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Record-breaking heat wave grips western United States

A record early heat wave striking the western United States on Friday is a one-in-500-year event and almost certainly the result of human-caused climate change, experts say. The heat has been toppling records this week and is set to continue into the weekend across western cities while expanding eastward. Four locations in the desert area near the California-Arizona border registered 44.4 degrees Celsius on Friday, a US national record for March. The readings were recorded near Yuma and Martinez Lake in Arizona, and around Winterhaven and Ogilby in California. Read: Intense heatwave grips US, triggering record-breaking temperatures Already, 65 cities have recorded new March highs, ranging from Arizona and California to Idaho, Weather.com reported. Death Valley reached 40°C on Thursday, while typically cool and foggy San Francisco tied its historic March record at 29°C. In Colorado, skiers were seen hitting the slopes shirtless. The National Weather Service issued extreme heat warni...

Nursing home fire in Indonesia kills more than a dozen

A fire at a nursing home on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi killed more than a dozen people, with three others injured, a local official said Monday. Firefighters received the report of the blaze at 8:31 pm Sunday at a nursing home in the North Sulawesi provincial capital Manado, said the city's fire and rescue agency chief Jimmy Rotinsulu. "There were 16 deaths; three (people) had burn injuries," he told AFP. Many bodies of the victims were found inside their rooms, Jimmy said, adding that many of the elderly residents were likely resting in their rooms in the evening when the fire broke out. Authorities managed to evacuate 12 people -- all unhurt -- and transfer them to a local hospital, he said. Footage aired by local broadcaster Metro TV showed the fire engulfing the nursing home, while locals helped to evacuate an elderly person. Deadly fires are not uncommon in Indonesia, a Southeast Asian archipelago of more than 17,000 islands. A fire tore through a seven-storey office building in Indonesia's capital Jakarta this month, killing at least 22 people. In 2023, at least 12 people were killed in the country's east after an explosion at a nickel-processing plant.

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