At least three people are dead in the village of Ruidoso, New Mexico after heavy rain caused flash flooding.

Up to 8.8cm (3.5in) of rain fell, causing the Ruidoso river to rise to an historic level. The floodwaters have now receded.

A man and two children died after being swept downstream, local officials confirmed on Tuesday evening.

The disaster comes after flooding in the neighbouring US state of Texas left at least 111 people dead, according to the latest toll published by US media. A further 161 people are still missing in one county alone, Governor Greg Abbott said on Tuesday.

In New Mexico, Ruidoso village spokesperson Kerry Gladden told the BBC’s US partner CBS News that search and rescue crews were still out in the field, and a hotline had been set up for people looking for missing family members.

Emergency crews in Ruidoso carried out at least 50 swift water rescues in the area, with residents urged to move to higher ground.

Three people had been treated for injuries at the local hospital, Ms Gladden said in a statement.

Social media footage captured by local artist Kaitlyn Carpenter showed at least one house being swept away by floodwaters, with Ruidoso Mayor Lynn Crawford unable to confirm how many homes had been lost.

Speaking on a local radio station, Mr Crawford said: “It got ugly really quick”.

The National Weather Service (NWS) had warned that two “burn scars” around Ruidoso were high risk for flash-flooding, as the charred soil left behind by last year’s wildfires would be “as water-repellent as a pavement”.

Southern New Mexico was hit by wildfires in June 2024. Ruidoso was evacuated as two fires burned approximately 10,000 hectares (25,000 acres) of land on either side of the village.

Two people were killed and hundreds of homes were destroyed.

Subsequent reports said that the risk of flash floods would be increased for at least two years due to the fires, and the likelihood of significant flooding events in the area was “dramatically increased”.

News of the flash flooding in New Mexico came just hours after Texas Governor Greg Abbott gave an update on the aftermath of last Friday’s floods in his own southern state.

He said at least 161 people were still missing in Kerr County alone, some four days after devastating flash floods in his own state.

The missing include five campers and a counsellor from Camp Mystic, a Christian all-girls summer camp located on the banks of the Guadalupe River.

More than 90 of the at least 111 people known to have died in the disaster, according to Us media reports, were in the Kerrville area.

North Koreans’ repatriation comes as South Korea’s newly-elected president is working to improve inter-Korean ties.

South Korea has repatriated six North Koreans who were rescued at sea earlier this year after their vessels drifted across the de facto maritime border, Seoul’s Unification Ministry has said.

The North Koreans, who were picked up by South Korean authorities in separate vessels in March and May, were transported across the Northern Limit Line on Wednesday morning with their “full consent” and after they had repeatedly expressed their wish to return home, the ministry said.

The repatriation was successfully completed with the cooperation of North Korean authorities despite repeated failed attempts by Seoul to contact Pyongyang about their return, according to the ministry.

The development comes as South Korea’s newly-elected president, Lee Jae-myung, is working to bolster ties between the two Koreas, which remain in a technical state of war after hostilities in the 1950-1953 Korean War ended with an armistice, not a peace treaty.

Speaking at a news conference to mark his first month in office last week, Lee said that Seoul should work to improve relations in coordination with its ally, the United States, and that cutting off dialogue completely would be a “foolish act”.

Last month, South Korea’s military turned off loudspeakers broadcasting anti-North Korea propaganda across the inter-Korean border in one of the Lee administration’s first steps towards rapprochement.

South Korea’s Ministry of National Defence at the time said the move would help “to restore trust in inter-Korean relations” and “promote peace on the Korean Peninsula”.

Just how safe are India’s skies?

It’s a question many are asking after June’s devastating Air India crash, which killed at least 270 people. The London-bound Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner went down less than a minute after taking off from Ahmedabad airport in western India on 12 June.

“India’s skies have always been safe – in the past and even today,” said Faiz Ahmed Kidwai, the chief of Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) – India’s aviation safety regulator – in an interview with the BBC.

“If you look at global safety metrics, such as those published by International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), which track the number of accidents per million flights, India consistently performs better than the world average,” he said.

“There were only two years within the 2010–2024 period where we exceeded the global average – those were the years when major accidents occurred.”

In August 2020, Air India Express Flight 1344 crashed after skidding off a rain-soaked tabletop runway in Kozhikode, killing 21 people. A decade earlier, in May 2010, Flight 812 from Dubai overshot the runway in Mangalore and plunged into a gorge, leaving 158 dead. June’s Air India crash was the third such accident in the country in 15 years.

While such major accidents remain rare, recent headlines have raised fresh concerns. From a Delhi-Srinagar flight that hit severe turbulence, to growing reports of maintenance oversights and training shortfalls, questions around aviation safety are once again in focus.

The latest involved SpiceJet, India’s fourth-largest and longest-running low-cost airline.

The Economic Times newspaper found that the aviation regulator had recently summoned the airline’s leadership after a series of alarming findings – not from routine audits, but triggered by a British aviation firm.

