A cluster of more than 100 dead birds scattered across N.C. 24 left passing motorists and bystanders puzzled Wednesday afternoon. The starlings were found dead on the highway at the Wildlife Boat Ramp in Cedar point around 2:30 p.m. Eyewitnesses hypothesized that a flock of the birds had been struck by a large passing vehicle, or that a charge from a nearby powerline had killed them.
Law enforcement officers were unable to provide an official explanation for the phenomenon. Officials with the Carteret County Sheriff’s Office said they had been called out to investigate the strange incident, but when they arrived on the scene just before 3 p.m., they could not locate the birds, and they closed the incident investigation shortly thereafter.
Ecuadorian authorities have issued an Orange alert for populations near the Tungurahua volcano, which is violently awakening from four months of inactivity.
The 16,500 ft. Tungurahua volcano in Ecuador eastern Andes, is located about 135 kilometers (84 miles) south of the capital Quito; it has been active since 1999 but its thermal activity has steadily augmented since the weekend, with ardent magma boulders being spewed some 950 ft. into the air and nearby towns getting covered in ashes.
Authorities have setup emergency refugees for citizens that live close to the Tungurahua, which means “Throat of Fire” in the indigenous Quechua language.
A mud volcano in southern Taiwan erupted yesterday, almost a year since its last eruption, the Central News Agency reported.
The mud volcano in Wandan, Pingtung County, erupted around 3 a.m. near a cemetery area, ejecting mud and releasing natural gases, according to the CNA. Residents in the neighboring ignited the natural gases coming out from the volcano, hoping to end the eruption as soon as possible, the CNA said.
The mud volcano usually erupts once of twice a year. It last erupted on Dec. 21 in an area around the Huang Yuan Holy Temple, north of the cemetery. The eruptions have been moving south. In early years, the eruptions occurred at the peak of Liyu Hill further north from the temple.
Magnitude 6.8 IZU ISLANDS, JAPAN REGION January 01, 2012
Magnitude 4.0 YOUNGSTOWN-WARREN URBAN AREA, OHIO December 31, 2011
Magnitude 6.6 SOUTHWESTERN SIBERIA, RUSSIA December 27, 2011
Magnitude 5.9 SOUTH ISLAND OF NEW ZEALAND December 23, 2011
Magnitude 5.8 SOUTH ISLAND OF NEW ZEALAND December 23, 2011
Magnitude 7.1 EASTERN NEW GUINEA REG, PAPUA NEW GUINEA December 14, 2011
Northern Mexico Wilts Under Worst Drought on Record
DURANGO, Mexico — The sun-baked northern states of Mexico are suffering under the worst drought since the government began recording rainfall 70 years ago. Crops of corn, beans and oats are withering in the fields. About 1.7 million cattle have died of starvation and thirst.
Hardest hit are five states in Mexico's north, a region that is being parched by the same drought that has dried out the southwest United States. The government is trucking water to 1,500 villages scattered across the nation's northern expanse, and sending food to poor farmers who have lost all their crops.
Life isn't likely to get better soon. The next rainy season isn't due until June, and there's no guarantee normal rains will come then.
Most years, Guillermo Marin harvests 10 tons of corn and beans from his fields in this harsh corner of Mexico. This year, he got just a single ton of beans. And most of the 82-year-old farmer's fellow growers in this part of Durango state weren't able to harvest anything at all.
"I almost got a ton of beans. It's very little, but you have to harvest whatever you get," said Marin, who depends on his crops to sustain himself and the seven grown children who work with him. More
Worst Windstorm in a Decade Strikes Pasadena, Southern California
Southern California is being buffeted by the worst windstorm in more than a decade – gusts have been clocked as high as 100 miles per hour – resulting in widespread power outages, diverted flights, hundreds of trees down, and the city of Pasadena on an emergency footing.
The high winds, which began late Wednesday, have rattled residents and businesses all over the West, from Utah to Southern California. Hundreds of thousands of people are without power, and colleges, schools and at least one movie studio have shut down. While some meteorologists are referring to the storm as an especially severe form of the Santa Ana winds that Southern California experiences at this time of year, others say the storm’s wind patterns are unusual, affecting communities that don’t usually experience such violent weather.
