Earth ChangesS


Cloud Lightning

India: Landslides Kill Six Personnel, Injure Seven


E-Pao
Wed, 06 Jul 2011 00:00 UTC
In a tragic incident of nature taking toll on human, a massive landslides along NH 53 today killed six personnel of Indian Reserved Battalion (IRB) and Manipur Rifles even as seven personnel were critically injured.

According to police report, the convoy led by AC 2nd IRB S Ingo was heading to Jiribam district headquarters to escort loaded freight trucks and oil tankers.

They had just reach Sinam Khul near Kotlen about 25 km from Imphal when the landslide struck them hit the bus in which they were travelling.

The bus was travelling with five commando teams and some personnel on other vehicles as Road Opening Party (ROP) .

The six ill fated personnel who were killed in the tragic accident were Havildar Yaima of 5th IRB, rifleman Diamond of 5th MR, rifleman Surchandra of 5th MR, rifleman Maradona of 6th IRB, rifleman Lakshman of 8th MR and rifleman Nasir Khan of 2nd MR.The injured personnel were 1st MR rifleman T Sandang Maring (31), 3rd IRB personnel Takhellambam Sushil (23) of Thoubal Athokpam Mayai Leikai, 2nd MR rifleman Ningrei (42) of Nunghu, 3rd IRB rifleman Thaimei (27) of Khoupum, 6th IRB rifleman Sapam Inao of Waikhong, 1st IRB rifleman Ambang (37) of Tumnoupokpi and 6th MR rifleman Athokpam James (30) of Kongba Laishram Leikai.
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Cloud Lightning

Colorado, US: Flood Damages Buildings in Vail

Scott N. Miller
Vail Daily
Wed, 06 Jul 2011 00:00 UTC
Mud, water create big cleanup job, do minimal damage

A combination of rainfall, snowmelt and crumbling debris dams pushed Middle Creek in Vail out of its banks Tuesday, causing minor flooding at two lodges and two town buildings.

The Vail Library was closed Wednesday so crews could clean mud and water from the floors. Town crews were also cleaning mud from the entryway and the ice sheet at Dobson Ice Arena.

Meanwhile, maintenance crews were cleaning the pool and some of the conference rooms at the Evergreen Lodge, as well as the parking garages at the Lodge at Lionshead.

While none of the condos were damaged, guests at the Lodge at Lionshead spent a mostly-sleepless night Tuesday.

"We asked a couple of people to move out of their units, and the cars were moved out of the underground parking garages," Joy Dunham, of the Lodge at Lionshead, said. "As water continued to flow into the garages, one had water almost knee-deep before the flooding started to subside around midnight."
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Cloud Lightning

Torrential Rains Continue to Wreak Havoc in China


The News International
Thu, 07 Jul 2011 02:00 UTC
Image
© The News International
The western part of the of Sichuan Basin and the northeastern part of the southwest China's Sichuan Province had been hit by a three-day continuous downpour.

Cities such as Bazhong and Guangyuan in northeastern Sichuan suffered most, with a precipitation over 300 millimeters at some areas during the new round of heavy rainfall.

The water level was recorded at 368.20 meters at a hydrometric station in Bazhong on Wednesday, 5.27 up from the alarm level.

Statistics of the Sichuan Provincial Command Center for Flood Control and Earthquake Relief show that 1.5 million people had been affected, with two dead and six missing, in 21 counties of cities of Guangyuan, Mianyan, Suining and Bazhong, by 20:00 on Wednesday.

More than 170,000 people had been evacuated and 10,000 houses were destroyed by torrential rain.

Mudslides triggered by the heavy rain had caused damages to a bridge on National Highway No. 212 and National Highway No. 317. Road traffic was suspended due to blocks on two provincial highways.
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Cloud Lightning

Florida, US: Heavy Rains to Roll Through Tampa Bay and Threaten Final Shuttle Launch

Danny Valentine
St. Petersburg Times
Thu, 07 Jul 2011 07:10 UTC
Heavy rains from a tropical wave in the Gulf of Mexico are expected to roll through the Tampa Bay area Thursday and could delay Friday's final space shuttle launch, disappointing up to a million onlookers.

NASA officials on Thursday reaffirmed that there is only a 30 percent chance that weather will allow the final space shuttle launch scheduled for 11:26 a.m. Friday.

But there is a 40 percent chance of acceptable weather for launching at 11:04 a.m. Saturday, and a 60 percent chance of good weather for a 10:38 a.m. Sunday launch, shuttle weather officer Kathy Winters said.

Scattered showers and thunderstorms should roll through Tampa Bay throughout Thursday, said Juli Marquez, a Bay News 9 meteorologist. The chance of rain and thunderstorms increases throughout the day, she said.

Friday's weather will be similar, with a 70 percent chance of rain. Some spots could see more than an inch of rain, Marquez said. Much of Central Florida will see heavy rain, she said.
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Life Preserver

Omaha, Nebraska: Missouri River Flooding Closes Another Nebraska-Iowa Bridge

David Hendee
Reuters
Wed, 06 Jul 2011 00:00 UTC
Missouri River Flood
© ReutersAn aerial view of Missouri River flood waters moving up to an I-29 on ramp in northwest Missouri.
Missouri River flooding closed another bridge on Wednesday morning, with U.S. Highway 30 between Blair, Nebraska, and Interstate 29 in Iowa shut down for 48 hours as crews install flood barriers, officials said.

