpled into the Patapsco River this week after a massive cargo ship crashed into one of its supports.

    Sparks could be seen flying from a section of bent and crumpled steel in the afternoon, and video released by officials in the evening showed demolition crews using a cutting torch to slice through the thick beams. The joint incident command said in a statement that the work was being done on the top of the north side of the collapsed structure.

    Crews were carefully measuring and cutting the steel from the broken bridge before attaching straps so it can be lifted onto a barge and floated away, Coast Guard Rear Adm. Shannon Gilreath said.

    Seven floating cranes — including a massive one capable of lifting 1,000 tons — 10 tugboats, nine barges, eight salvage vessels and five Coast Guard boats were on site in the water southeast of Baltimore.

    Each movement affects what happens next and ultimately how long it will take to remove all the debris and reopen the ship channel and the blocked Port of Baltimore, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore said.

    “I cannot stress enough how important today and the first movement of this bridge and of the wreckage is. This is going to be a remarkably complicated process,” Moore said.

    Undeterred by the chilly morning weather, longtime Baltimore resident Randy Lichtenberg and others took cellphone photos or just quietly looked at the broken pieces of the bridge, which including its steel trusses weigh as much as 4,000 tons.

    “I wouldn’t want to be in that water. It’s got to be cold. It’s a tough job,” Lichtenberg said from a spot on the river called Sparrows Point.

    The shock of waking up Tuesday morning to video of what he called an iconic part of the Baltimore skyline falling into the water has given way to sadness.

    “It never hits you that quickly. It’s just unbelievable,” Lichtenberg said.

    One of the first goals for crews on the water is to get a smaller auxiliary ship channel open so tugboats and other small barges can move freely. Crews also want to stabilize the site so divers can resume searching for four missing workers who are presumed dead.

    Two other workers were rescued from the water in the hours following the bridge collapse, and the bodies of two more were recovered from a pickup truck that fell and was submerged in the river. They had been filling potholes on the bridge and while police were able to stop vehicle traffic after the ship called in a mayday, they could not get to the construction workers, who were from Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador.

    The crew of the cargo ship Dali, which is managed by Synergy Marine Group, remained on board with the debris from the bridge around it, and were safe and were being interviewed. They are keeping the ship running as they will be needed to get it out of the channel once more debris has been removed.

    The vessel is owned by Grace Ocean Private Ltd. and was chartered by Danish shipping giant Maersk.

    The collision and collapse appeared to be an accident that came after the ship lost power. Federal and state investigators are still trying to determine why.

    Assuaging concern about possible pollution from the crash, Adam Ortiz, the Environmental Protection Agency’s mid-Atlantic Regional Administrator, said there was no indication in the water of active releases from the ship or materials hazardous to human health.

    Officials are also trying to figure out how to handle the economic impact of a closed port and the severing of a major highway link. The bridge was completed in 1977 and carried Interstate 695 around southeast Baltimore.

    Maryland transportation officials are planning to rebuild the bridge, promising to consider innovative designs or building materials to hopefully shorten a project that could take years.

    President Joe Biden’s administration has approved $60 million in immediate aid and promised the federal government will pay the full cost to rebuild.

    Ship traffic at the Port of Baltimore remains suspended, but the Maryland Port Administration said trucks were still being processed at marine terminals.

    The loss of a road that carried 30,000 vehicles a day and the port disruption will affect not only thousands of dockworkers and commuters, but also U.S. consumers, who are likely to feel the impact of shipping delays. The port handles more cars and more farm equipment than any other U.S. facility.

    ___

    Collins reported from Columbia, South Carolina. Associated Press writers Sarah Brumfield in Washington, D.C.; Kristin M. Hall in Nashville, Tennessee; Adrian Sainz in Memphis, Tennessee; and Lisa Baumann in Bellingham, Washington, contributed.

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  • Oxford coach blasts Thames pollution as a national disgrace ahead of Boat Race with Cambridge

    Oxford coach blasts Thames pollution as a national disgrace ahead of Boat Race with Cambridge

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    LONDON — The coach of Oxford’s crew taking part in the Boat Race described the pollution in London’s River Thames as a “national disgrace” as the company responsible for its upkeep faces mounting financial difficulties that critics say will need it to be taken back into state hands.

    Testing by a campaign group has found high levels of E.coli along a section of the Thames in southwest London that will be used for the historic race on Saturday.

    Crew members have been warned about the risks of entering the water and advised to use a “cleansing station” at the finish area. The pollution has also cast doubt on the post-race tradition of throwing the winning cox into the water.

    It comes as figures released by the Environment Agency showed the level of sewage spills into England’s rivers and seas by water companies more than doubled in 2023 compared to 2022, reaching 3.6 million hours of spills in 2023 compared to 1.75 million hours in 2022.

