Mount Sinabung volcano spews smoke as seen from Bekerah village in the district of Tanah Karo in Indonesia's North Sumatra province August 30, 2010. The Indonesian volcano that erupted for the first time in centuries on Sunday spewed fresh plumes of smoke early on Monday morning, causing panic in nearby villages and delaying local flights, officials said on Monday
Canadian quake shakes parts of Midwest,
Northeast
by Jonathan Erdman June 23, 2010
A 5.0 earthquake struck near Ottawa, Ontario, Canada at
1:41pm ET Wednesday. The epicenter was located 33 miles north-northeast
of Ottawa, Canada but the shaking from the quake was felt across many
parts of northern United States.
People in the cities of Detroit,
Milwaukee, Utica, Burlington, Syracuse, Akron and Pittsburgh (just to
name a few) all felt the rattling of the earth.
Location
of earthquake epicenter
High-rise buildings were evacuated in Downtown Ottawa, and some
chimneys were damaged near the Canadian capital.
Evacuations in Ottawa (left),
chimney damaged in Gatineau, Canada
Five LA Area Earthquakes
Five earthquakes shook up thousands of
people in the LA and Big Bear regions Monday.
The first was a 3.6 off Santa Monica Bay which was
felt most severely in the Westside and South Bay areas. Then about 1.30 in the
afternoon a 3.2 was registered a few miles north of Big Bear City, followed by a
3.1 10 minutes later. It was also felt in the San Bernadino Mountains region.
A magnitude 3.7 earthquake then occurred in the
Santa Monica Bay on Monday afternoon, followed by a 2.9 north of the Palos
Verdes Peninsula.
Midwest storms leave at least 5 dead
Search for other
victims; dozens of homes hit, nuclear plant forced to shut
J.D. Pooley /
Sentinel-Tribune via AP
Kelly Kirchner looks over damage left by a tornado in
Millbury, Ohio, on Sunday.
updated 2 hours, 1 minute ago
MILLBURY, Ohio -
Tornadoes and thunderstorms swept through the Midwest overnight,
destroying dozens of homes and upending school buses and police cars in
one miles-long trail of destruction in Ohio, and ripping off siding on a
nuclear plant in Michigan. At least five people died, including a
child, authorities said.
Rescue
officials in northwest Ohio were still searching through homes Sunday
and couldn't say whether anyone else was missing, Lake Township Fire
Chief Todd Walters said.
Police
Chief Mark Hummer flew over the damaged area and said at least 50 homes
were destroyed and another 50 severely damaged, as well as six
commercial buildings. He estimated a 7-mile path of destruction about
100 yards wide. The storm that hit around 11 p.m. Saturday fell over an
area of farm fields and light industry, narrowly missing the heavily
populated suburbs on the southern edge of Toledo.
"It's a war zone," Hummer said "It's pretty
disheartening."
Hummer
said that among those killed were a person outside the police
department and a motorist. He said a young child and two other victims
were from nearby Millbury, a town of about 1,200 about 10 miles
southeast of Toledo.
A township police and emergency medical
services building looked to be a total loss. The storm ripped off most
of the building's back half, tossing a car into where the building once
stood, now a mishmash of 2-by-4 framing and pink insulation strewn
about. At least four of the township's police vehicles were destroyed.
The lawn surrounding the station was littered with tree limbs and
branches, and a portion of the metal roof wrapped around one of trees.
Video
Michigan
hit June
6:
Severe storms strike Dundee, Mich. Msnbc's Alex Witt reports.
msnbc tv
Hummer
was talking to a police dispatcher by phone when the storm hit.
"She started saying, 'The
building is shaking,' and then another dispatcher came on and said the
roof just blew off," he said.
The storm knocked out emergency services for a short
time, and all the emergency dispatchers and 911 operators had to be
moved to a nearby town.
"When
the people who are supposed to help you are victims of the storm, it
does take you a minute to catch your breath," Hummer said.
No tornadoes had been
confirmed in Ohio as of late Sunday morning, though the National Weather
Service had received many reports and pictures of storm damage, said
Walter Fitzgerald, a hydrometeorological technician at the service in
Cleveland.
Damage
stretched from Illinois toward Pennsylvania and north into Michigan, and
more wind, scattered rain and cooler temperatures were expected Sunday.
Nuke plant
shut down In southeastern Michigan, severe storms and
high winds ripped siding off a building at the Fermi 2 nuclear plant,
causing it to shut down automatically, said Dan Smith, the public
information officer for Monroe County. Investigators were inspecting the
nuclear plant on the shore of Lake Erie on Sunday morning, and the
plant was expected to go back into operation, Smith said.
About 35,000 people were
without power but it wasn't clear whether that was directly related to
the nuclear plant's shutdown or because of damage to power lines in the
area, he said.
Eleven
people with minor injuries were taken to hospitals from Dundee, Mich.,
where the weather service was looking into reports of a tornado touching
down. More than a dozen people were injured in Dwight, Ill., where
about 40 mobile homes and 10 other homes were destroyed, Illinois
Emergency Management Agency spokeswoman Patti Thompson said, and
multiple tornadoes were reported in the state.
Reports by John Seach
Reports are posted in Eastern Australian Time (UT +10
hr).
Saturday 29th May
2010 Pacaya Volcano, Guatemala Pacaya volcano,
Guatemala erupted yesterday. Strombolian eruptions occurred at the summit.
Guatemala's President declared a state of "calamity" in two provinces and opened
emergency shelters to accommodate over 1,700 residents who were evacuated. More
than 65 people were injured, a television reporter killed, some people are
missing, and hundreds of houses damaged by the eruption which sent stones and
ash over a wide area. The international airport at Guatemala City was to remain
closed for 20 hours. The runway was covered by 2.5 cm of volcanic ash. More on Pacaya volcano... Volcanoes of Guatemala...
Saturday 29th May
2010 Tungurahua Volcano, Ecuador Tungurahua
volcano in Ecuador erupted yesterday forcing the evacuation of hundreds of
people. The eruption plume rose 10 km above the crater. Ashfall was reported at
the city of Guyaquil, 185 kilometers southwest of the volcano. Flights were
disrupted at Guayaquil and Quito airports. More on
Tungurahua volcano... Volcanoes of Ecuador...
Friday 28th May
2010 Vanuatu Earthquake (Mag 7.2) A major
earthquake (Magnitude 7.2) hit Vanuatu on 28th May 2010 at 04:14 hr local time.
The epicentre was located 125 km NW of Gaua volcano at a depth of 36 km. A
tsunami warning issued for Vanuatu, Solomon Islands and New Caledonia was later
canceled. More on Gaua volcano... Volcanoes of Vanuatu...
Thursday 27th May
2010 Eyjafjallajokull volcano, Iceland No activity
has occurred at Eyjafjallajokull volcano in Iceland for 5 days. It is looking
increaslingly likely that the volcano eruption has ended. Currenly there is only
steam coming from the crater. More on
Eyjafjallajokull volcano... Volcanoes of
Iceland...
Tuesday 25th May
2010 Eyjafjallajokull volcano, Iceland Quiet
continues at Eyjafjallajokull volcano in Iceland. At least 7 consecutive days of
inactivity are required to declare the eruption over. More on Eyjafjallajokull volcano... Volcanoes of Iceland...
Monday 24th May
2010 Eyjafjallajokull volcano, Iceland Eruptions
have stopped at Eyjafjallajokull volcano in Iceland. Since Saturday, there have
been no explosions at the summit, and tremor has almost reduced to pre-eruption
levels. The have been no reports of ashfall, no lightning, and low water
discharge from Gígjökull glacier. Renewed eruptions are possible. More on Eyjafjallajokull volcano... Volcanoes of Iceland...
Sunday 23rd May
2010 Katla volcano, Iceland In the past 48 hours 3
earthquakes occurred at Katla volcano, Iceland. The earthquakes may be due to
ice movements within Mýrdalsjökull glacier or magma movement under the volcano.
Scientists have been keeping a close watch on Katla volcano, due to the
possibility of an eruption triggered by the activity at nearby Eyjafjallajokull.
An eruption of Katla volcano has the potential to be more devastating than the
current eruption of Eyjafjallajokull. More on Katla
volcano... Volcanoes of Iceland...
Saturday 22nd May
2010 Eyjafjallajokull volcano, Iceland Eruptions
have decreased at Eyjafjallajokull volcano in Iceland. Yesterday the eruption
plume reached a height of 12,000 ft. No explosions are occurring at the summit
and no lava is flowing from the crater. There were two hours of elevated tremor
yesterday. No lightning has been observed since 13:00 hr on 20th May, local
time. More on Eyjafjallajokull volcano... Volcanoes of Iceland...
Saturday 22nd May
2010 Kilauea volcano, Hawaii Yesterday marked
10,000 days of the current eruption on the east rift zone of Kilauea volcano,
Hawaii. The east rift zone began erupting 3rd January, 1983, and Halemaumau
crater at the summit has been erupting since 9th March, 2008. Lava is currently
flowing into the sea west of Kalapana. More on Kilauea
volcano... Volcanoes of Hawaii...
Friday 21st May
2010 Eyjafjallajokull volcano, Iceland On 20th May
ash emissions from Eyjafjallajokull volcano in Iceland reached a height of
18,000 ft. The eruption is mainly explosive and almost no lava is flowing under
Gígjökull glacier. Volcanic tremor remains steady. More on Eyjafjallajokull volcano... Volcanoes of Iceland...
Wednesday 19th May
2010 Eyjafjallajokull volcano, Iceland Explosive
eruptions continue at Eyjafjallajokull volcano in Iceland at a rate of 200
tonnes/s. On 18th May eruption plume reached a maximum height of 21,000 ft.
Ashfall was reported in the Gnúpverjahreppur area, Hrauneyjar, Northeast and
eastern Iceland. The civil aviation authorities of Britain and Ireland announced
new rules for allowing aircraft to fly through small concentrations of volcanic
ash. This announcement is overdue, because the original grounding of 100,000
flights for 6 days last month was an over reaction to the eruption of
Eyjafjallajokull volcano. In other parts of the world, flights have been
operating for many years through volcanic ash. The often quoted incident of an
aircraft losing power to all 4 engines over Indonesia in 1982, was caused by the
aircraft flying very close to Galunggung volcano, and was not 3000 km away as
was the case in flights being grounded last month. More on Eyjafjallajokull volcano... Volcanoes of Iceland...
Sunday 16th May
2010 Eyjafjallajokull volcano, Iceland Ash
emissions from Eyjafjallajokull volcano in Iceland reached a maximum height of
27,000 ft on 15th May. An earthquake swarm was recorded beneath the volcano
between 23:54 hr (14th May) and 02:45 (15th May). Over 30 earthquakes less than
magnitude 2 were recorded at a depth of 30 km. Lightning continues to be
recorded in the eruption plume with a rate of about 30 strikes per day. Ash
emissions from Eyjafjallajokull volcano are expected to drift over parts of
Scotland on Sunday and the rest of UK on Monday, causing flight
disruptions. More on Eyjafjallajokull
volcano... Volcanoes of Iceland...
Saturday 15th May
2010 Eyjafjallajokull volcano, Iceland Eruptions
continue at Eyjafjallajokull volcano in Iceland. During the week, flights were
disrupted in Iceland, Spain, Portugal, and northern Africa. On 14th May ashfall
was reported on the Vestmann Islands, south of the volcano, and Reykjavík. Low
water discharge has been observed at Gígjökull glacier. Three earthquakes were
located beneath Eyjafjallajökull, at a depth of 7 -8 km. No major changes are
seen in the activity. There are no indications that the eruption is about to
end. More on Eyjafjallajokull volcano... Volcanoes of Iceland...
Sunday 9th May
2010 Indonesia Earthquake (Mag 7.2) A major
earthquake hit northern Sumatra, Indonesia at 12:59 pm local time on Sunday 9th
May 2010. The epicentre was located 35 km off the coast of Aceh. A local tsunami
watch was issued for Simeulue and Aceh, but was later cancelled. No tsunami was
generated. The closest active volcano is Geureudong, 140 km NE of the
epicentre. More on Geureudong volcano... Volcanoes of Indonesia...
Sunday 9th May
2010 Eyjafjallajokull volcano, Iceland Ash
emission from Eyjafjallajokull volcano has forced the temporary closure of
schools in southern Iceland. The eruption is still in the explosive phase.
Ashfall was reported in Vik, southern Iceland on 8th May. Very little steam was
observed at Gígjökull glacier on the northern side of the volcano. About 5000
flights were disrupted on Friday as ash drifted towards Europe. More on Eyjafjallajokull volcano... Volcanoes of Iceland...
Saturday 8th May
2010 Eyjafjallajokull volcano, Iceland Ash
emission from Eyjafjallajokull volcano, Iceland has closed 15 airports in Spain
and forced the cancellation of 104 flights in Portugal. More on Eyjafjallajokull volcano... Volcanoes of Iceland...
Saturday 8th May
2010 Tambora volcano, Indonesia A magnitude 6.1
earthquake hit 29 km NE of the summit of Tambora volcano on 8th May 2010. A
magnitude 5.1 aftershock occurred an hour later. More
on Tambora volcano... Volcanoes of
Indonesia...
Saturday 8th May
2010 Eyjafjallajokull volcano, Iceland Intensified
eruptions occurred at Eyjafjallajokull volcano, Iceland on 6th May 2010. Ash
emissions reached a height of 30,000 ft, and caused cancellation of flights in
Scotland. Melt water discharge has decreased from Gígjökull glacier in the west.
New melt water discharge is flowing towards the east, which indicates a change
in direction of lava flows. This could crate more hazardous floods. Explosions
are increasing at the summit, and a cinder cone is forming in the crater. Tremor
is similar to that seen in the phase of the eruption from 14-17 April 2010. On
6th May, there were 10 earthquakes detected under the volcano. Most earthquakes
are located beneath or south of the summit crater. More on Eyjafjallajokull volcano... Volcanoes of Iceland...
Wednesday 5th May
2010 Eyjafjallajokull volcano, Iceland The first
summit expedition to Eyjafjallajokull volcano, Iceland after the March eruption
was made by John Seach in April 2010. While on the summit John observed two
active vents inside the main crater. The southern vent was showing almost
continuous Strombolian activity, and the northern vent showed phreatomagmatic
eruptions. Intensified activity occurred under the Gigjokull Glacier on 1st
May. More on Eyjafjallajokull volcano... Volcanoes of Iceland...
On the
evening of 27 May, Pacaya volcano entered a phase of violent lava fountaining
reaching an height of about 1 km, and an ash
plume reaching about 3-4 km elevation drifting north-west towards the capital.
At least 3 people were killed in the eruption, two villagers and a
journalist who tried to approach the crater and was hit by bombs. According to
newspapers, at least 9 children are missing, more than 20 people injured and
thousands fled their homes or were evacuated. Many buildings were damaged.
Authorities evacuated the National Park of Pacaya and nearby villages and
declared the state of emergency for the region. The significant ash
fall caused traffic chaos in Guatemala city and the international airport to be
closed. The intensity of the explosions declined later in the evening, but
scientists warn that new violent phases could follow.
China Earthquake Today, Death Up to 400 [Map of China]
April 14, 2010 10:30 AM EDT
The death toll in an magnitude 6.9 earthquake in China today has risen to 400 people, according to the Associated Press. The quake, which occurred in the western province of Qinghai, injured more than 10,000 people, according to reports from Chinese state television.
The quake, which hit around 8 a.m., was in the southern portion of the province, near Tibet. Click here to see a map showing its location. The population consists of ethnic Tibetans who make a living farming and herding yaks, sheep, and horses, according to the Wall Street Journal and the Guardian.
According to news reports, soldiers and paramilitary police have been dispatched to the region to head up rescue efforts. The Red Cross is also sending relief supplies.
The 7.2 Mexicali earthquake that struck northern Mexico and rocked swaths of the American southwest Sunday was the region's most powerful in decades, but damage was limited in part because the temblor had a shallow depth of only six
Still, the quake frayed nerves in the wake of tragedies in Haiti and Chile.
“One way or another, we have the disasters in Chile and Haiti in the back of our heads. There is a fear that it could happen to us at any moment,” says Antonio Fernandez, the manager of Hotel Mexico in Mexicali, in a phone interview. “It seemed that the earth would never stop shaking, and the aftershocks are constant.”
The earthquake struck at 3:40 p.m. on Easter Sunday, some 38 miles from Mexicali, in Baja California, and 104 miles from Tijuana, and was felt throughout southern California.
One man was reported dead outside Mexicali, close to the epicenter of the earthquake, when his house collapsed around him, said Alfredo Escobedo, director of emergency services in Baja California.
Roads cracked in half
Local newspapers published photos of roadways cracked in half. A photograph sent via Twitter showed the second level of a two-story house collapsed over its garage in Mexicali.
The extent of damage was still unknown. On Sunday evening electricity was still out in much of the state of Baja California. In Mexicali, phone lines were down. It was impossible to get in touch with many establishments late Sunday night. Other phone conversations were quickly ended after lines cut out.
“It was terrible, it was so strong, one of the strongest I’ve felt,” says Ramon Fregoso, a resident of Mexicali, which has about one million residents, in a telephone interview.
Trapped in homes
Officials reported that many residents in the city were still trapped in their homes from a quake that is the worst to have hit the area in several years. A state of emergency has been declared in Baja California, and teams from Tijuana were en route to Mexicali Sunday night to aid in rescue efforts.
Mr. Fregoso, who was in his house when the earthquake struck during Easter Sunday, says he ran to the ground floor of his house and outside with his family. A few objects fell and walls cracked in his home, he says, but he did not see extensive damage.
Fregoso says he has not heard from all his family members since communication was down, and he was following the news of the earthquake through the radio in his car, since electricity was out.
Mr. Fernandez says that his hotel suffered only slight damages, but they have no water or light.
Still, the psychological toll is high, not only with recent tragedies in the Latin America still fresh but because of the widespread belief that this region of the US and Mexico could face the “big one” at any moment.
“We are trying to remain calm,” he says. “But this is definitely the worst quake I have ever felt in my life.”
February 27, 2010
PLEASE PASS THIS ON TO EVERYONE YOU KNOW. URGENT ALERT - EARTHQUAKE AND TSUNAMI
An 8.8Mag earthquake off the coast of Chile a few hours ago is being followed by scores of aftershocks (32 till now) of Mag 5.0 and higher. ("Death toll rises to 122").
Tsunami warnings and advisories have been issued for much of the Pacific Rim with waves possibly as high as 12ft predicted for Hawaii, where the Hilo airport has been closed.
These major aftershocks are happening as little as five minutes apart.
We say...There may be the potential for yet another much higher magnitude earthquake.
Argentina experienced a 6.3 'quake near Salta a short while ago.
Tsunamis "could cause widespread damage" says the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center.)
"Residents urged to seek safety before Honolulu County, Hawaii, closes all roads.."
"Tsunami waves as far away as Hawaii could last six to 10 hours..."
There is a tsunami "advisory" for California.
Forecasters predict arrival of #tsunami waves on California coast about 1:30 p.m. local time
" warnings now in effect for Russia, Japan, Taiwan, in addition to much of South Central America, Pacific islands, U.S. West Coast."
"Samoa police issue nationwide evacuation alert."
"Fiji and Tonga may expect tsunami waves of 7ft
"Pacific islands of American Samoa and Samoa urge residents to take shelter..."
If you are in any of the places that might be affected by a tsunami, DO NOT DO NOT DO NOT be stupid enough to go to the beach for a look. NO-ONE CAN PREDICT exactly how big (or small) a tsunami might be when it reaches shore...nor HOW MANY of them may come in a series.
We have NO IDEA how many aftershocks will occur, nor how big they might be.
If you have the slightest inkling that you should evacuate, do so immediately, but in a calm manner. Take your emergency kit/s in your vehicle. Go to high ground.
