Washington underestimated Iran's threat to close the Strait of Hormuz, causing global oil market jitters. Despite planning, economic fallout wasn't fully accounted for, leaving the US scrambling.

As winter coats Japan, snow and rime ice cover the trees, creating armies of monsters and snow giants that loom over the landscape. And in some of these photos, they look ready to trudge to life.

The Earth is endowed with the most breathtaking wonders that one would only imagine to be out of an animated movie. Amidst breathtaking winter landscapes around the world, few spots rival Japan's ...

Add Yahoo as a preferred source to see more of our stories on Google. Japan’s winter has ushered in the return of Mount Zao’s , or “snow monsters.” Near-constant blizzard conditions prevail on Zao’s ...

Japan's famed "snow monsters" may actually be ghosts of an ancient blast. For years, the hulking, ice-coated trees that blanket the Zao mountain range each winter have been explained largely by ...

If you're hitting the slopes, you better watch out for this scary, snowy phenomenon. Every winter in Japan's northern prefectures, snow monsters gather on the mountains for their yearly, um, summit.

Somewhere in the world, winter transforms a mountainside into an entire army of ghostly white giants. These aren't sculptures carved by human hands; they're trees completely encased in thick layers of ...

Yamagata, Japan, Feb. 5, 2012: The “snow monsters,” or “juhyo” in Japanese, at the top of Mount Zao in Yamagata, Japan, are actually windswept, snow-covered trees. The formation of the thick frost and ...