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Tropical cyclone Pam batters islands of Vanuatu

Sean Morris, Steve Almasy, Madison Park and Laura Smith-Spark,
CNN
Sat, 14 Mar 2015 01:24 UTC
tropical cyclone pam
© abc.net.au
A resident assesses damage caused by Cyclone in Tarawa, Kiribati, on March 11, 2015. (
Tropical Cyclone Pam may have weakened somewhat Saturday morning, but it was still pounding the islands of Vanuatu after hours of fierce winds and torrential rain.

"#CyclonePam still tearing through #Vanuatu. 'Much bigger than expected,' says our colleague in Port Vila. Initial reports of devastation," tweeted the Australian branch of UNICEF.

Pam, one of the strongest storms seen in the South Pacific in years, earlier made a direct hit on Port Vila, the capital, raising fears of mass destruction.


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Cloud Precipitation

Hawaii blizzard continues, snow removers and observatories evacuated


Big Island Video News
Fri, 13 Mar 2015 21:32 UTC
Image

March 12. 2015: Just before noon on Thursday, the blizzard allowed summit webcams to glimpse the observatories partially buried in snow.

Rapidly accumulating snow drifts reported

The blizzard warning continues for the summits of Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa, as snow is piling up high.

The National Weather Service says the warning is in effect for Hawaii Island's higher elevations - anything above 11,000 feet - until 6 p.m. Thursday. Forecasters expect an additional 2 to 4 inches of snow to fall. Temperatures are in the mid-20s, but its the wind that is extreme, gusting up to 85 miles per hour.

Those who work on the summit - including snow removal crews - had to abandon their posts. This message was issued by the Maunakea Rangers early Thursday morning.
The road to the summit of Maunakea is CLOSED to the public due to continuing blizzard-like, white-out conditions on the summit. Due to rapidly accumulating snow drifts, extremely strong winds and near white out conditions yesterday, the snow removal crew and all observatory personnel abandoned the entire summit area. Weather permitting, our snow removal crew will again begin attempting to clear the large amounts of snow from summit roads early this morning, however, it will likely take them at least the entire day to complete this task. - Maunakea Rangers at 3:55 a.m.
It is likely that the summit road will remain closed all day today.

Down below Mauna Kea, summit views were shrouded in clouds all day. Some folks were able to glimpse the snow on the areas just below the summit as it peeked out from beneath the blizzard. Lynn Beittel of Visionary Video took these shots from Waimea this morning.

Comment: Hawaii known for it's warm tropical breezes is having blizzard warnings along with 85 MPH winds in March! There's global warming for you.

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Question

Mysterious booms continue to shake houses in Port Angeles, Washington

Arwyn Rice
Peninsular Daily News
Thu, 12 Mar 2015 21:07 UTC
Image
© Peninsula Daily News
A new round of booming noises has disturbed residents of west Port Angeles and Joyce, who say the mysterious sounds shake their homes.

The rattling noises were reported at about 12:21 p.m. Wednesday, almost exactly two weeks after the last round of booms heard on the afternoon of Feb. 25, and again at about 9:35 a.m. Thursday.

"It sounded like it came from the direction of the Strait [of Juan de Fuca]," said Jim Haugen, who lives on Milwaukee Drive in west Port Angeles near the bluffs and reported the Wednesday boom.

"We were in the house, heard the boom and the house vibrated," he said.

"It sounds similar to a sonic boom, [but there were] no planes in the area," he added.

Haugen said he has been hearing and feeling the booming vibrations at his home for 13 years.

On Thursday morning, reports of booms from Joyce to downtown Port Angeles were made on Facebook.

Comment: See also: What are they? Rumblings, 'booms' heard anew in parts of Washington

Loud boom remains a North Whidbey mystery

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Arrow Down

200 reindeer killed by avalanche in Trollheimen, Norway

Jan Arve Ødegård
www.tk.no
Fri, 13 Feb 2015 20:03 UTC
Image

Reindeer killed by avalanche
An animal tragedy in the Oppdals part of Trollheimen, specifically in the area south of Storhornet, was discovered Wednesday afternoon.

Two local residents, Day Jørund Vik and John Bjorndal, wanted to see the extent of the landslide and took a trip inland to the area the same day.

We had heard about it being exceptional and wondered how big it was. We discovered that the animals had been taken and notified the reindeer owner, says Vik Adresseavisen.

The animal tragedy was also featured by a number of other media including local newspapers Opdalingen, Up and NRK Sor-Trondelag.
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Blue Planet

Sixth explosion at Turrialba Volcano, Costa Rica

L. Arias
The Tico Times
Fri, 13 Mar 2015 20:15 UTC
Image
© OVSICORI
OVSICORI’s webcam recorded the sixth explosion of Turrialba Volcano on Friday, March 13.
Two new explosion of gas and ash Friday mid-morning broke a brief period of low activity at Turrialba Volcano, located in the province of Cartago, 67 kilometers from the capital San José.

The new explosions follow one that occurred at 4:30 a.m. Friday and four on Thursday.

The Volcanological and Seismological Observatory of Costa Rica (OVSICORI)'s web cameras recorded the explosions Friday. The agency reported that columns of material reached some 1,500 meters high (4,921 feet), similar to those recorded on Thursday.