AP – Vehicles that were driving along a highway that collapsed near Santiago are seen overturned on the asphalt …
By ROBERTO CANDIA and EVA VERGARA, Associated Press Writer Roberto Candia And Eva Vergara, Associated Press Writer – 54 mins ago
TALCA, Chile – A devastating earthquake struck Chile early Saturday, toppling homes, collapsing bridges and plunging trucks into the fractured earth. A tsunami set off by the magnitude-8.8 quake threatened every nation around the Pacific Ocean — roughly a quarter of the globe.
Interior Minister Edmundo Perez Yoma said the most powerful quake to hit the country in a half-century killed at least 82 people, but the death toll was rising quickly.
In the town of Talca, just 65 miles (105 kilometers) from the epicenter, Associated Press journalist Roberto Candia said it felt as if a giant had grabbed him and shaken him.
The town's historic center, filled with buildings of adobe mud and straw, largely collapsed, though most of those were businesses that were not inhabited during the 3:34 a.m. (1:34 a.m. EST, 0634 GMT) quake. Neighbors pulled at least five people from the rubble while emergency workers, themselves disoriented, asked for information from reporters.
Many roads were destroyed, and electricity, water and phone lines were cut to many areas — meaning there was no word of death or damage from many outlying areas.
In the Chilean capital of Santiago, 200 miles (325 kilometers) northeast of the epicenter, a car dangled from a collapsed overpass, the national Fine Arts Museum was badly damaged and an apartment building's two-story parking lot pancaked, smashing about 50 cars whose alarms rang incessantly.
Experts warned that a tsunami could strike anywhere in the Pacific, and Hawaii could face its largest waves since 1964 starting at 11:19 a.m. (4:19 p.m. EST, 2119 GMT), according to Charles McCreery, director of the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center.
Tsunami waves were likely to hit Asian, Australian and New Zealand shores within 24 hours of the earthquake. The U.S. West Coast and Alaska, too, were threatened.
A huge wave swept into a populated area in the Robinson Crusoe Islands, 410 miles (660 kilometers) off the Chilean coast, President Michelle Bachelet said, but there were no immediate reports of major damage.
Bachelet had no information on the number of people injured. She declared a "state of catastrophe" in central Chile.
"We have had a huge earthquake, with some aftershocks," she said from an emergency response center. She said Chile has not asked for assistance from other countries, and urged Chileans not to panic.
"The system is functioning. People should remain calm. We're doing everything we can with all the forces we have. Any information we will share immediately," she said.
Powerful aftershocks rattled Chile's coast — 24 of them magnitude 5 or greater and one reaching magnitude 6.9 — the U.S. Geological Survey reported.
In Santiago, modern buildings are built to withstand earthquakes, but many older ones were heavily damaged, including the Nuestra Senora de la Providencia church, whose bell tower collapsed. A bridge just outside the capital also collapsed, and at least one car flipped upside down.
Several hospitals were evacuated due to earthquake damage, Bachelet said.
Santiago's airport will remain closed for at least 24 hours, airport director Eduardo del Canto said. The passenger terminal suffered major damage, he told Chilean television in a telephone interview. TV images show smashed windows, partially collapsed ceilings and pedestrian walkways destroyed.
Santiago's subway was shut as well and hundreds of buses were trapped at a terminal by a damaged bridge, Transportation and Telecommunications Minister told Chilean television. He urged Chileans to make phone calls or travel only when absolutely necessary.
Candia was visiting his wife's 92-year-old grandmother in Talca when the quake struck.
"Everything was falling — chests of drawers, everything," he said. "I was sleeping with my 8-year-old son Diego and I managed to cover his head with a pillow. It was like major turbulence on an airplane."
In Concepcion, 70 miles (115 kilometers) from the epicenter, nurses and residents pushed the injured through the streets on stretchers. Others walked around in a daze wrapped in blankets, some carrying infants in their arms.
Concepcion, Chile's second-largest city, is 60 miles (95 kilometers) from the ski town of Chillan, a gateway to Andean ski resorts that was destroyed in a 1939 earthquake.
The quake also shook buildings in Argentina's capital of Buenos Aires, 900 miles (1,400 kilometers) away on the Atlantic side of South America.
Marco Vidal, a program director for Grand Circle Travel who was traveling with a group of 34 Americans, was on the 19th floor of the Crown Plaza Santiago hotel when the quake struck.
"All the things start to fall. The lamps, everything, was going on the floor," he said. "I felt terrified."
Cynthia Iocono, from Linwood, Pennsylvania, said she first thought the quake was a train.
"But then I thought, `Oh, there's no train here.' And then the lamps flew off the dresser and my TV flew off onto the floor and crashed."
The quake struck after concert-goers had left South America's leading music festival in the coastal city of Vina del Mar, but it caught partiers leaving a disco.
"It was very bad. People were screaming. Some people were running, others appeared paralyzed. I was one of them," Julio Alvarez told Radio Cooperativa.
The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center called for "urgent action to protect lives and property" in Hawaii, which is among 53 nations and territories subject to tsunami warnings.
"Sea level readings indicate a tsunami was generated. It may have been destructive along coasts near the earthquake epicenter and could also be a threat to more distant coasts," the warning center said. It did not expect a tsunami along the west of the U.S. or Canada.
The largest earthquake ever recorded struck the same area of Chile on May 22, 1960. The magnitude-9.5 quake killed 1,655 people and left 2 million homeless. The tsunami that it caused killed people in Hawaii, Japan and the Philippines and caused damage to the west coast of the United States.
___
Eva Vergara reported from Santiago, Chile. Associated Press Television News cameraman Mauricio Cuevas in Santiago and AP writer Sandy Kozel in Washington contributed to this story.
Strong quake hits southern Japan
February 26, 2010
A strong earthquake has hit Japan's southern Okinawa island, prompting a tsunami warning for waves of up to two metres in some areas to be issued, but later withdrawn.
Japan’s Meteorological Agency said that the 6.9 quake occurred off the coast of the island of Okinawa at a depth of 10km at 5.31am on Saturday (2031 GMT on Friday).
The US Geological Survey said the earthquake had a 7.3 magnitude.
Noritomi Kikuzato, an Okinawa prefectural police official, said there were no reports of injuries or major damage.
Seiboku Sueyoshi, an official in Naha city, southern Okinawa, said: "First there was a strong vertical shake, then sideways. The strong quake lasted for about 10 seconds."
Small waves of around 10cms were recorded in southern areas of Okinawa island, Japan’s Meteorological Agency said, adding that additional minor surges of the sea level may still be seen near the island.
'Big one' feared
Earthquakes are common in Japan, one of the world's most seismically active areas.
The country accounts for about 20 per cent of the world's earthquakes of magnitude 6 or greater.
Geologists warn that Japan is overdue for a massive and potentially devastating earthquake.
They point to an 87 per cent chance that the "Big One" - a magnitude-eight earthquake or worse - will strike the greater Tokyo region, home to around 35 million people, within the next 30 years.
The last time a massive earthquake struck Tokyo was in 1923, when the Great Kanto Earthquake claimed more than 140,000 lives, many of them in fires.
In October 2004, an earthquake with a magnitude of 6.8 struck the Niigata region in northern Japan, killing 65 people and injuring more than 3,000.
That was the deadliest quake since a magnitude 7.3 tremor hit the city of Kobe in 1995, killing more than 6,400.
Janet Clem, 37, looks at the damage to her home in Mt. Carmel, Ill. Friday morning April 18, 2008 after the 5.2 early morning earth quake. The quake is believed to have involved the Wabash fault, about six miles north of Mount Carmel. (AP)
WEST SALEM, Ill. -- Bricks shook loose and fell from buildings. Walls cracked. Books tumbled off shelves.
A 5.2-magnitude earthquake centered near this southern Illinois town struck before dawn Friday, shaking things up from Nebraska to Atlanta but doing little damage and seriously hurting no one. It was the kind of temblor that might be ignored in earthquake-savvy California.
But the quake rattled nerves across the Midwest as it rocked skyscrapers in Chicago, 230 miles north of here, and sent people scrambling for their TV sets in Milwaukee, Cincinnati and Louisville, Ky., where bricks toppled to the pavement.
''We thought it (the house) was falling on us, we really did,'' said 85-year-old Anna Mae Williams, who was shaken awake at 4:37 a.m. in tiny West Salem, six miles from the epicenter.
Dozens of aftershocks followed, including one with a magnitude of 4.6.
The quake is believed to have involved an extension of the New Madrid fault, a network of deep cracks in the earth's surface, the U.S. Geological Survey said. The fault is at the center of the nation's most active seismic zone east of the Rockies, something that's known to Midwest residents -- even if they forget it now and then.
The last severe earthquake in the region was a 5.0 magnitude quake that shook a nearby area in 2002.
Williams said she knew exactly what was happening because it reminded her of an earlier earthquake, back in 1968. Others had no idea what was going on.
Janet Clem of nearby Mt. Carmel thought a nearby power plant had exploded.
It was the realization that what she'd heard -- ''a heckuva rumble then a loud kaboom'' -- was in fact one of the most powerful earthquakes in Illinois history that had her so afraid.
''I'm terrified, I'm not going to lie to you,'' she said after the earthquake that collapsed her porch. ''I've never experienced anything like that and I don't want to experience it again.''
The earthquake was the talk of towns throughout much of the Midwest.
''I just saw my house just shake. Golly,'' said Mike Morrow of Mount Carmel, his eyes widening during an aftershock that hit as he was interviewed by a reporter.
Morrow's two-story apartment building was evacuated because of loose and falling bricks. The initial quake woke the 30-year-old and startled his pit bull.
''He was about as scared as I was,'' Morrow said. ''We both just froze.''
Though nowhere close to the power of the nation's most famous quakes -- including the devastating temblor that hit San Francisco exactly 102 years ago Friday -- it was enough to remind people of the risk that exists in the Midwest.
In 1811 and 1812, the New Madrid fault produced a series of earthquakes estimated at magnitude 7.0 or greater said to be felt as far away as Boston. They were centered in the Missouri town of New Madrid (pronounced MAD'-rid), 140 miles southeast of St. Louis.
Experts said that with the much higher population in the Midwest, another major quake along the New Madrid fault zone could destroy buildings, bridges, roads and other infrastructure, disrupt communications and isolate areas.
Road crews in Kentucky and Indiana were out early Friday, inspecting bridges and overpasses, and work crews took a close look at skyscraper construction sites in Chicago.
Early homeowner damage claims received by State Farm, the largest provider of earthquake coverage in the area, were mostly for cracks in drywall and foundations, spokeswoman Missy Lundberg said.
Many residents said they felt helpless.
''I tell you, it was scary,'' said Williams. ''There was no warning at all.''
David Behm of Philo, 10 miles south of Champaign, said he was awakened by the quake.
''Windows were rattling, and you could hear it,'' he said. ''The house was shaking inches. For people in central Illinois, this is a big deal. It's not like California.''
Norway Time Hole “Leak” Plunges Northern Hemisphere Into Chaos
By: Sorcha Faal, and as reported to her Western Subscribers
Russian scientists are reporting to Prime Minister Putin today that the high-energy beam [photo top left] fired into the upper heavens of the United States High rom the Frequency Active Auroral Research Program (HHARP) radar facility in Ramfjordmoen, Norway this past month has resulted in a “catastrophic puncturing” of our Plant’s thermosphere thus allowing into the troposphere an “unimpeded thermalinversion” of the exosphere, which is the outermost layer of Earth's atmosphere.
To how catastrophic for our Planet this massive thermal inversion has been Anthony Nunan, an assistant general manager for risk management at Mitsubishi Corporation in Tokyo, is reporting today that the entire Northern Hemisphere is in winter chaos, with the greatest danger from this unprecedented Global event being the destruction of billions of dollars worth of crops in a World already nearing the end of its ability to feed its self.
So powerful has this thermal inversion become that reports from the United Statesare stating that their critical crops of strawberries, oranges, and other fruits and vegetables grown in their Southern States, are being destroyed by record cold temperatures. The US is further reporting record amounts of snowfall in what they are now warning may be their worst winter in 25 years.
Reports from the United Kingdom today are, likewise, showing a Nation in chaos as brutal cold temperatures continue to batter the British people suffering under the worst snow blizzards to hit them in almost 50 years. So dire has it become in the UK that their National Grid yesterday issued only its second warning in its entire history stating that their Nation’s gas supply was running out due to this unprecedented event.
Not just to the UK, but also to the entire European Union has this thermal inversion been affecting as reports from that region show continued chaos is occurring due to plunging temperatures and snows. In the UK, also, reports are showing that the military has been called out to rescue over 1,000 stranded vehicles.
Though the Motherland, and its people, are some of the best equipped in the World to handle such severe winter conditions, the Russian island of Sakhalin was inundated this past week by a rare Snow Cyclone setting off no less than avalanches.
But to the worst affected region of the Northern Hemisphere no one has been hit harder than China, where in what is being described as a “soul-destroying snowstorm”this Asian Nation has been plunged into such havoc the entire country has been brought to a standstill. China further reports that the massive snowstorms hitting them are their worst in 60 years and necessitating their military forces to save over 1,400 people trapped when their train became covered in snow. So overwhelmed by this unprecedented event has China become that they have ordered all of their citizens to help with snow removal too.
Canada, another Nation used to extreme winter events, reports that the storm that had hit their maritime provinces this past week was so powerful buildings were knocked off of their foundations in what one resident, Tom Jardine, described as being “worse than a hurricane”.
To the long-term consequences of this thermal inversion caused by the West, these reports further warn that by the puncturing of our atmosphere by the HHARP radars our Planet has, also, been “needlessly exposed” to the growing threat posed to us by the giant mysterious object currently approaching us (named by NASA as G1.9) which we had previously reported on in our January 3rd report titled “Russia Prepares For Asteroid Strike As New Comet Nears Sun”, and which has been blamed for the rapid shifting of our Earth’s North Pole that was first documented in 2005.
But to the most critical aspect of these events it surely lies with the Western World’s continued arrogance in regards to experimenting on both our Planet
EXTREME WEATHER
GULF STREAM AT A HAULT FROM GULF OIL TRAGEDY - COULD CREATE A MINI ICE AGE
September 6, 2010
Anonymous said...
Up to 70cm of snow has fallen in the past 36 hours on northern Alpine glaciers.
Solden is currently hoping to start their winter 2010-11 season a month earlier than planned, this weekend September 4th, following the heavy snow fall there - they've currently got a 61cm base.
The Pitztal Glacier has announced 50cm of fresh snow.
The Kitzsteinhorn Glacier above Kaprun has had several feet of new snow and now boasts 55 - 65cm over a 500m vertical.
Dachstein glacier reports a foot of new snow.
The Molltal glacier has had 50cm of new snow and now has a 1.3m base.
In Germany the Zugspitz glacier has reported 70cm of new snow.
It Italy Val Senales reports 30cm of new snow taking its total base to a metre.
This report was swept under the rug along with all other studies showing the true damage from the politically-managed cover-up of the oil disaster. However, there are now very unusual record cold snaps and snow happening, just days after Stirling's report. Here are a just a few reports of strange cold weather since the Gulf spill:
South America experienced record cold this winter resulting in millions of fish and other wild life dying off.
Even Los Angeles had the coldest summer days on record prompting the July LA Times headline "What Summer?" And on September 1st the National Weather Service reported, "DAILY RECORD LOW MAXIMUM TEMPERATURES WERE SET OR TIED AT LOS ANGELES AIRPORT ON 16 DAYS IN THE MONTH OF AUGUST 2010."
AP – Luis Colon uses an umbrella to shield himself from rain and wind caused by the approaching Hurricane …
Earl batters Caribbean, threatens US East Coast
By MIKE MELIA, Associated Press Writer – Mon Aug 30, 7:40 pm ET
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico – Hurricane Earl battered tiny islands across the northeastern Caribbean with heavy rain and roof-ripping winds Monday, rapidly intensifying into a major Category 4 storm on a path projected to menace the United States.
Already dangerous with sustained winds of 135 mph (215 kph), Earl is expected to gain more strength before potentially brushing the U.S. East Coast this week and bringing deadly rip currents.
The U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami warned coastal residents from North Carolina to Maine to watch the storm closely.
"Any small shift in the track could dramatically alter whether it makes landfall or whether it remains over the open ocean," said Wallace Hogsett, a meteorologist at the center. "I can't urge enough to just stay tuned."
In the Caribbean, Earl caused flooding in low-lying areas and damaged homes on islands including Antigua and Barbuda, Anguilla and St. Maarten. Several countries and territories reported power outages. Cruise ships were diverted and flights canceled across the region.
"We are getting a battering with wind and rain," said Martin Gussie, a police officer in Anguilla. Several utility poles were down and a couple of roofs had blown away, and it was still too dangerous to go out and assess the full extent of damage, he said.
The storm's center passed just north of the British Virgin Islands on Monday afternoon. It was gradually moving away from the Caribbean and was forecast to approach the U.S. Mid-Atlantic region around Thursday, before curving back out to sea, potentially swiping New England or far-eastern Canada.
The Hurricane Center said it was too early to say what effect Earl would have in the U.S., but warned it could at least kick up dangerous rip currents. A surfer died in Florida and a Maryland swimmer has been missing since Saturday in waves spawned by former Hurricane Danielle, which weakened to a tropical storm Monday far out in the north Atlantic.
Craig Fugate, administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, said Earl's approach ought to serve as a reminder for Atlantic coastal states to update their evacuation plans.
"It wouldn't take much to have the storm come ashore somewhere on the coast," Fugate said. "The message is for everyone to pay attention."
Close on Earl's heels, Tropical Storm Fiona formed Monday afternoon in the open Atlantic. The storm, with maximum winds of 40 mph (64 kph), was projected to pass just north of the Leeward Islands by Wednesday and stay farther out in the Atlantic than Earl's northward path. Fiona wasn't expected to reach hurricane strength over the next several days.
The rapid development of Earl, which only became a hurricane Sunday, took some islanders and tourists by surprise.
Wind was already rattling the walls of Lila Elly Ali's wooden house in Anegada, the northernmost of the British Virgin Islands, when she and her son went out to nail the doors shut Monday.
"They say the eye of the storm is supposed to come close to us, so we've just got to pray. Everyone here is keeping in touch, listening to the radio," the 58-year-old said by phone from the island of 280 people.
At El Conquistador Resort in Fajardo, Puerto Rico, people lined up at the reception desk, the lights occasionally flickering, to check out and head to the airport. There, more delays awaited.
John and Linda Helton of Boulder, Colorado, opted to ride out the storm. The couple, celebrating their 41st wedding anniversary, finished a cruise Sunday and planned to spend three days in Puerto Rico.
"There was a huge line of people checking out as we were coming in, and I thought it was just that summer vacation must be over," said John Helton, a real estate appraiser. "But we paid for the room, so we might as well stick it out."
"I don't think we could get a flight even if we wanted to leave," Linda Helton added.
There were no reports so far of major damage from Earl.
In St. Maarten, sand and debris littered the streets, and winds knocked down trees and electricity poles and damaged roofs. But police spokesman Ricardo Henson said there was no extensive damage to property.
Alisha Daya, a 24-year-old tourist from Milwaukee, wore earplugs but still had trouble sleeping overnight because of the wind and crashing waves at the Oyster Bay Beach Resort.
"It was loud because we were right on the ocean," Daya said, adding that the storm delayed their planned departure Monday but the worst seemed to be over.
In Antigua, at least one home was destroyed but there were no reports of serious injuries. Governor General Dame Louise Agnetha Lake-Tack declared Monday a public holiday to keep islanders off the road and give them a chance to clean up.
Jeremy Collymoore, head of the Barbados-based Caribbean Disaster Emergency Response Agency, said islands such as Antigua and Anguilla appeared to have been spared worse damage because they were raked by the system's northwestern quadrant — the most forgiving part.
Mudslides and flooding were still a risk, with 4 to 8 inches (10 to 20 centimeters) of rain forecast to fall on islands including Puerto Rico.