According to the National Weather Service, what’s driving the strong winds is a large, cold, low-pressure system centered over Needles, California. The service expects the system to stay put, rotating counter-clockwise for at least another day, although with declining power. “These are the worst winds we have seen in at least a decade,” says Stuart Seto, a National Weather Service specialist in Oxnard, near Los Angeles. He says he expects the winds to continue gusting into the weekend, with winds as high as 55 mph through Saturday. “If you are on a motorcycle or a high profile vehicle, you may want to stay off the Interstate,” he adds, “as the cross winds will continue to be very strong.” More
The 2011 Atlantic Hurricane Season: Another Strangely Active One
November 30 marks the final day of the 2011 Atlantic hurricane season, and it was another very odd year. The season featured a huge number of named storms–nineteen–tying 2011 with 2010, 1995, and 1887 as the 3rd busiest year for tropical storms.
Only 2005 and 1933 had more named storms since record keeping began in 1851. However, 2011 had an unusually low percentage of its named storms reach hurricane strength. The year started out with eight consecutive tropical storms that failed to reach hurricane strength–the first time on record the Atlantic has seen that many storms in row not reach hurricane strength.
We had a near-average average number of hurricanes in 2011–seven–meaning that only 37% of this year’s named storms made it to hurricane strength. Normally, 55 – 60% of all named storms intensify to hurricane strength in the Atlantic. There were three major hurricanes in 2011, which is one above average, and the total Accumulated Cyclone Energy (ACE)–a measure of the destructive potential of this season’s storms–was about 20% above average.
The rare combination of near-record ocean temperatures but unusually dry, stable air over the Atlantic is no doubt at least partially responsible for 2011′s unusually high count of named storms, but near-average number of hurricanes and ACE. More
Thailand: Flood Impact Will Last for Months
The Bank of Thailand has lowered its economic growth projection for this year to 1.8%, from the previous forecast of 2.6%, as a result of the floods. However, the BoT expects the economy to expand by 4.8% next year, from a previous projection of 4.1% on the back of the government's spending in projects to rehabilitate flood-hit areas and to rebuild the country.
The bank's Monetary Policy Committee met on Wednesday and cut the one-day repurchase rate by 0.25 percentage points to 3.25%, from 3.5%, to boost the economy. Despite the healthy growth projections for next year, figures released by Somchai Sajjaphong, director of the fiscal policy office at the Finance Ministry, paint a grim picture of the damage incurred by the floods, says Post Today.
Value-added tax receipts in October rose 11.3% compared to the same time the previous year. In the previous month, tax receipts were up 13.3%. Imports grew 6% compared to the same time last year, as against 12.9% in September. Automobile sales fell 38.8% on the same month last year, compared to an increase of 29.6% in the previous month, while motorcycle sales dipped 4.6% on the same time the previous year, compared to 11.4% growth in September.
The consumer confidence index was 62.8% in October compared to 72.7% in September. Private sector investment was hit as well. Pickup truck sales, an indicator of economic activity, fell 41.8% in October compared to the same time the previous year, with growth of 25.7% in the previous month. More
Wild Weather Wreaks Havoc in Alberta
CALGARY — Winds ripped through Calgary and roads turned to ice rinks near Hinton, Alta., while Edmonton enjoyed unusually warm temperatures on a Sunday when erratic weather seemed to rule the province.
In downtown Calgary, winds were clocked at 149 kilometres per hour. The high winds wreaked havoc throughout the city, downing power lines, breaking windows, and even ripping off three light-rail crossing arms, causing transit delays. Police urged residents to stay indoors as flying debris became a hazard on roads and walkways.
Near Hinton, RCMP said poor weather had created hazardous driving conditions after a passenger bus carrying a midget AA hockey team from Edmonton rolled shortly before 1:30 p.m. Sunday. “We had rain this morning until the snow (on the ground) was almost all gone. Then it turned to sleet,” said Const. Deanna Alford, adding that travel was not recommended for the area.
Meanwhile, temperatures in Edmonton reached a relatively balmy 9 C, well above the city’s daily average temperature for November of about -6 C. Temperatures are forecast to continue fluctuating in the city throughout the week.
