Earth ChangesS


Dollar Gold

Las Vegas is "screwed"; Water situation "as bad as you can imagine". Yet they're still building!

Nick Allen
The Telegraph
Sat, 28 Jun 2014 11:15 UTC
Lake Mead
© GettyLake Mead: boaters seen in front of a white "bathtub ring" on the rocks on the upstream side of the Hoover Dam
Amid a brutal drought the reservoir that supplies 90 per cent of Las Vegas's water is fast disappearing and desperate attempts to save Sin City are under way

Outside Las Vegas's Bellagio hotel tourists gasp in amazement as fountains shoot 500ft into the air, performing a spectacular dance in time to the music of Frank Sinatra.

Gondolas ferry honeymooners around canals modelled on those of Venice, Roman-themed swimming pools stretch for acres, and thousands of sprinklers keep golf courses lush in the middle of the desert.

But, as with many things in Sin City, the apparently endless supply of water is an illusion.America's most decadent destination has been engaged in a potentially catastrophic gamble with nature and now, 14 years into a devastating drought, it is on the verge of losing it all.

"The situation is as bad as you can imagine," said Tim Barnett, a climate scientist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. "It's just going to be screwed. And relatively quickly. Unless it can find a way to get more water from somewhere Las Vegas is out of business. Yet they're still building, which is stupid."

Comment: Typical of a capitalist mentality that is out of control: Blind focus on immediate profits at the expense of neglected essentials that ultimately will result in self-destruction.

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Arrow Down

Highway shut down after sinkhole opens up in northern Alberta

Julia Parrish
edmonton.ctvnews.ca
Mon, 30 Jun 2014 10:44 UTC
Image
RCMP shut down Hwy 754, after a sinkhole was found, and spread, near kilometre 74 of the highway, on Monday, June 30.
RCMP in northern Alberta had to shut down a highway in the area, after a sinkhole was discovered near the roadway.

Desmarais RCMP said on Monday at about 7 a.m., officers were alerted to the emerging sinkhole near Highway 754.

Officers responding to the call found the sinkhole near kilometre 74 on Highway 754 - and traffic on the roadway was reduced to one lane, as the sinkhole had started to spread underneath the northbound lane of the highway Monday morning.

Later that day, RCMP said the entire roadway had been closed, as the sinkhole had continued to expand the width of the highway.
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Arrow Down

Four people buried by landslide in China


Daily Telegraph
Sun, 29 Jun 2014 09:58 UTC
Image
© China News Service/Zhong XinFirefighters try to rescue the missing people after a landslide in southwest China's Yunnan Province on Monday, June 30, 2014.
A landslide on Saturday afternoon in southwest China's Yunnan Province is captured on camera

Amateur video footage shows a large section of steep terrain give way above a village in Daguan County in China's Yunnan Province.

Four residents of the village of Tuohe were out collecting herbs at the time and were buried under tonnes of debris.

Rescuers rushed to hunt for survivors as large boulders continued to tumble down the hill. One victim was pulled out alive but the other three are still missing.


Source: ITN
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Snowflake Cold

Antarctica sets new record for sea ice


Talking about the Weather
Sun, 29 Jun 2014 00:00 UTC
Antarctic sea ice record
Antarctic sea ice has set a new all-time record maximum over the weekend of June 28-29, 2014.
The sea ice surrounding Antarctica, which, as I reported in my book, has been steadily increasing throughout the period of satellite measurement that began in 1979, has hit a new all-time record high for areal coverage.

The new record anomaly for Southern Hemisphere sea ice, the ice encircling the southernmost continent, is 2.074 million square kilometers and was posted for the first time by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign's The Cryosphere Today early Sunday morning.

It was not immediately apparent whether the record had occurred on Friday or Saturday. Requests for comment to Bill Chapman, who runs The Cryosphere Today, were not immediately returned.

The previous record anomaly for Southern Hemisphere sea ice area was 1.840 million square kilometers and occurred on December 20, 2007.
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Cloud Lightning

Tornadoes hit the West coast of Sweden

Karin Fjaervoll
GP.se
Fri, 27 Jun 2014 01:26 UTC
Tornado in Sweden
© Anders Lagerin
Tornadoes appeared on Friday morning off the coast of Varberg.

A concentrated storm front with thunderclouds, called thunder cells, moved on Friday morning in over the west coast of Sweden from Kattegat.

The tornadoes were visible off the coast of Varberg but then moved in over land and the remains of them were at 11 o'clock over Ulricehamn og Kinna.

On Sunday tornadoes were observed in both Malmö and in Bohuslän and in southern Norway a tornado was seen at the beginning of the week.

According to Christopher Hallgren, a meteorologist at Foreca, there have been more tornadoes than normal for this time of year.

- There are many now, it's exciting. Every summer, usually around ten tornadoes are reported around the country. It has simply been favorable tornado conditions in recent times, he says.

