Six in the Morning

It's a wacky weather edition of Six in the Morning! Happy summer!

1. "ACT OF GOD" ENDS COUNTRY MUSIC FEST: A sudden windstorm blew through Camrose Alberta on Saturday, just as the first of the evenings headliners were about to take the stage at the Big Valley Jamboree. The winds were so powerful they smashed the main stage, killing one person and injuring dozens more. In the wake of this tragedy, the Jamboree was canceled. (Globe and Mail)

2. BC ABLAZE: A heat wave affecting much of British Columbia is responsible for one of the most widespread outbreaks of forest fires in history. While the record-breaking heat finally broke late last week, temperatures are hovering in the high twenties and a significant rainfall still hasn't hit the typically sodden coast. Fires remain a worry, then, as the hot summer has left forests tinder dry, and, thanks to a pine beetle infestation worsened by years of warmer-than-usual weather, thousands of hectares of BC are covered by dead trees. (Globea and Mail)

3. DEAD SEA DYING: While it is being considered for inclusion on a new list of the world's seven wonders, the Dead Sea is evaporating at an alarming rate. Thanks to over-eager irrigation off the Jordan River compounded with years of drought, the famous body of water is shrinking at the rate of a metre a year. (Globe and Mail)

4. MONARCHS LATE AGAIN: For the second year in a row, monarch butterflies came to Canada later than usual and in such small numbers that insect fanciers are worried. (CBC)

5. SPAIN ABLAZE: The Spanish prime minister ended his holiday early to inspect forest fire damage on the Canary Islands. Thanks to sizzling hot temperatures and high winds, southern Europe has seen a marked increase in forest fires. Spain and Greece have been the hardest hit. (Yahoo News)

6. CLIMATE CHANGE DENIERS IMPERVIOUS TO REASON: After Globe and Mail columnist and CBC personality, Rex Murphy, let loose with a tirade against climate change, Desmogblog points out that he has a habit of spouting such myopic nonsense. Meanwhile, Murphy's science hero, Ian Plimer, is chickening out of a chance to debate Guardian science columnist, George Monbiot. This despite the fact that it was Plimer who challenged Monbiot to the debate in the first place. Turns out, Monbiot was willing to accept the challenge to a public debate on climate change only if Plimer accepted his challenge to respond in writing to the serious charges about misinformation in Plimer's book, Heaven and Earth. That was apparently a little too daunting a task for the author. On a related note, Monbiot writes about climate change deniers whining that they're being censored despite being unable to provide a single example of that happening, while at the same time, there are numerous examples of legitimate climate scientists being muzzled by climate change deniers. (Dog Blog, Desmogblog, Guardian)