“You can continue to see 20-degree temperature swings, plus or minus, throughout this week,” said Nicola Crosbie, chief meteorologist at Global Edmonton. “It’s not completely unusual to see these types of fluctuations this late in the year, usually when we’re in a shoulder season, at the end of fall and heading into winter, the temperatures can go up and down.” More
A Weird and Disastrous US Weather Year: Tornadoes, Drought, Flooding, Irene, Blizzard, Quakes
WASHINGTON (AP) — Nature is pummeling the United States this year with extremes. Unprecedented triple-digit heat and devastating drought. Deadly tornadoes leveling towns. Massive rivers overflowing. A billion-dollar blizzard. And now, unusual hurricane-caused flooding in Vermont.
If what's falling from the sky isn't enough, the ground shook in places that normally seem stable: Colorado and the entire East Coast. On Friday, a strong quake triggered brief tsunami warnings in Alaska. Arizona and New Mexico have broken records for wildfires. Total weather losses top $35 billion, and that's not counting Hurricane Irene, according to the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration. There have been more than 700 U.S. disaster and weather deaths, most from the tornado outbreaks this spring.
Last year, the world seemed to go wild with natural disasters in the deadliest year in a generation. But 2010 was bad globally, and the United States mostly was spared. This year, while there have been devastating events elsewhere, such as the earthquake and tsunami in Japan, Australia's flooding and a drought in Africa, it's our turn to get smacked. Repeatedly. "I'm hoping for a break. I'm tired of working this hard. This is ridiculous," said Jeff Masters, a meteorologist who runs Weather Underground, a meteorology service that tracks strange and extreme weather. "I'm not used to seeing all these extremes all at once in one year."
The U.S. has had a record 10 weather catastrophes costing more than a billion dollars: five separate tornado outbreaks, two different major river floods in the Upper Midwest and the Mississippi River, drought in the Southwest and a blizzard that crippled the Midwest and Northeast, and Irene.
What's happening, say experts, is mostly random chance or bad luck. But there is something more to it, many of them say. Man-made global warming is increasing the odds of getting a bad roll of the dice.
Sometimes the luck seemed downright freakish.
Tornado Reports from Jan 1, 2011 to Sept 2, 2011
Worldwide Wicked Weather
Matthew 24:27 For as the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.
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* 2 Apple Slices
Dairy
* 1 Chocolate Drink Mix
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* 15 Instant Milk
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Beans
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German-Czech Border Region Rattled By Earthquake Swarm
Towns and villages across the western Czech Republic were shaken overnight by two separate earthquakes, the latest in a series of tremors to hit the region. The Geophysical Institute, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic says it has recorded 10,000 earthquakes during the last 10 days in Nový Kostel area of the Cheb District, a region located close to the Czech Republic’s western border with Germany.
The earthquake swarm started on Tuesday 23 August and continued Saturday 03 September. While many have gone unnoticed by the local population some of the larger tremors, including more than two dozen quakes exceeding 3 magnitude have been felt in the towns of Chemnitz, Karlovy Vary, Birch, Bukovany and Luby.
The total number of earthquakes in this five week-long swarm is more that 4,200. The number of earthquakes per day has risen dramatically in the past few days.
Click the image for a larger view
El Hierro is on the southwestern end of the Canary Island archipelago.
Spain’s Instituto Geográfico Nacional (IGN) confirmed on Tuesday that an underwater eruption has occurred five kilometres off the southern coastline of El Hierro, the smallest of the Canary Island. The eruption is Spain’s first since the eruption in 1971 of the Teneguía volcano on the island of La Palma (Canary Islands).
The IGN says all three of its seismic stations on El Hierro in the Canary Islands have registered a volcanic tremor of low frequency in the south of the island at La Restinga, the southern-most village in the Canaries. The estimated 537 residents of the town were summonsed to a local football field on Tuesday afternoon to be briefed on evacuation procedures.
A Red Alert has since been issued by local authorities for the town. A notice posted on the Emergencia El Hierro website on Tuesday evening stated: “Phase pre-eruptive. It involves the initiation of a preventive evacuation. Make yourself available to the authorities.” Spanish Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero and cabinet colleagues will attend an emergency briefing on the developing situation on Tuesday evening.
Scientists from IGN and CSIC (Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas), meanwhile, have conducted a reconnaissance flight over the sea to the area south of the island, where they have located dead fish floating on the surface five kilometres from the coast. The dead fish were identified in an area where lower seismic magnitude occurred on October 9, at a depth of approximately 2 km.
