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Evil Rays

The epic fight to protect cetaceans from the US Navy

Brandon Keim
wired.com
Wed, 23 Jul 2014 10:52 UTC
Image
© John Durban/NOAA
A Blainville’s beaked whale.
On the morning of March 15, 2000, 17 beaked whales stranded themselves on beaches in the northern Bahamas.

It was an terrible and extraordinary event: Beaked whales are the world's deepest-diving mammals, and these creatures had spent most of their lives in deep undersea canyons. For even one to show up in shallow water would be extremely unusual.

For 17 to strand was almost inconceivable, and it might have remained a mystery but for an equally extraordinary coincidence. Just a few feet away from one of the beaches lived Ken Balcomb, a beaked whale researcher who more than anyone in the world was equipped to find out what happened.

Long before he started studying whales, Balcomb had served two tours of duty in the Navy, where he'd done classified work with submarine-detecting sonar. He knew just how loud it could be, and in days following the stranding photographed Navy destroyers in Bahamian waters. He also had the wherewithal to have several of the dead whales' heads sent for autopsies - and when they returned evidence of hemorrhages, Balcomb knew what happened. They'd fled to shallow water to escape noise so concussively loud it burst blood vessels in their brains.
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Attention

Pilot whale dies after beaching in Hanalei Bay on Kauai, Hawaii

Jim Mendoza
hawaiinewsnow.com
Fri, 25 Jul 2014 10:40 UTC
Image
© Terry Lilley
Dead whale washes up to shore on Kauai.
Video posted on YouTube shows a 16-foot adult short-finned pilot whale lying sideways in shallow water at Hanalei Bay. Marine biologist Terry Lilley was one of the first to come upon the animal Friday morning. He said the whale was barely breathing.

"It didn't look like it was something where we would have had the ability to get it back out into the sea in time," Lilley told Hawaii News Now by telephone.

He said there were two small punctures in the whale's body, each about an inch across, but no other outward signs of injury.

"This whale was very fat, very healthy looking," he said. "It did not seem to have any disease or markings or anything that would indicate it had any trauma. So having a super healthy whale wash up like this is highly unique," Lilley said.

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Attention

Mother Earth gives a warning: Earthquakes occur in 3 areas of Alaska


news.yahoo.com
Sat, 26 Jul 2014 07:53 UTC
Image
© Becky Bohrer AP
A view from the back porch of a home along View Drive in Juneau, Alaska, Friday, July 11, 2014. Earthquakes occurred in 3 different parts of Alaska Friday. Some shaking could be felt in Juneau.
Seismologists in Alaska say earthquakes have jolted three different parts of the state.

Several earthquakes, including a 5.9 magnitude one, occurred around the same location early Friday in southeast Alaska. The U.S. Geological Survey says light shaking was felt around Juneau, about 100 miles to the east.

An unrelated 4.3 magnitude earthquake was felt in Kodiak and no one reported feeling another unrelated 3.7 quake in Alaska's interior.

There are no immediate reports of damage.
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Cloud Precipitation

Typhoon Matmo brings flooding rainfall, damaging winds to China, Taiwan


Reuters
Fri, 25 Jul 2014 17:36 UTC
Former Typhoon Matmo brought torrential rainfall to China and Taiwan through Thursday night, local time.

Matmo made landfall along the east coast of Taiwan Tuesday night, local time, with winds over 160 kph (100 mph).

The cyclone then crossed Taiwan and emerged over the Formosa Strait (Taiwan Strait), before making a second landfall on Fujian Province, China, late Wednesday afternoon, local time.

As of Friday evening, local time, Matmo was moving northeastward over the Korean Peninsula.

The hardest-hit areas in the mountains of eastern Taiwan received more than 650 mm (25.60 inches) of rain from Matmo.

Matmo damage
© AP Photo/Wally Santana
A city maintenance crew member removes fallen trees from a main road as Typhoon Matmo passes by Taipei, Taiwan, Wednesday, July 23, 2014. The eye of Typhoon Matmo made landfall in eastern Taiwan early Wednesday bringing with it heavy rains and winds with gusts over 140 kilometers (85 miles) per hour.
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Cloud Precipitation

Highest flood level in 300 years hits Emmental, Switzerland


Swissinfo.ch
Fri, 25 Jul 2014 14:11 UTC
Emmental flood 2014 Switzerland
© 20min
Torrential rains in the Emmental region caused the Emme river to overflow its banks on Thursday, causing massive flooding in the area. Statistically, this level of flooding takes place just once in 300 years, the environment ministry reported.

The rain began early Thursday morning, with more than 100 litres per square metre falling within hours. The already soaked ground in the region around the farming village of Schangnau was unable to absorb the precipitation, resulting in mudslides and huge amounts of water that flooded many of the structures in the mostly rural area.

There were no injuries to people, but three goats and around 100 chickens were killed. Two old wooden bridges were washed away, and parts of Schangnau were cut off.

The army and emergency services were called in to help clean up the area, and were working around the clock, Bern cantonal police reported.

Video footage from Swiss public television, SRF, showed how the area looked on Thursday.