The newspaper reported that it began earlier this year when two of SpiceJet’s De Havilland Q400 turboprops showed premature propeller failures. The airline alerted Dowty Propellers, a GE Aerospace-led UK manufacturer, which found damage to the internal bearings of the propellers.

Each propeller has bearings with two races, or rings or tracks. In this case, the inner race was damaged. Instead of addressing the root cause, SpiceJet “reportedly kept applying more grease to the [entire] unit instead of addressing the root cause”. Frustrated by the lack of corrective action, Dowty escalated the issue directly to India’s aviation regulator, the newspaper reported.

The DGCA’s own audit in April “revealed even more deficiencies, including snag occurrences”, the report said.

Mr Kidwai told the BBC that the “turboprop propeller issue came to our attention through one of SpiceJet’s maintenance organisations”.

“We took it up with SpiceJet and we ensured they took corrective action. We also found out that the senior management was not fully aware of the situation. We took action against the various post holders who were supposed to ensure compliance with the original equipment manufacturer and other regulations. We directed SpiceJet to remove them and suspend a few of them which they did,” he said.

More recently, Reuters reported that the aviation watchdog reprimanded Air India’s budget carrier in March for delaying mandatory engine part replacements on an Airbus A320 and falsifying records to show compliance.

Air India Express told the news agency it acknowledged the error to DGCA and undertook “remedial action and preventive measures”.

Mr Kidwai told the BBC that the information in this case came through “self-reporting by the airline”.

“I would not condone it [the lapses]. But [at least] we have started getting these reports. This came from the airline. Action has been taken in this case. In our audits we have mandated our people to be more alert and see whether there is any lapse and bring it to our attention.”

In May, an IndiGo flight from Delhi to Srinagar faced severe turbulence and hail about 45 minutes after takeoff.

The Airbus A321, carrying 222 passengers, reportedly encountered extreme vertical air currents – updrafts followed by downdrafts – that dislodged overhead bins and caused nose damage. The crew declared an emergency and safely landed at Srinagar with no injuries. The regulator launched an investigation, during which two pilots were grounded.

Mr Kidwai told the BBC that the regulator had now “refined” its guidelines for pilots flying in turbulent conditions.

For instance, if there’s significant cloud cover or any weather pattern that poses a risk – and “we’ve clearly defined what constitutes such a risk” – pilots are now required to take specific action a set number of nautical miles before reaching it, he said.

“This could include diverting, going around, or taking other appropriate steps.”

Since 2020, Indian domestic carriers have reported 2,461 technical faults, according to the federal civil aviation ministry data. IndiGo accounted for over half (1,288), followed by SpiceJet with 633, and Air India and its subsidiary Air India Express with 389 cases, as of January 2025.

“Reporting of snags by airlines has gone up. This is good,” Mr Kidwai said.

“I wouldn’t say I’m pleased about it. But I do see value in the growing culture of reporting [snags]. It’s far better for every snag to be brought to the attention of the authorities than keeping quiet and operating the aircraft.”

Mr Kidwai said with the number of flights increasing, it’s important to “see whether the turnaround time for flights is adequate for [maintenance] checks or not”.

To be sure, demands on the regulator have grown: India has emerged as the third-largest passenger aviation market in the world. Yet, over the past two years, the ministry of civil aviation has faced budget cuts, reflecting a reduced financial priority for the sector.

Today, the country’s scheduled carriers operate nearly 850 aircraft – a significant increase from around 400 just a decade ago.

The number of air passengers has more than doubled since 2014–15 – from 116 million to 239 million.

The number of commercial aerodromes has also seen a substantial rise – from around 60-70 a decade ago to nearly 130-140 today.

“In total, including both scheduled and non-scheduled operators, we now have 1,288 aircraft in operation. By the end of the decade, we are projected to operate over 2,000 aircraft,” Mr Kidwai said. (Non-scheduled operators include charter airlines, private jet operators, air taxis and helicopter services.)

So had the latest Air India crash dented the reputation of air travel in India? Mr Kidwai said the data didn’t point to that.

“We looked at the data to assess whether it had any impact on domestic or international operations. There was no significant drop in traffic. At most, we observed a very marginal dip for a short period, affecting both domestic and international flights, along with a few cancellations,” he told the BBC.

“It’s natural for people to feel anxious after such incidents. But over time, as more clarity emerges and the situation is better understood, that anxiety tends to subside. Time is a great healer.”

A moderately strong, 5.7-magnitude earthquake struck in Guatemala on Tuesday, according to the United States Geological Survey.

The temblor happened at 3:41 p.m. Central time about 10 miles southwest of Guatemala City, data from the agency shows.

U.S.G.S. data earlier reported that the magnitude was 5.6.

As seismologists review available data, they may revise the earthquake’s reported magnitude. Additional information collected about the earthquake may also prompt U.S.G.S. scientists to update the shake-severity map.

Aftershocks can occur days, weeks or even years after the first earthquake. These events can be of equal or larger magnitude to the initial earthquake, and they can continue to affect already damaged locations.