The closing means that with the exceptions of Omaha and Plattsmouth, Nebraska, crossings between Nebraska and Iowa, all bridges are closed along a 228-mile stretch of the river from Sioux City, Iowa to St. Joseph, Missouri.

Iowa crews are installing giant sandbags along the north side of Highway 30. The south side already has the barrier installed.

Other bridges that have been closed by flooding include Highway 2 from Nebraska City into Iowa, Highway 136 from Brownville, Nebraska, into Missouri, and Highway 159 from Rulo, Nebraska, into Missouri.
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Pistol

Canada: Rampaging Polar Bear Shot in Churchill


CBC News
Wed, 06 Jul 2011 11:41 UTC
Image
© Laura Gray-EllisThe head of a man who got too close to a polar bear while taking pictures can be seen just behind a rock in the background.
Conservation officers in Churchill, Man., were forced to shoot and kill a polar bear after it wandered into town, became aggressive and started charging their truck.

Early Monday morning, the bear turned on a man who was on the beach in town taking photographs. The man hid behind some rocks and the bear kept him trapped by pacing around the area.

Conservation officer Bob Windsor and his partner distracted the bear by firing off noisemakers known as bear bangers. The ruckus startled and confused the bear enough to give the man a chance to escape.

Laura Gray-Ellis, who was watching from her apartment window as the events unfolded, saw the man scramble over the rocks.

"He ran up the road into town, rounded the corner of the apartment building that I live in, and started jumping from backyard to backyard," she said.
Bear heads into town
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Radar

US: Minor Earthquake Rattles Northeast Philadelphia

Robert Moran
Philly.com
Thu, 07 Jul 2011 00:00 UTC
A 0.43-magnitude earthquake gave some Northeast Philadelphia residents a tiny jolt early Wednesday.

The temblor was confirmed by Lamont-Doherty Cooperative Seismographic Network in New York, though seismologist Mitchell Gold said he had to look very hard to find the evidence. It was recorded at 6:37 a.m.

Gold said it was about 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) west of Cornwells Heights, close to where a 1.72-magnitude quake struck May 27. The largest earthquakes in the region in recent decades occurred in 1994, when two quakes measuring 4.2 and 4.6 hit Reading on the same day, Gold said.
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Radar

Africa: 4.5 Magnitude Earthquake Rattles Mozambique, Eastern Zimbabwe


Times Live
Thu, 07 Jul 2011 01:39 UTC
An earthquake measuring 4.5 on the Richter scale rocked the lower Save Valley in Mozambique and was felt in eastern Zimbabwe.

According to the United States Geological Survey, the earthquake struck at 12.37PM on Wednesday in an area that has seen more than a dozen quakes in the last 20 years, including two very large ones in 2006 that were felt as far as Harare.

The earthquake was severe in Chipinge where panic-stricken residents scurried for cover.

No deaths or injuries were recorded, Zimbabwe's Herald Online reported on Thursday.

Zimbabwe's Goetz Observatory in Bulawayo said it was still busy putting together all readings.
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Radar

7.6 Pacific Earthquake Sends Tsunamis East and West


sunlive.co.nz
Thu, 07 Jul 2011 03:04 UTC
Image
© NOAAA GNS plot of the energy dispersal from the 7.6 magnitude earthquake.
Thursday morning's submarine earthquake near the Kermadec trench sent most of its energy east and west, rather than south towards New Zealand say GNS scientists.

The earthquake was magnitude 7.6 and occurred in the Pacific tectonic plate close to the Kermadecs. The epicentre was 160km from Raoul Island and 920km from Tonga.

The orientation of the earthquake's fault rupture was north-south and most of the tsunami energy radiated perpendicular to the fault plane.

The largest observed peak-to-trough wave-height caused by this was 1.9 metres at the two tsunami gauges at Raoul Island, operated by GeoNet. This puts the top of the wave at about one metre above the normal tide level.

GNS Science tsunami scientist Dr William Power says small tsunami arrivals, not much larger than normal 'sea noise', were subsequently observed on tsunami gauges at Great Barrier Island and East Cape.

"The mechanism of the rupture was that of a normal fault, rather than a subduction thrust event, but both can produce a large vertical movement of the seafloor."
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Cloud Lightning

Chinese coal blamed for global warming er... cooling

Andrew Orlowski
The Register
Tue, 05 Jul 2011 04:06 UTC
Economists ride into sulphurous cloud of aerosols

The refusal of the global temperatures to rise as predicted has caused much angst among academics. "The fact is that we can't account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can't," wrote one in 2009. Either the instruments were wrong, or the heat energy had gone missing somewhere.

Now a team of academics, after tweaking a statistical model to include sulphur emissions, suggest that coal power stations may be to blame for a lack of global warming since 1998. The IPCC's 2007 assessment acknowledged the negative radiative forcing (aka, cooling effect) of both natural aerosols from volcanoes and manmade aerosols, but admitted the level of scientific understanding was low.
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