There is a region of the world where the weather is always hot and humid and it rains almost every day of the year. Sounds predictable, right? But weather in the Intertropical Convergence Zone, or ITCZ, can be volatile and dangerous. The Intertropical Convergence Zone, which circles the Earth near the equator, is where officials say Air France Flight 447 plunged into the Atlantic Ocean. While weather has not been cited as a reason for the plane's crash, the tragedy ...

A suspected suicide attacker detonated his explosives at a mosque in northwestern Pakistan during Friday prayers, killing at least 30 people and wounding roughly 40 others, a local police official said. "It has been verified that the material did not belong to the plane," Brig. Ramon Borges Cardoso told reporters in Recife, Brazil, about the material recovered Thursday. "It is a pallet of wood that is utilized for transport. It is used in planes, but on this flight to Paris, ...

The Brazilian air force said that debris picked up Thursday near where officials believe Air France Flight 447 crashed into the Atlantic Ocean was not from the plane. "It has been verified that the material did not belong to the plane," Brig. Ramon Borges Cardoso told reporters in Recife, Brazil, about the material recovered Thursday. "It is a pallet of wood that is utilized for transport. It is used in planes, but on this flight to Paris, there was no ...

The space shuttle Atlantis is scheduled to land at Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Friday, but the weather is likely to delay its arrival. "Weather currently is forecast 'no go' due to a prediction of broken clouds at 4,000 feet and a chance of thunderstorms within 30 nautical miles of Kennedy's Shuttle Landing Facility," NASA said on its Web site. A weather system that has dumped more than 2 feet of rain over parts of northeastern Florida ...

Final preparations are under way for Monday's scheduled launch of the space shuttle Atlantis from Kennedy Space Center in Florida in a repair mission for the Hubble Space Telescope. The countdown timeline is on target, and "Atlantis is ready to fly," said Charlie Blackwell-Thompson, NASA's test director. Preparations for the 2:01 p.m. ET flight will continue throughout the day. The forecast is favorable, according to the shuttle's weather officer, Kathy Winters, who said there's a 90 percent chance the weather ...

A wildfire that has engulfed dozens of homes and displaced thousands of people kept roaring in Southern California late Friday, scorching about 8,600 acres, fire officials said. "We have a lot of resources on the line -- our folks are working their hearts out," Joe Waterman of the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection told reporters. An estimated 30,500 residents of Santa Barbara County have been ordered to evacuate because of the blaze, which has damaged or ...

The death toll from flooding that has covered large parts of Brazil continued to rise Friday, with the government reporting seven new fatalities, bringing the total to 38. The rain-induced floods left nearly 800,000 people displaced, according to the Brazilian civil defense agency. Rain has fallen steadily in some parts of the country for more than two weeks and is forecast to continue for another 10 days. World Vision, a relief agency working in Brazil, predicted it could take 30 ...

The first tweet the White House Twittered was not about the weather. It had nothing to do with how the President was feeling, what he was doing or what he wanted for lunch. The First Dog, Bo, failed to receive even an oblique mention. Instead, the Obama Administration jumped with both feet into the 140-character Twitterverse on May 1 with a one-sentence post on how Americans can learn about swine flu directly by joining social networks with the Centers for Disease Control and ...

Without traffic, the drive to Mexico City from Cuernavaca usually can take just 50 minutes. Weekends are the exception, when the horrendous jams of vehicles returning from a quick trip outside the capital can snarl the highways for up to three hours. The close of this past weekend, however, was ghostly. The late afternoon drive on Sunday took only 45 minutes. Barely anyone was on the road. It was, of course, the weekend that saw the swine flu panic grip ...

For some concertgoers, the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival really kicked into action on Day Two. Day One was leisurely and pleasant -- the weather was mild, the acts were fairly mellow and the big headliner was Paul McCartney. On Day Two, someone took the dial and turned it up a notch, as the desert sun beat down a little harder, the music pumped a little louder and the crowds who packed the VIP tent threw a little ...