Weather

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. (AP) — Fire crews made significant progress overnight against a wildfire burning for nearly a week in Southern California coastal mountains, officials said Sunday.

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. (AP) — Firefighters reported significant progress in corralling a wildfire in Southern California coastal mountains on Friday.

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. (AP) — A key Southern California highway closed for days because of a wildfire was reopened Thursday evening but authorities warned that flames still posed a threat to remote properties in a coastal mountain range.

For the second straight year, the world heads into a new La Nina weather event. This would tend to dry out parts of an already parched and fiery American West and boost an already busy Atlantic hurricane season.

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. (AP) — A wildfire raging through Southern California coastal mountains threatened ranches and rural homes and kept a major highway shut down Wednesday as the fire-scarred state faced a new round of dry winds that raise risk of infernos.

PELHAM Ala. (AP) — Communities affected by last week's flash flooding, which left roads and neighborhoods under water and killed four people in Alabama, are still working to clean up the mess and address persistent drainage issues that seem to be getting worse.

SOLVANG, Calif. (AP) — Evacuation orders were expanded Tuesday for a growing wildfire driven by intense winds that has shut down a key Southern California highway for more than a day.

LAFITTE, La. (AP) — Hurricane Ida swept through Louisiana with furious winds that ripped roofs off buildings and storm surge so powerful it moved homes. What it wrought on the living it also wrought on the dead, moving vaults and caskets and adding another layer of trauma for families and communities recovering from the powerful storm.

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Pacific Gas & Electric began shutting off power to about 25,000 customers in central and northern California Monday and Southern California Edison warned it may do the same for up to 9,000 of its customers as high winds toppled trees, downed power lines and ignited fires that forced people to flee from their homes.

ST. LOUIS (AP) — After water levels at a California dam fell to historic lows this summer, the main hydropower plant it feeds was shut down. At the Hoover Dam in Nevada — one of the country’s biggest hydropower generators — production is down by 25%. If extreme drought persists, federal officials say a dam in Arizona could stop producing electricity in coming years.

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Conditions deteriorated at a warehouse housing evacuated nursing home patients, five of whose deaths were linked to Hurricane Ida, because widespread and unexpected storm damage interrupted essential services, the nursing homes' owner says.

PELHAM, Ala. (AP) — Terrified drivers climbed out of swamped cars and muddy floodwater flowed through neighborhoods after a stalled weather front drenched Alabama for hours, leaving entire communities under water Thursday and killing at least four people.

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (AP) — Flash flood warnings were in effect Thursday for a swath of the southeastern U.S. after a stalled weather front drenched Alabama, leaving high water that covered roads, swamped a Piggly Wiggly, unleashed sewage and forced water rescues. A child's death was blamed on the floods.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is known for damming rivers and building levees to keep waterways at bay. But a new initiative seeks natural flood control solutions as climate change brings increasingly frequent and severe weather events that test the limits of concrete and steel.

DULAC, La. (AP) — Coy Verdin grew up 100 feet (30 meters) or so from the slow-moving waters of Bayou Grand Caillou, and a few miles north of Louisiana's marshy coast.