    There has been no suggestion that the annual Boat Race between storied universities Oxford and Cambridge that dates to 1829 will not go ahead. The women’s race will precede the men’s event along the same 4.2-mile (6.8-kilometer) section of the Thames.

    But Oxford coach Sean Bowden has lamented the state of the water.

    “It’s a national disgrace, isn’t it?” Bowden posed. “It would be terrific if the Boat Race drew attention to it. We are very keen to play a part and we recognize we have a role and a responsibility to it.

    “Why,” he added in British newspaper The Daily Telegraph, “would you want to put your kids out in that?”

    Invariably, the focus has turned to whether the winning crew will dunk its cox into the Thames at the end of the race.

    “If there’s a health and safety problem, I don’t think we’ll be throwing him in because we don’t want to risk that,” said Harry Glenister, who has rowed for Britain and will compete for Oxford.

    “It’s just too much of a risk. We support whatever the Boat Race is saying about the conditions in the water. We just hope we’ll win and then we’ll decide.”

    Cambridge has won four of the last five men’s races and leads the rivalry 86-81.

    Cambridge has also won six straight in the women’s race.

    E.coli bacteria normally live in the intestines of healthy people and animals. Most strains are harmless, cause relatively brief diarrhea and most people recover without much incident, according to the Mayo clinic. But small doses of some strains — including just a mouthful of contaminated water — can cause a range of conditions, including urinary tract infection, cystitis, intestinal infection and vomiting, with the worst cases leading to life-threatening blood poisoning.

    River Action, a campaign group, said the testing locations suggested the source of pollution was from utility company Thames Water discharging sewage directly into the river and its tributaries. Thames Water, Britain’s largest water company, is facing huge pressure to clear up the river, though it insists that the elevated levels of E.coli are not necessarily its fault.

    “I would point out that E.coli has many different sources,” the company’s recently appointed chief executive Chris Weston told the BBC. “It is not just from sewage, it is also from land run-off, it is from highway run-off, it is from animal feces. All of those things contribute to the problem and I am absolutely determined that at Thames, we will play our part in cleaning up the problem and so the Thames is a river that people can use as they would like to everyday.”

    Under a plan drawn up last summer, Thames Water was asking investors to inject close to 4 billion pounds ($5.05 billion) into the business over the next five years. However, on Thursday shareholders refused to make the first payment of 500 million pounds ($630 million) without a big increase in consumers’ water bills, a demand that the industry regulator denied.

    Weston insisted that it was “business as usual” at the debt-laden company as it has enough financial resources to survive into next year, by which time he hoped a new funding arrangement will have been agreed. However, the news has raised speculation that the company may have to be nationalized.

    The parlous state of many of Britain’s rivers, canals and coastlines is set to feature heavily in the general election, which is expected to take place in the next few months. The main opposition Labour Party, which is way ahead of the governing Conservatives in opinion polls, has said it will make sure that “new investment comes through to fix the broken sewage system without taxpayers being left to foot the bill.”

    ___

    AP sports: https://apnews.com/sports

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  • To make water last year-round, Kenyans in dry regions are building sand dams on seasonal rivers

    To make water last year-round, Kenyans in dry regions are building sand dams on seasonal rivers

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    MAKUENI, Kenya — On a dry riverbed one recent sunny morning, residents of Kasengela village toiled away mixing cement and sand to make concrete. The sound of their shovels resonated through the valley while other residents, working in pairs, carried rocks to the site in wooden frames.

    They were building a sand dam, a structure for harvesting water from seasonal rivers. The barrier, typically made of concrete, impedes water flow and coarse grains of sand settle behind it, creating an artificial aquifer that fills up during rainy seasons.

    Seasonal rivers flow a few times a year here, and with little piped water and few reliable alternatives, many people here depend on them for water. Building sand dams on these rivers, where people can scoop the sand to fetch the water or use hand pumps, helps minimize water loss through evaporation and recharges groundwater. This is increasingly important as human-caused climate change is leading to prolonged seasons of drought, scientists say, and the simple sand dam solution has gained traction across dry regions of Kenya and some other parts of Africa looking for reliable water sources. But experts also warn that finding the right sites for structures is key to making them work.

    Kasengela village is in Machakos County, which, alongside other counties of Makueni and Kitui in southeastern Kenya, is classified as arid and semi-arid. For many communities here, sand dams built on seasonal rivers have grown in popularity.

    That’s true for Kyalika village in Makueni County, where Rhoda Peter and her welfare group have built three sand dams along a nearby river. When The Associated Press met her, she was fetching water from one of the dams to clean utensils and wash clothes.

