Earth ChangesS


Music

Strange howling sound awakens St. Paul, Minnesota

Was it an animal in distress? Heavy equipment tearing up concrete before dawn? A train accident?

Not that anyone in St. Paul could tell. But a distant, howling scraping sound woke people up about 4 a.m. this morning in St. Paul's Highland Park and Mac-Groveland neighborhoods.

You can hear it here:


The sound echoed for miles through the city

Igloo

Where's the snow? On the ground in 49 of 50 states

Snowstorm in Washington
© Michael Reynolds, epaThe Washington Monument is barely visible behind visitors to the Lincoln Memorial in Washington on Feb. 13.

Some snow is on the ground at the highest elevations of the Big Island of Hawaii.


Snow is on the ground in 49 out of the 50 states - only the Sunshine State of Florida is completely snow-free, according to a map produced Thursday morning by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

(This doesn't mean that those 49 states are snow-covered, of course, only that some part of each state has snow.)

Although this map doesn't show it, there is snow in Hawaii, where webcams are showing snow on the high peaks of the mountain volcanoes of Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea.

HAWAII SNOW: Webcam from peak of volcano

The map also doesn't include Alaska, but it's a given that most of that state is snow-covered this time of year. A quick check with the National Weather Service forecast office in Fairbanks found 19 inches of snow on the ground there.

There doesn't appear to be much snow on the ground in Texas or Louisiana, and with the forecast of mild temperatures, it doesn't figure to last much longer there, if it even makes it through the day Thursday.

The map shows how sparse the snow is in parts of the West, as only small parts of Nevada, Arizona and New Mexico are showing snow because of the ongoing drought and warmth.

How dry and warm has it been in the Southwest so far this winter? January 2014 was the driest January ever recorded in New Mexico, while Arizona had its second-driest January on record, according to data released Thursday by the National Climatic Data Center.

As for warmth, both Arizona and New Mexico, along with California, had a top-10 warm January.

Cloud Lightning

Dolphins, seals and birds killed in storm onslaught in Cornwall, UK

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Seals, dolphins and sea birds have all been killed in the succession of storms in Cornwall.
Wildlife in Cornwall has taken a battering in the relentless storms with "an unprecedented number" of dead birds, dolphins and seals washing up on the coast.

Dead sea birds including puffins, razorbills and guillemots, gannets and cormorants have been washed up all along the north and south coasts according to the Cornwall Wildlife Trust (CWT).

The charity said seals in particular were struggling, with many of this year's new pups being found stranded, injured, weak and often dead on our shores.

CWT said 29 birds, 14 seals and 9 dolphins were recorded dead on the shores of Cornwall in the last four weeks.

Attention

Whale carcass washed up on the coast of Minahasa, Indonesia

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© Ronny Adolof BuolA dead whale washed up on the beach Minahasa, North Sulawesi.
The whale already thought to be dead, beached at Minahasa, North Sulawesi. The size of the whale's body was about 10 meters, with a width of 2 meters and weighed 300 kilograms.

Attention

Rare whale species washes up dead in Playa Matina, Costa Rica

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© Noticias RepretelScreenshot of the rare beaked whale, which was approximately 5 meters in length.
A beaked whale was found dead on the shores of Playa Matina on Tuesday, Noticias Repretel reported. The sighting is only the fourth beaked whale body ever found in Costa Rica, and the first on the Caribbean side.

According to Noticias Repretel's report, the body showed no signs of human inflicted damage, and residents believe the whale got disoriented and drowned in deep water.

Not much is known about beaked whales due to their tendency to stay deep under the water. Though they must surface to breath every hour or so, beaked whales are known to dive to average depths of 300 meters (1,000 feet).

Snowflake Cold

Storm engulfs US east coast as havoc persists in South

Capitol Hill
© Getty Images

A huge snow storm is blanketing the densely populated US North-east, after wreaking havoc in the South.

Across the typically mild South, more than half a million homes and businesses lack power, and thousands of flights have been cancelled.

The weather system has affected people in about 22 states from Texas to Maine and caused a dozen deaths.

