Earth ChangesS


Bizarro Earth

420 Whale Sharks Swarm Mexican Coastline

Jennifer Viegas
Discovery News
Wed, 25 May 2011 18:43 UTC
Whale Sharks
© Oscar ReyesWhale shark aggregation off the coast of Mexico.

Up to 420 whale sharks gathered off the coast of the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico, forming the world's largest known assembly of this species, according to a press release issued by the Smithsonian National Zoological Park.

The discovery counters the widely held belief that whale sharks, which can weigh more than 79,000 pounds, are solitary filter feeders that prefer to be alone in the open ocean. The impressive shark assembly proves they will gather for the right reasons. Food now appears to be the draw.

"Whale sharks are the largest species of fish in the world, yet they mostly feed on the smallest organisms in the ocean, such as zooplankton," Mike Maslanka, biologist at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute and head of the Department of Nutrition Sciences, says in the press release. "Our research revealed that in this case, the hundreds of whale sharks had gathered to feed on dense patches of fish eggs."

Maslanka and his team identified the whale shark assembly using both surface and aerial surveys. Considering these sharks can grow to more than 40 feet long, the surface-level surveying must have been extraordinary.
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Cloud Lightning

Oklahoma Tornadoes: Home shelter shields 14 from twister in Cole

David Zizzo
NewsOK
Wed, 25 May 2011 19:57 UTC
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© David Zizzo, The OklahomanVeterinarian Patrick Young attends to Baxter, a Labrador that was in the garage of a home destroyed Tuesday by a tornado in Cole.
Cheryl Mayo and 14 other people huddled in a shelter as a monstrous tornado churned overhead late Tuesday afternoon.

The tornado blew open the door of the storm shelter, Mayo said about 30 minutes after the storm passed by. "As soon as it blew the lid open you could see that the house was gone."

The home was destroyed, along with a double-wide trailer on the same property on State Highway 74B east of Cole, a small town about 15 miles southwest of Norman.
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Cloud Lightning

U.S. tornado death toll mounts, many still missing


International Business Times
Wed, 25 May 2011 19:51 UTC
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© REUTERS / Ed ZurgaA man looks through a friend's trailer as he tries to find anything salvageable after a devastating tornado hit Joplin, Missouri May 23, 2011.
The death toll from a monster tornado that hit Joplin, Missouri on Sunday rose to 123 with 750 people injured and many more missing, authorities said on Tuesday.

Rescue and recovery teams scoured the wreckage of the small Midwestern city, which was devastated by a high-velocity whirl of wind that destroyed about 2,000 buildings.
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Cloud Lightning

US: Several nursing home residents dead after Missouri tornado


McKnight's
Wed, 25 May 2011 19:47 UTC
Image
© Unknown
At least 10 nursing home residents and one employee were killed in a Sunday tornado that hit Joplin, MO. The storm killed at least 117 people, and may have caused up to $3 billion in insured losses to 10,000 buildings, according to a preliminary estimate released Tuesday by Eqecat Inc.

Greenbriar Nursing Home, one of six skilled nursing facilities citywide, was directly in the tornado's path. A Los Angeles Times report describes a horrific scene at Greenbriar, where 10 nursing home staffers tried to protect 85 residents in the building's central hallway. One employee said several people were pulled through the roof by high winds that also tore off the building's roof. He told the paper that he could see cars being tossed around in the air above the building.
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Cloud Lightning

US: Joplin rescuers race to find tornado survivors before time runs out, more storms arrive


The Washington Post
Wed, 25 May 2011 19:37 UTC
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© Unknown
Emergency crews drilled through concrete at a ruined Home Depot, making peepholes in the rubble in hopes of finding lost shoppers and employees. A dog clambered through the shattered remains of a house, sniffing for any sign of the woman and infant who lived there.

Across this devastated city, searchers moved from one enormous debris pile to another Tuesday, racing to respond to any report of a possible survivor.
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Cloud Lightning

US: No respite from threat of tornadoes

Nicholas Riccard
Los Angeles Times
Wed, 25 May 2011 19:28 UTC
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© Joe Raedle, Getty ImagesErnie Darby hugs his son Davis as they search for belongings in their Joplin, Mo., home after Sunday's tornado.
An unrelenting storm season spread havoc in Oklahoma, Kansas and Texas while devastated Joplin, Mo., hunkered down for a night punctuated by tornado sirens.

