On Tuesday, officials in Louisiana said that at least 11 people have died since widespread flooding hit the state in what the Red Cross has called “likely the worst natural disaster since Superstorm Sandy,” NBC News reports.

At least 16 people, including nine children, were killed this week when flash flooding struck Zion National Park and a Utah border town best known as the headquarters of a fundamentalist Mormon sect.

Authorities say at least 61 people were killed and another 37 were injured early Monday morning when a torrential mudslide swept away homes in the municipality of Salgar, Colombia, AFP reports.

The Faith Regional Medical Center in Norfolk, Neb. is reporting that one person has died and at least 15 people have been admitted with critical injuries after twin tornadoes tore through the state this evening.

A massive, mile-wide tornado touched down in Moore, Oklahoma Monday afternoon, killing at least 51 people, including 20 children. A reporter from local news station KFOR supposedly called it "the biggest, most destructive tornado in the history of the world," and estimated it was two to three times the magnitude of the massive tornados that hit Oklahoma in 1999.

THE BOTTOM LINE: There is evidence that large-scale catastrophes may influence birth and marriage rates, but in which direction is not clear.

A 4.0 magnitude quake hit Maine tonight at about 7:00. Maine families were just welcoming home their fishermen dads when a quake erupted about 3 miles west of Hollis Center, Maine. Some Bostoners doling out bread bowls at Faneuil Hall might have been shaken and could've spilled spilled some soup on their counters. Some kid probably said that his bed moving back and forth was "wicked awesome," and other smaller kids were probably "wicked scared."

Have you tried to look directly at the sun yet today? Good luck finding it, chump – that thing is so far away it's practically in another zipcode.

The congressional dispute over how to replenish FEMA's disaster relief coffers — which, if not resolved by September 30, could shut down the government — will resume on Monday. Go enjoy a national park while you still can! How about the Washington Monument? Oh, nevermind, the earthquake cracked that sucker good. In that case, do whatever the hell you want.

All that Hurricane Irene and Tropical Storm Lee wanted was to smash a few windows, flood some streets, and uproot an old tree here or there. But now they may indirectly end up shutting down the federal government, too! This really is a banner year for the forces of evil.

Five Italian seismologists and a government official are on trial for manslaughter for not predicting a major earthquake that hit a town in April of 2009. Seismologists have sort of a different job in Italy!

A 7.2-magnitude earthquake has hit New Zealand's second-largest town, with aftershocks ongoing.

Your comedically terrible chain reaction of the day: A golfer who swung his iron and hit a rock sparked a 12-acre fire in California today. Flint and steel: It really works! [AP, image via Shutterstock]

Hurricane Earl is "gathering strength" off the coast of Puerto Rico, and may send squalls all the way to Maine this week. Earl has kindly agreed to leave the Gulf coast alone, though, because it's got enough to deal with.

This is pretty much unimaginably frightening. As we told you this weekend, Russia is currently being consumed by a group of uncontrollable wildfires. In this shocking video, a group of men desperately attempt to flee the inferno in their car.

If snow is God's dandruff, then tornadoes are his middle fingers. After hours of absorbing the danger and the destruction, important themes and facts emerged.

If you thought that being a celebrity meant you were given some kind of gold-plated volcano-proof airplane, well boy, were you wrong. While Eyjafjallajokull traps little people in Europe's hellish social democracies, Whitney Houston is being burdened, too!

Do you need context, for this? A Fox correspondent says Philippines is covered in ash, because of a volcano, so "in a way they're having a white christmas." So nice of Jesus to blanket them in His loving sulfur!

Mere days after scientists assured her that "karma tectonics" was most certainly not responsible for the devastating May 12 earthquake that killed nearly 70,000 people in China, Sharon Stone revised her earlier geological lecture to include a direct apology to the Chinese people for suggesting as much in the first place. "Due to my inappropriate words and acts during the interview, I feel deeply sorry and sad about hurting Chinese people," Stone said in a statement released through Christian Dior, which is dropping the actress from its ads in China. "I am willing to take part in the relief work of China's earthquake, and wholly devote myself to helping affected Chinese people."

Steve Garbarino, the sorta Jeff Daniels look-a-like editor in chief of Black Book magazine, met his new wife when on "a snowy night in March 2005, at Hudson Bar and Books, in Manhattan, [he] was holding court with friends and drinking a dark and stormy." Garbarino, says the Times, "made some ridiculous drolleries, told some tales, bragged a bit about the HBO [show]—which did not come to fruition." Really, this sort of thing works? On some women apparently.