The U.S. Virgin Islands imposed a curfew for Monday night.
The Hovensa LLC oil refinery in St. Croix said operations were normal except for the harbor, which was closed along with all ports in the U.S. Virgin Islands by order of the Coast Guard.
Monday afternoon, Earl was about 110 miles (180 kilometers) northeast of San Juan, Puerto Rico, and headed west-northwest at 15 mph (24 kph), according to the center in Miami. Hurricane-force winds extended outward up to 70 miles (110 kilometers) from its center.
___
Associated Press writers Ben Fox in Fajardo, Puerto Rico, Anika Kentish in St. John's, Antigua, Judy Fitzpatrick in Philipsburg, St. Maarten, Clive Bacchus in Basseterre, St. Kitts, David McFadden in San Juan and Sofia Mannos in Washington contributed to this report.
Antarctic Glacier Has Five-story Blood-red Waterfall of Primodial Ooze
There is a five-story, blood-red waterfall pouring slowly from the Taylor Glacier in Antarctica's McMurdo Dry Valley. Its back story, at Atlas Obscura, is simply remarkable:
Roughly 2 million years ago, the Taylor Glacier sealed beneath it a small body of water which contained an ancient community of microbes. Trapped below a thick layer of ice, they have remained there ever since, isolated inside a natural time capsule. Evolving independently of the rest of the living world, these microbes exist without heat, light, or oxygen, and are essentially the definition of "primordial ooze." The trapped lake has very high salinity and is rich in iron, which gives the waterfall its red color. A fissure in the glacier allows the subglacial lake to flow out, forming the falls without contaminating the ecosystem within.
One takeaway here is that life possible in extreme conditions. That said, in the absence of ideal conditions, life can evolve without begetting plants or birds or cuddly mammals or sentient beings who write blogs on the internet; it just begets a glob of ooze.
1 Million Fish Dead in Bolivian Ecological Disaster
(3 Aug. 2010 - Update: The number of dead fish and other water-dependent wildlife has increased to about 6 million.)
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9 Aug. 2010 update: Due to the extremely high degree of interest and numerous comments generated by this event, we interviewed authorities today and took them the questions YOU posted in our forums. Here's what really caused the fish to die.
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Over 1 million fish and thousands of alligators, turtles, dolphins and other river wildlife are floating dead in numerous Bolivian rivers in the three eastern/southern departments of Santa Cruz, Beni and Tarija. The extreme cold front that hit Bolivia in mid-July caused water temperatures to dip below the minimum temperatures river life can tolerate. As a consequence, rivers, lakes, lagoons and fisheries are brimming with decomposing fish and other creatures.
Unprecedented: Nothing like this has ever been seen in this magnitude in Bolivia. Inhabitants of riverside communities report the smell is nauseating and can be detected as far as a kilometer away from river banks. River communities, whose livelihoods depend on fishing, fear they'll run out of food and will have nothing to sell. Authorities are concerned there will be a shortage of fish in markets and are more concerned by possible threats to public health, especially in communities that also use river water for bathing and drinking, but also fear contaminated or decaying fish may end up in market stalls. They've begun a campaign to ensure market vendors and the public know how to tell the difference between fresh and unhealthy fish.
In university fish ponds and commercial fisheries the losses are also catastrophic.
For automatic updates on this and other news stories, please subscribe to the BoliviaBella.com Blog. We'll run more information on it when we have news.
CHECK OUT THE VIDEO TO YOUR LEFT
LUKE 21:25-28 25 And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring;
27 And then shall they see the Son of man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. 28 And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.
Record cold temperatures hit several South American nations, including Argentina, Paraguay, Bolivia, Chile, and Uruguay, leaving more than two dozen people dead.
People bundle up on the streets of Buenos Aires Monday as record cold temperatures hit several South American nations.
At least 26 people have died in Argentina from a combination of exposure to harsh climates, poisoning from carbon monoxide inhalation, and other factors, according to the Associated Press.
The front, which set in Saturday, has remained over many of the countries in the Southern Hemisphere, which are in the height of winter now.
As authorities respond to shelter for thousands in need, the cold snap could wreak havoc on farmers for months to come. Argentina is just coming out of one of its worst droughts in five decades, which saw cows dying and grassland shriveled last year. In neighboring Paraguay, authorities say approximately 1,000 cattle have frozen to death.
Ten people have died in Paraguay, while in Uruguay, two deaths have been reported due to low temperatures as of Tuesday. The Andina news agency reports that pregnant alpacas in Peru have been losing their babies.
As one reader noted on the CNN website: “I think many people are failing to realize that in some parts of these countries there is no infrastructure to handle these temperatures. While it may seem like a mild winter to some of us in the US, these places do not have similar well-heated homes. Some of them live in basic shacks.”
In Bolivia, school was canceled through at least Wednesday, as the nation faced 18 deaths due to low temperatures. In the eastern city of Santa Cruz de la Sierra, an opposition stronghold in this normally tropical region, the temperature, at 37 F., was the lowest reported in nearly three decades. Elsewhere in the country it dropped below freezing.
In Chile, the Associated Press reports that the capital, Santiago, has turned a sports stadium into a shelter after one reported death linked to exposure.
And further south, in the Aysen region (Summer Photo Essay), heavy snow has cut off access to many small towns that dot this sparsely populated province. Weather forecasters say that this cold front could persist through tonight, and into tomorrow.
Flooding and landslides from Tropical Storm Agatha have killed more
than 150 people throughout Central America in the past few days, and
apparently caused a giant Guatemala City sinkhole.
Personal comment...I feel that this is being engineered to weaken the
techtonic plates. Or, they wanted to cause another earthquake that
failed. These plates all connect...the Chile Quake, The Argintina Quake,
the Haiti Quake, and now a sink hole, or a beam hole. They are
weakening the fault lines to cause a major crisis...could be the big
California Quake! Let's watch the next move.
What on earth, or not on earth, make that perfectly round hole with
apparently no bottom.
SOMETHING IS WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE....LOOKS LIKE A BEAM FROM HAARP DID THIS!!!!!!!!!!!
THIS WAS JUST A TROPICAL STORM WITH WINDS OF 45 MPH............HMMMMMMMMMMM
Tropical Cyclone Phet In the Arabian Sea????? Hmmmm
Tropical Cyclone Phet raged over the Arabian Sea just off the coast of Oman on June 2, 2010. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite captured this natural-color image the same day. Northwest of the storm’s eye, one of Phet’s spiral arms skirts the coastline. Inland, skies are clear.
On June 2, 2010, the U.S. Navy’s Joint Typhoon Warning Center (JTWC) reported that Tropical Cyclone Phet had maximum sustained winds of 125 knots (230 kilometers per hour) and gusts up to 150 knots (280 kilometers per hour). The storm was located roughly 560 nautical miles (1,040 kilometers) southwest of Karachi, Pakistan.(How convienent is that-Is the US ready to strike?) The storm had been slowly moving toward the northwest over several hours.
The JTWC stated that conditions favored continued intensification, and forecast that the storm would make landfall in Oman on June 3 before dissipating. Once over Oman, the JTWC expected, Phet would turn eastward and cross back over the northern Arabian Sea, but it would not remain significant storm at that time.
Tropical Cyclone Phet the 2nd strongest Arabian Sea storm on record
The record heat over southern Asia in May has helped heat up the Arabian Sea to 2°C above normal. The exceptionally warm SSTs have helped fuel a rare major hurricane in the Arabian Sea today, as Tropical Cyclone Phet underwent an impressive bout of rapid intensification this morning to become a Category 4 storm with 145 mph winds. Phet is a Thai word pronounced as Pet, meaning "Diamond". Intense hurricanes are rare in the Arabian Sea, due to the basin's small size, the interference of the summer monsoon, and the frequent presence of dry air and dust from the Arabian Peninsula. Phet is now the second strongest tropical cyclone ever recorded in the Arabian Sea, behind Category 5 Cyclone Gonu of 2007, which devastated Oman. Third place is held by the 2001 India Cyclone 01A and Very Severe Cyclonic Storm ARB 01 (02A), which were Category 3 storms with 125 mph winds.
Phet is over some of the warmest ocean waters on the planet, 30 - 31°C (86 - 88°F), and warm waters in excess of 26.5°C (80°F) extend to a depth of at least 50 meters (165 feet), resulting in a Tropical Cyclone Heat Potential high enough to allow Phet to attain Category 5 status. Phet is under moderate wind shear of 10 - 20 knots. The Joint Typhoon Warning Center (JTWC) is forecasting Phet to become a Category 5 storm later today. The storm is moving slowly north-northwest towards Oman, and could ingest dry air from the Arabian Peninsula on Thursday, resulting in weakening. It now appears likely that Phet will make landfall in Oman before recurving to the northeast and hitting Pakistan. The region of Oman likely to get hit is sparsely populated, so wind and storm surge damage will not be the main concerns. Phet will spread heavy rains over the heavily populated northern regions of Oman, which will likely cause extreme flooding. Phet has the potential to be worse for Oman than Tropical Cyclone Gonu, which did $4.2 billion in damage and killed 50 people in June 2007.
Impact on Pakistan Phet is on track to make landfall in Pakistan or Iran after hitting Oman. Phet will be much weakened by passage over Oman, and may only be a tropical storm after crossing the Gulf of Oman and arriving at the Iran/Pakistan coast. Still, Phet's rains could easily cause destructive floods in Iran and Pakistan.
Water Discharge Increases At Attabad, Spillway Breakage Fears Wednesday, June 2, 2010 at 5:18 pm under Pakistan News
HUNZA: The water outflow from Hunza Lake has reached to 1400 cusecs creating fears of breakage of spillway during next 24 hours.
According to official sources, the seepage from the spillway has been reached to 1400 cusecs and the water level in the lake has been soared to 8.5 feet since May 29. Next 24 hours are crucial as spillway boundaries are more like to be destroyed due to immense water pressure, they added.
Home department of Gilgit Baltistan announced that Gilgit-Hunza section of Karakoram Highway will remain open for traffic till 4:00 pm today. Helicopter service is also operating in the affected areas to evacuate people and drop relief goods.
Tropical Cyclone Bandu will move through the Gulf of Aden Sunday, passing between Yemen and Somalia. Tropical cyclones are very rare in this part of the world.
Bandu originated over the open, warm waters of the Arabian Sea this past week. The cyclone has remained below hurricane strength.
The north coast of Somalia was grazed by Bandu Friday into Saturday with heavy rain and strong winds.
Bandu will pass through the middle of the Gulf of Aden Sunday, keeping the worst effects offshore. However, some rain will reach both the southern coast of Yemen and northern Somalia.
Between 1 and 3 inches of rain could cause flash flooding as Bandu passes. Wind gusts could top 40 mph near the coast, but strong wind gusts of 60 to 70 mph are expected to remain offshore.
The last major tropical cyclone to impact this area was Cyclone Gonu. It struck Oman in June 2007. Gonu was the strongest cyclone ever to form in the Arabian Sea with peak sustained winds of 150 mph. Gonu made landfall in Oman, causing dozens of deaths.
Earth Watch: Giant Dust Storm swallows Chinese village(June 2, 2010)
GOLMUD - "Like a scene from a Hollywood disaster movie, a towering cloud of sand dwarfs the rows of uniform houses as it descends on a small village in central China. Residents hid inside their homes with their windows and doors locked shut as the dust storm swept through the region advancing 70ft a minute. Day turned to night as tons of dust temporarily blocked out the sun and reduced visibility to around 600ft. But suddenly the storm calmed and the mile-high cloud settled back to Earth again, leaving villagers with a major clean-up operation. Golmud is home to 200,000 people with 140,000 living in the city centre. The new industrial city is built on a flat expanse close to the borders of the Gobi desert, which is the largest desert in Asia. Although not an ideal place to live, tens of thousands of people have relocated there to work at the salt lakes in the region. But the prospect of a good job and lots of living space comes at a price. Every spring strong winds blow across the Gobi creating huge columns of dust and sand, which are then dumped nearby. The dust can cause frequent power blackouts, transport delays and respiratory illness. The Gobi sand even travels as far as Beijing, with nearly a million tons of desert blown into the city each year. In March this year China's capital turned orange during a particularly ferocious dust storm. More than a quarter of China - around one million square miles - is covered in sand with the Gobi covering northern parts of the country. the bad news for the government is that the desert is growing despite their best efforts to contain it. The process of desertification has been worsened by over-grazing, deforestation, urban sprawl and an increasingly erratic climate. The Chinese Academy of Sciences estimates that the number of sandstorms has jumped six-fold in the past 50 years to two dozen a year. Around 80 per cent of them occur between March and May. Unless the government can find an effective way to stop the desert from spreading these impressive storm scenes will continue." -Daily Mail
Iceberg breaks loose in Antarctica
February 26, 2010
The iceberg broke off from the Mertz Glacier Tongue, a 160km spit of ice in the Southern Ocean [AFP]
An iceberg the size of the European country of Luxembourg has broken off from a glacier in Antarctica in an event that could disrupt ocean circulation patterns around the world, scientists warn.
Nearly 3,000 square kilometres of iceberg broke off earlier this month from the tip of the Mertz glacier that juts out into the Southern Ocean from east Antarctica, Australian scientists said on Friday.
The incident occurred when another, older iceberg, known as B9B, crashed into the Mertz glacier, ripping off a billion-tonne mass of ice.
The two icebergs are drifting together about 100 to 150km off eastern Antarctica following the collision on February 12 or 13, Neal Young, an Australian Antarctic Division glaciologist, told The Associated Press news agency.
"It gave it a pretty big nudge," Neal Young, an Australian Antarctic Division glaciologist, told The Associated Press news agency, speaking about the older iceberg.
Massive icebergs
The two icebergs are drifting together about 100 to 150km off eastern Antarctica following the collision on February 12 or 13, Young said.
in depth
"They are now floating right next to each other."
Each massive block of ice contains enough water to supply a fifth of the world's needs for an entire year.
Scientists said the impact of the incident may not be felt for decades or longer, but a slowdown in the production of colder, dense water could result in less temperate winters in the north Atlantic.
They said both natural cycles and man-made climate change can contribute to the collapse of ice shelves and glaciers.
'Entirely natural'
However, David Santillo, a scientist with Greenpeace Research Laboratories in the UK, said evidence indicates the event is rare, but "entirely natural".
"That doesnt' mean that we shouldn't be concerned about it. It could have some far-reaching impact," he told Al Jazeera.
"The area in which these icebergs are located isn't usually an area where you would find a lot of sea ice.
"It could make it more difficult for the key species in those ecosystems to be able to find their food. They may have to travel farther.
"The second concern is that this is one of a few major areas around the globe that is important for the development of very cold, dense oxygen-rich water, which sinks to the sea floor and keeps the deep oceanswell-oxygenated.
"If this interferes with that process, by making the water less dense, that could have far reaching impacts on a ... global scale over many years."
Giant iceberg heading toward Australia
ByAdminFriday, January 8, 2010
(CNN)—A massive iceberg—more than twice the size of New York’s Manhattan island—is drifting slowly toward Australia, scientists said Wednesday.
The iceberg, measuring 140 square km (54 square miles), cleaved off an ice shelf nearly 10 years ago and had been floating near Antarctica before commencing on its unusual journey north.
Named B17B, it was about 1,700 km (1,056 miles) off the coast of West Australia, according to the country’s Antarctic Division.
“B17B is a very significant one in that it has drifted so far north while still largely intact,” said Australian Antarctic Division glaciologist Neal Young, who spotted the slab using satellite images taken by NASA and the European Space Agency… more
ICEBURG HEADED TO AUSTRALIA
AFP/Australian Antarctic Division/Ho – A NASA satellite image of iceberg B17B (C), floating southwest off the West Australian coast. Australian …
Fri Dec 11, 2:34 am ET
SYDNEY (AFP) – Australian authorities Friday issued a shipping alert over a gigantic iceberg that is gradually approaching the country's southwest coast.
The Bureau of Meteorology said the once-in-a-century cliff of ice, which dislodged from Antarctica about a decade ago before drifting north, was being monitored using satellites.
"Mariners are advised that at 1200 GMT on December 9, an iceberg approximately 1,700 kilometres (1,054 miles) south-southwest of the West Australian coast was observed," it said, giving the iceberg's coordinates.
"The iceberg is 140 square kilometres in area -- 19 kilometres long by eight kilometres wide."
Experts believe the iceberg -- known as B17B -- is likely to break up as it enters warmer waters nearer Australia, creating hundreds of smaller icebergs in a hazard to passing ships.
"It's still 1,700 kilometres away, so it's quite a long way away, it's not really on our doorstep yet but it's been heading steadily towards us," glaciologist Neal Young said Thursday.
Young earlier told AFP that an iceberg of that size had probably not been seen in the area since the days when 19th century clipper sailing ships plied the trade route between Britain and Australia.
The iceberg has been floating around Antarctica since shearing off the icey continent but had lately begun heading north because of ocean currents and weather conditions.
Its discovery comes after two other large icebergs were spotted further east, off Australia's Macquarie Island, followed by more than 100 smaller chunks heading towards New Zealand.
Young described the icebergs as uncommon, but said they could become more frequent if sea temperatures rise through global warming.
A train passenger quenches his thirst in Allahabad as temperatures in the Indian city soared above 113 degrees Fahrenheit. Photograph: Diptendu Dutta/AFP/Getty Images
Record temperatures in northern India have claimed hundreds of lives in what is believed to be the hottest summer in the country since records began in the late 1800s.
The death toll is expected to rise with experts forecasting temperatures approaching 50C (122F) in coming weeks. More than 100 people are reported to have died in the state of Gujarat where the mercury topped at 48.5C last week. At least 90 died in Maharashtra, 35 in Rajasthan and 34 in Bihar.
Hospitals in Gujarat have been receiving around 300 people a day suffering from food poisoning and heat stroke, ministers said. Officials admit the figures are only a fraction of the total as most of the casualties are found in remote rural villages.
Wildlife and livestock has also suffered with voluntary organisations in Gujarat reporting the deaths of bats and crows and dozens of peacocks reported dead at a forest reserve in Uttar Pradesh.
"Because of the heat, lakes and other water bodies have been reduced to parched land, making dehydration common in such birds," said Neeraj Srivastava, a wildlife campaigner.
Even India's northern hill stations – historically a refuge from the heat – have not escaped. Temperatures in Shimla, recorded a peak temperature of 32.4 Celsius, eight degrees hotter than the seasonal average.
After a drought last year, India's farmers are now impatient for the arrival of the monsoon, which irrigates 60% of India's fields. National meteorologists have forecast "normal" rains for this year, a relief in a country where prices of basic foodstuffs have rocketed in recent months due to growing shortages and structural problems with agriculture.
Forecasters have predicted that the south-west monsoon could arrive over the southern state of Kerala as early as today, but it is unlikely to reach the parched north before the end of June.
"It's too long to wait. We'll all go mad before," said Sanjoy Kumar, who sells dumplings from a stall in south Delhi.
The capital has sweltered under intense heat for weeks though, having endured temperatures of around 45C last week, dust storms and scattered rain brought some relief over the weekend. The new air-conditioned metro has seen record numbers of passengers as travellers abandon buses, taxis and auto rickshaws.
Parts of the city have suffered prolonged electricity blackouts and, in outlying suburbs, water shortages. In upmarket Mehrauli village, residents were forced to buy from private suppliers plying door to door with tankers. In the new town of Gurgaon, entire apartment blocks have run short. In the city of Nagpur, Maharashtra, petrol pumps ran dry after railway wagons which normally carry fuel were switched to supply water.
The Indian Meterological Department attributes the record heat to lack of atmospheric humidity, hot dry winds blowing across the south-western Thar desert and the effects of last year's El Nino cycle.
Mean temperatures for both March and April were the highest in more than 100 years.
