Dust storms and lightning kill at least 96 people in northern India

LUCKNOW, India (AP) — Dust storms, heavy rain, and lightning damaged homes and other structures and killed at least 96 people in northern India, officials said Thursday.

The storms also injured more than 50 people as they swept across several districts late Wednesday in Uttar Pradesh, India’s most populous state.

Officials said some deaths were caused by falling trees, collapsing structures and lightning. Police and disaster response teams used chainsaws and cranes to clear fallen trees from roads and railway tracks in several districts.

Storms are common in northern India during the hot season from March to June, before the annual monsoon rains arrive.

Narendra N. Srivastava, an administrative official, said emergency teams were deployed across the affected areas and that homes, crops and power infrastructure were widely damaged, particularly in rural districts.

In Prayagraj district, residents described panic as strong winds tore through neighborhoods.

“The storm came suddenly and the sky turned completely dark within minutes,” Ram Kishore said. “Tin roofs were flying and people ran indoors. We could hear trees falling throughout the evening.”

In neighboring Bhadohi district, Savitri Devi said her family narrowly escaped after strong winds damaged their mud house.

“We rushed outside when the walls started shaking because of the wind. Our roof collapsed moments later. We spent the night at a relative’s house," she said.

Uttar Pradesh's Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath ordered officials to complete relief operations within 24 hours and directed authorities to provide compensation and emergency aid to affected families.

Shweta Yadav, 16, who was injured while trying to save her brother Summit Yadav, 24, after a wall of their neighbor's house collapsed following dust storms and heavy rain, is consoled by a relative in Prayagraj, India, Thursday, May 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

Relatives place the body of Summit Yadav, 24, who died after the wall of his neighbor's house collapsed following dust storms and heavy rain, into an ambulance at a mortuary in Prayagraj, India, Thursday, May 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh) CORRECTION: Corrected to that Yadav died after the wall of his neighbor's house collapsed, not his own house's.

Relatives cry after seeing the body of Summit Yadav, 24, who died after a wall of his neighbor's house collapsed following dust storms and heavy rain in Prayagraj, India, Thursday, May 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

Relatives mourn beside the body of Summit Yadav, 24, who died after the wall of his neighbor's house collapsed following dust storms and heavy rain in Prayagraj, India, Thursday, May 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh) CORRECTION: Corrected to that Yadav died after the wall of his neighbor's house collapsed, not his own house's.

A Home Guard member ties a rope to a fallen tree to set up a temporary shelter following dust storms and heavy rain in Prayagraj, India, Thursday, May 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

SAN DIEGO & WESTMINSTER, Colo.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 14, 2026--

BAE Systems Geospatial eXploitation Products ™ (GXP®) and Vantor, the leading provider of unified spatial intelligence, today announced that they will be providing advanced intelligence and targeting capabilities for contested electronic warfare (EW) environments. This delivery integrates part of Vantor’s Raptor, a vision-based software suite that enables autonomous systems to navigate, orient, and extract accurate ground coordinates without relying on GPS, with the GXP software ecosystem, ensuring intelligence continuity when sensors are degraded.

This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260514728440/en/

In modern conflict zones, the proliferation of inexpensive unmanned aerial systems (UAS) with equally low-quality sensors, in addition to widespread GPS spoofing and jamming, have rendered traditional drone video collection unreliable. Significant metadata drift in tactical video feeds leads to "targeting paralysis": high-quality imagery is available, but the underlying geographic coordinates are too inaccurate for precision activities.

To solve this, Raptor Sync georegisters the full-motion video feed from the drone’s on-board camera with Vantor’s 3D terrain data in real-time, enabling downstream GXP intelligence fusion, multi-domain interoperability across different sensors, and accurate ground coordinate extraction at a demonstrated absolute accuracy of <3 m. This system enables previously impossible intelligence and targeting workflows.

“In contested environments, the sensor's imagery and video collections are only half the battle; the accuracy of the data it produces is what determines mission success,” said Kurt de Venecia, Sr. Director of Product Development at BAE Systems GXP. “By including Raptor directly into our GXP intelligence workflows, we are providing analysts with the ability to maintain absolute targeting confidence, even when the platform’s systems or inertial sensors lack high absolute accuracy.”

Injecting corrected Key-Length-Value (KLV) metadata from Raptor directly into the drone’s video stream at the edge enhances accuracy prior to exploitation in GXP software. This overrides inaccurate telemetry, enabling analysts using GXP solutions to extract weapon-quality coordinates and execute intelligence and targeting missions in real time.

“Analysts cannot afford to lose confidence in where a target actually is,” said Paul Millhouse, Sr. Director Raptor Products at Vantor. “By using Raptor to correct video before it enters the GXP Ecosystem, we’re enhancing the performance of existing and new drone fleets. The result is a more resilient workflow for extracting accurate ground coordinates and maintaining operational tempo.”

These capabilities will be highlighted at:

About BAE Systems GXP

Supporting development of the most advanced geospatial intelligence, BAE Systems Geospatial eXploitation Products (GXP) software enables rapid discovery, exploitation, and dissemination of mission-critical geospatial data. From key military, security, and incident response operations to a variety of commercial development and research initiatives, GXP provides a comprehensive suite of solutions to inform effective decision-making and ensure a safer world. To learn more, visit www.baesystems.com/gxp.

About Vantor

Vantor is forging the new frontier of spatial intelligence to unlock a more autonomous, interoperable world. We give decision makers and operators the power to build a unified intelligence picture, delivering the clarity they need to navigate what’s happening now and shape what’s coming next. We fuse data from our constellation, which includes the most capable imaging satellites on orbit, with real-time sensor feeds from space, air, and ground to create an AI-ready digital twin of Earth. Our spatial intelligence platform automates every part of the cycle—from tasking to collection to production—to update and analyze this foundation at the pace of change. Our products drive deeper mission-critical insights and connect the next generation of autonomous systems across the defense, intelligence, and commercial landscape. To learn more, visit www.vantor.com.

Vantor and BAE Systems GXP are delivering more resilient targeting from drones operating in contested environments.