The most recent, significant earthquake measured 3.7 magnitude and struck at 02:25 AM on Saturday. The shallow earthquake was measured at a depth of just 5 kilometres. According to the European-Mediterranean Seismological Center, the epicentre was located 1 km NE Bukovany (pop 1,798), 2 km SW Sokolov (pop 24,847), and 72 km NW Plzen (pop 163,953). The quake occurred just over two hours after a quake measuring 3.6 magnitude on the Richter Scale hit. The epicentre was located less than 2 kilometres north of Luby, a two with a population of just over 2,500. The tremor was also felt 71 kilometres away in Gera, a city of some of 105,000 people.
In recent years, scientists have noted an increase in the movement of magma towards the earth’s surface in the Cheb Basin, western Czech Republic. They say rising magma could be one of the causes of the earthquake swarms, which regularly occur in the Vogtland, North-West Bohemia, the Fichtelgebirge and the Upper Palatinate. The last earthquake swarm to occur before this week’s activity was in 2008. More
Plot of Time vs. Magnitude
New Icelandic Volcano Eruption Could Have Global Impact
In the graph of seismic energy release, the truth is that the release of seismic energy tonight (10/8/2011) was the most powerful release we've had since the swarm began, overtaking the 28th of September that was previously the most energy released at once. The question now is whether it will continue.
Graph by Actualidad Volcánica de Canarias (AVCAN) Click graph to view source.
Oklageddon: What a Year in the Sooner State!
2011 has been the year of extremes for the state of Oklahoma, with residents experiencing a wide variety of over-the-top weather events. From a major blizzard to extreme heat and a historic drought to powerful, record-setting tornadoes and earthquakes, Oklahoma has seen it all this year.
Major Blizzard
The famed "2011 Groundhog Day Blizzard" that hammered areas from the southern Plains to the Midwest and Northeast from Jan. 31 to Feb, 2, 2011 and set numerous records also packed a big punch in Oklahoma.
Extreme Drought
The extraordinary drought that Oklahoma has experienced this past year has been among the state's worst on record.
Extreme Heat
As if exceptional drought wasn't enough, this past summer went down in history as the hottest ever for Oklahoma. The relentless heat was responsible for many heat-related illnesses and deaths as high temperatures frequently exceeded 100 degrees.
Flash Flooding
Even with extensive drought, there is such a thing as too much rain. To add to the list of extreme weather events, flash flooding was observed with this past week's severe weather outbreak.
Tornadoes
A strong autumn storm traversed the central Plains this past week, producing a late-season bout of severe weather over portions of Oklahoma, Texas and Louisiana. The storm system spawned as many as six tornadoes from a single severe thunderstorm late Monday afternoon and evening.
Record Earthquake
Extremes don't necessarily come from the sky. Sometimes, they can come from the ground. To round out the list of extremes experienced in Oklahoma so far in 2011, rare earthquakes rocked the state in record fashion. On Nov. 5 at 2:12 a.m. local time, a powerful 4.7 magnitude foreshock occurred 46 miles east of Oklahoma City. Later that day, a 5.6 magnitude main shock hit 44 miles east-northeast of Oklahoma City at 10:53 p.m. local time. This set a new state record for largest magnitude earthquake. More
Mighty Katla, with its 10km (6.2 mile) crater, has the potential to cause catastrophic flooding as it melts the frozen surface of its caldera and sends billions of gallons of water surging through Iceland's east coast and into the Atlantic Ocean.
"There has been a great deal of seismic activity," says Ford Cochran, the National Geographic's expert on Iceland.
There were more than 500 tremors in and around the caldera of Katla just in October, which suggests the motion of magma. "And that certainly suggests an eruption may be imminent."
Scientists in Iceland have been closely monitoring the area since 9 July, when there appears to have been some sort of disturbance that may have been a small eruption. -source
Hundreds of metres under one of Iceland's largest glaciers there are signs of a looming volcanic eruption that could be one of the most powerful the country has seen in almost a century.
Photos: Etna Volcano in Sicily Erupts on January 6, 2012
Lava spews from a crater of the giant Etna Volcano on the southern Italian island of Sicily on January 6, 2012.