Columnists have wondered why, given that scorching temperatures in India are inevitable, the heat has become the centre of every conversation. For Jug Suraiya, a well-known writer, the answer lies in the concept of karma and rebirth.
"That's why we moan and bitch and bellyache," Suraiya explained in The Times of India newspaper. "Because by doing so we hope in our next incarnation, life will, in all senses of the term, be cool."
expected to rise as India faces record temperatures of up to 122F in hottest summer on record
UNUSUAL TROPICAL STORM IN THE EASTERN ATLANTIC IN JANUARY???
Posted by: Jeff Masters, 3:04 PM GMT on February 01, 2010
An interesting 1002 mb low pressure system with some characteristics of a tropical storm has developed off the coast of Africa, a few hundred miles west-southwest of the Canary Islands. An ASCAT pass from last night revealed top winds of 40 mph near the center, so the low is probably near tropical storm strength. This low is moving east-northeast towards the Canaries, and will likely bring sustained winds of 30 - 35 mph, gusting to 50 mph, to the islands tonight. The storm formed over the weekend from an isolated cold-cored low that was wandering over the Atlantic, and phase space analyses from Florida State University revealed that the low developed a partial warm core over the weekend. A respectable amount of heavy thunderstorm activity has built near the storm's center, characteristic of a tropical storm. The low is over cool 21 - 22°C water, far colder than the typical 26°C needed for a tropical storm to form. These SSTs are about 1 - 2°C warmer than usual for this time of year. Wind shear is marginal for tropical storm formation, about 20 knots. The comma-shaped structure of the storm's spiral bands is characteristic of an extratropical cyclone, and it is pretty unlikely that NHC will view this hybrid storm as being sufficiently tropical to warrant naming it a subtropical depression or subtropical storm. The low is headed towards colder waters of 20°C that lie near the Canary Islands, and the system should become less tropical today.
Figure 1. Hybrid 1002 mb low approaches the Canary Islands, in this visible METEOSAT image from 7am EST 2/1/10.
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GUATEMALA CITY (AP) - Torrential rains brought by the first tropical storm of
the 2010 season pounded Central
America and southern Mexico, triggering deadly landslides. The death toll
stood at 16 Sunday but authorities said the number could rise.
Tropical Storm Agatha made landfall near the border of Guatemala and Mexico
on Saturday with wind speeds of up to 45 mph (75 kph), then weakened into a
tropical depression before dissipating over the mountains of western Guatemala.
Although no longer even a tropical depression, Agatha still posed trouble for
the region: Remnants of the storm were expected to deliver 10 to 20 inches (25
to 50 centimeters) of rain over southeastern Mexico, Guatemala and parts of El
Salvador, creating the possibility of "life-threatening flash floods and
mudslides," the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said in an advisory
Sunday.
Guatemalan President Alvaro Colom said Saturday night that the rivers in the
country's south were flooding or close to it.
Colom said 4.3 inches (10.8 centimeters) of rain had fallen in Guatemala
City's valley in 12 hours, the most since 1949.
As of Saturday night, 4,300 people were in shelters and authorities said the
number could rise as figures come in from around the country.
Earlier Saturday, Agatha's rains caused a landslide on a hillside settlement
in Guatemala City that killed four people and left 11 missing, Guatemalan
disaster relief spokesman David
de Leon said. Most of the city was without electricity at nightfall,
complicating search efforts.
Four children were killed by another mudslide in the town of Santa Catarina
Pinula, about six miles (10 kilometers) outside the capital. And in the
department of Quetzaltenango, 125 miles (200 kilometers) west of Guatemala City,
a boulder loosened by rains crushed a house, killing two children and two
adults, de Leon said.
Calls to local radio stations told of many more landslides and possible
deaths, but those reports could not be immediately confirmed.
A three-story building in northern Guatemala City fell into a sinkhole but
there were no reports of victims.
Cesar George of Guatemala's meteorological institute said the community of
Champerico had received 11.8 inches (30 centimeters) of rain in 30 hours.
"It rained in one day what it usually gets in a month," George said.
Colom said authorities have not been able to reach Champerico by "air, land
or sea."
In El Salvador, President Mauricio Funes declared a "red alert," the highest
level of emergency, after rains delivered by Agatha triggered at least 140
landslides throughout the country and killed two adults and a 10-year-old child.
The exact cause of their deaths was unclear.
Civil defense officials said the Acelhuate
River that passes through the capital, San
Salvador, had risen to dangerous levels and was threatening to overflow into
city streets.
In Honduras, national emergency agency Copeco reported one man was crushed to
death by a wall that collapsed in the town of Santa Ana, near the capital of
Tegucigalpa.
Flooding and slides destroyed 45 homes in the country and prompted
authorities to evacuate 1,500 people, according to figures released by the
agency.
Agatha formed as a tropical storm early Saturday in the East Pacific.
Before the rains, Guatemala already was contending with heavy eruptions from
its Pacaya volcano that blanketed the capital in ash and destroyed 800 homes.
The volcano, which is just south of the capital, started spewing lava and
rocks Thursday afternoon, forcing the closure of Guatemala City's international
airport. A TV reporter was killed by a shower of burning rocks.
Five dead as tornadoes hit Plains
Tens of thousands left without power in Kan., Okla.
Sue Ogrocki / AP
Houses lie in shambles in the mobile home community of Prairie Creek Village in Slaughterville, Okla., after a tornado ripped through Monday, May 10.
NORMAN, Okla. - Violent storms that tore through the southern Plains killed five people and injured dozens more, leaving behind flattened homes, toppled semitrailers and downed power lines.
Several tornadoes were reported in Oklahoma and Kansas on Monday as the storms moved through the area, dumping hail as big as baseballs and leaving tens of thousands of people without power.
"The kids and I got in the closet and prayed," said Jamie Keyes, of Norman, an Oklahoma City suburb that is home to the University of Oklahoma. "I heard a hiss. It was like something was whistling very loud."
Spring snowstorm hits northern NY, New England
AP foreign, Tuesday April 27 2010
GEORGE M. WALSH
Associated Press Writer= ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — A late-season storm expected to dump as much as a foot of snow across the hills and mountains of northern New York and New England was a boon for skiers and ski resorts in a region largely spared by the massive storms that blasted the rest of the nation this winter.
Snow had begun to fall Tuesday across the Adirondacks and the St. Lawrence and Champlain valleys. Higher altitudes were expected to see the most accumulation, with a foot or more by midday Wednesday at ski resorts and other spots above 2,000 feet.
Snowstorms in late April are "fairly unusual" but do happen, said Andy Nash, a National Weather Service meteorologist. "We've had snow as late as May 12 in the valley and into late May in the higher elevations," he said.
Snowfall was expected to range from slushy accumulations in the valley floors, through 5 or 6 inches at 500 feet and more at higher elevations, levels that would be modest for a typical winter storm.
"It's been pretty much a below-normal snowfall season in northern New York and northern New England," Nash said. "Everyone was saying, 'Where was winter?'"
Motorists were warned to use caution, but the storm wasn't expected to disrupt travel too much. That would be good news for Francis Strack, who runs a plow service in Lake Placid, N.Y., and had already stored his equipment for the season.
"My plow, my tires and my sander had all been taken off and put away. But my wife told me about the forecast Monday morning, and I thought she was crazy," he said. "We've lived here long enough. You think we would know better."
Residents seemed resigned to the offseason storm after largely escaping a winter that smashed snowfall records across much of the Northeast.
"It's been a nice mild spring, but this is a reality check. I got home from school yesterday — it was 68 degrees. I was in shorts watching games," said John Button, athletic director at Tupper Lake High School. "Now I'm looking for sweaters. It's spring in the Adirondacks."
At the Noon Mark Diner, a family-run landmark favored by skiers, hikers, bikers and climbers in the mountain town of Keene Valley, N.Y., Violet Terry was taking the storm in stride.
"People have been talking about the weather here this morning, and they're all disgusted with the snow. Everyone has been ready for spring," Terry said. "But it doesn't seem to be stopping people. We had six hikers in here this morning getting their sandwiches."
Skiers welcomed the fresh snow ahead of season's end Sunday at the Sugarloaf ski area in Maine, which still has two ski lifts operating and 24 trails open. The resort is offering a ski-and-tee special this weekend where people can ski and play 9 holes of golf on the same day for a special rate, said Sugarloaf spokesman Ethan Austin.
And the Jay Peak ski resort in northern Vermont was scheduled to be operating this weekend but decided to open Thursday to take advantage of the storm.
The rest of Vermont's ski areas have closed, said Jen Butson of the Vermont Ski Areas Association. She said she wished the storm would have come three weeks earlier, when more Vermont ski resorts were still open.
Several inches of snow fell overnight Monday in far northern Maine, with St. Francis recording 4 inches Tuesday morning.
The heaviest snows were predicted for the higher elevations of Maine's western mountains, where 6 to 10 inches — and possibly more than a foot in localized areas — was expected through Wednesday, said Weather Service meteorologist Jim Mansfield.
The storm is expected to move slowly east and then northeast out to sea.
---
Associated Press writers Wilson Ring in Montpelier, Vt., and Clarke Canfield in Portland, Maine, contributed to this report.
AP – A car sits submerged in the parking
lot of the Warwick Mall on Tuesday, March 30, 2010 in Warwick, R.I. …
By ERIC TUCKER, Associated Press Writer Eric Tucker, Associated Press Writer
–
1 min ago
CRANSTON, R.I. – Flooding on a scale rarely seen in New England
forced hundreds of residents from their homes Wednesday, overwhelmed
sewage systems and snarled traffic as major East Coast routes washed out
or transformed into a soaked labyrinth of detours and closures.
As three days of record-breaking rains tapered to a
drizzle, forecasters warned the worst of widespread flooding from Maine to Connecticut
was still ahead as rivers and streams had yet to crest — for the second
time in a month.
In Rhode
Island, which bore the brunt of the storm, residents were
experiencing the worst flooding in more than 100 years. Stretches of Interstate 95, the main
route linking Boston to New York, were closed and could remain so
for days.
Every resident of Rhode Island, a state of about 1
million, was asked to conserve water and electricity because of flooded
sewage systems and electrical substations. Rising waters either stranded
hundreds of people or sent them to shelters. Many of those who stayed
behind appeared shell-shocked, still recovering from floods two weeks
ago caused by as much as 10 inches of rain.
Monica Bourgeois, 45, cried Wednesday morning as she
stood outside her home in Cranston, where a sewer pump station gave out and hundreds of
residents had evacuated by early Wednesday. The Pawtuxet River had turned
her lawn into a lake and flooded her basement with six feet of
still-rising water.
"It's over the furnace. We're afraid it's going to
hit the electrical panel. It's so awful. The whole basement is
destroyed. The whole basement is under water," she said.
"I have absolutely no idea how we're going to pay for
this. I'm extremely, extremely worried. Do you know how much a new
furnace costs? We're just praying to God for some help."
The flooding caps a month that set rainfall records
across the region. Boston measured nearly 14 inches for March, breaking
the previous record for the month, set in 1953. New Jersey, New York City and Portland, Maine, surpassed similar records.
Providence registered its rainiest month on record, period, with a
total of more than 15 inches of rain in March.
"None of us alive have seen the flooding that we are
experiencing now or going to experience," Rhode Island Gov. Don Carcieri said. "This
is unprecedented in our state's history."
President Barack Obama issued an emergency
declaration late Tuesday for Rhode Island, ordering federal aid for disaster relief and
authorizing the Federal
Emergency Management Agency to coordinate relief efforts.
But the havoc was spread throughout the region, as National Guard troops
went into action in Rhode Island, Massachusetts and Connecticut.
Non-essential state workers in Rhode Island were given the day off, and
state officials asked schools and private businesses to consider
closing, as well.
Officials in water-weary Warwick, R.I., where a water
and sewage treatment
plant failed, asked residents not to launder clothes or flush toilets. The state
also asked people to stay off highways and local roads.
Heavy
rains in Connecticut caused the earth under a Middletown
apartment complex parking lot to give way, leaving two buildings
teetering over the ravine of a river. Residents were taken to an
emergency shelter at a high school.
Authorities also evacuated 50 units at a condominium
complex in Jewett City
in eastern Connecticut because a sewage treatment plant next door was
under at least 4 feet of water. Floodwaters washed out a two-lane
highway bridge at Groton.
In Massachusetts,
the biggest concerns were in the southeastern part of the state, where a
highway was closed, said state
Emergency Management Agency spokesmanScott MacLeod. A bridge gave out in
Freetown, isolating about 1,000 residents, he said.
North
of Boston, Peabody District Court was closed Wednesday because
flooding in the downtown area made it inaccessible. Some residents
there evacuated. Heavy rains buckled a road in Fall River.
Cranston Mayor Allan Fung told ABC's "Good Morning
America" on Wednesday that the city was facing "dire circumstances."
Authorities there said that the Pawtuxet River flooding was unprecedented
and that they didn't know what damage to expect.
One resident hung a sign: "FEMA + State + City of
Cranston. Buy our houses."
"Right now it's bad and getting worse," said Brian Dupont, a real estate
broker who owns two homes on the street. He feared the dozens of
sandbags protecting the homes would offer minimal protection.
Standing water pooled on or rushed across roads in the region, making
driving treacherous and forcing closures. Adjutant General Robert Bray,
the commander of the Rhode Island
National Guard, said the area south of Providence was like a
"maze" with drivers repeatedly getting stuck.
In Maine, a dam in
Porter let loose Tuesday morning, sending a torrent of water down
country roads. No evacuations or injuries were reported.
___
Contributing to this report were Associated Press writers Bob Salsberg
in Wayland, Mass., Stephen Singer and Pat Eaton-Robb in Hartford, Conn.,
Clarke Canfield
in Portland, Maine,
and Samantha Henry in Newark, N.J.
Killer Cyclone - Fiji Being Hammered
Situation: Severe Tropical cyclone Tomas has killed one person and forced the evacuation of at least 5000 others as it crosses the Fiji islands in the South Pacific.
The Fiji meteorological Office repoort says" "Winds increasing to very destructive hurricane force with average speeds of 175 km/hr with momentary gusts to 230 km/hr. Frequent heavy rain and squally thunderstorms. Phenomenal seas. Damaging heavy swells. Flooding including flooding of low-lying coastal areas."
Television New Zealand says the storm is at least as powerful as Katrina was.
(What does that say about what we can expect this year?).
Snowstorms wreak havoc in Spain
Schools closed and commuters stranded after blizzards sweep across north east
A couple walk on the beach during a snowstorm in Barcelona, Spain. Photograph: David Ramos/AP
Some 220,000 people in Catalonia, north-east Spain, were without power today and railway lines and roads have been cut off after a severe snowstorm.
The region's interior minister, Joan Boada, said the outage, caused by a fault in a high-tension cable, was affecting the area around Girona city, north of Barcelona, the regional capital.
Spain's border with France at La Junquera was closed today because of heavy snowfall, while many schools cancelled classes for a second consecutive day.
About 3,000 people were put up in a town hall last night and many others were stranded in their cars as railway lines and roads became impassable, Boada said.
Authorities said the situation was improving but below-freezing temperatures would continue to cause transport delays.
Killer Nor'easter
CNN reports that "Authorities have linked seven deaths to the nor'easter affecting the Eastern Seaboard, and more than 300,000 customers remained without power Monday in the Northeast after rain and fierce winds.
"Hurricane-force winds over the weekend toppled trees, taking power lines with them. Five of the weekend's deaths were caused by falling trees, authorities said."
As this storm lashes the north east of the US, you can start expecting spring flooding too because of the massive snow melt after some exceptional snow storms through the winter.
That in turn is going to affect many agricultural and consumer crops. Which of course is another pointer toward higher food prices this year.
AP – A tree lies across a smashed car at a home in Wantagh, N.Y., Sunday, March 14, 2010. Strong winds and …
By BRUCE SHIPKOWSKI, Associated Press Writer Bruce Shipkowski, Associated Press Writer – 1 hr 46 mins ago
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. – Utility crews pushed through fallen trees and windblown debris to reach downed power lines Sunday, working to restore electricity to hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses as strong winds and heavy rain that wreaked havoc in parts of the Northeast pushed on into New England.
The storm, which battered parts of Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York and Connecticut on Saturday with gusts of up to 70 mph, struck about two weeks after heavy snow and hurricane-force winds left more than a million customers in the Northeast in the dark. More than a half-million customers in the region lost electricity at the peak of Saturday's storm, and roughly 500,000 were waiting for power to be restored Sunday morning.
In Manhattan, Broadway's sidewalks and trash cans were littered with hundreds of shattered umbrellas.
In Jackson Township, N.J., Dave Thomas still had electricity, even though the storm brought down two large trees and several smaller ones in his yard Saturday night.
"We were sitting at home, hearing the rain, then all of a sudden there was heavy rain, heavy winds storming in," Thomas, 42, said Sunday. "It just seemed to come out of nowhere."
Traveling was problematic on the rails and in the air. More than 500 passengers on a New Jersey Transit train were stranded for six to seven hours because of power supply problems, spokesman Dan Stessel said Sunday. Amtrak service between Philadelphia and New York was suspended for hours before limited service was restored, spokesman Cliff Cole said.
Lois Glassman, 62, of Manhattan boarded an Amtrak Acela train in Washington D.C. at around 4 p.m. Saturday. The train traveled seamlessly through Philadelphia but slowed outside a station in Edison, N.J., at about 6:30 p.m. Then the waiting began.
The conductor on the train kept the passengers updated, Glassman said, first blaming switching problem and power issues. The train didn't begin making its way toward New York until after 11 p.m., Glassman said.
"I've had a weary day," Glassman said.
Flights at Newark Liberty International Airport were delayed by as many as four hours Saturday, and some flights bound for New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport had to be redirected to Boston's Logan International Airport.
At the storm's peak, more than 265,000 customers in the New York City area and 235,000 customers in New Jersey were without power. The Philadelphia area reported 70,000 customers without electricity, while more than 80,000 customers in Connecticut sat in the dark.
PECO, an electric company serving the Philadelphia area, had assistance from crews from western Pennsylvania and Michigan, but the wait could last until Monday for some customers, spokesman Fred Maher said.
In Uniondale, N.Y., the aging Nassau Coliseum lost three pieces of its aluminum facade about 90 minutes before the start of the New Jersey Devils and New York Islanders National Hockey League game.
In Atlantic City, the horizontal arm of a boom crane plunged 47 floors at the Revel Casino construction site. Debris went flying and crashed through the driver's side window of a police cruiser; the officer suffered minor injuries.
One person was killed and three others were injured in Westport, Conn., after a tree fell on a car Saturday night during the storm, police said.
Police in the New York City suburb of Teaneck were investigating whether two people found dead Saturday night were killed by a falling tree. The tree took down power lines as it fell. Chief Robert Wilson told The Record of Bergen County that police believe the two were walking on the sidewalk.
In Hartsdale, N.Y., another suburb, a man was killed when a large tree crushed the roof of his car and entangled it in live wires. Brendan McGrath, 58, of Auburn, N.Y., was found dead in his 2009 Hyundai sedan. His wife, Mary, also 58, escaped from the passenger side.
Two condominium complexes near the construction site were evacuated and several area roads were briefly closed. A shelter was set up at the Atlantic City Convention Center. The wind also caused at least two homes to collapse and damaged other homes and buildings.
"This is not where I expected to be tonight," said Jerome Martin, who was evacuated from his nearby condo to the Atlantic City Convention Center. "I'd rather be in my home, but that's not going to happen."
Martin said he was told it could be days before he could return home.
Pittsburgh had braced for what meteorologists were calling the worst potential for flooding since remnants of Hurricane Ivan swept through the city in September 2004. Officials worried that a forecast of warm weather and several days of rain would cause deep snow in the mountains to melt, prompting rivers to swell.
But officials downgraded some of their river crest projections Saturday in western Pennsylvania as rainfall appeared to be less than was projected.
