World Bank Loans Money to Clean Ganges River

The World Bank will loan India $1 billion over the next five years to clean up the Ganges. The holy river is one of the world’s most polluted rivers.

It supports about 400 million people and runs through some of India’s most populated states.

The World Bank is also helping the country get funding to stop the dumping of untreated waste into the river. The government says it plans to end the practice completely by 2020.

The Ganges is 2,510 kilometers in length and runs from a glacier in the western Himalayas to the Bay of Bengal in Bangladesh. The river is unfit for human and animal use because it is filled with so much sewage. Floating corpses are also a common sight because Hindus believe cremation on the river banks leads to salvation.

Solar Tsunami Caught on Tape

Scientists say there is proof that solar tsunamis are real. Earlier this year the twin STEREO spacecraft captured the phenomenon from two positions separated by 90 degrees. This gave researchers an unprecedented view of the event.

A solar tsunami is when a towering wave of hot plasma races along the sun’s surface. They pose no direct threat to Earth; however, scientists say they are important to study because they can diagnose conditions on the sun. This can improve forecasting of space weather.

Solar tsunamis were discovered back in 1997, however some questioned whether they were really waves or just shadows. The scale of the towering hot waves are staggering. They rise up higher than the Earth itself and ripple out from a central point in a circular pattern millions of kilometers in circumference.