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US, Texas: Severe Weather Across Nation Causes Food Scarcity at Food Bank

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The West Texas Food Bank is being hit by months of severe weather across the nation, from droughts to floods it's all taking a toll on how much and what type of food they are handing out.

The food bank is trying to fill two gaps right now, food and finances, and the scarcity of both is very visible.

"If you look around and see all these empty spots in this facility here, they should be filled with food," said Augie Fernandes, the Executive Director of the West Texas Food Bank.

Flooding, quickly followed by severe droughts have caused quite an alarming situation for the West Texas Food Bank.

"A situation where some crops have been burdened by drought and some by flooding and too much water."

Now the food bank, filled with non-perishables is in desperate need for fresh produce.

Cloud Lightning

Australia: Wild Weather Still Lashing Illawarra Coast

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© Google
The State Emergency Service (SES) experienced a busy night in the Hunter and on the central coast but the number of calls-outs has dropped off in the Illawarra.

A heavy weather front continues to dominate the coast, with the Bureau of Meteorology issuing a severe weather warning with very heavy surf for the Illawarra.

In the 24 hours to 9:00am Friday, Fig Tree received 74 millimetres of rain, Bellambi 71mm and Scarborough 62mm.

Grant McClory from the SES says localised flooding is still occurring and houses are experiencing rain damage.

"Total tasks since Tuesday lunchtime add up to only around 80 to 90 tasks," he said.

Bizarro Earth

Guatemalan woman finds huge sinkhole under bed

sinkhole
© Johan Ordonez/AFP/Getty ImagesA man inspects the sinkhole in Guatemala City.
Sinkhole, 12m deep and 80cm in diameter, forms at Guatemala City home of 65-year-old Inocenta Hernandez

You may sometimes wish the ground would swallow you up, but for some the danger of disappearing down a deep hole is all too real.

The people of Guatemala City are increasingly unable to trust what's beneath their feet because of treacherous sinkholes.

The latest person to get a shock was 65-year-old Inocenta Hernandez. "When we heard the loud boom we thought a gas canister from a neighbouring home had exploded, or there had been a crash on the street.

"We rushed out to look and saw nothing. A gentleman told me that the noise came from my house, and we searched until we found it under my bed."

Comment: What was once an occasional incident has become a alarmingly regular occurrence - we're getting reports of sinkholes every other day now!

July 17: Tennessee, US: Sinkhole beside Spring Hill's new high school stirs speculation

July 14: Utah, US: Girl dies, father hurt in crash caused by sinkhole

July 14: Florida, US: Tarpon Springs homeowners wonder if homes will be swallowed by sinkhole

July 12: US: Lenoir, North Carolina sinkhole evidence of a possible wider problem

July 7: South Carolina, US: Sinkhole Closes Stephens County Boat Ramp

June 27: Australia: Enormous sinkhole swallows south-east Queensland Rainbow beach

A collection of sinkhole images from around the world


Bizarro Earth

Small Volcanoes Add up to Cooler Climate

Mt.Montserrat
© NASAActive since 1995, Soufrière Hills in Montserrat (shown in a 2009 photo taken from the International Space Station) is one of several small volcanoes that have spit cooling sulfur particles high into the atmosphere in the last decade.

Along with sulfur emitted by coal-burning power plants, volcanic particles spewed high in the atmosphere reduced the amount of global warming otherwise expected during the 2000s, a new study finds.

Relatively small volcanic eruptions last decade sent sulfur high enough in the atmosphere to reflect sunlight and help stall a rising global temperature trend. The work, reported online July 21 in Science, suggests it doesn't take a colossal eruption for volcanoes to have a discernible influence on climate.

"If you don't include these stratospheric aerosols in the models, you're going to overestimate how much the temperature should have increased over the past decade," says team member John Daniel, an atmospheric physicist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in Boulder, Colorado.

Scientists had known that aerosols cool the planet, and that big eruptions spew lots of aerosols up high. But nobody had calculated how smaller recent eruptions might affect climate, and many had assumed that stratospheric aerosols from volcanoes dropped essentially to zero after particles from the 1991 eruption of the Philippines' Mt. Pinatubo fell out of the atmosphere.

Bizarro Earth

Best of the Web: Gigantic Crack Opens Up In Mexico

Mexico Crack
© Before It's News
The crack appeared on 13 July in Santa Maria Huejoculco in Chalco, State Mexico, land has now reached 500 meters long and authorities have not taken preventive measures, warned James Espinoza Hilario, responsible for Social planning on the Sierra Nevada project of the Autonomous Metropolitan University.