Flood warnings were issued for rivers in northern Jersey, including the Ramapo River at Mahwah and Saddle River at Lodi, where minor to moderate flooding was expected Saturday night and Sunday. A coastal flood advisory was in effect for the Jersey Shore.
In northern New England, a wind advisory and flood watch were in effect for extreme southern Maine and parts of New Hampshire.
At least 4 inches of rain fell Saturday in parts of New Jersey, and an additional 1 to 2 inches was expected through early Sunday.
___
Associated Press Writer Bob Lentz in Philadelphia and AP Hockey Writer Ira Podell in Uniondale, N.Y., contributed to this report.
49 states dusted with snow; Hawaii's the holdout
AP – Graphic shows snow coverage of the U.S. on Friday
By SETH BORENSTEIN, AP Siter – Sat Feb 13, 9:50 am ET
Forget red and blue — color America white. There was snow on the ground in 49 states Friday. Hawaii was the holdout.
It was the United States of Snow, thanks to an unusual combination of weather patterns that dusted the U.S., including the skyscrapers of Dallas, the peach trees of Atlanta and the Florida Panhandle, where hurricanes are more common than snowflakes.
More than two-thirds of the nation's land mass had snow on the ground when the day dawned yesterday, and then it snowed ever so slightly in Florida to make it 49 states out of 50.
At the same time, those weird weather forces are turning Canada's Winter Olympics into the bring-your-own-snow games.
Who's the Great White North now?
"I'm calling it the upside-down winter," said David Robinson, head of the Global Snow Lab at Rutgers University in New Jersey.
Snow paralyzed and fascinated the Deep South on Friday. Snowball fights broke out at Southern Mississippi University, snow delayed flights at the busy Atlanta airport, and Louisiana hardware stores ran out of snow supplies. Andalusia, Ala., shut down its streets because of snow. And yet, Portland, Maine, where snow is usually a given, had to cancel its winter festival for lack of the stuff.
Weather geeks turned their eyes to Hawaii. In that tropical paradise, where a ski club strangely exists, observers were looking closely at the islands' mountain peaks to see if they could find a trace of white to make it a rare 50-for-50 states with snow. But there was no snow in sight.
Hawaii's 13,800-foot Mauna Kea volcano, which often gets snow much of the year at its higher elevations, is the most likely place in the 50th state to have snow, but there "is nothing right now," said research meteorologist Tiziana Cherubini at the Mauna Kea Weather Center. It has been a few weeks since there has been snow in the mountains, and none is in the forecast, ruining a perfect 50-for-50, she said.
The idea of 50 states with snow is so strange that the federal office that collects weather statistics doesn't keep track of that number and can't say whether it has ever happened. The office can't even say whether 49 out of 50 has ever taken place before.
Snow experts at the Global Snow Lab were combing their records but said it may be days before they find out if there has ever been a 50-for-50 snow day. Their best suspect — Jan. 19, 1977 — had snow in Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia, but then Robinson looked for snow in South Carolina and couldn't find any.
As of early Friday morning, 67.1 percent of the U.S. had snow on the ground, with the average depth a healthy 8 inches. Normally, about 40 or 50 percent of the U.S. has snow cover this time of year, Robinson said.
It snowed for only 10 minutes in Century, Fla., just north of Pensacola, barely enough to scrape a few snowballs from the hood of a truck. But that was enough for 6-year-old Kaleb Pace.
"I've only ever seen snow on TV till now," Kaleb said, smiling.
This is after a month that saw the most snow cover for any December in North America in the 43 years that records have been kept. And then came January 2010, which ranked No. 8 among all months for North American snow cover, with more than 7.03 million square miles of white.
The all-time record is February 1978, with 7.31 million square miles. There is a chance this February could break that. There is also a chance that this could go down as the week with the most snow cover on record, Robinson said.
Stay tuned. The weather pattern is in a snow rut.
At least in Washington, where snow is now measured by the yardstick, more snow may be coming soon. It looks like a little more snow on Monday and maybe a lot more about a week or so after that.
"As long as this pattern persists we have potential for additional storms," said Dan Petersen, lead winter weather forecaster at the National Weather Service prediction center in Camp Springs, Md.
To count as snow cover, snow has to stick on the ground and be recorded at special stations at specific times when meteorologists check, Robinson said.
The strange snowfall pattern is produced by the El Nino weather phenomenon and its Arctic counterpart, Robinson and Petersen said.
During moderate to strong El Ninos like the current one, more moisture is pumped into the subtropical jet stream across the South, increasing precipitation, Robinson said. Then there's the Arctic Oscillation, the Northern cousin to El Nino, which shifts cold polar air south. That cold air can turn a rainstorm into a snowstorm.
A snowy winter doesn't disprove — or prove — global warming, Petersen and Robinson said. This is weather, which is variable, not long-term climate, and there is a huge difference.
"This has nothing to do with long-term trends," Petersen said. "This is just a several-week period."
Patrick Marsh, who is working on his doctorate in meteorology at the University of Oklahoma, has been trying to collect photos of snow on the ground in all 49 or 50 states. After his effort was publicized, he was flooded with photos and videos.
"It just shows that deep down inside, all of us is a weather weenie, a weather fanatic," Marsh said. "This is just an awesome weather event."
___
Associated Press Writer Melissa Nelson contributed to this report from Pensacola, Fla.
A woman struggles through a blizzard in Washington, D.C. A second major snowstorm struck the eastern U.S., paralyzing travel for millions, shutting down the U.S. capital, and forcing school closures from Virginia to New York.
Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images
A woman struggles through a blizzard in Washington, D.C. A second major snowstorm struck the eastern U.S., paralyzing travel for millions, shutting down the U.S. capital, and forcing school closures from Virginia to New York.
February 10, 2010
More than a month remains in winter but already Washington D.C., Philadelphia and Baltimore logged their snowiest winters in history.
The second of back-to-back snow storms smothered the East Coast and easily eclipsed record seasonal snow totals. Most of the effects of the second storm had tapered off by Thursday.
In Washington, D.C., the federal government planned to be closed for a fourth straight day, while city agencies and schools in the hardest-hit regions also scored snow days.
The National Weather Service issued blizzard warnings in cities from Washington, D.C., to New York. It predicted that as much as 16 inches of snow could fall in New York City, and that Philadelphia could get nearly 2 feet as the storm makes its way up the Atlantic coast. As conditions rapidly deteriorated, local officials in some areas pulled snowplows off the roads because of whiteout conditions and gale-force winds.
Several days of clearer weather are expected in the mid-Atlantic, but forecasters are already warning of possible snow showers returning by Monday.
It's hard to find anything in the history books of these types of storms back to back.
- National Weather Service meteorologist Stephen Konarik
Airlines, Retailers Weigh Impact
Sales of shovels, groceries and booze mounted with the snows, but for airlines and department stores, the region's wintry weather meant millions of dollars of lost revenue.
Airports were closed from Washington to New York City, a further blow to an industry that has been forced to cancel thousands of flights in the past week.
Travelers were stopped in their tracks at airports far outside the snow zone. But the major airlines said it was too early to put a dollar figure on the storms' impact, in part because carriers typically reduce the number of available flights anyway in February.
Robert Herbst, an aviation consultant, said many customers will ask for credits toward future travel instead of refunds, which should also work in the airlines' favor.
Travel on the ground wasn't any easier. Amtrak announced it was limiting service along its Northeast Corridor.
Pileups involving 50 or more vehicles were reported on I-64 near Williamsburg, Va., and in western Pennsylvania’s Clearfield County. The crash in Pennsylvania left one motorist dead.
For shopping malls and department stores, the loss of revenue may be permanent.
Dan Hess, CEO of research firm Merchant Forecast, said a snowstorm of this magnitude can knock down sales by 10 to 25 percent for the week. When it happens in the slow months of January and February, "you don't make that business back up," he said.
Records Fall With The Snow
The latest barrage helped Baltimore and Washington eclipse all-time recorded marks for seasonal snowfall.
The previous records for snowiest winters were 62.5 inches in Baltimore in 1995-96, and 54.4 inches in Washington in 1898-99. As of Wednesday afternoon, Baltimore had 72.3 inches so far this winter and Reagan National Airport on the D.C./Virginia border had 54.9.
The National Weather Service said 12.6 inches of snow fell in parts of the Chicago area Tuesday. That total shatters the daily snowfall record for February. The last record was 8.9 inches on Feb. 9, 1885.
Philly, New York Paralyzed
In Philadelphia, Wednesday's snowfall had pushed the city past its previous winter snowfall record of 65.5 inches by early afternoon. "It's incredible," NWS meteorologist Tony Gigi told the Philadelphia Inquirer. "I never would have thought I would see another '95-96. This is going to leave '95-96 in the dust — I mean, in the drifts."
The blizzard shut down the city's schools, businesses, roads and public transit.
Citing low visibility, among other conditions, Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell closed major highways across the state and three interstates within Philadelphia, leaving the city of 1.5 million people with one driving choice: I-95.
Rendell said 1,100 National Guard members had been activated to patrol roads for stranded motorists.
Public transit officials halted all bus service across the city and rail lines were delayed.
Downed trees and power lines cut electricity to thousands of people, and officials said the extreme conditions could delay efforts to restore power.
Schools throughout the city and suburbs were canceled through Thursday.
Much of New York City seemed like a ghost town early Wednesday, but the financial district continued to buzz with activity. The New York Stock Exchange remained open, and workers trudged through snow and slush on Wall Street.
Alex Rosenthal, a broker at 44 Wall Street, said he waited 45 minutes for a subway in from Brooklyn, only to find that many of his colleagues didn't make it at all. "The people that live in Brooklyn, they had to come in. Long Island and Jersey, they stayed home today. Hopefully, the boss will let us out early," he said.
New York's commuter trains warned that they might have to shut down in the afternoon, and the city's 1.1 million schoolchildren had a rare snow day — only the third in six years.
Whiteout Conditions In Maryland
Baltimore officials banned all nonemergency traffic, and Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley appealed to drivers to stay off the road as visibility neared zero in many areas.
"Stay at home for the duration" of the snowstorm, O'Malley said at a news conference. "We're experiencing blizzard conditions in every county in every part of Maryland."
O'Malley said there is growing concern that roofs may collapse under the weight of so much snow. The venerable Smithsonian Institution reported that part of the roof and a wall at a support center in Suitland, Md., had collapsed.
Snowfalls measured as much as 10 inches in many areas hit by the second blizzard in five days. A weekend storm had previously dumped as much as 30 inches of snow in many areas of Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C.
"It's hard to find anything in the history books of these types of storms back to back," said National Weather Service meteorologist Stephen Konarik.
Road Crews Struggling
Thousands of workers along the East Coast were scrambling to plow and salt roads. Plows and salt spreaders fought heavy snow in Pennsylvania and New Jersey, where the flakes briefly turned to rain to make a slushy mix. Maryland officials said salt supplies used by road crews were dwindling in some parts of the state. A spokesman for Pennsylvania's Department of Transportation said drivers' shifts were running as long as 16 hours.
"It can be exhausting, mentally and physically," said Jerry Graham, a state plow truck driver in Pennsylvania's Lehigh County.
Thousands of residents remained without power from the last storm in parts of western Pennsylvania, Maryland and other areas. Utilities said deep snow was hindering some crews trying to fix damaged power lines even before Tuesday's storm arrived.
D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty said his city has spent millions on snow removal, and he has asked the federal government to help pay the mounting costs.
Federal Government Still Shut Down
In Washington, officials were tallying up the cost of the double-barreled snowstorms after the federal government shut down yet again. About 230,000 federal workers in Washington have been off since Friday afternoon, when the first storm began.
Eleanor Holmes Norton, the District of Columbia's representative in Congress, asked President Obama to declare a federal emergency to provide funds to help the nation's capital recover.
Norton said the city does not have a state government's financial reserves to fall back on in an emergency.
The U.S. House announced it is scrapping the rest of its workweek. Several hearings and meetings in Congress and federal agencies were postponed, including one planned to address Toyota's massive recalls.
Officials estimate that the cost to U.S. taxpayers is around $100 million a day in lost productivity. But the effects of the federal government's closure are negligible because about 85 percent of federal employees work outside the Washington region. An IRS spokeswoman said tax returns should not be affected.
The National Weather Service said Wednesday that heavy snows were likely over the next few days from the Great Lakes, upper Ohio Valley, central Appalachians, northern mid-Atlantic and into the New York City metro area/southern New England region.
From NPR's Deborah Tedford, Richard Gonzales and Robert Smith, with contributions from Susan Phillips and Peter Crimmins of WHYY and material from The Associated Press
Croat scientist warns ice age could start in five years
Croatian Times
A top scientist in Croatia has warned Europe to prepare for an ice age instead of talking about global warming.
Physician Vladimir Paar suggests one would not need to cross the sea when travelling from Ireland or UK to Croatia via the rest of Europe.
"A majority of Europe will be under ice, including Germany, Poland, France, Austria, Slovakia and part of Slovenia", Paar said in an interview on Croatian news website Index.
"Ice ages in the past lasted about 70,000 years. That's a fact, and a new ice age will occur. It is a question what will happen to people in Central European countries. They might migrate south or might stay put, but with a huge increase in energy spending", the scientist said.
"What I am warning is that global warming is natural. Some 130,000 years ago, the temperature was the same as now, the level of CO2 was almost the same, and the level of the sea was four metres higher".
Asked when the ice age would begin, he said: "That could happen in five, ten, fifty or a hundred years, or even later. We can't predict it precisely, but it will come".
Paar cited America as an example: "They keep talking to people about global warming, but 50 per cent of Americans do not believe it any more as they keep
Historic snowstorm winds down later today
Chris Dolce, Lead Meteorologist, The Weather Channel
Feb. 6, 2010 12:05 pm ET
Snow, heavy in some locations, continues to fall from West Virginia and southwest Pennsylvania eastward to the Mid-Atlantic Coast. Look for the snow to wind down from west to east late this afternoon and early evening putting the final touches on this historic event.
Widespread totals of a foot to over two feet have been reported in portions of southern Pennsylvania, West Virginia, northern Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, southern New Jersey and the District of Columbia. Localized amounts have topped 30 inches.
As the low pushes off the coast it will continue to strengthen which will result in very strong winds near and along the coast. Gusts of 40 to 50 miles per hour will be likely along the coasts from the Tidewater of Virginia north to the Jersey shore.
Snow and gusty winds will contribute to low visibilities and near-blizzard conditions in some areas.
The winds will also serve up high surf which will lead to beach erosion and areas of coastal flooding from Atlantic City southward to the Carolina coast
Frigid weather hits Midwest, -52 wind chill in ND
AP – Vehicles travel in white out conditions caused by blowing snow on Interstate 80 west of Omaha, Neb., …
By MICHAEL CRUMB, Associated Press Writer Michael Crumb, Associated Press Writer – 22 mins ago
DES MOINES, Iowa – Snow was piled so high in Iowa that drivers couldn't see across intersections and a North Dakota snowblower repair shop was overwhelmed with business as heavy snow and wind chills as low as 52 below zero blasted much of the Midwest on Thursday.
Frigid weather also gripped the South, where a rare cold snap was expected to bring snow and ice Thursday to states from South Carolina to Louisiana. Forecasters said wind chills could drop to near zero at night in some areas.
In Bowbells, in northwestern North Dakota, the wind chill hit 52-below zero Thursday morning.
"The air freezes your nostrils, your eyes water and your chest burns from breathing — and that's just going from the house to your vehicle," said Jane Tetrault, the Burke County deputy auditor.
Her vehicle started, but the tires were frozen.
"It was bump, bump, bump all the way to work with the flat spots on my tires," Tetrault said. "It was a pretty rough ride."
Other parts of the Midwest also had dangerously cold wind chills, including negative 40 in parts of South Dakota and minus 27 in northeast Nebraska, according to the National Weather Service. Equally disturbing chills were expected overnight Friday.
An additional 10 inches of snow was expected in Iowa, already buried by more than 2 feet of snow in December, while up to 9 inches could fall in southeast North Dakota that forecasters warned would create hazardous zero-visibility driving conditions. Wind gusts of 30 miles per hour were expected in Illinois — along with a foot of snow — while large drifts were anticipated in Nebraska and Iowa.
Joe Dietrich said he had to turn away dozens of customers this week from his snowblower repair shop in Bismarck, N.D.
"My building is only so big and I can only take so many," Dietrich said.
The weather hasn't let up since sweeping into the eastern U.S. earlier this week. Five straight days of double-digit subzero low temperatures, including negative 19, were recorded by the National Weather Service office in Chanhassen, Minn., a Twin Cities suburb.
"It's brutally cold, definitely brutal," meteorologist Tony Zaleski said.
Several recent deaths have been blamed on the cold. An 88-year-old woman died of hypothermia in her unheated Chicago home, an Alzheimer's sufferer died after wandering into his yard in Nashville, Tenn., and a homeless man was found dead in a tent in South Carolina, authorities said. Kansas City police said a man involved in a multi-car pileup Wednesday died after jumping a barrier wall in the dark, apparently to avoid sliding cars, and falling about 80 feet.
Slick roads were blamed for scores of accidents. In Indiana, a driver was reported killed in a crash with a school bus near Delphi on Thursday. In Iowa, a driver died Wednesday after slamming into the back of a semitrailer that had slowed for an accident near Des Moines.
In preparation for worsening conditions, more than 500 flights were grounded at Chicago's airports. The Chicago Department of Aviation reported more than 400 canceled flights at O'Hare International Airport and more than 100 canceled flights at Midway International Airport. In Atlanta, Delta Air Lines canceled nearly 200 flights scheduled to leave after 5 p.m. Thursday in anticipation of snow. Frost on planes' wings delayed seven early flights in Tampa, Fla.
Just one day into the 2010 legislative session, the Missouri Senate canceled its Thursday session because of weather. The House planned only a technical session, which allows bills to be processed without the attention of most lawmakers.
Freeze warnings covered nearly all of Florida with temperatures expected to drop into the 20s. Iguanas were seen falling out of trees; experts say the cold-blooded reptiles become immobilized and lose their grip when the temperature falls into the 40s or below.
Schools in parts of Nebraska, Minnesota, South Dakota, Oklahoma, Indiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia canceled classes because of the weather. Major roads were closed in South Dakota, Minnesota, North Carolina and Virginia.
Salt had no effect on the Twin Cities' ice-rutted streets, and deep snow left over from a Christmas storm had hardened into rock-solid blocks. The conditions helped business at Roger's Master Collision, an auto-body repair shop in Plymouth, Minn.
"A lot of people sliding on the ice, then hitting the snowbanks. They're frozen up pretty hard," said store manager Kirk Suchomel, estimating the shop is averaging 15 repair estimates a day. "I'm sure we're going to stay busy."
In Iowa, officials in Des Moines warned that a $3 million annual snow removal budget would likely be exhausted with this week's storm. Public Works Director Bill Stowe said the city would tap a $6 million road maintenance fund to cover snow clearing for the rest of the season. Snow that had been plowed into tall piles at intersections was set to be dumped into a lake.
"It can be a half-million dollar operation, depending on the amount of snow," Stowe said.
___
Associated Press writers Jeff Baenen in Minneapolis; James MacPherson in Bismarck, N.D; Nelson Lampe in Omaha, Neb.; and Erin Gartner in Chicago contributed to this report.
Forecasters warn of continued blizzards in Plains
Christmas snowstorm moves east
AP – Snow plows work to keep I-70 clear Friday, Dec. 25, 2009, near Lawrence, Kan. (AP Photo/Orlin Wagner)
By DINESH RAMDE, Associated Press Writer Dinesh Ramde, Associated Press Writer – 1 hr 38 mins ago
MILWAUKEE – Residents in the nation's heartland were digging out after a blustery storm as meteorologists warned that blizzard conditions could continue across the northern Plains on Saturday.
The National Weather Service issued blizzard warnings for parts of North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Wyoming, Minnesota, Iowa and Wisconsin through Saturday. The storm had already dumped significant snow across the region, including a record 14 inches in Oklahoma City and 11 inches in Duluth, Minn., on Thursday.
