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Some of the hottest global weather in recorded history is happening this week. It's likely that records will continue to fall this year.

Far-Flung Postcards is a weekly series in which NPR's international team shares moments from their lives and work around the world.

Brian Phillips got quite a shock in his kitchen: A lightning strike threw him across the room. Paramedics concluded the rubber soles of his well-worn slippers protected him from electrocution.

A rescuer testifying at a public hearing into West Virginia's Sago mine disaster admits to mistakenly saying the trapped miners were alive, when in fact the sole survivor had been located. The rescuer nearly broke down while describing finding the dead miners.

The Senate Armed Services Committee votes unanimously to approve Robert Gates as the new secretary of defense. In his sole day of hearings, Gates faced questions about Iraq and U.S. troop levels. The full Senate will vote on his nomination Wednesday.

China has become the biggest lender on the African continent. The Nairobi-to-Mombasa railway is a symbol of Kenya's ambitions. But critics say China is saddling Kenya with unsustainable debt.

The Mohammed VI Tangier Tech City would stand in monument to China's expansion into a North African nation on Europe's doorstep. But experts say the project has stalled.

The giant, U-shaped tube is designed to form a garbage-corralling barrier propelled by wind and waves. Its creator hopes to remove half the plastic in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch in five years.

It took six days, 16 hours and 38 minutes and an unexpected detour down the California coast. Audie Cornish talks to Troy Bradley about his trans-Pacific journey with Leonid Tiukhtyaev.

Britain is a maritime nation that a century or two ago boasted the world's largest navy. Today, the names of shipping areas in the surrounding seas are embedded in the British national psyche — thanks to the BBC's Shipping Forecast bulletin, a cultural phenomenon beloved by seafarers and landlubbers alike.