In addition, after survey work was detected in Santa Maria Huejoculco yet another gap of about four km which reached La Candelaria Tlapala, in the community of Miraflores, in Chalco, explained Professor Martín Espinosa.

These failures are part of a family of cracks that exist in the region and threaten to spread across the entire east area of the Valley of Mexico.

This event began back 2009 in a small area of this region but since it has grown and is eating up everything around it .

Comment: On top of all the sinkholes opening up, this crack in the ground in Mexico joins a list of fissures opening up all over the world:

June 30: US: St. Clair Crack Remains a Mystery

March 18: Everett, Washington: Land Crack Appears, Neighborhood is Sinking

March 7: Pakistan: Giant Fissure / Crack Opens in the Ground in Seagi Gulistan

February 25: Large Crack Opens in the Earth in Southern Peru

January 7: Large crack in the ground appears in the Michigan Upper Peninsula

October 6 2010: Mysterious crack still begs answers


Extinguisher

U.S.: Thousands Evacuated After Sewage Plant Fire at Riverbank State Park New York

sewage plant fire
© phlpp7r/Twittermassive fire at the North River Wastewater Treatment Plant at 725 W. 135th St. forced the evacuation of Riverbank State Park and closed a portion of the West Side Highway.

Manhattan - Thousands of people were evacuated from a packed Harlem park Wednesday afternoon after an explosion triggered a roaring fire at a sewage treatment plant that spewed a 30-foot plume of fire into the air, officials said.

The ferocious four-alarm blaze, which also snarled traffic on the West Side Highway, broke out in the engine room of the city's North River Wastewater Treatment plant, at 725 W. 135th St., at 11:46 a.m., an FDNY spokesman said.

"There was heavy fire, heavy smoke," said FDNY Deputy Assistant Chief Joseph Woznica. The cause of the fire, which raged for hours, was not immediately clear, but Woznica said that pressurized fuel helped spark a "30-foot plume of fire."

Extinguisher

Canada: Forest Fires Rage, Up to 7000 Likely to be Evacuated

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© (Mitch Miller/Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources/The Canadian Press
The fire situation across Northwestern Ontario remains severe. There were twenty new fires reported since yesterday. Across the province the current scope of the area covered by fires is 300,000 hectares. This is a major increase in the scope of fires and sets a new record. Evacuations of communities in the North continue. It is expected that up to 7000 people will be evacuated out of their home communities. There will be people sent, mostly through Thunder Bay to London, Ottawa, Winnipeg, Wawa, Greenstone and other communities with hundreds also expected to stay in Thunder Bay.

Assembly of First Nations (AFN) National Chief Shawn A-in-chut Atleo and AFN Ontario Regional Chief Angus Toulouse support the calls for immediate mobilization of resources by all levels of government for the safe evacuation of First Nation communities impacted by forest fires in northwestern Ontario, adding that capacity needs at the community level must be addressed to deal with immediate and long-term emergency response needs.

"The safety and security of First Nation citizens and communities is of primary concern and our thoughts and prayers are with the many people affected by the devastating fires in northwestern Ontario, particularly in Nishnawbe Aski territory," said AFN National Chief Shawn Atleo speaking today from Vancouver, where he's meeting with provincial and territorial leaders at a meeting of the Council of the Federation.

Bizarro Earth

Canada: Alberta pipeline spill releases 1,300 barrels of oil

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© Mike Sturk, Calgary HeraldPembina Pipeline said it has contained oil spilled in a remote area near Swan Hills, Alberta Tuesday.

Calgary - Another northern Alberta oil pipeline has been shut down after operator Pembina Pipeline discovered a leak in a remote area north of Swan Hills.

An estimated 1,300 barrels were released from the underground pipeline onto muskeg and into a creek before the Calgary-based company shut down the line, said Pembina spokeswoman Shawn Davis.

"We detected a volume imbalance at our control centre and from that we initiated air and ground investigations," Davis said Wednesday. "And from there we found that there was a leak."

Fish

US: Louisiana Neighborhood lake full of dead fish

Prairieville, Louisiana- Hot weather is causing trouble for a Prairieville neighborhood. However, it's not just the heat causing trouble. People there are dealing with a lake, full of dead fish.


About 15 houses surround the lake in the Cypress Lake subdivision in Prairieville.

Cloud Lightning

Mexico on high alert for strengthened hurricane

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Mexican authorities went on high alert Wednesday as Hurricane Dora upgraded into a Category 4 storm off the country's Pacific coast.

The Mexican National Meteorological Center, citing initial reports, said the hurricane had caused flooding in the southern states of Guerrero, Oaxaca and Chiapas, resulting in some damage.

There were no immediate reports of casualties, but local residents were urged to be cautious, and Mexican emergency personnel had been put on full alert.