    Peter put a yellow container on the shallow well platform and walked to the pump, pulling it up and pushing it down until it was full. Nearby, a donkey stood with two containers hanging on its back.

    “When I think about sand dams, I feel happy,” said Peter, a farmer. “Our shallow well does not dry. It goes all through the dry seasons.”

    Before the sand dams were built, she and her children would walk many miles to fetch water in springs in the faraway Mbooni Hills. It took them three hours, and many times they’d fall because of the rocky terrain.

    Many people in Kenya’s dry southeastern region rely on boreholes and rivers for water, but many boreholes produce saline water and permanent rivers are few and far for most people. Earth dams are another source, but they’re also few and require regular desilting.

    At the site in Kasengela, Mwanzia Mutua, the leader of the group constructing the dam, said that he used to trek seven kilometers (4.3 miles) from his home to Athi River to fetch water for his household and livestock, spending an entire day on the road. Later, a borehole was constructed, shortening the distance, but it was still far. The sand dam will reduce the walk to get water to 10 minutes, he said.

    “When water is far, you spend all your time looking for it and are unable to do any other work,” said the farmer. “Cattle die because the water is far.”

    The sand dam in Kasengela was completed on March 14 after two and a half months of construction, and should be ready to use by December 2025, after it fills with sand.

    Only 5% of Makueni’s nearly 245,000 households had access to clean piped water by 2022. The county produces about 30,000 cubic meters per day against a demand of 60,000 cubic meters.

    “The water situation in Makueni is dire,” said Mutula Kilonzo Junior, the county’s governor. “We have a huge deficit that we are not supplying.”

    Shortages of water lead to problems for agriculture and health implications as people are forced to use unclean sources, taking the time and energy of children to fetch water, affecting their education, he said.

    The Makueni County government has been building sand dams with partner organizations and residents, and by 2022, it had built 71, according to county government data.

    “Seasonal rivers run dry barely after a week of raining. So for us, we have to store their water, and this is the best way for us to do it,” said Sonnia Musyoka, county minister for environment and climate change. “With such dams, we will enable children to stay at school, and parents to concentrate on other economic activities.”

    The construction of sand dams in the region is community-driven. Africa Sand Dam Foundation — which helped build the dams in Kyalika and Kasengela — is one nonprofit supporting communities in Makueni, Machakos and Kitui to build sand dams. Residents approach the nonprofit with a request to build a dam and provide sand, rocks and other locally available material plus labor. Meanwhile, the nonprofit, through partners, provides hardware material such as cement and skilled expertise. After construction, the community manages the sand dam.

    Since it started in 2010, the nonprofit has constructed 680 sand dams in the three counties.

    “We’ve used this model for years, and we’ve seen its success,” said Andrew Musila, development director at Africa Sand Dam Foundation, at the Kasengela site. “To us, sand dams are the best solution for water provision in arid regions and the best solution for providing communities with water throughout the year.”

    The usefulness of the structures has gained the attention of governments of other local counties, as well as other countries. ASDF has worked with governments and nonprofits in Malawi, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Madagascar, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Somalia and India to site, design and build sand dams as well as train people in the processes.

    Scientists warn that proper siting of sand dams is key to making them work. A study carried out in Kitui County found that about half of 116 sand dams surveyed were not functional because they were built in locations with unfavorable factors for enabling sand dams to supply water. Factors to consider, the study says, include the rainfall amount, the percentage of clay in the soil and the presence of visible rock formations.

    “You cannot put a sand dam anywhere,” said Keziah Ngugi, lead author of the study and a hydrologist with interest in dryland areas. “The most important thing to observe is the siting.”

    And as climate change makes drought more likely, scientists say the structures minimize water loss through evaporation because they store water within sand, and that helps with water supply during dry seasons. Additionally, they say the structures rejuvenate surrounding vegetation and recharge groundwater, raising the water table.

    “There are good things that happen when the water table is raised,” said Dorcas Benard, an environmental and biosystems engineer. She gave examples of the emergence of alternative water sources or resources like springs and boreholes. “These are very important sources, especially within the arid and semi-arid lands.”

    And for residents like Mutua, the builder in Kasengela, they offer hope for improved livelihoods. Spending weeks building the dam with fellow residents may be arduous work, but the reward of having reliable water near his home will be fulfilling in immeasurable ways.

    “Water is life,” he said.

    __

    The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

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  • 2 Japanese men die in river near Washington state waterfall made popular on TikTok

    2 Japanese men die in river near Washington state waterfall made popular on TikTok

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    INDEX, Wash. — The bodies of two people recovered over the weekend after they fell into the water at a dangerous swimming area in Washington state made popular by TikTok have been identified as men from Japan.

