Earth Changes

Fierce cyclone in North Pacific marks end of year of record weather events

Tamsin Green
The Guardian
Thu, 07 Jan 2021 06:00 UTC

Satellite image showing a storm over the Bering Sea moving towards Alaska

Last year was a year of record-breaking weather events, ending with a bang of explosive cyclogenesis in the North Pacific on New Year's Eve.

The extratropical storm saw its central pressure fall to a record 921 millibars from 972 millibars in 24 hours, making it the strongest storm in that basin in at least 60 years, and also setting records for Alaska and the Bering Sea in its path onwards.

Meanwhile, a global record for the highest mean sea-level pressure was broken in Mongolia, central Asia, barely days before. A recording of 1094.3 millibars came hand-in-hand with bitingly low temperatures of -45.5C (-50F) in Tsetsen-Uul in the western Zavkha province.

This year, on the other hand, opened with a disruptive ice storm across the midwest and Great Lakes of the US. Ice storms, or freezing rain, occur as raindrops falling vertically through the atmosphere move into a thin layer of sub-freezing air near the earth's surface. This allows the droplets to become supercooled and freeze upon contact with any objects, creating extremely hazardous conditions such as ice coats the ground. In the southern hemisphere, the first storm of the season was birthed. Tropical Cyclone Imogen made landfall in the Shire of Carpentaria in Queensland, Australia, on Monday, with reports of over 260mm of rain falling in Karumba.

Comment: For more information on extreme weather events, check out SOTT's monthly documentary SOTT Earth Changes Summary - December 2020: Extreme Weather, Planetary Upheaval, Meteor Fireballs

Intense cold wave hits Taiwan, rare snow in mountains that haven't seen any in years

RTI English
Fri, 08 Jan 2021 19:08 UTC

Snow falls on 6 mountains in Taiwan

An intense cold wave has hit Taiwan, bringing snow to high mountains, including some that haven't seen snowfall in years.

The cold weather has also brought thousands of motorists up into the mountains in search of rare wintry scenes.

They haven't been disappointed, but authorities are urging caution: people here are unused to driving in snow.

Extreme freezes and snowfall batters parts of world

Arirang News
YouTube
Thu, 07 Jan 2021 19:01 UTC

Parts of the world have been struck by extreme cold and snowfall.

Spain saw a record MINUS 34-point-1 degrees Celsius in the Catalan Pyrenees on Wednesday their lowest temperature in history.

The BBC reports snow and "nasty" wet and wintry conditions are expected in the country and neighboring Portugal,... over the next few days.

It says cold air originating in Russia is moving across Europe.

In China, temperatures plummeted to minus 19-point-six in Beijing,... the lowest since 1966.

Beast from the East brings snow & ice as much of UK hit by severe Winter weather

Ellie Cambridge
The Sun (UK)
Fri, 08 Jan 2021 18:49 UTC

A1M Motorway in County Durham is currently grid locked with traffic queuing for miles

SNOW and ice warnings cover nearly all of the entire UK today as the Beast from the East II looms.

An arctic blast from Greenland has left the country shivering as snow was dumped overnight and leaving treacherous conditions on the roads.

Temperatures fell to -15C in some spots, with yellow warnings issued for most of the country today by the Met Office.

It comes as another Beast from the East is set to arrive next week, with snowstorms and extreme temperatures expected to batter Britain in the cold blast.

Woman dies after shark attack at beach near Waihī, New Zealand

Catrin Owen, Sharnae Hope and Andre Chumko
Stuff
Thu, 07 Jan 2021 14:40 UTC

Witnesses have described harrowing scenes at a Bowentown beach, near Waihī, in western Bay of Plenty, after a shark attacked a woman while she was swimming.

Despite emergency services performing vigorous CPR on the victim, who was in her early 20s, she died at the scene.

A rāhui has been placed around the area by local iwi as whānau gathered to mourn at a Coastguard building at the Bowentown end of Waihī Beach on Thursday night, where the victim's body was believed to be laying.

As the night came to a close, a group of locals and holidaymakers lit candles and had drinks in memory of the victim on the beach itself.

Very rare noctilucent clouds appear over Argentina

Spaceweather.com
Fri, 08 Jan 2021 05:35 UTC

They're back. Noctilucent clouds (NLCs), recently missing, are once again circling the South Pole. And, in an unexpected twist, they've just appeared over Argentina as well.

"This is a very rare event," reports Gerd Baumgarten of Germany's Leibniz-Institute of Atmospheric Physics, whose automated cameras caught the clouds rippling over Rio Grande, Argentina (53.8S) on Jan. 3rd:

Comment: Another unusual sighting occurred in our changing atmosphere this week: Novel atmosphere phenomenon 'STEVE' makes ANOTHER appearance over Finland

See also:

Hospital in Naples evacuated after huge sinkhole opens up

The Local Italy
Fri, 08 Jan 2021 08:33 UTC

Witnesses reported hearing a loud explosion at dawn as a large chasm appeared outside the Ponticelli Ospedale del Mare in eastern Naples.

There were no injuries reported at the site, where firefighters say the sinkhole "affected an area of about 500 square meters" and has swallowed up several cars which were parked outside the hospital.

Comment: See also:

6.1 magnitude earthquake strikes near Isangel, Vanuatu

Huaxia
Xinhua
Fri, 08 Jan 2021 06:23 UTC

An earthquake with a magnitude of 6.1 jolted 146 km SSE of Isangel, Vanuatu at 05:01:04 GMT on Friday, the U.S. Geological Survey said.

The epicenter, with a depth of 117.74 km, was initially determined to be at 20.735 degrees south latitude and 169.8807 degrees east longitude.

Magnitude 6.3 earthquake hits off New Zealand's Kermadec Islands

Kirill Kurevlev
Sputnik International
Thu, 07 Jan 2021 22:11 UTC

The Kermadec Islands are located in the South Pacific Ocean approximately 800-1,000 km northeast of New Zealand's North Island, and are uninhabited, except for the permanently manned Raoul Island meteorological station. The islands are part of New Zealand, though not subject to any region.

A powerful earthquake occurred on Friday in the sea near New Zealand's Kermadec Islands at a depth of 222.3 km. The magnitude of the tremor is 6.3, according to the United States Geological Survey (USGS).

According to reports, the earthquake kick was registered at a distance of about 935.0 km northeast of the settlement of Ngunguru, New Zealand.

No possibility of a tsunami has been reported at the moment.

Comment: A couple of days ago a 6.2-magnitude earthquake hit the same Kermadec Islands region.