4:40 PM Thursday UPDATE:

Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
Caveats: NONE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Routine testing at Redstone creates unusual radar patterns

Redstone Arsenal, Ala.- On Tuesday routine tests were being conducted at Redstone's airfield. During these tests RR-188 (chaff) was dropped from aircraft. This chaff showed as an anomaly on local weather screens as weather conditions caused it to linger longer than normal.

This substance is commonly used by the military in training and testing operations.

There are no known environmental effects caused by RR-188.

"Redstone is committed to ensuring environmental stewardship while balancing that with our critical missions to support the war fighter," said COL John S. Hamilton, Garrison commander.

Terri Stover
Public Affairs Specialist

11:45AM Update: Redstone Arsenal Releases Statement

Public Relations Specialist, Terri Stover, has released the following statement in relation to media inquiries about the mysterious blob detected on radar.

"Aviation and missile technology testing at Redstone collects data that protects and improves the weapon systems that America's sons and daughters are using in ongoing overseas contingency operations, and in forward-deployed areas worldwide. As a matter of Operational Security policy, we do not offer details concerning the circumstances under which testing activities are performed. Further, discussing specific measures and operational procedures could adversely affect the success of testing activities. We routinely evaluate and validate weapon systems and components so that we and our allies can maintain the edge over adversaries. Testing assures that war fighting capabilities are in a high state of readiness."

- Updated by WHNT News 19 Staff

Researchers at the University of Alabama in Huntsville and the National Weather Service are working to figure out why radars are showing a mysterious blob above Redstone Arsenal after 1:45 p.m. today, the Times' news partner WHNT News 19 is reporting.

The anomaly showed up late this afternoon and was centered near the northwest edge of Redstone Arsenal close to Zierdt Road and Madison Boulevard/I-565. WHNT reported it was first believed the radar image was being caused by a damaged substation in the Madison or West Huntsville area.

However, Huntsville Utilities used a spectral analyzer to see if a frequency generated at the substation was "tricking" the radar but tests showed no damage or other problems that could be causing the image.

Anglers and those who live along the Jamestown Reservoir are seriously concerned by what they are seeing wash up along the shore.

Hundreds of dead carp are appearing, and North Dakota Game and Fish biologists are stumped as to why.

Living on the east side of the reservoir, Jim Schmitt has seen his fair share of fish, but what he sees now is strange to him. "The darndest thing. They were so high on the water, and it looked like they were gasping for air," says Schmitt.

He has also been seeing dead ones floating near shore.

His concerns are the concerns of many who have been vocal to the Game and Fish Department. Fisheries Biologist BJ Kratz says he first started noticing signs of the fish kill as the ice came off, but then he started getting reports that the carp seemed sluggish.

"It's not typical for carp because carp are usually pretty active this time of year and are also easy to spook and reactive when people approach them," says Kratz.

The carcasses also continue to pile up.

Major volcanic eruptions around the world have coincided with periods of unusually cold weather in Ireland for a span of more than 1,200 years, new research shows. The findings suggest eruptions could have complex effects on regional climates, possibly leading to cooling in areas of the Northern Hemisphere even in wintertime, which hadn't been clearly shown before.

The study, published today in the journal Environmental Research Letters, reconstructed the history of cold events in Ireland from the fifth through 17th centuries A.D., based on more than 40,000 writings of scribes and monks from that time. The history of volcanic eruptions was also recreated based on levels of sulfate found in Greenland ice cores - an accepted method to date past eruptions, said study author and Harvard researcher Francis Ludlow. By comparing the two sources, Ludlow and his colleagues found cold events were more likely to occur in the years after these eruptions: More than half of the 69 coldest periods happened in the years following huge volcanic eruptions, Ludlow said.

"This suggests that a very major volcanic eruption can have a long-lasting impact on climate, with extreme cold occurring for possibly several years after an event," Ludlow told LiveScience.

For years, people have known about the amount of human-generated trash that ends up in the ocean, but a new study in the journal Deep-Sea Research I: Oceanographic Research Papers showed just how deep our detritus sinks, particularly in the waters around Monterey, California.

"We were inspired by a fisheries study off Southern California that looked at seafloor trash down to 365 meters," said lead author Kyra Schlining, a senior research technician at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI).

Scientists from the MBARI examined 18,000 hours of underwater video collected by cameras on the institute's remotely operated underwater vehicles in search of man-made debris along the ocean floor.

"We were able to continue this search in deeper water - down to 4,000 meters," Schlining said. "Our study also covered a longer time period, and included more in situ observations of deep-sea debris than any previous study I'm aware of."

