The South African city of Cape Town and surrounding areas were hit by more storms Thursday that ripped roofs off houses and caused widespread flooding, forcing at least 4,500 people out of their homes and damaging at least 15,000 structures, authorities said. The devastating weather began a week ago.

Multiple cold fronts have battered the region on the southwest tip of Africa since late last week, bringing record rainfall in some parts and gale-force winds. City authorities said the bad weather was expected to continue until the weekend and possibly into next week.

Weather alerts, forest fires, melting pavement in cities: A sizzling heat wave has sent temperatures in parts of central and southern Europe soaring toward 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) in some places.

From Italy to Romania, authorities warned people to be cautious, drive carefully if going on holiday, drink plenty of water and avoid going out during the hottest hours of the day.

Authorities in Western states warned of the rising risk of wildfires as hot conditions and low humidity dry out the landscape amid a protracted heat wave that is expected to bake much of the U.S. again Thursday.

California's top fire official said Wednesday that so far this year the state has responded to more than 3,500 wildfires that have scorched nearly 325 square miles (842 square kilometers) of vegetation — five times the average burned through July 10 in each of the past five years.

The U.N. General Assembly on Wednesday declared 2025 to 2034 the United Nations Decade on Combating Sand and Dust Storms — extreme weather events that are increasing and threatening health and economies from central Africa to northern China.

Uganda's U.N. Ambassador Godfrey Kwoba, who introduced the resolution on behalf of the Group of 77, a powerful U.N. group of 134 developing countries and China, told the 193-member assembly the initiative aims to "halt and mitigate the negative effects of sand and dust storms " through "international and regional cooperation."

Incessant rains Wednesday halted the search for 30 people believed trapped under a landslide that engulfed an unauthorized gold mine on Indonesia's Sulawesi island over the weekend, killing at least 23 people.

More than 100 villagers were digging for grains of gold on Sunday in the remote and hilly village of Bone Bolango in Gorontalo province when tons of mud plunged down the surrounding hills and buried their makeshift camps.

Rescue efforts were underway Wednesday for more than 130 people including some tourists who were trapped in a mountainous town in China's Tibet region after heavy rains and flooding washed away sections of a provincial highway, China's state media said.

Those trapped also included migrant workers and business people, according to state broadcaster CCTV. Another 342 stranded people had been relocated earlier to nearby towns.

Used to shrugging off the heat, Las Vegas residents are now eyeing the thermometer as the desert city is on track Wednesday to set a record for the most consecutive days over 115 degrees Fahrenheit (46.1 Celsius) amid a lingering hot spell that will continue scorching much of the U.S. into the weekend.

On Tuesday, Las Vegas flirted again with the all-time temperature record of 120 F (48.8 C) reached on Sunday, but settled for a new daily mark of 119 F (48.3 C) that smashed the old one of 116 F (46.6 C) set for the date in 2021. Forecasters say the city will likely hit a record fifth straight day above 115 F (46.1 C) on Wednesday.

The return of searing heat in the Houston area has deepened the misery for people still without power after Hurricane Beryl left residents in search of places to cool off and fuel up as the extended outages strained one of the nation's largest cities.

More than 1.7 million homes and businesses in Texas lacked electricity Wednesday morning, down from a peak of over 2.7 million on Monday, according to PowerOutage.us. State officials faced questions over whether the power utility that covers much of the area had sufficiently prepared.

Earth's more than year-long streak of record-shattering hot months kept on simmering through June, according to the European climate service Copernicus.

There's hope that the planet will soon see an end to the record-setting part of the heat streak, but not the climate chaos that has come with it, scientists said.

Deforestation in Colombia fell 36% in 2023 versus the previous year, the government said, marking the lowest level since records began.

The decline was driven by a drop in environmental destruction in the Amazon, the world's largest rainforest, including about one-third of it in Colombia, the government of leftist President Gustavo Petro said.