Arctic sea ice hit its 2026 minimum on September 12 at about 4.6 million square kilometers, tied for 10th lowest on record. NASA Earth Observatory says the remaining ice is thinner and younger, and scientists still warn of a nearly ice-free summer before 2050.
Reality
- Evidence82
- Adoption
- Not scored
- Hype gap−5
- Incentives
- Not scored
- Confidence70
Hurricane Simon passed about 50 km off Mexico's Pacific coast on Oct. 11 as a Category 4 storm with winds near 210 km/h, NASA reported. The Sierra Madre appeared to shrink its wind field, while news reports described flooding in Manzanillo.
Reality
- Evidence68
- Adoption
- Not scored
- Hype gap−5
- Incentives
- Not scored
- Confidence62
ISS astronaut photographed Saririaky massif in Madagascar, 100 square km of anorthosite at least 600 million years old. Anorthosite also makes up much of the Moon's bright highlands, and NASA Earth Observatory says scientists link the deformed rock around it to the collisions that built Gondwana.
Reality
- Evidence55
- Adoption
- Not scored
- Hype gap+20
- Incentives
- Not scored
- Confidence50
NASA's Landsat images show farmland and aquaculture along Prachin Buri's Bang Pakong River flooded on 2 October 2026, set against the same season in 2025. The pair is strong evidence of how far the water spread that day and weaker evidence of what caused it.
Reality
- Evidence65
- Adoption
- Not scored
- Hype gap−5
- Incentives
- Not scored
- Confidence60
Landsat 9 imaged the Moose, Nottaway and Harricanaw rivers carrying tea-colored water into James Bay's southern bays on September 27, 2026. The stain is dissolved organic matter from boreal bog and forest. NASA's account gives no estimate of the carbon it carries.
Reality
- Evidence55
- Adoption
- Not scored
- Hype gap0
- Incentives
- Not scored
- Confidence60
NASA counts 20 named storms and nine hurricanes in the northeastern and central Pacific by Sept. 28, against 1991-2020 averages of 13.5 and 7.4. Colorado State data put storm energy at more than double the norm, so the season is running stronger as well as busier.
Reality
- Evidence62
- Adoption
- Not scored
- Hype gap+5
- Incentives
- Not scored
- Confidence60
NASA's INSPYRE flight caught a pileus cap on a wildfire cloud over Montana's Sand Creek fire on August 11, visible in just one of its half-hourly scenes. NASA says researchers rarely see such a cap over a fire cloud in this much detail.
Reality
- Evidence55
- Adoption
- Not scored
- Hype gap+10
- Incentives40
- Confidence60
NASA-led researchers mapped 1,943 valleys under Greenland's ice from faint bumps in satellite maps of its surface, about a third of them new. The map is meant to improve future versions of BedMachine Greenland, a high-resolution dataset of the terrain beneath the ice.
Reality
- Evidence55
- Adoption
- Not scored
- Hype gap+10
- Incentives35
- Confidence55
A Category 1 peak, 30 to 35 inches of projected rain, and warnings across all eight major Hawaiian islands. The wind rating described almost none of the actual exposure.
Perspective Coverage
3 publishers
- Builder
- Builder 22%
- Operator
- Operator 67%
- Investor
- Investor 11%
Reality
- Evidence70
- Adoption
- Not scored
- Hype gap−30
- Incentives
- Not scored
- Confidence65
The August berg was the largest Arctic calving since 2020, but it broke along a fracture the team watching Petermann had not expected, leaving two rifts that together outline more than twice the area that left.
Reality
- Evidence62
- Adoption
- Not scored
- Hype gap0
- Incentives
- Not scored
- Confidence66
Above-average June rain and a very wet August in Western Australia's Murchison brought carpets of wildflowers that Landsat 8 caught in late August, in a before-and-after pair where the ground is greener and the flowers themselves go uncounted.
Reality
- Evidence68
- Adoption
- Not scored
- Hype gap+18
- Incentives45
- Confidence62
Lake Powell's surface read 3,517.24 feet on September 10, the lowest on record, after the Upper Colorado Basin's 2025-2026 snowpack came in thin and record warmth took more of it before the melt reached the river.
Reality
- Evidence72
- Adoption65
- Hype gap−10
- Incentives40
- Confidence70
Joel Lapointe noticed a circle near Lake Marsal while planning a 2024 camping trip in Quebec. A floatplane and a 50-metre wade later, Gordon Osinski's team found the shatter cones that decided its origin.
Reality
- Evidence62
- Adoption
- Not scored
- Hype gap+12
- Incentives45
- Confidence55
A small, routinely active volcano between Java and Sumatra produced a day of explosive eruption whose effects on flying and on air quality took several days to clear, and the flight tally in circulation comes from news reports.
Reality
- Evidence64
- Adoption55
- Hype gap+16
- Incentives32
- Confidence68
NASA Earth Observatory's map of September 15 pairs satellite data with the GEOS model to show air approaching 40 degrees Celsius across the south-central states. The 41 million figure beside it counts residents of National Weather Service alert areas.
Reality
- Evidence74
- Adoption
- Not scored
- Hype gap−5
- Incentives40
- Confidence68
NASA Earth Observatory puts the 2026 Indonesian fire season at roughly a tenth of 2015's 1.75 billion tons of greenhouse gas equivalents after about a month, with the underground smoldering fires the hardest for satellites to count.
Reality
- Evidence62
- Adoption55
- Hype gap+8
- Incentives45
- Confidence66
Puerto Rico held no drought at all three months before August 25, when the U.S. Drought Monitor put 44 percent of the territory in extreme drought and rationing was already running in several municipalities.
Reality
- Evidence64
- Adoption68
- Hype gap+8
- Incentives45
- Confidence58
By September 3 the Northeast Pacific had 15 named storms and six hurricanes against the Atlantic's five and none, the split forecasters called back in spring. A basin tally, though, says nothing about where the rain lands.
Reality
- Evidence68
- Adoption
- Not scored
- Hype gap+8
- Incentives38
- Confidence62
Peat gives off roughly three times the fine particulate matter of other tropical forest fires, so most of this season's health cost is decided by how much soil is already dry and when the rains return.
Reality
- Evidence68
- Adoption58
- Hype gap+6
- Incentives42
- Confidence63