Storms that spawned at least one twister were responsible for 2 deaths, more than 100 injuries and some 400 homes and buildings destroyed or damaged early Monday in the area around Birmingham, Ala. -- less than a year after the state saw 240 lives taken by tornadoes.
More than 200 homes were destroyed, the Red Cross said, and as many were damaged.
Jefferson County appeared hardest hit, especially the town of Clay, where the National Weather Service confirmed that a tornado with 150-mph winds had struck. "We have major, major damage," said a Jefferson County Emergency Management Agency official, Bob Ammons, in reference to the region.
Earth Changes
Springfield --"I can't think of any explanation for what happened." says Judy Carmicheal who lives just about a hundred feet from where a flock of starlings died. On Saturday she came out to see the birds dead in the road on Fremont and Erie Street away from power lines and trees.
"None were on the sidewalk. There weren't any in the grass. They were just all right there and I just about counted everyone." says Carmichael. She counted about 100 birds. Garrett Lane works along the intersection and when he showed up some of the birds were still alive.
"Most of the birds were standing right here just leaning up against the wall so when I walked up they wouldn't fly away so that was kind of odd to me. Why aren't the birds flying away--they just weren't able to fly." says Lane. There were no dead birds on his lawn. He doesn't know what happened to the birds that couldn't fly.
Video
"None were on the sidewalk. There weren't any in the grass. They were just all right there and I just about counted everyone." says Carmichael. She counted about 100 birds. Garrett Lane works along the intersection and when he showed up some of the birds were still alive.
"Most of the birds were standing right here just leaning up against the wall so when I walked up they wouldn't fly away so that was kind of odd to me. Why aren't the birds flying away--they just weren't able to fly." says Lane. There were no dead birds on his lawn. He doesn't know what happened to the birds that couldn't fly.
Video
© Agence France-Presse
Graphic showing Mount Tongariro in New Zealand’s North Island, which erupted Wednesday sending a plume of ash into the atmosphere.
Graphic showing Mount Tongariro in New Zealand’s North Island, which erupted Wednesday sending a plume of ash into the atmosphere.
The official GNS Science monitoring service issued a potential threat alert after the 1:25 p.m. (0025 GMT) eruption at the volcano which became active in August this year after lying dormant for more than a century.
Civil Defense authorities described the eruption as minor but said conditions could be hazardous in the vicinity of the mountain and nearby areas could experience ashfall.
The August eruption, the first since 1897, hit domestic flights and closed highways but Air New Zealand said it did not expect the latest activity to disrupt services, although it was closely monitoring the situation.
Local resident Clint Green witnessed the eruption and said it sent ash spewing about two kilometres (more than a mile) into the air.
"It was pretty spectacular. All of a sudden a towering black plume just began erupting very quickly, skyrocketing up," he told Radio New Zealand.
"At first I didn't believe what I was seeing."
There were no immediate reports of injuries.
© The Spokesman-Review/Associated Press
During a strong gust of wind, Michele Purkey's umbrella flips back as she crosses street Monday in downtown Spokane, Wash.
During a strong gust of wind, Michele Purkey's umbrella flips back as she crosses street Monday in downtown Spokane, Wash.
Rain and wind pounded Washington and Oregon on Monday, flooding streets, toppling large trucks and cutting power to more than 20,000 people.
Nearly 2 inches of rain fell in six hours in one Seattle neighborhood - a total that Seattle Public Utilities meteorologist James Rufo-Hill called "extraordinary."
"It was a pretty big storm for most of the city - lots of rain in a relatively short amount of time," he said, but several neighborhoods "really got drenched."
By late Monday night, 2.13 inches of rain had fallen for the day at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, shattering the record of 1.23 inches for Nov. 19 set in 1962.
Comment: There is evidence of more to come, starting at 52 seconds.
A driver in Cosmopolis was in for a surprise as they drove towards the hill on C Street. Right as they passed the entrance to Mill Creek Park, they fell into a hole in the road.
Mayor Vickie Raines says that the culvert underneath C Street collapsed and tried to swallow the vehicle.
The road to the hill has been blocked to traffic as crews wait out the storm and prepare to assess the damage.
A Pacific storm train of weather disturbances will continue to barrel through the Northwest in quick succession bringing bouts of rain, snow and wind. At this time it appears that no prolonged period of dry weather is on the horizon.
The series of storm systems will likely continue well past Thanksgiving and into the following weekend. These storms will bring rain, mountain snow and damaging coastal winds.
According to AccuWeather's Western Weather Expert Ken Clark, "Between the major storms, the weather is not likely to be dry, especially from the Cascades on west. Moist, onshore winds will cause showers between these major storms at just about any time".