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Attention

Chinese river turns blood-red over a couple of hours

Moar Kardoudi
Sploid
Fri, 25 Jul 2014 06:57 UTC
Image
The residents of Wenzhou, China, woke up last Thursday to discover that the inner city river had turned blood-red. Everyone is puzzled, as this has never happened before and nobody knows the cause yet. China Radio International reports:
Inspectors from the Wenzhou Environmental Protection Bureau are taking samples and analyzing the cause of the incident.

The villagers pointed out that there wasn't a chemical plant along the upper stream.

Local residents say the river was flowing normally at 4am, but it started to redden at around 6am, and in no time at all had turned as crimson as blood.

Comment: A set of rivers turning blood-red in recent years:

Yet another European river turns 'blood' red overnight, this time in Northampton, UK 06 Jan 2014

Another European river turns 'blood' red overnight, this time in Slovakia! 03 Dec 2013

River turns blood red overnight in The Netherlands, 01 Nov 2013

Waters at Bondi Beach, Australia turn blood red, 28 Nov 2012

Yangtze River turns red, 07 Sep 2012

Lebanon: Beirut River mysteriously runs blood red, 16 Feb 2012

Texas Lake Turns Blood-Red, 01 Aug 2011

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Bad Guys

Researchers find alarming link between declining wildlife and human conflict


Rt.com
Fri, 25 Jul 2014 11:47 UTC
dead elephant
© AFP Photo / Sabah Wildlife Department

Researchers at UC Berkeley have found an alarming correlation between a decline in wildlife and human conflict. As human activity directly threatens animals, their declining numbers introduce drastic changes to our way of life.

The July 24 paper in the journal Science is "about recognizing wildlife decline as a source of social conflict rather than a symptom," lead author, Justin Brashares of UC Berkeley's Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Management, explains.

Two of the main reasons for this decline are seen to be the loss of natural habitat and changing climate - both attributed largely to human habitat expansion. Our population has doubled over the past 40 years.

"Billions of people rely directly and indirectly on wild sources of meat for income and sustenance, and this resource is declining. It's not surprising that the loss of this critical piece of human livelihoods has huge social consequences," Brashares says.

Animal numbers are falling. For example, less fish to catch leads to an increase in efforts spent trying to harvest them. This increases the need for manpower, much of which these days is provided by children; this in turn increases the number working for, or even sold to fishing boats to work 18-20 hour-a-day shifts at sea.

Comment: While human conflict and encroachment upon wildlife habitats is indeed impacting wildlife numbers, the earth is currently undergoing massive changes which is now one of the prime reasons that species of many kinds are being decimated. For an idea of just how much is really impacting the globe see the SOTT map below which shows some of the global events that have occurred in just the last month.



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Ice Cube

Antarctic sea ice extent July 24 2014 - breaks daily record by 240,000 sq km


sunshinehours.wordpress.com
Thu, 24 Jul 2014 06:52 UTC
Image
Antarctic Sea Ice Extent is 1,102,000 sq km above the 1981-2010 mean

That smashes the previous daily record by 240,000 sq km. And is also the 126th daily record for the year.
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Bizarro Earth

Horrific flash flood captured on video at Lai Chau, Vietnam


Youtube
Sat, 07 Jun 2014 02:59 UTC
Image
Due to heavy rains lasting about 14 hours on the 5th June, at km59+820 Highway 12, Lai Chau province, flash floods happened causing 20.000m3 of mud and soil flowing down onto the road, cutting off Highway 12 connecting the two provinces of Lai Chau and Dien Bien. According to representatives of Hung Hai building company, which is working on the construction and renovation upgrade to Highway 12, very fast and powerful flash floods have swept away the roadbed of the bridge Nam Pon and swept away two houses from the upstream along with equipment, machinery down the river, including the 60-ton ferry, 16-ton roller, temporary housing, etc. It caused an estimated 3 billion dong in damage and caused local congestion between Lai Chau-Dien Bien, fortunately no damage to people. As soon as the incident occurs, the construction company has conducted a road blockade, informed the media. Initially, the vehicles from Dien Bien province will temporarily go towards Nua-Sin Ho in Lai Chau and vice versa.
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Sun

Water shortage: Colorado river groundwater disappearing at 'shocking' rate

Becky Oskin
Live Science
Thu, 24 Jul 2014 17:13 UTC
Image

A ring of light-colored rock shows how much the water level has dropped at Nevada's Lake Mead.

Credit: U.S. Bureau of Reclamation
As the Southwest's drought has worsened in the last decade, making surface water scarce, millions of people are drawing more heavily on underground water supplies. The water is coming out faster than it's being replenished, a new study finds.

Between December 2004 and November 2013, more than 75 percent of the water lost in the Colorado River Basin was from groundwater, according to the study. The region has been in a drought since 2000, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor.

The results show that groundwater is already being used to fill the gap between the demands of the region's millions of residents and farmers, and the available surface water supply, the researchers said. [Dry and Drying: See Images of Drought]

Comment: For another recent report on this important issue see here

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