It is difficult to measure the strength of a tornado, which is formed by extremely strong winds.
- The worst may get up to wind speeds of 75 meters per second. The limit for the windspeed of the storm [category]is at 24 meters per second and for hurricane at 33 meters per second, so it's incredibly high winds.

Tornadoes form in thunderclouds. Thunderclouds contain vertical winds blowing upwards. The upward moving winds results in a decrease in pressure, which contribute to a low pressure cell. Uppvindarna makes the pressure decreases, contributing to a local low pressure. In the low pressure begins swirling winds and it gets these wind cones.

- The reason is that you see the tornado is that it pulls up dust or water, says Christopher Hallgren.

Translated by Sott.net
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Bizarro Earth

USGS: Earthquake Magnitude 6.2 - Bonin Islands, Japan region


US Geological Survey
Mon, 30 Jun 2014 21:49 UTC
Bonin Quake_300614
© USGS
Event Time
2014-06-30 19:55:32 UTC
2014-07-01 04:55:32 UTC+09:00 at epicenter

Location
28.354°N 138.864°E depth=512.4km (318.4mi)

Nearby Cities
359km (223mi) WNW of Chichi-shima, Japan
656km (408mi) SSE of Shingu, Japan
682km (424mi) SSE of Owase, Japan
683km (424mi) SSE of Tanabe, Japan
817km (508mi) S of Tokyo, Japan

Scientific Data
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Ice Cube

Ice age reboot: Ocean current shutdown viewed as culprit

Becky Oskin
livescience
Thu, 26 Jun 2014 00:00 UTC
thermohaline circulation
© NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization StudioThe thermohaline circulation is a global ocean current that redistributes warm surface water and cold, dense deep water.
A dramatic slowdown in deep ocean currents matches a major reset in Earth's ice ages about 1 million years ago, new evidence from the South Atlantic seafloor suggests.

The discovery doesn't mean the ocean current stall-out is the only culprit behind the change in Earth's incessant ice ages, the study authors said. However, the findings provide new evidence that Earth's oceans can significantly alter its climate.

"We cannot tell for sure what broke the cycle," said lead study author Leopoldo Pena of the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in New York. "Our evidence shows the oceans played a major role."

For unknown reasons, about 950,000 years ago, Earth's ice age cycles suddenly lengthened, from 41,000 years to 100,000 years. The planet's thermostat was tweaked at the same time, with ice ages growing colder than before.

Comment: We are seeing similar type disruption of Ocean Currents

Life on this Earth Just Changed: The North Atlantic Current is Gone

Wake The World Up Campaign

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Black Cat 2

Mountain lion strolls through shopping mall in Salt Lake City

Richard Hartley-Parkinson
Daily Mirror, UK
Sat, 28 Jun 2014 13:07 UTC
Image
Mountain lion casually walks through shopping mall
The cougar wandered through the centre, in Salt Lake City, before settling down in the doorway of a steak restaurant

This isn't something you expect to see on a normal shopping trip - a mountain lion having a browse.

Shoppers were stunned when they spotted the wild animal, also known as a cougar, puma or panther, relaxing outside a doorway before taking a stroll through the mall.

The big cat was caught on camera wandering through the Jordan Commons Centre, in Sandy, Salt Lake City, in Utah, at about 8am yesterday.

Leesha Francis, who works in an office in the mall, said she was scared when she saw the animal sitting in the doorway of a steakhouse in the mall.

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Cloud Lightning

Tornado-like cloud formation spotted in the English channel

Leon Watson
Daily Mail, UK
Sun, 29 Jun 2014 12:26 UTC
Image
Storm brewing: Father-of-two Carey Mackinnon, a Coastguard watch manager, took this picture of a tornado-like cloud formation off the coast of West Sussex
* Witnesses described seeing a funnel of cloud over the English Channel

* Coastguards launched a lifeboat, but there was no distress signal

* Seaside town of Selsey hit by tornadoes before, in 1998 and 1986

Dramatic pictures emerged today of a tornado-like cloud formation whirling in the skies off the coast of West Sussex.

Stunned witnesses described seeing the giant funnel of cloud over the English Channel near the seaside town of Selsey around 7.15pm.

Coastguards launched a lifeboat as a precaution, but there was no distress signal.
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Attention

Stranded humpback whale dies in Mooloolaba marina, Australia


The Queensland Times
Sun, 29 Jun 2014 12:06 UTC
Image
SAD TRIP: Water Police towed the dead humpback whale out to sea after it washed up in Mooloolaba River.
A sick humpback whale that touched the hearts of people along the Sunshine Coast has finally died.

The 6.5m mammal was first seen off the Gold Coast a week ago and slowly swam north, reaching the Mudjimba area by Thursday.

On Friday it returned south and attracted a large crowd as it rubbed against the rock wall at the mouth of the Mooloolah River.

But as darkness fell on Friday night, the young whale swam quietly into the river and passed away overnight.

A spokesman for the Department of Environment and Heritage Protection said the whale stranded itself within the Mooloolaba marina, where it died under a pontoon.

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