Slippery roads have been blamed for at least 21 deaths this week as the storm lumbered across the country from the Southwest.
Paul Mews, who drove from Faribault, Minn., to a relative's home in Plum City, Wis., on Friday morning, said the first 15 minutes of the 80-mile trip were clear, but a surge of heavy snowfall produced a stretch of near-whiteout conditions.
"It was snow-pocalypse. It was wicked," said Mews, 25. "We thought about turning around and going back."
They decided to continue when the surge passed minutes later.
Others weren't as lucky.
Army Sgt. Mark Matthey was spending Friday night at the Flying J Travel Plaza in Sioux Falls, S.D., after Interstate 90 closed. Matthey, 26, left Fort Bragg, N.C., on Wednesday for his hometown of Spokane, Wash., in hopes of making it by late Friday or early Saturday.
Instead, he spent Friday afternoon drinking coffee, watching TV and making friends at the truck stop. Matthey said he and the other travelers were in decent spirits.
"Everybody has the attitude that you have to play the cards you were dealt," he said. "No use in getting upset about something you can't control."
Interstates also were closed in North Dakota, Nebraska and Wyoming. Meteorologists warned that massive snow drifts and blustery winds could cause whiteouts across the northern Plains. Officials urged travelers to stay home and pack emergency kits if they had to set out.
In Texas, volunteer firefighters and sheriff's deputies rescued hundreds of people stranded along Interstate 44 and Texas State Highway 287 near Wichita Falls. The area recorded up to 13 inches of snow, said Doug Speheger, a National Weather Service meteorologist.
"It's really been horrible," Wichita County Sheriff David Duke said. "Although we live in north Texas and get a lot of cold weather, we weren't prepared for the significant amount of snow that we've received."
Only two of the sheriff department's vehicles have four-wheel drive, so rescuers used their own pickups and the heavy 5-ton brush trucks normally used to fight fires to get to motorists, many of whom ran out of gas while they were stuck in traffic stalled by the storm.
"It was exciting at first to wake up and go, 'Oh, this will be great. We'll have a white Christmas,'" Wichita Falls Mayor Lanham Lyne said. "Then it kept snowing. As the roads became impassable, then we started to worry."
The storm grounded flights at South Dakota's biggest airports. Sioux Falls Regional Airport was closed until Saturday morning at the earliest, manager Dan Letellier told the Sioux Falls Argus Leader. Flights also were canceled at Rapid City Regional Airport and Pierre Regional Airport.
Mark Kranenburg, director of the Will Rogers World Airport in Oklahoma City predicted it would be two or three days before all three runways were open and flights resumed as scheduled at Oklahoma's largest airport.
The 14 inches of snow in Oklahoma City broke a record of 2.5 inches set back in 1914.
The previous record for Christmas Eve in Duluth, which has gotten more than 22 inches in two days, was 3 inches in 1893, said Kevin Kraujalis, a National Weather Service meteorologist.
With heavy winds producing snow drifts as deep as 5 feet, "it's awful, it's just awful," Kraujalis said. "It's a big workout just walking outside to check my weather equipment."
Since Tuesday, icy roads have been blamed for accidents that killed at least seven people in Nebraska, five people in Oklahoma, four in Kansas, two in Minnesota and one each in North Dakota, Missouri and New Mexico.
Fellow blogger Frank Strait pointed out this unusual situation last Saturday in the North Carolina and Virginia mountains (my old stomping ground)... official reporting stations had extremely low dew points (as low as -44 F!) producing extremely low relative humidities (2-3%!) Here's a map of the lowest dew points recorded that day (I have circled Jefferson, NC and Hillsville, VA):
Note that both of those are official NWS stations, and neither are marked Orange (Caution) by MESOWEST (though some observations near that time were).
Of course, government sensors, especially dew point sensors, are notorious for being inaccurate. Still, the data was reported by multiple stations at the same elevation and looking at this Stuve Diagram (a SKEW-T that makes sense to non-meteorologists by plotting temperatures vs. height as perpendicular lines) I think that it's plausible that the readings were correct:
That chart shows dew points below -40 at around 5,000 feet elevation which would include the highest elevations in the Appalachian mountain chain. That sounding was taken at Roanoke the night before which is considerably to the NE of the readings we observed, so I don't think it's out of the question to think that air might have dipped to the elevation of Boone (3179 ft.) or Hillsville (2179 ft.)
Frank thought it could have been a rare "tropopause fold" event but the upper air archives I have didn't specify the tropopause level and it's been too long since college (we both went to UNC-A) to speculate further. If you have an opinion leave me a Comment.
James Wilson, Lead Meteorologist, The Weather Channel
Dec. 19, 2009 8:55 pm ET
The powerful Gulf Low that brought flooding rains to Georgia, South Carolina, and severe and life threatening flooding, (12 to 18 inches) from Hollywood, Florida to Miami is now a historic Nor'easter dumping blinding snow in the Northeast.
This massive Atlantic storm will continue to strengthen, dumping dangerously heavy snow and producing even white-out conditions from Baltimore to Philadelphia to New York City to Southern New England and Boston.
A large swath of record and dangerous December snows have reached 14 to 20 inches or more already burying major cities from western North Carolina to Washington, DC.
Record 24 Hour snowfall records have been set in Roanoke,Virginia, Washington, DC, and Baltimore, Maryland and 2nd highest for Philadelphia so far with this monster snowstorm.
Interior mountains of West Virginia to western Virginia have had 26 to 32 inches of snow.
The heaviest final totals of 1 to 2 feet for the big cities will occur from northern Virginia including Washington, DC Maryland including Baltimore and the Delaware Valley including Philadelphia across Long Island to southern Rhode Island and Cape Cod.
Winter storm warnings remain posted overnight from eastern Kentucky and southern Ohio, through most of the Mid-Atlantic, to Southern New England, with Blizzard Warnings for Long Island to southern Rhode Island and Cape Cod.
North to Northeast winds will swirl 25 to 30 mph with gusts reaching 40 to 50 mph along the Northeast coastal areas from Long Island, southern Rhode Island to Cape Cod tonight into early Sunday.
Combine the winds with the heavy snow and travel will be treacherous and not recommended on I-81 and I-95 through early Sunday.
Air travel has come to a standstill with the heavy snow and wind. You can expect very long delays or even widespread flight cancellations through tonight through early Sunday.
The intensifying Atlantic storm will move northward to off Long Island by late tonight before heading eastward to Cape Cod and then south of Nova Scotia by Sunday.
The dangerous blizzard with blinding snow and dangerous winds will be persisting from southern Rhode Island and Cape Cod overnight into early Sunday, dumping over a foot of snow.
Finally the storm will move completely out to sea by early afternoon on Sunday, all that will remain is the ongoing shoveling and plowing.
Blizzard-like storm slams East, region snowed in
Play VideoAP
– Washington under blanket of snow; treacherous conditions
AP – People dressed as Santa Claus cross a street on their way to a bar during a snow storm in Philadelphia, …
By SARAH KARUSH, Associated Press Writer Sarah Karush, Associated Press Writer
–
1 hr 17 mins ago
WASHINGTON
– A blizzard-like storm rocked the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast on
Saturday, crippling travel across the region and leaving hundreds of
thousands of customers without power.
Five deaths appeared to have been caused by the storm system, which stretched from the Carolinas north to New England
and also spread into some Midwestern states. The 16 inches of snow that
fell at Reagan National Airport outside Washington was the most ever
recorded for a single December day, while about 16 inches had also
fallen in Philadelphia.
Those
who did venture out were treated to nearly desolate stores on what is
usually one of the busiest shopping days of the year. There were
virtually no lines to get a picture with a mall Santa on the last
weekend before Christmas.
The National
Guard used Humvees to rescue stranded motorists in Virginia and some
500 people had sought warmth and refuge in emergency shelters.
"The
snow has not stopped falling, the storm isn't over, and folks should
not think this is crying wolf," said Laura Southard, a spokeswoman for
the Virginia Department of Emergency Management.
More
than two feet of snow fell in some areas since Friday. Public
transportation in the nation's capital nearly ground to a halt, but it
wasn't enough to keep senators from staying in session to debate health care reform.
The slow-moving storm was headed to the Northeast, where forecasters said parts of Connecticut, Rhode Island and Massachusetts could see more than 16 inches by Sunday night. Forecasters expected the storm to drop as many as 10 inches on New York City.
Snowplows cleared the runway at Andrews Air Force Base in suburban Washington as President Barack Obama returned from climate talks in Copenhagen. The White House said Obama rode in a motorcade back to the White House, instead of taking his helicopter, because of the conditions.
The region was virtually a sea of white. The Smithsonian Institution closed its museums, and the National Mall, which normally would be swarming with tourists, instead was the scene of snowball fights and cross-country skiers.
For Chris and Kelly Fitzpatrick, who were visiting from Clearwater, Fla., the winter wonderland came at the perfect time.
"It's her fault that we're out so long. She wants to walk and walk and walk," said Chris Fitzpatrick, 38.
In
western Virginia, officials said several hundred motorists became
stranded and had to be rescued by four-wheel-drive vehicles.
"Some
folks have decided to stay in vehicles, others have been taken to
shelters," said Virginia Department of Emergency Management spokesman
Bob Spieldenner. "We're definitely trying to keep people off the roads."
Virginia State Police spokeswoman
Corinne Geller said traffic was moving, though slowly. There were
reports of jackknifed tractor-trailers and some semis on their sides.
Troopers had responded to more than 4,000 traffic crashes and disabled
vehicles.
One person in Virginia
was killed in a traffic accident caused by slick roads, and authorities
said the weather may have contributed to another traffic death. A third
death is believed to have been caused by exposure. In Ohio, two people were killed in accidents on snow-covered roads hit by the same storm system.
At Crump's Store at the intersection of two country roads outside Richmond, Va.,
owner Suzanne Rudd stood with a man dressed as Santa and waved to the
few motorists who dared to hit the slick roads. Rudd said only a few
children had come to visit with Santa.
"Normally we'd have a long line here but people are having a hard time getting out," Rudd said.
The same was true at the Cherry Hill Mall
in New Jersey, which would typically be a place where down-to-the-wire
Christmas shoppers would create a mob scene. Instead, parking spots
were plentiful.
Inside, there was no line for a picture with Santa.
"It was fantastic," said Chris Bailey, who got pictures of his 4-year-old daughter Olivia.
Mayors in Washington and Philadelphia declared snow emergencies
and forecasters said the conditions could worsen. Governors in
Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky and Delaware declared states of
emergency.
"It's going to be an all day thing. It's going to be on and off," said National Weather Service meteorologist Kevin Witt in Sterling, Va.
Most flights were canceled at Reagan National Airport and Dulles International Airport near Washington, Philadelphia International Airport and at Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey, creating a ripple effect of delays across the country. BWI Thurgood Marshall Airport
near Baltimore also closed Saturday afternoon, and travelers who tried
to reach their destinations by train also faced long delays and threats
of cancellations.
"It's going to be very challenging for people who weren't able
to get out today to rebook on flights this week," said Tara Hamilton, a
spokeswoman for the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority.
Joy Rood, 20, played solitaire as she waited at Reagan for a flight to visit family in Los Angeles with her husband, who was asleep at a table outside an airport cafe.
"We had a canceled flight at Dulles at 6 yesterday because the plane had difficulties," she said. "So they cabbed us over here to — uh, what airport am I at?"
Washington's Union Station
was full of travelers, some of them sprawled on the floor. Other
travelers were stuck on the tracks. A train with 255 passengers was
stopped in northern Virginia for around six hours Saturday because of a
frozen track switch, said Amtrak spokeswoman Vernae Graham. The train
arrived at a station in Alexandria at 9:11 p.m.
Delays were also reported for trains between Washington and Boston. At Union Station, Imke and Mike Jandreau were hoping to get on a train to Boston after their flight to Maine was canceled.
"I was on hold for almost seven hours with the airline, so we gave up and came here," Imke Jandreau, 25, said.
Forecasters said the storm system was expected to generate winds up to 35 miles per hour, which could cause near-whiteout conditions.
At a Walmart in the Richmond, Va., area, Nnika White took advantage of
the few shoppers, buying a drum set for her 2 1/2 year old son. White,
dressed in a toboggan, scarf and flannel-like jacket, said she works
long hours at the law firm she owns and doesn't get much time to shop.
"It's nice because no one's here. For shopping, it's great, but the roads are very, very bad," she said.
Snow, ice and freezing rain also hit western North Carolina on Friday, knocking out power to almost 60,000 customers around the Asheville area.
After a warm start to the ski season that delayed openings of many resorts, the storm arrived just in time for West Virginia, dumping more than 20 inches on some slopes, said Joe Stevens, a spokesman for the area's ski association.
"These are midseason conditions," he said. "The storm couldn't have come at a better time."
The storm came from the Gulf and drenched South Florida with
rain starting late Thursday, leaving flooded homes and stranded
drivers.
___
Associated Press writers Dena Potter in Chesterfield, Va.; Jacob Jordan in Atlanta; Geoff Mulvihill in Cherry Hill, N.J., and photographer Jacquelyn Martin in Arlington, Va.,contributed to this report.
Tropical Cyclone Mick tears through Fiji
Two Fiji villagers are dead, several people are missing and thousands have
been made homeless after a tropical cyclone battered the South Pacific
nation, causing flooding, damaging homes and trees, and disrupting power
supplies.
Published: 2:00AM GMT 15 Dec 2009
Cyclone Mick, Fiji's first of the summer cyclone season, ripped through the
most populated island of Viti Levu and is headed toward Tonga, which has
been placed on alert.
Fiji Meteorological Service said winds gusting up to 95 miles an hour were
recorded close to the Category 2 cyclone's epicenter, with winds averaging
60 to 70 miles an hour. Category 1 is the lowest cyclone rating, Category 5
the highest.
Mick was a "very vicious" cyclone with damaging gale force winds
which struck up to six hours earlier than expected, catching many people
unprepared, said Tim Sutton, of the United Nations Children's Fund (Unicef),
who is based in Suva.
"There's a lot of damage. Lots of trees down, power lines down
everywhere, all the roads around Viti Levu are still closed with flooding
and landslides," he told New Zealand's National Radio.
Tourists on the Yasawa and Mamanuca islands northwest of Viti Levu were
reported safe, but Octopus Resort was forced to close because of damage.
Some villagers had fled their homes after roofs were blown off.
Fiji's National Disaster Management Office has set up temporary shelters for
more than 2,000 people displaced from damaged homes and by flooding from the
torrential rains.
The office said a student from Drala village in the Nadarivatu highlands died
instantly when a tree fell on him, while at Sigatoka, on the west coast of
Viti Levu, a young man was swept away by strong currents while trying to
cross the Sigatoka River.
In the wake of the storm, Fiji Prime Minister and military dictator Commodore
Frank Bainimarama announced he will not attend the climate change conference
in Copenhagen because of the damage caused by Cyclone Mick.
December 8-9, 2009 Blizzard and Heavy Snow Impact The Region
A powerful storm system brought heavy snow, ice and even blizzard conditions to a large portion of the central plains on December 8-9, 2009. The greatest impact occurred across north central and northeast Kansas, southeast Nebraska, northwest and north central Missouri and both southern and eastern Iowa, where strong winds gusting up to 45 mph produced blizzard conditions. The heaviest snowfall also occurred in these areas, where accumulations of 8 to 12 inches were common. The graphic below depicts snowfall across the National Weather Service in Pleasant Hill domain, with the greatest snow total of 14 inches being observed in Rockport, Missouri.
A review of the snow storm archives found this storm unusual in that it was the first snow storm that blizzard conditions were reported - wind speeds of 35 mph greater and wind-driven snow reducing visibilities to 1/4 mile or less sustained for three hours or more - to affect the forecast domain of the National Weather Service in Pleasant Hill, Missouri since the office opened in the 1992. Though observed snowfall in the 10 to 14 inch range is uncommon, there have been several instances that snow amounts of these magnitudes have been observed in the past 15 years. What is unusual is the combination of heavy snow and wind speeds exceeding 35 mph. Since record keeping began, only five other instances have been recorded in which blizzard or near-blizzard conditions have impacted the forecast area for which the National Weather Service in Pleasant Hill has responsibility: February 5, 1924, December 31, 1978-January 1, 1979, December 1-2, 1985, January 18, 1996 and January 27, 1996.
Figure 1. December 8-9, 2009 Observed Snowfall (click on image for larger version).
Listing of Snowfall and Storm reports
PRELIMINARY LOCAL STORM REPORT...SUMMARY NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE KANSAS CITY/PLEASANT HILL MO 1044 AM CST WED DEC 09 2009
0640 AM BLIZZARD LANCASTER 40.52N 92.53W 12/09/2009 SCHUYLER MO LAW ENFORCEMENT
5 TO 6 INCHES OF SNOW AND VISIBILITIES REPORTED BELOW 1/4 FOR AN EXTENDED PERIOD
0640 AM BLIZZARD UNIONVILLE 40.48N 93.00W 12/09/2009 PUTNAM MO LAW ENFORCEMENT
PERSISTANT BLIZZARD CONDITIONS OVERNIGHT. SOME TREES DOWN.
0648 AM HEAVY SNOW MILAN 40.20N 93.12W 12/09/2009 E8.0 INCH SULLIVAN MO LAW ENFORCEMENT
6 TO 8 INCHES OF SNOW ALONG WITH BLIZZARD CONDITIONS
0648 AM BLIZZARD MILAN 40.20N 93.12W 12/09/2009 SULLIVAN MO LAW ENFORCEMENT
SUSTAINED VISIBILITIES BELOW 1/4 MILE AND 6-8 INCHES OF SNOW
0753 AM BLIZZARD 5 SW SPICKARD 40.19N 93.66W 12/09/2009 GRUNDY MO AMATEUR RADIO
ESTIMATED 8 INCHES ACCUMULATION WITH VISIBILITIES FREQUENTLY BELOW 1/4 MILE
0800 AM HEAVY SNOW SAVANNAH 39.94N 94.83W 12/09/2009 M6.0 INCH ANDREW MO CO-OP OBSERVER
STORM TOTAL SNOWFALL
0800 AM HEAVY SNOW AMITY 39.87N 94.43W 12/09/2009 M10.0 INCH DEKALB MO CO-OP OBSERVER
STORM TOTAL SNOWFALL
0800 AM SNOW 5 SE PLATTE CITY 39.31N 94.71W 12/09/2009 M4.2 INCH PLATTE MO ASOS
STORM TOTAL SNOWFALL AT KMCI
0800 AM SNOW HAMILTON 39.74N 94.00W 12/09/2009 M5.0 INCH CALDWELL MO CO-OP OBSERVER
STORM TOTAL SNOWFALL
0800 AM HEAVY SNOW GRANT CITY 40.49N 94.41W 12/09/2009 M6.0 INCH WORTH MO CO-OP OBSERVER
STORM TOTAL SNOWFALL 7 INCHES
0800 AM HEAVY SNOW CONCEPTION JUNCTION 40.27N 94.69W 12/09/2009 M8.0 INCH NODAWAY MO CO-OP OBSERVER
STORM TOTAL SNOWFALL
0800 AM SNOW BROOKFIELD 39.79N 93.08W 12/09/2009 M3.0 INCH LINN MO CO-OP OBSERVER
0800 AM SNOW KIRKSVILLE 40.20N 92.58W 12/09/2009 M2.5 INCH ADAIR MO CO-OP OBSERVER
0800 AM SNOW EXCELSIOR SPRINGS 39.34N 94.24W 12/09/2009 M2.5 INCH CLAY MO CO-OP OBSERVER
0800 AM HEAVY SNOW BETHANY 40.27N 94.03W 12/09/2009 M8.0 INCH HARRISON MO CO-OP OBSERVER
STORM TOTAL SNOWFALL 10 INCHES
0800 AM SNOW LEXINGTON 39.18N 93.87W 12/09/2009 M2.4 INCH LAFAYETTE MO CO-OP OBSERVER
0800 AM SNOW OVERLAND PARK 38.91N 94.68W 12/09/2009 M1.7 INCH JOHNSON KS CO-OP OBSERVER
0800 AM SNOW BONNER SPRINGS 39.08N 94.88W 12/09/2009 M2.2 INCH WYANDOTTE KS CO-OP OBSERVER
0800 AM HEAVY SNOW UNIONVILLE 40.48N 93.00W 12/09/2009 M6.3 INCH PUTNAM MO CO-OP OBSERVER
STORM TOTAL SNOWFALL 10 INCHES
Thursday, December 10, 2009 -
RUSSIA - Moscow's Mayor, known for his attempts to control both the rain and the snow, lambasted weather forecasters Tuesday for failing to predict this winter’s first big snowfall, which caused traffic jams that even stunned drivers used to Moscow’s notoriously crowded streets. Some 15 centimeters of snow fell from Monday afternoon through early Tuesday, while the weather forecast delivered on Monday morning had predicted just 1.2 centimeters. City traffic ground to a halt during the evening rush hour, causing spectacular snarl-ups along the major ring roads and forcing desperate drivers to abandon their cars near metro stations. Traffic police registered close to 2,700 accidents, roughly twice the usual amount. “It took me 7 1/2 hours to get home at 1:30 a.m.,” a blogger wrote. But City Hall officials said it was senseless to dispatch the city’s more than 6,000-strong fleet of gritters and snowplows during peak hours and instead demanded an apology from meteorologists. "How can our snow-removal vehicles get on roads that are totally blocked by traffic?” It will take at least a week to remove the snow, which amounted to 13.5 billion cubic meters. A department head in the meteorological service said Monday’s snowfall was caused by an EXTREMELY RARE WEATHER PHENOMENON that was impossible to foretell. “We had a high-altitude high pressure system, something that we have only recorded twice in the past 50 years. There is no model in the world that could forecast this." The Mayor promised in September that the city would save money on snow removal this year by using special planes to blast clouds from the sky in the event of pending large snowfall. His announcement angered the surrounding Moscow region, where officials warned that they would have to cope with the extra snow. But the plan, which costs 180 million rubles ($6 million), will only reach the experimental phase in February. The Mayor has long championed spraying liquid nitrogen, silver or cement particles into clouds, forcing precipitation to fall before it can reach the city center and spoil public holidays. But meteorologists say it is difficult to conduct effective cloud blasting for an area as big as the whole city.
