New Year around the world: Pacific nations welcome 2025
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(LONDON) — The Pacific island nation of Kiribati was the first country to ring in 2025, with its 133,500 citizens celebrating the new year at 5 a.m. ET on Tuesday.
The Micronesian nation was soon followed into 2025 by the Chatham Islands in New Zealand at 5:15 a.m. ET.
Most of the rest of New Zealand crossed the International Date Line at 6 a.m. The islands of Tokelau, Samoa, Tonga and parts of Antarctica were among those joining the party shortly after.
Auckland, New Zealand
New Zealand’s capital Wellington and its largest city of Auckland — both located on the country’s North Island — welcomed 2025 at 6 a.m. ET. Fireworks lit up the Auckland skyline as massed crowds watched.
Sydney, Australia
Residents of the western Australian city of Sydney enjoyed a fireworks display three hours ahead of midnight local time, which will be at 8 a.m. ET.
The famed Sydney Harbour Bridge and Sydney Opera House provided a familiar backdrop for New Year revellers in the country’s largest city.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(LONDON) — Nearly a quarter of the world’s freshwater species are at risk of extinction, according to new research.
A detailed extinction assessment of more than 23,000 species of freshwater fauna by the International Union for Conservation of Nature identified major threats from pollution, dams, agriculture and invasive species, according to a paper published Wednesday in the journal Nature.
The species studied included fish, decapod crustaceans — such as crabs, crayfishes and shrimps — and odonates, such as dragonflies and damsel flies. About 24% of those species are at risk of extinction, Catherine Sayer, lead of the freshwater biodiversity team for the IUCN, told ABC News.
“That means there are high to extremely high risks of becoming extinct in the future,” Sayer said. “That’s quite an alarming percentage.”
Decapods have the highest percentage of species threatened at 30%, while 26% of freshwater fish and 16% of odonates are threatened, according to the analysis. Nearly 90 freshwater species have already been reported extinct, Sayer said.
Of the threatened species, 54% of studied species are thought to be affected by pollution.
Dams and water extraction are impacting 39% of the studied species, according to the paper.
“Dams completely block water courses, which means that species can’t move downstream, and so they can’t get to habitats that they previously used for breeding or feeding,” Sayer said. “And that completely disrupts the lifecycle.”
Land use change and associated effects from agriculture — including the use of pesticides and herbicides — are affecting 37% of the studied species, while 28% by invasive species and disease are impacting 28% of studied species.
Freshwater ecosystems are home to more than 10% of all known species and provide benefits such as nutrient cycling, flood control and climate change mitigation, the researchers said.
These species hold “intrinsic value” — both ecologically and economically, Sayer said. Some species even hold cultural and spiritual value for indigenous groups, such is the case of the Atlantic salmon, Sayer said.
Other notable freshwater species that are threatened are the European eel, which is critically endangered, and several freshwater crustacean species in the Southeast United States, Sayer said.
Climate change is also threatening freshwater species and is expected to have more of an impact in the future, Sayer said. As global temperatures rise, it causes habitats to change, making it even easier for invasive species to thrive in ecosystems that were previous cooler, she added.
The analysis found that 18% of the freshwater species studied are threatened by climate change.
Since IUCN reassesses species every five to 10 years, researchers believe that if the analysis were repeated 10 years in the future that climate change would play a more prominent role in the decline of freshwater species.
“It’s very much a threat that we see as intensifying, and it’s it’s getting worse with time,” Sayer said.
The findings highlight the urgent need to address threats to prevent further species declines and losses and could help to inform future efforts to reduce the loss of freshwater biodiversity, the researchers said.
“We have about a quarter of species which are on their way to extinction if we don’t do anything to stop it,” Sayer said.
(WASHINGTON) — The upcoming change in the White House is sparking uncertainty for the Middle East. President-elect Donald Trump might be a familiar face (and a historically friendly one for the Israelis), but what he will do to address the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian territories remains unclear.
During his first term, Trump moved the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem in a deeply symbolic show of support for Israel. The decision created anger among Palestinians, since it effectively recognized the city as Israel’s capital.
Jerusalem lies at the heart of the near-century-old conflict between Israelis and Palestinians, since it stands as a powerful political and religious symbol for both sides. Palestinian protests over the move spread to Gaza and the West Bank, turning deadly as demonstrators clashed with the Israeli military.
Many Israelis welcome Trump’s return to the White House. In his first term, Trump became the first Western leader to officially recognize Israel’s control over the Golan Heights, which it seized from Syria in 1967. And, as a thank you, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu renamed a planned settlement in the area “Trump Heights” in 2019.
Some members of the Israeli government hope Trump will go a step further when he returns to the White House on Jan. 20. Days after Trump won the presidential election, Bezalel Smotrich — Israel’s far-right finance minister — announced at a press conference that he’s ordered preparations for the annexation of settlements in the West Bank.
“I intend, with God’s help, to lead a government decision that says the government of Israel will work with the new administration of President Trump and the international community to apply Israeli sovereignty over Judea and Samaria,” he said in Hebrew.
Smotrich referred to the West Bank as Judea and Samaria, a reference to ancient Israelite kingdoms as some Israelis assert that the area is a historic Jewish homeland.
Smotrich’s plan would effectively cement the West Bank as Israeli territory, despite the occupied land being part of what would form a Palestinian state.
Official U.S. policy has always been in favor of a two-state solution, meaning it supports the creation of a Palestinian state alongside the state of Israel. Trump’s appointment of Mike Huckabee — the former governor of Arkansas and a staunch supporter of Israel’s expansion ambitions — as ambassador to Israel has thrown continued commitment to that policy into question.