Spewings of ash and gases lasted for periods of some 30 minutes, OVSICORI reported.


Comment: It's an unprecedented high activity for this particular volcano. For more info, see: Volcanic ash closes Costa Rica's Juan Santamaría International Airport

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Arrow Down

Sinkhole closes down busy road in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

Mike DeNardo
philadelphia.cbslocal.com
Fri, 13 Mar 2015 19:52 UTC
Image
© Mike DeNardo
A large sinkhole has shut down Plymouth Road in Montgomery County.
A busy road in Plymouth Meeting, Montgomery County is closed until further notice because of a sinkhole.

Plymouth Road between the Blue Route and Butler Pike is detoured indefinitely while PennDOT assesses how badly a sinkhole has damaged the bridge over Plymouth Creek.

At street level, the 12×3 foot hole takes up the narrow shoulder of the two-lane bridge. But down along the creek bed, exposed utility lines are visible.

Drivers, meanwhile, are being forced to detour to Germantown Pike until PennDOT can assess the damage and repair the bridge.
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Bizarro Earth

'Baikal seriously ill': World's deepest lake suffers alien algae, record water-level drop


RT.com
Fri, 13 Mar 2015 13:27 UTC
Olkhon Island and Lake Baikal
© Wikimedia Commons
Olkhon Island and Lake Baikal.
The shores of Lake Baikal in Siberia, the world's largest body of fresh water and popular tourist destination, are covered with rotting algae dangerous to its unique ecosystem.

Baikal is getting increasingly contaminated by spirogyra, which could pose a threat to the purity of its waters.

Spirogyra is not native to Baikal's ecosystem. It thrives on biological waste which, according to ecologists, is provided in abundance by the sewage facilities of the local holiday centers, as well as private boats.

Now, most of Baikal's shores are covered in rotting spirogyra. Only the western shore remains clean.

"It has never been detected previously in such a mass abundance. Spirogyra is completely occupying more than 50 percent of the coastal area of Lake Baikal," says Oleg Timoshkin from the Limnological Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The institute researches the flora and fauna of Siberian lakes.

"Last year, there was more than 1,500 tonnes of rotting algae. Unfortunately, I can definitely say that Baikal is ill. Seriously ill."
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Wolf

Wolves attack dogs in Pacific Rim Park, Canada


cbc.ca
Thu, 12 Mar 2015 19:24 UTC
Image

Parks Canada is warning people to keep their dogs on a leash while walking in Pacific Rim National Park near Ucluelet, B.C. because of attacks by wolves.
Two dogs are injured and another is missing after a series of wolf attacks near Ucluelet, B.C.

On Tuesday morning, a pair of wolves attacked two dogs being walked off leash on Wickaninnish Beach. While the larger dog escaped, the smaller one — a Jack Russell Terrier — was taken by the pair.

Todd Windle, a human-wildlife conflict expert with Parks Canada, says the dogs' owner was only 200 metres away when the attack happened.

"She saw both wolves come up and they started attacking her larger dog first," says Windle.

The second, smaller dog then came in to defend the larger one. The wolves left the bigger one alone and made off with the smaller one instead.
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Snowflake Cold

Winter has been tough on waterfowl across America

Chris Bosak
The Hour
Thu, 12 Mar 2015 17:24 UTC
Image
© Chris Bosak
A male Hooded Merganser swims in a half-frozen Mill Pond in Norwalk.
What would you do if your refrigerator and kitchen cupboards were locked and you didn't have a key? The grocery stores were all boarded up, and it's the dead of winter so your garden has long stopped being productive. Oh, and you can't drive anywhere because of a natural instinct telling you to stay put.

That is what the last six weeks have been like for many birds, especially waterfowl. And it's been a deadly scenario.

I heard the other day that upwards of 70 ducks and geese were found dead at the Norwalk Wastewater Treatment Plant, most likely because of malnutrition. I also received a call from a Westport resident who had five dead Canada geese in her yard one morning. The number swelled to eight as the week went on. Mute Swans have been stranded on frozen water, too, although some of those birds have been saved.

"It's been the most severe winter we've had in 30 years," said Min Huang, a waterfowl specialist with Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP). "We've seen a lot of mortality over the last three weeks up and down the coast, mostly geese and puddle ducks."
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Snowflake Cold

A week before Spring: Nova Scotia blizzard forecast with 40 cm of snow


cbc.ca
Fri, 13 Mar 2015 16:54 UTC
Image
© Craig Paisley/CBC
CBC meteorologist Peter Coade expects "all forms of traffic" to be affected on Sunday, including flights, roads and ferries.
Environment Canada warns of snow squalls for some areas of Maritimes Friday morning

Just a week away from the official start of spring, the Maritimes are bracing for another winter storm.

CBC meteorologist Peter Coade says two weather systems — one from the northwest and another warm and moist disturbance out of the Gulf of Mexico — are forecast to collide and become one, just south of Nova Scotia on Sunday.

The system is expected to produce snow. Coade expects "all forms of traffic" to be affected on Sunday, including flights, roads and ferries.

"Although it is still early to come up with a solid snowfall amount forecast, I think it safe to say that blizzard conditions can be expected with the strong east-to-northeast wind blowing around some 10 to 20 centimetres — possibly as high as 30 to 40 centimetres — of fresh snow," said Coade.
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