    The Snohomish County Medical Examiner’s Office identified the men Tuesday as Hiroya Konosu, 21, and Takayuki Suzuki, 34, the Daily Herald reported.

    Search and rescue personnel responded to the Eagle Falls area along the Skykomish River east of Index on Saturday after reports that two men had gone underwater and hadn’t resurfaced. The two men were reportedly part of a four-person group.

    Their bodies were recovered on Sunday.

    The beautiful but dangerous swimming hole along U.S. Route 2 has soared in popularity because of social media, Sky Valley Fire Chief Eric Andrews said. The falls, videos of which went viral on TikTok in 2020, have become a “hot spot” for drownings in recent years, he said.

    The falls feature a series of rapids where the glacier-fed water is funneled into narrow chutes between rock. People drown or are rescued nearly every year after they are swept over or into the falls.

    Andrews said the TikTok surge has calmed down, but the falls remain popular.

    First responders have urged people to admire the falls away from the water.

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  • Ship earlier attacked by Yemen’s Houthi rebels sinks in the Red Sea

    Ship earlier attacked by Yemen’s Houthi rebels sinks in the Red Sea

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    DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — A ship attacked by Yemen’s Houthi rebels has sunk in the Red Sea after days of taking on water, officials said Saturday, the first vessel to be fully destroyed as part of their campaign over Israel’s war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

    The sinking of the Rubymar comes as shipping through the crucial waterway for cargo and energy shipments moving from Asia and the Middle East to Europe has been affected by the Houthi attacks.

    Already, many ships have turned away from the route. The sinking could see further detours and higher insurance rates put on vessels plying the waterway — potentially driving up global inflation and affecting aid shipments to the region.

    The Belize-flagged Rubymar had been drifting northward after being struck by a Houthi anti-ship ballistic missile on Feb. 18 in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, a crucial waterway linking the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.

    Yemen’s internationally recognized government, as well as a regional military official, confirmed the ship sank. The official spoke on condition of anonymity as no authorization was given to speak to journalists about the incident.

    The British military’s United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations center, which watches over Mideast waterways, separately acknowledged the Rubymar’s sinking Saturday afternoon.

    The Rubymar’s Beirut-based manager could not be immediately reached for comment.

    Yemen’s exiled government, which has been backed by a Saudi-led coalition since 2015, said the Rubymar sank late Friday as stormy weather took hold over the Red Sea. The vessel had been abandoned for 12 days after the attack, though plans had been made to try and tow the ship to a safe port.

    The Iran-backed Houthis, who had falsely claimed the ship sank almost instantly after the attack, did not immediately acknowledge the ship’s sinking.

    The U.S. military’s Central Command previously warned the vessel’s cargo of fertilizer, as well as fuel leaking from the ship, could cause ecological damage to the Red Sea.

    Ahmed Awad Bin Mubarak, the prime minister of Yemen’s internationally recognized government, called the ship’s sinking “an unprecedented environmental disaster.”

    “It’s a new disaster for our country and our people,” he wrote on X, formerly Twitter. “Every day, we pay for the Houthi militia’s adventures, which were not stopped at plunging Yemen into the coup disaster and war.”

    The Houthis have held Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, since 2014, expelling the government. Its fought a Saudi-led coalition since 2015 in a stalemated war.

    Satellite pictures analyzed by The Associated Press from Planet Labs PBC showed smaller boats alongside the Rubymar on Wednesday. It wasn’t immediately clear whose vessels those were. The images showed the Rubymar’s stern sinking into the Red Sea but still afloat, mirroring earlier video taken of the vessel.

    The private security firm Ambrey separately reported Friday about a mysterious incident involving the Rubymar.

    “A number of Yemenis were reportedly harmed during a security incident which took place” on Friday, Ambrey said. It did not elaborate on what that incident involved and no party involved in Yemen’s yearslong war claimed any new attack on the vessel.

    Since November, the rebels have repeatedly targeted ships in the Red Sea and surrounding waters over the Israel-Hamas war. Those vessels have included at least one with cargo bound for Iran, the Houthis’ main benefactor, and an aid ship later bound for Houthi-controlled territory.

    Despite over a month of U.S.-led airstrikes, Houthi rebels remain capable of launching significant attacks. That includes the attack on the Rubymar and the downing of an American drone worth tens of millions of dollars. The Houthis insist their attacks will continue until Israel stops its combat operations in the Gaza Strip, which have enraged the wider Arab world and seen the Houthis gain international recognition.

    However, there has been a slowdown in attacks in recent days. The reason for that remains unclear.

    ___

    Associated Press writer Samy Magdy in Cairo contributed to this report.

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