Global Cooling - Climate and Weather Forecasting
Introduction.
Over the last 10 years or so as new data have accumulated the general trend and likely future course of climate change has become reasonably clear. The earth is entering a cooling phase which is likely to last about 30 years and possibly longer. The major natural factors controlling climate change have also become obvious.Unfortunately the general public has been bombarded by the scientific and media and political establishments with anthropogenic global warming - anti CO2 propaganda based on the misuse and misrepresentation of already shoddy IPCC "science" for political ,commercial and personal ends.
The IPCC climate science community largely abandoned empirical Baconian inductive scientific principles and built worthless climate models based on unfounded assumptions designed to show that anthropogenic CO2 was the driving force behind changing climate. Most of the IPCC output is useless as a tool for predicting future climate trends and their impacts and in particular the IPCC Summaries for Policymakers can be safely ignored for practical purposes. The divergence between the IPCC Hansen projections and the observed trends is shown [below].
Fortunately, however , the basic data is now easily available so that any reasonably intelligent person can check on line daily or monthly to see what the incoming empirical data actually is and draw ones own conclusions.
Here's how to do it in a few simple steps. I have put in CAPITALS the main empirical observations on which one can draw conclusions re climate change, its causes and future trends and also get a good idea of weather patterns and trends for the next year or so.
Introduction.
Over the last 10 years or so as new data have accumulated the general trend and likely future course of climate change has become reasonably clear. The earth is entering a cooling phase which is likely to last about 30 years and possibly longer. The major natural factors controlling climate change have also become obvious.Unfortunately the general public has been bombarded by the scientific and media and political establishments with anthropogenic global warming - anti CO2 propaganda based on the misuse and misrepresentation of already shoddy IPCC "science" for political ,commercial and personal ends.
The IPCC climate science community largely abandoned empirical Baconian inductive scientific principles and built worthless climate models based on unfounded assumptions designed to show that anthropogenic CO2 was the driving force behind changing climate. Most of the IPCC output is useless as a tool for predicting future climate trends and their impacts and in particular the IPCC Summaries for Policymakers can be safely ignored for practical purposes. The divergence between the IPCC Hansen projections and the observed trends is shown [below].
© Prof. Jan-Erik Solheim (Oslo)
Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Here's how to do it in a few simple steps. I have put in CAPITALS the main empirical observations on which one can draw conclusions re climate change, its causes and future trends and also get a good idea of weather patterns and trends for the next year or so.
The RCMP say the Trans-Canada Highway in eastern Newfoundland has been shut down because of a landslide.
The Mounties issued a brief statement saying a landslide in the Northwest Brook area east of Clarenville forced the closure of the highway.
Traffic has been rerouted and police say they expected the road to be closed throughout Saturday evening.
Clarenville is about 190 kilometres northwest of St. John's, N.L.
The Mounties issued a brief statement saying a landslide in the Northwest Brook area east of Clarenville forced the closure of the highway.
Traffic has been rerouted and police say they expected the road to be closed throughout Saturday evening.
Clarenville is about 190 kilometres northwest of St. John's, N.L.
© George Esiri/EPA
Nigerians move along a flooded road in Okpe, Nigeria. Heavy rains for weeks flooded most of the oil rich Niger delta region.
Nigerians move along a flooded road in Okpe, Nigeria. Heavy rains for weeks flooded most of the oil rich Niger delta region.
Efforts to repair infrastructure and restore livelihoods destroyed by Nigeria's recent flooding - the worst in five decades - require urgent funding and will take six months or longer, say aid agencies. Flooding between July and October affected 7 million people, displaced 2.1 million and killed 363, according to the National Emergency Management Authority (Nema).
"Never before has there been a disaster of this scale or magnitude," said Oxfam's deputy regional humanitarian co-ordinator in Nigeria, Dierdre McArdle. "Finding partners who have the capacity to deal with it is challenging."
President Goodluck Jonathan is channelling $110m (£70m) to the 33 affected states. He set up a committee on flood relief and rehabilitation, and held a fundraising event on Monday. But he was late to declare a state of emergency, which many observers and some aid agencies say slowed the response and hampered co-ordination.
Comment: Radar Doppler images confirm overhead 'turbulence' cause of 2011 mass bird death case in Beebe, Arkansas Meteoric Deja-vu: Exactly one year later, dead blackbirds fall again in Beebe, Arkansas
A Sign for the New Year: 1,000 Birds Fall From the Sky in Beebe, Arkansas
Reign of Fire: Meteorites, Wildfires, Planetary Chaos and the Sixth Extinction