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For the first time in the 2008 hurricane season, there are four tropical cyclones active in the Atlantic Ocean basin on one day.

In late August and early September 2008, widespread fires in Mozambique, Zimbabwe, and South Africa poured smoke out of the Indian Ocean.

A mixture of haze and clouds hovered over eastern China in early September 2008.

Monsoon rains pushed the Brahmaputra River to dangerous levels in early September 2008.

Gustav formed off the coast of Hispaniola in the Caribbean Sea on August 25, 2008.

Greenhouse gas emissions from previously frozen organic carbon in soil are seen as larger than previously believed. (American Institute of Biological Sciences press release)

Scientists have exploited crystals from lavas to unravel the records of volcanic eruptions. (Durham University press release)

A fall in levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide, close to that of pre-industrial times, explains the transition from a mostly ice-free Greenland of three million years ago to the ice-covered region we see today. (University of Bristol press release)

Atmospheric scientists have sorted through the pall that hangs over Mexico City to precisely identify aerosols that make up the haze and chart daily patterns of changes to the mix. (University of California - San Diego press release)

The theory that global warming may be contributing to stronger hurricanes in the Atlantic over the past 30 years is bolstered by a new study. (Florida State University press release)

Researchers confirm that surface temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere were warmer over the last 10 years than any time during the last 1,300 years. (Pennsylvania University press release)

A team of researchers reports that sea level rise from greenhouse-induced warming of the Greenland ice sheet could be double or triple current estimates over the next century. (University of Wisconsin-Madison press release)

Up to 20 million people, thousands of whom are already displaced from their homes following the devastating Chinese earthquake, are at increased risk from flooding and major power shortages in the massive Sichuan Basin over the next few decades and possibly centuries. (Durham University press release)

Despite projections by some scientists of global seas rising by 20 feet or more by the end of this century as a result of warming, a study concludes that global sea rise of much more than six feet is a near physical impossibility. (University of Colorado at Boulder press release)

Gustav formed off the coast of Hispaniola in the Caribbean Sea on August 25, 2008.

Beginning in late July 2008, the remaining ice shelves along the northern coast of Canada's Ellesmere Island underwent rapid retreat, losing a total of 214 square kilometers (83 square miles).

On September 5, 2008, a dust storm formed over Afghanistan, Iran, and Pakistan. The storm expanded in the next few days.

Gustav formed off the coast of Hispaniola in the Caribbean Sea on August 25, 2008.

Gustav formed off the coast of Hispaniola in the Caribbean Sea on August 25, 2008.

Tropical Storm Josephine formed in the eastern Atlantic near the Cape Verde Islands on September 2, 2008.

Dormant for more than 9,000 years, the Chaiten Volcano in southern Chile began to erupt on May 2, 2008, forcing thousands of residents from their homes. In the months that followed, the volcano remained active.

On August 28, 2008, the eighth named storm of the 2008 Atlantic hurricane season got underway in the Caribbean Sea. Hanna made landfall on the East Coast as a tropical storm on September 6.

A large fire was burning near the western border of the Central Kalahari Game Reserve in Botswana in late August 2008.

Hundreds of agricultural or land-clearing fires were burning in central South America on August 26, 2008.

Gustav formed off the coast of Hispaniola in the Caribbean Sea on August 25, 2008.