Strong earthquake rocks western Indonesia
AP foreign, Friday October 16 2009
JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) â A strong undersea earthquake made buildings in Indonesia's capital sway Friday, but there were no immediate reports of damage or injuries.
The quake came as Indonesia is still recovering from another, more powerful earthquake that killed more than 1,000 people dead.
The epicenter in Friday's quake was in the Sunda Strait off the western coast of Java and the preliminary magnitude was 6.4, Indonesia's Meteorology and Geophysics Agency said.
Suhardjono, an official at the agency who like many Indonesian goes by a single name, said there were no immediate reports of damage "but it could have caused damage in areas closes to the epicenter."
It was not powerful enough to cause a tsunami, he said.
A 7.6 magnitude quake on the neighboring Indonesian island of Sumatra killed more than 1,100 people late last month. The epicenter of that quake was a few hundred miles (kilometers) north.
The U.S. Geological Survey put the strength of Friday's earthquake at 6.5 and said it had a depth of 35 miles (55 kilometers).
October 6 2009:
Floods, Earthquakes, Glaciers, Money, Emergency Kits, War
1. Major Floods In India. Millions homeless.
Reutersis reporting that 250 people are dead and over 2.5 million homeless because of heavy rains and floods in southern India.
Up to 5 million people are currently huddled in 1200 temporary camps and government shelters as flooded rivers rage across huge areas of sugar cane fields and rice paddies.
"Flood waters swamped millions of acres of cropland, including sugarcane plantations, prompting worries of a fall in sugar output in Karnataka, the country's third-biggest producer.
"Traders also estimated the flooding would hit corn output by at least one million tonnes in Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, which account for about 35 percent of India's total corn production."
2. Over 800 Earthquakes in California
While survivors bury the thousands who died in earthquakes and tsunamis in Indonesia and the Samoa/Tonga region last week (must see graphic animation of tsunami here) earthquake activity seems to be increasing in the California Nevada region.
Over 800 'quakes measuring from 1 to 5.2 have been recorded there in the seven days to October 5.
3. Greenland/Antarctic Glaciers Melting Faster
"While NASA satellite data clearly shows the Arctic is thinning, researchers from the British Antarctic Survey and the University of Bristol say the "dynamic thinning" of glaciers now reaches all latitudes in Greenland and has intensified on key Antarctic coastlines. Working with millions of NASA satellite measurements, the researchers claim the ice sheets are shrinking faster than scientists previously thought.
"The research shows the most profound loss of ice sheets in Greenland and western Antarctica is a result of glaciers speeding up where they flow into the sea. The ice melt is penetrating far into the ice sheets' interior and is spreading as ice shelves thin by ocean-driven melt. Ice shelf collapse has triggered particularly strong thinning that has endured for decades."
Summary:
Typhoon kills 32 in Vietnam;
Philippine toll at 246
2nd Typhoon, Largest in a Century to Hit Philippines!
Scores Are Killed as Tsunami Hits Samoa Islands
Indonesia Hit by Quake After Temblor Kills
Second storm slams into northern Philippines
AP – Local residents make their way through flood waters in Taytay township, Rizal province east of Manila, …
By ROHAN SULLIVAN, Associated Press Writer Rohan Sullivan, Associated Press Writer– 1 hr 28 mins ago
MANILA, Philippines –Typhoon Parma slammed into the Philippines on Saturday, ripping off roofs, toppling power pylons and swelling rivers in the country's mountainous north. At least two people were killed, an official said.
The storm — the country's second in eight days — cut a path across the northeastern tip of the main island of Luzon and was headed in the direction of Taiwan, where evacuations of southern villages were under way.
The capital, Manila, escaped the worst of the storm. The city was still reeling from one on Sept. 26 that caused the worst flooding in four decades, killing at least 288 people and damaging the homes of 3 million more.
The provinces of Cagayan and Isabela were hardest hit Saturday by powerful winds and drenching rain, cutting some communications and roads to some towns.
"The damage is quite heavy," Cagayan police Chief Roberto Damian told ABC-CBN television. "We are clearing highways and roads to reach people calling for rescue."
In Isabela, one man drowned and another died from exposure to the cold and wet weather, said Lt. Col. Loreto Magundayao of an army division based in the province.
Tens of thousands of people were moved to safe ground across the Philippines ahead of the typhoon, though officials said the threat of another national disaster eased as Parma changed course overnight Friday and bypassed the capital, parts of which are still chest-deep in flood waters.
Trees were uprooted and power poles toppled in the provincial capital of Tuguegarao, Cagayan local government official Bonifacio Cuarteros told The Associated Press by telephone. Buildings had their roofs torn off. Similar damage was reported in neighboring Isabela.
Parma hit the coast packing sustained winds of 108 mph (175 kph), though they weakened as the storm passed overland, the national weather bureau said.
Weather bureau chief Prisco Nilo warned that the heavy rain could trigger landslides and flooding, and strong winds could create tidal surges "similar to a tsunami" along the eastern coast.
After the storm changed course, officials began moving back tens of thousands of people who had been evacuated from coastal areas that might have been in the path of the storm.
Taiwan issued a storm warning and began moving people out of villages in the southern county of Kaohsiung, local official Lin Chun-chieh said. Flash floods from the last typhoon to hit the Kaohsiung area killed about 700 people in August.
The earlier storm to hit the Philippines, Ketsana, went on to hit other Southeast Asian countries, killing 99 in Vietnam, 14 in Cambodia and 16 in Laos.
It was part of more than a week of destruction in the Asia-Pacific region that has claimed more than 1,500 lives so far: an earthquake Wednesday in Indonesia; a tsunami Tuesday in the Samoan islands; and Typhoon Ketsana across Southeast Asia.
Another typhoon, Melor, was churning in the Philippine Sea, 1,600 miles (2,575 kilometers) to the east, threatening the U.S. territory of the Northern Mariana Islands.
Most businesses there were shut Saturday morning, and residents of the island of Saipan who don't live in concrete homes moved to typhoon shelters, said Charles Reyes, Northern Marianas Gov. Benigno Fitial's press secretary.
___Associated Press writers Oliver Teves in Manila and Debby Wu in Taipei, Taiwan, contributed to this report.
Super typhoon" bears down on flood-ravaged Philippines
Reuters – Children look out from a window of a partially submerged house in floodwaters brought on by Typhoon Ketsana, …
By Rosemarie Francisco Rosemarie Francisco– Fri Oct 2, 6:11 am ET
MANILA (Reuters) –The Philippines declared a nationwide state of calamity on Friday as a "super typhoon" bore down a week after flash floods killed nearly 300 people in and around Manila.
Typhoon Parma, about 150 km (100 miles) east of Luzon, was gaining strength as it churned west-northwest toward the mainland, bringing heavy rain.
It was expected to make landfall in or near the northeastern province of Isabela on Saturday. The area is mountainous and not heavily populated, but Parma was likely to lash Luzon with rain over the next two days, making life worse in flood-hit regions.
"We're concerned about the effects of more rain on the relief work in flooded areas because the water level could rise again," Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro said in a briefing aired live on national television.
The Asia-Pacific region has been hit by a series of natural disasters in recent days, including Typhoon Ketsana which killed more than 400 in the Philippines, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam.
Tens of thousands were also displaced in southern Laos and flash floods were reported in northern Thailand.
Two powerful earthquakes rocked the Indonesian island of Sumatra, with the death toll likely to be in the thousands, and a tsunami battered American and Western Samoa, killing nearly 150.
In Taiwan, authorities identified 12 villages for mandatory evacuation ahead of Parma and another storm in the Pacific, Typhoon Melor.
The Taiwan government came in for heavy criticism after a deadly typhoon in August killed as many as 770 people.
In the Philippines, harsh criticism of the slow response to last week's floods could affect the chances of Teodoro in next May's presidential election, where he seeks to replace President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.
Teodoro, also the head of the National Disaster Coordinating Council, has placed the military and police on alert and ordered civilian agencies to stockpile food, water, medicine, fuel and other relief supplies.
Arroyo declared a state of calamity across the country, which will allow local governments access to emergency funds for relief work.
She also ordered provincial governments to evacuate people living in low-lying areas in the path of Parma, by force if necessary.
Airlines also canceled about 26 domestic flights to four destinations in typhoon-affected areas in the central Philippines from 1 p.m. (0500 GMT) on Friday, airport authorities said.
The weather bureau said Parma, with gusts of up to 230 kph (143 mph) at the center, will be the strongest typhoon to hit the country since 2006.
"It's still very much possible that we will raise signal number 4 as it closes in on northern Luzon," Prisco Nilo, head of the weather bureau, told reporters.
At signal number 4, residential and commercial buildings may be severely damaged, large trees uprooted, and power and communication lines may be cut.
Last week's storm, Ketsana, left hundreds of thousands homeless in and around Manila and areas around a lake near the capital remain submerged under 2-3 meter floodwater's. It also damaged or destroyed more than $108 million in crops, infrastructure and property.
The Philippines is hit by frequent typhoons in the summer which often continue on their track to hit Vietnam, China and Taiwan before weakening over land.
(Additional reporting by Ho Binh Minh in Hanoi, Ralph Jennings in Taipei, Martin Petty in Bangkok and Manny Mogato)
(Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan and Jerry Norton)
Powerful Indonesia quake kills 75, traps thousands
Reuters – A man stands in front of a collapsed building after an earthquake hit Padang, on Indonesia's Sumatra …
By ANTHONY DEUTSCH, Associated Press Writer Anthony Deutsch, Associated Press Writer – 1 min ago
JAKARTA, Indonesia – A powerful earthquake struck western Indonesia on Wednesday, triggering landslides and trapping thousands under collapsed buildings — including two hospitals, an official said. At least 75 bodies were found, but the toll was expected to be far higher.
The temblor started fires, severed roads and cut off power and communications to Padang, a coastal city of 900,000 on Sumatra island. Thousands fled in panic, fearing a tsunami.
Buildings swayed hundreds of miles (kilometers) away in neighboring Malaysia and Singapore.
In the sprawling low-lying city of Padang, the shaking was so intense that people crouched or sat on the street to avoid falling. Children screamed as an exodus of thousands tried to get away from the coast in cars and motorbikes, honking horns.
The magnitude 7.6 quake hit at 5:15 p.m. (1015GMT, 6:15 a.m. EDT), just off the coast of Padang, the U.S. Geological Survey reported. It occurred a day after a killer tsunami hit islands in the South Pacific and was along the same fault line that spawned the 2004 Asian tsunami that killed 230,000 people in 11 nations.
A tsunami warning was issued Wednesday for countries along the Indian Ocean, but was lifted after about an hour; there were no reports of giant waves.
The temblor flattened buildings and felled trees in Padang, damaged mosques and hotels and crushed cars. A foot could be seen sticking out from one pile of rubble. In the gathering darkness shortly after the quake, residents fought some fires with buckets of water and used their bare hands to search for survivors, pulling at the wreckage and tossing it away piece by piece.
"People ran to high ground. Houses and buildings were badly damaged," said Kasmiati, who lives on the coast near the quake's epicenter.
"I was outside, so I am safe, but my children at home were injured," she said before her cell phone went dead. Like many Indonesians, she uses one name.
The loss of telephone service deepened the worries of those outside the stricken area.
"I want to know what happened to my sister and her husband," said Fitra Jaya, who owns a house in downtown Padang and was in Jakarta when the quake hit. "I tried to call my family there, but I could not reach anyone at all."
Initial reports received by the government said 75 people were killed, but the real number is "definitely higher," Vice President Jusuf Kalla told reporters in the capital, Jakarta. "It's hard to tell because there is heavy rain and a blackout," he said.
Health Minister Siti Fadilah Supari told MetroTV that two hospitals and a mall collapsed in Padang.
"This is a high-scale disaster, more powerful than the earthquake in Yogyakarta in 2006 when more than 3,000 people died," Supari said, referring to a major city on the main Indonesian island of Java.
Hospitals struggled to treat the injured as their relatives hovered nearby.
Indonesia's government announced $10 million in emergency response aid and medical teams and military planes were being dispatched to set up field hospitals and distribute tents, medicine and food rations. Members of the Cabinet were preparing for the possibility of thousands of deaths.
Rustam Pakaya, head of the Health Ministry's crisis center, said "thousands of people are trapped under the collapsed houses."
"Many buildings are badly damaged, including hotels and mosques," said Wandono, an official at the Meteorology and Geophysics Agency in Jakarta, citing reports from residents.
Kalla said the worst-affected area was Pariaman, a coastal town about 40 miles (60 kilometers) northwest of Padang. He gave no details on destruction or deaths there.
Local television reported more than two dozen landslides. Some blocked roads, causing miles-long traffic jams of cars and trucks.
On Tuesday, a powerful earthquake off the South Pacific islands of Samoa, American Samoa and Tonga — thousands of miles from Indonesia — spawned tsunami that killed more than 100 people. Experts said the seismic events were not related.
Both Indonesia's Aceh province, which was devastated in the 2004 tsunami with 130,000 dead, and Padang lie along the same fault. It runs the along the west coast of Sumatra and is the meeting point of the Eurasian and Pacific tectonic plates, which have been pushing against each other for millions of years, causing huge stress to build up.
Scientists have long suggested Padang would suffer a similar fate to Aceh in the coming decades. Some predictions said 60,000 people would be killed — mostly by giant waves generated by an undersea quake.
The dire predictions spread alarm across Padang, which was struck by an earthquake in 2007 that killed dozens of people.
Indonesia, a vast archipelago with more than 17,000 islands and a population of 235 million, straddles continental plates and is prone to seismic activity along what is known as the Pacific Ring of Fire.
_____
Associated Press writers Ali Kotarumalos, Irwan Firdaus and Niniek Karmini contributed to this report.
Scores Are Killed as Tsunami Hits Samoa Islands
By MERAIAH FOLEY
Published: September 30, 2009
SYDNEY, Australia — A powerful tsunami generated by an undersea earthquake on Tuesday has killed at least 89 people and wiped out several villages on the tropical islands of American Samoa and Samoa, according to government officials, the police and local residents.
Christopher Moore of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration looked at projected tsunami travel times at the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Ewa Beach, Hawaii. (Many tsunami warnings were later canceled.)
The downtown of Fagatoga was flooded when a tsunami hit American Samoa early on Tuesday.
The earthquake, with a magnitude of 8.0, struck around dawn on Tuesday, as many residents were preparing for work and getting their children ready for school. Over the next 12 hours, 15 smaller quakes rumbled through the Samoan islands region, and 14 more were recorded near Tonga, to the south, according to the United States Geological Survey.
At least 24 people were killed in American Samoa, according to officials there, and the territory’s governor, Togiola T. A. Tulafono, said in a news conference that the worst damage had been caused by the second and third waves in a series of four. There was also widespread devastation reported in the territory’s capital, Pago Pago.
In a statement from the White House, President Obama declared that “a major disaster exists in the Territory of American Samoa,” and he authorized federal aid to supplement local recovery efforts.
Filipo Ilaoa, deputy director of the American Samoan office in Honolulu, said that the tsunami struck the territory’s coast in “a matter of minutes” after the quake and that many residents would not have had much time to run for higher ground.
“American Samoa is a small island, and most of the residents are around the coastline,” he said. “There was no warning or anything at all. By the time the alert was out of the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center, it had already hit.”
On Samoa, 65 people had died and 145 had been injured, according to the general manager of the National Health Service, who spoke Wednesday afternoon to the BBC.
There were reports late Wednesday that six people had been killed on Tonga, but those reports could not be immediately verified.
Officials and rescue teams worked throughout Wednesday to assess the damage and to begin relief efforts, and they said witnesses had seen heavy destruction in the southern parts of Samoa and American Samoa, a United States territory with about 60,000 residents.
Samoa, governed by New Zealand until gaining its independence in 1962, has a population of 180,000 spread across its islands. Upolu, the second largest of the islands, has numerous resorts and guesthouses along its southern shores, and initial reports from the coast described widespread destruction.
A Red Cross worker, Sati Young, speaking to Radio New Zealand, said waves 10 feet high had flattened beachside resorts on Upolu and that residents told him the tourist zone of Lalomanu had been crushed by a 33-foot wall of water. Graeme Ansell, a New Zealander, told the radio station that every building had been destroyed in the village of Faofao Beach Fales on Upolu’s southeastern coast.
“There’s not a building standing,” he said. “We’ve all clambered up hills, and one of our party has a broken leg. There will be people in a great lot of need around here.”
Damaged telephone lines on both islands hampered efforts to count the casualties and obtain comprehensive damage assessments. The earthquake struck below the ocean about 120 miles southwest of American Samoa and 125 miles south of Samoa, and it was centered only 11 miles below the seabed, according to the geological agency.
The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center at Ewa Beach, Hawaii, raised a regionwide alert that extended from American Samoa to New Zealand, though minimal damage was reported elsewhere.
On Wednesday morning, the Japan Meteorological Agency issued a tsunami advisory for the entire eastern coast of Japan. The advisory carried warnings of high waves, but by early evening the agency scaled back the advisory to parts of southern Japan, Okinawa and northern Hokkaido.
Both Samoan islands are just east of the international date line, which is why it was early Tuesday morning when the quake occurred, but it was already early Wednesday in Japan, China and Australia.
Meraiah Foley reported from Sydney. Mark McDonald contributed reporting from Hong Kong, and Sarah Wheaton from New York.