The videos had been used to identify objects and animals that appeared in these videos and record them in the MBARI's Video Annotation and Reference System (VARS). In the latest study, Schlining and her colleagues combed through the database to locate video clips of rubbish on the seafloor. They were able to identify over 1,500 observations of deep-sea debris, from sites near Vancouver Island to the Gulf of California to the Hawaiian Islands.

Wildlife rehabilitation centers have rescued more than 1,550 sea lion pups along Calfornia's coast during this record year of strandings, but the number of new cases seems to be tapering off.

SeaWorld, a prime intake facility for these pups, has between 70 and 80 sea lions in its care these days. That's down from nearly 200 at the height of the crisis in March, spokesman Dave Koontz said. The marine-themed park's rehabilitation center is taking in about three to five pups per week, he said, down from more than 10 per day at the peak.

Since January, SeaWorld has rescued about 340 stranded pups, Koontz said. Most of these emaciated and dehydrated animals are found right at the coast, but a few have reached places such as a hotel, a resident's garage and the middle of a busy road.

In March, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration declared a "marine mammal unusual mortality event" for California, in response to stranding rates that were nearly three times higher than the historical average.

"The number of admits to rehab in recent weeks has definitely been much less than it was at the height of the event in March," said Sarah Wilken, marine mammal stranding coordinator for the agency. "But there are still a lot of animals in the centers that are in need of care."

At SeaWorld, stranded sea lions receive hydration and nutritional treatment, along with medical care, before being released back to the wild after a few weeks or months. About 10 percent to 15 percent of the pups treated at the park's rehab center this year have become stranded again and required a second rescue, Koontz said.

"Some of them just need a little bit more help," he said.

Scientists believe that population changes among squid and small fish - primary sources of food for sea lions - may have triggered the strandings as newly weaned pups struggled to find scarce prey. They're analyzing data about food supplies and certain diseases in their quest to pinpoint the leading cause of this year's unusual toll.

"There are some early indications, but the answers are going to be better in July, after this year's pups are born," Wilken said. "For the moment, everyone's grateful for the breather. But we're not yet saying that it's over."

Heavy rain was pouring across much of Florida early Thursday as the first tropical storm of the Atlantic hurricane season headed toward the state's western coast and a new tropical storm warning was issued for a swath of the U.S. East Coast.

Tropical storm warnings were in effect for a large section of Florida's west coast from Boca Grande to Indian Pass and for the East Coast from Flagler Beach, Fla., all the way to Cape Charles Light in Virginia.
Tropical Storm Andrea's maximum sustained winds increased to near 60 mph (95 kph) and the storm was expected to make landfall in Florida's Big Bend area Thursday afternoon before moving across southeastern Georgia and the Carolinas. It was not expected to strengthen into a hurricane.

"The rain covers a good portion of the Florida peninsula even though the center is a couple of hundred miles off shore," said Eric Blake, a hurricane specialist at the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami.

Shipping containers are partly immersed in water at the flooded harbour in Riesa in the federal state of Saxony after the Elbe river has broken its banks, June 5, 2013:
Additional images

Residents and emergency crews had worked through the night to fight the floods in Dresden. The German military and the national disaster team sent more support in a frantic effort to sandbag levees and riverbanks as floodwaters that have claimed 16 lives since last week surged north.
"Everybody's afraid but the people are simply fantastic and sticking together," said Dresden resident Silvia Fuhrmann, who had brought food and drinks to those building sandbag barriers.

The Elbe hit 28 feet, 9 inches around midday - well above its regular level of 6 1/2 feet. Still, that was not high enough to damage the city's famous opera, cathedral and other buildings in its historic city centre, which was devastated in a flood in 2002.

Germany has 60,000 local emergency personnel and aid workers, as well as 25,000 federal disaster responders and 16,000 soldiers now fighting the floods.

Further downstream, the town of Lauenburg - just southwest of Hamburg - evacuated 150 houses along the Elbe, n-tv news reported, as the floodwaters roared toward the North Sea.

Passau - Swollen rivers gushed into the old section of Passau in southeast Germany on Monday, as water rose in the city to levels not seen in more than five centuries.

The city was one of the worst hit by flooding that has spread across a large area of central Europe following heavy rainfall in recent days. At least eight people were reported to have died and nine were missing due to floods in Germany, Austria, Switzerland and the Czech Republic.

"The situation is extremely dramatic," Herbert Zillinger, a spokesman for Passau's crisis center, told The Associated Press.

Much of the city was inaccessible on foot and the electricity supply was shut down as a precaution, he said. Rescuers were using boats to evacuate residents from flooded parts of the city.

But with water from the Danube, Inn and Ilz rivers relentlessly pouring into the city, water was advancing into previously dry streets - in one case going from dry to ankle-deep within half an hour. Markers set in 1954, when the city suffered its worst flooding in living memory, have disappeared beneath the rising water.