In the West Bank village of Al-Makhrour, a Christian area west of Bethlehem, local woman Alice Kasiya is holding out hope for better days under Trump. Her family’s land was seized by Israeli settlers at the end of July. In a video posted to social media, she said 50 Israeli soldiers sealed off the area as bulldozers drove through.
“He’s a business guy. He had many peace agreements with other countries before, in his presidential time,” she told ABC News. “And I know everyone says no, it will, it will be worse with him, but I believe it will be better. He’s a good guy.”
Kasiya, who’s been arrested three times while protesting, said she believes the situation can’t get any worse. She noted that Israeli settler expansionism has accelerated dramatically since Hamas’ deadly Oct. 7, 2023, attack.
“We have seen many settlers coming and trying to take over lands, ” she said. “So it’s like cancer. They are spreading. They put the first step and they will keep moving around until they get everything slowly, slowly.”
Kasiya also warned that what happens in her area reverberates far and wide.
“It’s not for us only, it’s for the whole world,” she told ABC News. “Because this city is the Holy City that affects the whole world. If it’s not in peace, nowhere else will be living in peace.”
(NEW YORK) — The climate crisis is not a distant threat; it’s happening right now and affecting what matters most to us. Hurricanes intensified by a warming planet and drought-fueled wildfires are destroying our communities. Rising seas and flooding are swallowing our homes. And record-breaking heat waves are reshaping our way of life.
The good news is we know how to turn the tide and avoid the worst possible outcomes. However, understanding what needs to be done can be confusing due to a constant stream of climate updates, scientific findings, and critical decisions that are shaping our future.
That’s why the ABC News Climate and Weather Unit is cutting through the noise by curating what you need to know to keep the people and places you care about safe. We are dedicated to providing clarity amid the chaos, giving you the facts and insights necessary to navigate the climate realities of today — and tomorrow.
The US just experienced its warmest autumn on record
Another season, another climate milestone. According to a new report from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), persistent above-average to record-warm conditions across much of the United States made meteorological autumn, which lasts from September to November, the warmest ever recorded.
The record-warm fall season makes it more likely that 2024 will end up as one of the nation’s warmest, if not the warmest, years on record. As of November 2024, the contiguous U.S. year-to-date temperature was 3.3 degrees Fahrenheit above average.
Despite December’s chilly start for much of the country, with widespread below-average temperatures in many regions, NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center says that the cold will ease during the second half of the month with above-average temperatures favored from the West to the Northeast.
The stretch of abnormally warm temperatures was accompanied by extremely dry weather across much of the country, fueling dangerous wildfire conditions in regions like the Northeast. A very dry start to the season brought drought conditions to more than half of the lower 48 states by late October.
Fortunately, several significant rainfall events in November brought notable drought relief to large swaths of the country, reducing overall drought coverage by nearly 10.5% and suppressing the wildfire danger.
-ABC News meteorologist Dan Peck
Nearly one-third of the planet’s species risk extinction because of climate change
Nearly one-third of the world’s species could be at risk for extinction because of climate change if the world does nothing to reduce global warming, according to a new analysis from Science.
University of Connecticut researcher and biologist Mark Urban found that while some species are adapting to climate change, 160,000 species are already at risk. Many are now facing declining populations because of changes in our climate.
According to the study, with current global temperatures at 1.3 degrees Celsius above industrial levels, 1.6% of species are projected to become extinct. As the temperatures warm even more, Urban found the extinction rate would also increase, with the most severe scenario included (5.4 degrees Celsius of warming) putting the extinction risk at 29.7%.
“The increased certainty of predicted climate change extinctions compels action,” Urban wrote. “Extinction represents just the final endpoint of a species’ existence; even when extinction is avoided, declining abundances and shrinking ranges can strongly affect many other species, including humans.”
Urban defines the risk of extinction as the probability that any one species will go extinct without mitigation efforts. Urban found that extinction rates could increase dramatically if global temperatures rise over 1.5 degrees Celsius compared to industrial levels.
1.5 degrees Celsius is the warming limit set by the world’s nations under the Paris Agreement after the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change found that crossing that benchmark would lead to more severe climate change impacts.
Risks varied across geographic areas in the study, with Australia/New Zealand and South America facing the highest risks (15.7% and 12.8%, respectively) and Asia facing lower risks (5.5%).
-ABC News Climate Unit’s Kelly Livingston
Antarctic sea ice hits new low during Earth’s 2nd warmest November on record
Imagine you have a swimming pool with ice cubes filling it. Now, measure the total area of the pool that has ice on the surface, even if the ice cubes don’t cover it completely. Because ice often spreads out unevenly, leaving water between the chunks, scientists count areas where at least 15% of the surface is covered. So, because your pool is loaded with ice cubes, it would be considered ice covered. In the real world, scientists call it sea ice extent.
While you can add ice to your pool, you can’t to the ocean. And according to a new report by Copernicus, the European Union’s Climate Change Service, the sea ice extent in the Antarctic has dipped to its lowest value on record for the month of November. It is 10% below average. This occurred during a stretch of near-record global land and sea surface temperatures.
Last month ranked as the second warmest November on record globally, with an average temperature of 14.10 degrees Celsius, or 57.38 degrees Fahrenheit.
Copernicus noted the new data not only makes it virtually certain that 2024 will surpass 2023 as Earth’s warmest year on record, but it will likely be the first year to be 1.5 degrees Celsius warmer (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) than the pre-industrial average of 1850-1900.
The Paris Agreement aims to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius to prevent the worst outcomes of climate change.
As of November 2024, the average global year-to-date temperature was 0.14 degrees Celsius (or 0.25 degrees Fahrenheit) higher than it was in 2023, which is the warmest year ever recorded.