Five people died and three children were critically injured when tornadoes touched down west of Oklahoma City at rush hour, officials said. Two more died in Kansas when high winds tossed a tree into a vehicle. And at least one twister disrupted air travel in North Texas. Travelers were hustled to storm shelters and, at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, flights were canceled while crews inspected aircraft for hail damage and runways for debris.
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Cloud Lightning

US: Tornado warning in St. Louis after 14 killed in 3 states


MSNBC
Wed, 25 May 2011 15:50 UTC
Kansas City area earlier saw twisters; several states on alert
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© Sydney Brink/The Sedalia Democrat/APJoe Horacek of Sedalia, Mo., surveys the damage shortly after a tornado sliced through his neighborhood Wednesday. Horacek said he got sprayed with glass and debris when he looked out a window and barely made it to the safety of his bathroom. His home, in background, he said, "is gone."
Kansas City, Missouri - As residents in three states picked through rubble, looking for victims and belongings buried by storms that killed 14 people, twisters hopped across the Kansas City area Wednesday while a tornado warning was issued for St. Louis, where a trained spotter reported a twister briefly touched down near a busy interstate.

Funnel clouds were seen across the St. Louis area, NBC affiliate KSDK-TV reported.

The system also caused Chicago's O'Hare airport to cancel 550 flights and delay inbound and outbound flights by three hours.

Suburbs around Kansas City, Mo., reportedly saw at least one twister, and the National Weather Service issued a tornado warning for the downtown area, where a a rotating wall cloud was seen before the weather improved.

No reports of damage were immediately available but tornado sirens were heard in some areas. People in downtown buildings moved into underground areas before the worst of the weather passed.

A tornado also touched down in nearby Sedalia, Mo., the National Weather Service said. A Sedalia resident told KSHB-TV that damage in the town of about 21,000 was significant.

Earlier Wednesday, a twister was reported on the ground in Miami County, Kan., just west of Kansas City. Damage was spotted near Highway 69, KSHB-TV reported officials as saying.
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Info

Japan Quake Raises Shaking Risk Elsewhere in Country


OurAmazingPlanet
Wed, 25 May 2011 15:23 UTC
Japan Tremors
© USGSMap showing the 11 March 2011 magnitude 9.0 off Tohoku mainshock and 166 aftershocks of magnitude 5.5 and greater until May 20. Warmer color indicates more recent events. Larger symbol indicates greater quake magnitude.

The massive 9.0 magnitude earthquake that devastated Japan in March built up stress on other faults in the country, putting some areas, including Tokyo, at risk of aftershocks and even new main shocks over the next few years, scientists have found.

After studying data from Japan's extensive seismic network, researchers from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), Kyoto University and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) have identified several areas at risk from the quake, Japan's largest ever, which already has triggered a large number of aftershocks.

Data from the Tohoku earthquake on March 11 has brought scientists a small step closer to a better assessment of future seismic risk in specific regions, said Shinji Toda of Kyoto University, a lead author of the study.

"Even though we cannot forecast precisely, we can explain the mechanisms involved in such quakes to the public," he said. Still, he added, the findings do bring scientists "a little bit closer" to being able to forecast aftershocks.
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Bizarro Earth

US: Little Missouri River reaches record high Tuesday, hydrologist calls it 500-year event


Rapid City Journal
Wed, 25 May 2011 16:14 UTC
The stream flow of the Little Missouri River at Camp Crook reached a record high when the water level peaked, according to real-time U.S. Geological Survey stream-gage data.

The water level peaked at 19.42 feet on Tuesday, about seven feet above the National Weather Service designated flood stage of 12 feet.

"This event only had a 0.2 percent chance of occurring, making it a 500-year event," said Joyce Williamson, a USGS hydrologist. "This doesn't mean that the next comparable flood will be in 500 years, just that there is a 0.2 percent chance of this level of flooding to occur. Multiple 500-year events can occur in a short time frame and then not again for a very long time."
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Cloud Lightning

"We are not in Kansas anymore?" Kansas, US: Storms wallop Rush County

Mike Corn
The Hays Daily News
Wed, 25 May 2011 15:00 UTC
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© Steven Hausler • Hays Daily NewsVehicles travel along U.S. Highway 183 as power poles are blown over Tuesday after a thunderstorm south of La Crosse
As the winds died down and the heavy rains slowed to a sprinkle, residents here started venturing out from their homes, curious what they might see.

What they found, surprisingly, was little damage, but an abundance of water in the streets along with trash cans.

"Lot of rain," said Lynn Enslinger, who retrieved a trash cart from the middle of the street. "We avoided the big disaster. We were lucky."

Fire trucks canvassed the city, driving up and down every street, checking for damage.

Rainfall amounts varied, but Rush County Emergency Management Director Jim Fisher suspected they were in the 4- to 5-inch range, all of it falling within an hour's time.

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© UnknownStormchasers watch a thunderstorm Tuesday in Rush County
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