Browsing: Scientific America

After two dams in northeastern Libya failed, thousands of people are dead, thousands more are unaccounted for, and tens of thousands are displaced in the city of Derna and surrounding towns. The dams along the Wadi Derna river valley collapsed amid Storm Daniel, a Mediterranean cyclone that dropped up to 16 inches of rain over parts of the North African country in a single 24-hour period this week. The same record-breaking storm also inundated Greece, Bulgaria and Turkey, causing devastating flooding across the region of those nations before making landfall in Libya.