Philippine storm toll rises to 140
September 27, 2009
Play VideoAFP – Philippines overwhelmed as flood death toll rises
AP– Two chairs hang on electrical wires outside a house in Marikina city, east of Manila, Philippines on …
By TERESA CEROJANO, Associated Press Writer Teresa Cerojano, Associated Press Writer– 1 hr 13 mins ago
MANILA, Philippines– The Philippines appealed for international help Monday after a tropical storm killed 140 people in the country's north and warned a new storm could strike this week, with tens of thousands of citizens still displaced from their homes.
At least 32 people were reported missing, and authorities were still trying to verify scores of unconfirmed deaths, including in the hard-hit capital Manila and nearby Rizal province, where there were reports that about 99 more people had died, Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro said.
Tens of thousands of residents, meanwhile, began a massive cleanup of the carnage left by Tropical Storm Ketsana, which struck Saturday, bringing the region's worst flooding in 42 years and triggering deadly landslides.
The extent of devastation became clearer Monday with mud-covered communities, cars upended on city streets and huge numbers of villagers without drinking water, food and power.
In Manila's suburban Marikina city, a sofa hung from electric wires.
Resident Jeff Aquino said flood waters rose to his home's third floor at the height of the storm, when it dumped more than a month's worth of rain in just 12 hours.
Aquino, his wife, three young children and two nephews spent that night on their roof without food and water, mixing infant formula for his 2-year-old twins with the falling rain.
"We thought it was the end for us," Aquino said.
Among those stranded by the flood waters was young actress Christine Reyes, who was rescued by movie and TV heartthrob Richard Gutierrez from the rooftop of her home near Manila after she made a frantic call for help to a local TV network with her mobile phone.
"If the rains do not stop, the water will reach the roof. We do not know what to do. My mother doesn't know how to swim," she said, weeping.
Gutierrez, a close friend and Reyes' co-star in an upcoming movie, heard of her plight, borrowed an army speedboat and ferried Reyes, her mother and two young children to safety.
Since the storm struck, the government has declared a "state of calamity" in metropolitan Manila and 25 storm-hit provinces, allowing officials to use emergency funds for relief and rescue.
The homes of more than 450,000 people were inundated. Some 115,000 of them were brought to about 200 schools, churches and other evacuation shelters, officials said. Troops, police and volunteers have been able to rescue more than 7,900 people so far, Teodoro said.
He told a news conference that help from foreign governments will ensure that the Philippine government can continue its relief work. Government welfare officials have begun focusing on providing food, medicine and other necessities to those in emergency shelters.
Teodoro said government forecasters have monitored a low pressure area over the Pacific that could develop into a storm and possibly hit the country later this week, he said.
President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo has said Ketsana and the flooding were "an extreme event" that "strained our response capabilities to the limit but ultimately did not break us."
The United States has donated $100,000 and deployed a military helicopter and five rubber boats manned by about 20 American soldiers from the country's south, where they have been providing counter terrorism training. The United Nations Children Fund has also provided food and other aid.
Officials expected the death toll to rise as rescuers penetrate villages blocked off by floating cars and debris.
The 16.7 inches (42.4 centimeters) of rain that swamped metropolitan Manila in just 12 hours on Saturday exceeded the 15.4-inch (39.2-centimeter) average for all of September, chief government weather forecaster Nathaniel Cruz said.
Government forecasters tracked Ketsana moving toward Vietnam on Monday at about 372 miles (600 kilometers) west of the northern Philippines.
___
Associated Press writer Jim Gomez contributed to this report.
Australia hit by worst dust storms in 70 years
Dust from Outback casts Sydney under eerie orange glow
A visitor takes pictures in front of the Sydney Opera House during Wednesday's dust storm.(Rob Griffith/Associated Press)
A
giant cloud of red dust has settled over Australia's largest city,
closing the country's largest airport and prompting a spike in
emergency calls.
The dust cloud settled over about a dozen towns and cities in two
states on Wednesday as strong winds snatched up red topsoil in the
country's dry interior and carried it hundreds of kilometres east.
The cloud of Outback grit swept into Sydney, casting the city under an orange glow, and blowing into the Pacific Ocean.
"It did feel like Armageddon, because when I was in the kitchen
looking out the skylight, there was this red glow coming through,"
Sydney resident Karen told Australian Broadcasting Corp. radio.
10 dry years
Australia's weather bureau said the dust storm is among the worst to hit the country since the 1940s.
Sydney's central business district is seen at 6:30 a.m., top, and 12:45 p.m. Wednesday as a dust storm swept through the city.(Tim Wimborne/Reuters)
"These
dust storms are some of the largest in the last 70 years," said Nigel
Tapper, an environmental scientist at Monash University. "Ten very dry
years over inland southern Australia and very strong westerlies have
conspired to produce these storms."
International flights were diverted from Sydney to other airports
and some domestic flights were cancelled due to unsafe visibility.
Passenger ferries around the city were also halted for safety reasons.
Ambulance services in the city reported about 250 emergency calls
from people experiencing breathing difficulties. People with asthma or
heart or lung diseases were urged not to go outside and to keep their
medicine inhalers handy.
Officials reported that the dust set off smoke alarms in some
buildings in the city's business district. The conditions also forced
some construction projects to be temporarily halted.
Drivers were being warned to use caution on area roads.
Record particle pollution
The particle pollution in Sydney hit a record since levels began to be recorded in 1970 because of the dust, officials said.
Readings in the city were showing up to 15,500 micrograms of
particulate matter per cubic meter, said New South Wales Environment
Department atmospheric manager Chris Eiser. A normal reading on a clear
day is between 10-20 micrograms, he said.
Though much of the dust in Sydney had settled by the afternoon,
officials reported the grit was being blown farther north into
Queensland and the capital of Brisbane was falling under its debris by
early evening.
In the Outback, officials reported that some towns were under a
complete blackout on Wednesday due to the dust storms. Some mines in the
region have been forced to shut down until the storms settled.
The dust storms are expected to continue into Thursday, with the red
dust expected to reach New Zealand about 2,220 kilometers away.
University of Queensland climatologist Samuel Marx told the
Australian Broadcasting Corp. a storm of this size can move between
eight and 40 million tonnes of dust.
The Bureau of Meteorology said a big cold front in New South Wales
caused severe thunderstorms and gale-force winds, which whipped up the
dust from inland and spread it across Australia's most populous state.
Winds of more than 100 km/h also fanned bush fires in the state.
"We've got a combination of factors which have been building for 10
months already — floods, droughts and strong winds," Craig Strong, an
official with Dust Watch at Griffith University in Queensland, told
Reuters.
With files from The Associated Press
Murky water swamps Georgia homes, roads
'Long morning' for commuters in Atlanta; death toll at eight
John Bazemore / AP
These homes in Mableton, Ga., near Atlanta were flooded on Tuesday.
ATLANTA - Neighborhoods, schools and even roller coasters at Six Flags over Georgia were awash in several feet of murky, brown water Tuesday, and officials warned worried residents to wait for the floodwaters to recede before checking out their damaged homes.
As Tuesday rush-hour began in Atlanta, Interstate 20 west of the city was closed in two spots by water spilling over the major artery for suburban commuters. Portions of at least two other freeways in the metro area were also closed, as was I-75 in Houston County in central Georgia.
Hundreds of roads and bridges were under water or washed out, including 17 bridges on state and interstate highways.
"It's going to be a long morning. We're asking people to be patient," DOT spokeswoman Crystal Paulk-Buchanan said.
Torrential Southeast rains soaked the area for days, and at least eight people have died since an onslaught of bad weather began late Sunday. A Tennessee man was still missing.
Washed-out roads and flooded freeways around metro Atlanta caused commuters headaches and hundreds of residents sought refuge in shelters. State emergency officials said they were confident those in immediate danger had been evacuated, but were concerned about residents attempting to return to their homes too soon.
"We had people who were out safely but decided they wanted to get back in danger," said Charley English, head of Georgia Emergency Management Agency.
Gov. Sonny Perdue asked President Barack Obama to declare a state of emergency in Georgia and urged residents to stay away from flooded areas. Officials were beginning to assess the damage and did not provide a financial estimate.
Slideshow
Damage, deaths Days of heavy rain turn docile creeks into surging rivers.
more photos
"I want to plead with you to give these waters time to recede," Perdue said. "Rescuers are putting their lives at risk to try to get someone out who foolishly drove through rushing waters."
The skies were clear and even sunny in parts of Georgia on Tuesday. Most of the rain eased overnight, but some residents in some areas woke up to new flooding.
In west Atlanta, resident Garrett Nail and several neighbors worked several hours to clear a tree that had blocked a road to their community.
"It was troubling at first. There was no power. We knew people had to get to work, school, doctor's appointments," said Nail. "We were left with two options. Help ourselves or wait on the government. We obviously decided to help ourselves."
State climatologist David Stooksbury said the ground was saturated and unable to absorb the large amounts of water.
"It just takes time for that water to work through the system," he said.
After several days of steady rain that dropped up to 20 inches in one place, forecasters said there was a chance of more light showers.
'It's a mess all over' As much as a foot of rain fell over parts of the Atlanta area Monday. The town of Dallas northwest of Atlanta had 16 inches in a 48-hour period, the Georgia Emergency Management Agency said.
Video
Waterlogged Sept. 22: NBC's Ron Mott reports on the continued flooding across the Southeast.
msnbc tv
Aerial shots showed schools, football fields, used car lots and even entire neighborhoods submerged by the deluge, sending some unlucky residents scurrying for higher ground.
"It's a mess all over," said Lisa Janak of the Georgia Emergency Management Agency.
About 12,000 Georgia Power customers were without power. Scattered outages were also reported in North Carolina.
Over 300 people were being helped at shelters across the Atlanta and north Georgia region, according to Red Cross officials.
One of the largest shelters was at the Cobb County Civic Center, where Shirley Jones joined others sitting on green cots, chatting about the fate of their homes. Around them, children played games, oblivious to the destruction.
"When I saw the water rising, it brought back bad memories," said Jones, who lived in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina. The 72-year-old had moved to the area two months ago.
Jones said rescue efforts this time went much more smoothly. A boat retrieved her from a family member's house.
Before being evacuated, Cordell Albert and her husband Christopher moved their valuables to the second floor of their Powder Springs home. The couple waded through knee-deep water before a raft picked them up.
"I feel lost," she said. "I feel homeless."
Toddler was swept away Seven people have died in Georgia since Sunday night, including a toddler swept away from his father's arms after a swollen creek ripped apart their trailer home.
As the storm front rumbled through west Georgia, it turned a normally sleepy creek into a surging head water that tore apart 2-year-old Preston Slade Crawford's mobile home around 2 a.m. Monday. The body of the drowned boy nicknamed "Scooter" wasn't found until hours later. His parents had been rescued from the raging waters as another son, Cooper, age 1, clung to his mother's arms in Carroll County, west of Atlanta.
Pat Crawford, the boy's grandmother, watched helplessly as the family's mobile home was whisked away. "Y'all gotta help us! Y'all gotta save us!" Crawford remembers Bridgett Lawrence and Craig Crawford shouting above the roaring water. She said she was on higher ground, but couldn't get to them because the current was so bad.
In Alabama, a 22-year-old man drowned when a pond's rain-soaked bank collapsed beneath him.
In Chattanooga, Tenn., Sylvester Kitchens, 46, was still missing two days after betting onlookers he could swim across a flooded ditch next to his house.
Several others who died were motorists whose cars were overtaken or trapped by fast-rising floodwater's. Days of downpours and thunderstorms saturated the ground from Alabama through Georgia into eastern Tennessee and western North Carolina, just months after an epic two-year drought in the region ended following winter rains.
Dozens of roads remained closed in western North Carolina and several small landslides were reported. Officials said the flooding there was the worst since remnants of hurricanes Frances and Ivan came through in 2004.
Crews in the tiny Georgia town of Trion worked to shore up a levee breached by the Chattooga River and in danger of failing. The town evacuated more than 1,500 residents, and Red Cross workers set up an emergency shelter.
Unusual winter tornadoes hit Midwest
The Associated Press
Aug. 21, 2009 4:18 pm ET January 2009 Tornadoes
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) -- A possible tornado damaged homes in central
Arkansas on Tuesday, a day after a freak cluster of January twisters
struck the unseasonably warm Midwest and demolished houses, knocked a
railroad locomotive off its tracks and briefly shuttered a courthouse.
One
person was killed in the Arkansas tornado, said Tommy Jackson, a
spokesman for the state Department of Emergency Management. Others were
injured, said Jim Campbell, Assistant Director for Pope County 911.
"We've got some homes damaged, trees and roads and stuff like that," Campbell said.
A
line of thunderstorms stretched across the region Tuesday and a tornado
watched remained in effect during the afternoon in parts of central and
eastern Arkansas, and western Tennessee, the National Weather Service
said.
A tornado-destroyed home in New Munster, WI, on Monday (AP PHOTO)
The
tornadoes developed as temperatures rose to record highs across wide
areas of the country. Tornadoes were reported or suspected Monday in
southwest Missouri, southeastern Wisconsin, Arkansas, Illinois and
Oklahoma. Two people were killed in Missouri.
Monday's
storms also poured more than 5 inches of rain on north-central Indiana,
causing near-record flooding that threatened a dam on the Tippecanoe
River, and one man drowned while attempting to evacuated in Remington
after a creek flooded, said Karen Wilson, Jasper County emergency
management director. Remington is about 90 miles northwest of
Indianapolis.
"The waters were moving so
rapidly and so deep that he just went under and didn't come back up,"
Wilson said. She said up to 150 people were evacuated in Remington.
Boats
were called out to assist in evacuations in several communities about
80 miles northwest of Indianapolis, said White County emergency
management director Gordon Cochran said. Some roads were washed out in
the county, authorities said.
On Monday,
Bill Lischka was drinking coffee at a restaurant in Caledonia, Ill.,
when he heard something he didn't expect in January: a tornado siren.
"Next thing you know ... a tornado just popped right out of the clouds," Lischka said.
Al
Ost said he "prayed like a sissy" as he fled to the basement of his
house in Boone County, Ill. The storm damaged a barn on his property,
he told the Rockford Register Star.
Hardest
hit Monday in Wisconsin was a subdivision in Wheat land, about 50 miles
southwest of Milwaukee, where at least 60 homes were damaged, Kenosha
County sheriff's Lt. Paul Falduto said Tuesday morning.
"With the light of day it always looks worse than at night," Falduto said.
Fifteen people were injured in the county, none seriously.
"I
have never seen damage like this in the summertime when we have
potential for tornadoes," Kenosha County Sheriff David Beth said. "To
see something like this in January is mind-boggling to me."
Kenosha
County Circuit Judge Bruce E. Schroeder, presiding over opening
testimony in a murder trial, said he couldn't believe it when a deputy
said the courtroom had to be evacuated because of a tornado warning.
"It's
a first," he said while waiting with 300 people in the basement. "I've
actually had ... warnings occur during jury trials before and frankly I
just ignored them. But not in January."
About
15 miles away in Harvard, Ill., a suspected tornado derailed one
locomotive and 12 freight cars. A tank car containing shock absorber
fluid leaked for hours before it was contained, Union Pacific spokesman
Mark Davis said.
The only other recorded
January tornado in Wisconsin was in 1967 and it was Illinois' first
since 1950, the National Weather Service said. However, tornadoes are
not unknown elsewhere, with 141 twisters in January 1999 in Arkansas,
Louisiana and Tennessee, according to weather service records.
Meteorologists
said the unusual weather was the result of warm, moist air moving from
the south. It brought temperatures nearly to 70 degrees on Sunday and
Monday. Temperatures hit record highs Monday at 138 cities across the
Plains and Midwest, the weather service said.
Tornado kills 1, rips apart buildings in Colorado
updated 7:00 p.m. EDT, Thu May 22, 2008
CNN)-- A massive tornado tore into the northern Colorado
town of Windsor and nearby towns Thursday, killing one person and
damaging many homes and businesses, the town's mayor said.
The storm struck the town of Windsor and "several other areas" of Weld County, a fire spokeswoman says.
"It will be a long time before the town recovers from this," Windsor Mayor John Vasquez said.
The funnel cloud, accompanied by golf-ball sized hail, blackened the
skies over Windsor as it knocked down power lines, shredded crops in
fields outside the city and blasted whole neighborhoods.
The southeast side of town was hit the worst by the storm, which began around noon, Vasquez said.
Windsor, with a population of nearly 19,000, is about 80 miles (130 km) north of Denver.
Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter ordered the National Guard to aid rescue and
cleanup efforts. He visited the town Thursday evening, saying the
number of homes damaged was significant.
More than 100 children escaped injury when the staff at Windmill Child
Enrichment Center hustled them into an interior room as the storm
approached, Kristi Bernhardt, the center's director, told CNN. Daycare worker describes huddling with dozens of children »
Rough weather also affected communities in western Colorado. Rising
waters prompted authorities to close a 12-mile stretch of I-70 near
Grand Junction a few hours after the tornado struck Windsor, about 220
miles away.
Power was out across town, and about 100 people were taking shelter at a local recreation center, he said.
Vasquez said firefighters and utility crews were working to cap ruptured gas lines.
The single fatality reported was at a campground at a park outside
Windsor, near the city of Greeley, he said. Authorities had no count of
injuries.
"Some are completely demolished and unrecognizable -- just masses of timber," said Scott Scofield, a Weld County deputy.
CNN confirmed that another tornado touched down in Laramie, Wyoming,
hitting a high school, a middle school, a Wal-Mart store and houses.
In Fort Collins, Colorado, the Larimer County Sheriff's Office had
several reports of damage, including one home destroyed and another in
which residents were trapped by a fallen tree, spokesman Don Nadow
said.
Witnesses also reported funnel clouds over parts of Loveland, about 13 miles south of Fort Collins, he said.
Several power outages were reported because of downed power lines, but
there were no reports of injuries in Larimer County, said Capt. Steve
Fleming of the Poudre Fire Authority.
Inspector Dan Engelhardt,
a Loveland Fire Department spokesman, said multiple funnel clouds had
been reported in that area and several touched down. Loveland and other
area fire departments have contributed engine companies and rescue
teams to Windsor, he said.
Windsor, Fort Collins and Loveland lie in the shadow of the Rocky Mountains, where the Great Plains give way to steep hills.
"It's very unusual to see this by a mountain range. It's kind of a freak thing," Fleming said.
The storm, moving northwest, dissipated quickly after the tornado
struck. But watches and warnings remained posted for northeastern
Colorado.
Later Thursday night, KABC in Los Angeles, California,
reported that a tornado warning was issued for west central Riverside
County.
Mid-East suffers rare cold snap
By Crispin Thorold
BBC News, Amman January 17, 2009
Snow has fallen in Baghdad for the first time in living memory
There have been a number of deaths and considerable damage to crops
in the Middle East as temperatures in the region have fallen to
exceptional lows.
Local reports say that 10 people died in Saudi Arabia after snowfalls.
In Syria, temperatures have dropped to minus 16 degrees
Celsius. There has been widespread damage to crops in Syria, Jordan and
Israel.
There has also been snow in the Iraqi capital Baghdad for the first time in living memory.
The Middle East is a region used to extremes of temperature - but not ones like these.
Kuwaiti meteorologists are eagerly watching thermometers
to see if the previous low recorded in the open desert, minus four
degrees Celsius in 1964, could be broken in the coming days.
Some in the Jordanian government are worried that food prices may increase, giving inflation another unwelcome bump.
But reports from Israel suggest the weather may not be bad news for everyone.
Some farmers are suffering, but there has been a jump in
the sale of heaters and warm clothes, with retailers saying the demand
for some goods has tripled.
This cold snap has been caused by a weather system that began in Siberia.
But meteorologists in the region cannot agree whether it
is the result of climate change; the director of Baghdad's Meteorology
Department reportedly said it could be, his counterpart in Amman
disagrees.
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