The storm dumped more than 12in (30cm) of snow in the Washington DC region, before descending on New York.

Snow-covered streets were deserted during the morning commute in the nation's capital, where the federal government shut down its offices.

Ten to 20 inches of snow could fall from north-eastern Pennsylvania to New England on Thursday, said the National Weather Service.

Nearly 5,000 flights were cancelled by Thursday morning, according to airline-tracking website FlightAware.com.

Road Cone

Eight vintage Corvettes swallowed by 40-foot sinkhole inside National Corvette Museum

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© National Corvette MuseumThe sinkhole is reportedly about 40 feet wide and at least 25 feet deep.
A sinkhole reportedly opened up inside the National Corvette Museum in Bowling Green, KY at around 5:44AM local time, swallowing eight vintage Corvettes that were on display. The sinkhole is reportedly about 40 feet wide and at least 25 feet deep. No one has been hurt.

The Bowling Green fire department was on the scene right away and geologists from Western Kentucky University have been called to investigate. Much of the western Kentucky region is underlain by karst, limestone that has been eroded to produce springs, sinking streams, caves, and sinkholes.

The sinkhole occurred in the museum's Sky Dome, a yellow cone-shaped dome 140 feet in diameter with a nearly 100-foot high glass ceiling. Cars in this area are rotated, as they are in the rest of the museum. No one is being allowed into the Sky Dome, but the rest of the museum initially remained open before reportedly closing later in the morning so an engineer could assess damages.


Arrow Down

Sinkholes opening up all over the world: Here's a tiny sample (VIDEO)

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These unsuspecting victims were caught on camera as they narrowly cheated death as the ground dramatically gave way beneath them

One minute, you're going about your daily business and the next, you're being sucked into a killer sinkhole.

These unsuspecting victims were caught on camera as they narrowly cheated death as the ground dramatically gave way beneath them.



Three cars were sent crashing into an enormous sinkhole in Chicago last November when the road gave way .

Miraculously only one driver suffered minor injuries during the jaw-dropping incident, as the vehicles were dragged into the monstrous hole.



A teenager talking on her mobile phone had to be rescued by firefighters after she plunged 20 feet into a sinkhole.


Windsock

80,000 homes without power after 100 mph storms hit north and west Wales

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Gusts up to 80mph battered west and north west Wales
Some 80,000 homes are without power as winds of over 100 mph batter the coast forcing the closure of roads, rail lines and schools.

Wales has been offered military help following Wednesday's storms.

Secretary of State David Jones spoke to First Minister Carwyn Jones after the UK government's emergency Cobra meeting and offered the Army's help.

A red "take action" weather warning was issued by the Met Office as exceptionally strong winds hit.

The west and north west coast have been worst hit, and a gust of 108 mph has been recorded at Aberdaron, according to the Met Office.

Scottish Power says 45,000 homes are without power in mid and north Wales, while Western Distribution has 35,000 homes affected in south and west Wales.

Phil Davies, network services manager for Western Power Distribution, said: "We've got staff out there. We were prepared for it.

Ice Cube

U.S. Bone-chilling winter blast wipes out power to 300,000 in southern states

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Deep freeze
An army of emergency crews were gearing up for battle Wednesday with a vicious ice storm in Georgia that had already cut off power for tens of thousands of people across a long arm of the Southeast and left the streets of Atlanta looking like a sci-fi wasteland.

Nearly 300,000 customers across Louisiana, Arkansas, Texas, Mississippi, Alabama and the Carolinas were without power early Wednesday. But Georgia was bearing the brunt of the wicked weather, with more than 200,000 customers in the dark Wednesday after frozen tree limbs slashed power lines, while emergency planners urged drivers across the state to stay off "deceptively dangerous" roads.

Metro Atlanta was a veritable ghost town as an eerie calm settled over desolate streets slick with ice. The highways were deserted as freezing rain and ferocious wind gusts kept drivers at home. At local retailers, shoppers scrambled to stock up on supplies before the brunt of the storm came crashing down.