Earth Changes

Aftershocks of 2011 killer earthquake still hitting near Japan

Nola.com
Wed, 29 Feb 2012 10:42 UTC

It's been almost one year since the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami devasted eastern Japan, but major aftershocks continue to occur. The original "undersea megathrust" quake just off Japan's coastline on March 11, 2011, was a magnitude 9.0, one of the worst ever recorded.

At about 8:30 a.m. today, Central time, a magnitude 5.7 quake ocurred near the island of Honshu, 77 miles east southeast of Tokyo , according to the U.S. Geological Survey. The Geological Survey's PAGER earthquake risk site indicates this most recent tembler may have been perceived as moderate shaking by 962,000 people in Japan, and may have caused some moderate damage to vulnerable buildings.

13 killed as tornadoes rake Midwest states

MSNBC
Wed, 29 Feb 2012 10:35 UTC

US: Branson, Missouri - At least 13 people were killed overnight as a line of tornadoes marched across the Midwest, flattening areas in several towns, including the tourist hub of Branson. Forecasters warned more twisters could strike the Tennessee Valley and southern Appalachians through Wednesday evening.

Ten of the deaths occurred in Harrisburg, Ill., officials said in updating an earlier death toll of three. A possible tornado swept through the town around 5 a.m. local time, destroying 35-40 homes, according to local TV station KFVS12.

Three other deaths were reported in Missouri, where storms included a suspected tornado that hit a mobile home park outside the town of Buffalo. One person died there and around a dozen people were injured. Two others died in the Cassville and Puxico areas.

The rough weather also knocked out power to all of Buffalo's 3,000 residents.

At least 8 people were injured when a suspected tornado ripped through Harveyville, Kan., on Tuesday night, NBC News reported. At least three of the injured are in critical condition, according to weather.com, and 40 percent of the town suffered damage.

NBC affiliate KSHB TV reported that an apartment complex and a church were among the damaged buildings in the town of about 250 people.

The Cs Hit List 06: Let's Do the Planetary Twist to the Tune of the Brothers Heliopolis

Harrison Koehli
Sott.net
Wed, 29 Feb 2012 11:39 UTC

OK, it's time for more weirdness. As we covered in a recent SOTT Report, accounts and recordings of strange noises heard all over the world went semi-viral on YouTube in January this year, and some are even receiving mainstream media coverage. Some YouTube pundits claim they're all faked, a couple of scientists say they're 'normal' and nothing to worry about, and many are freaking out as the phenomenon is feeding the '2012-apocalypse-oh-my-God-we're-all-gonna-die' hysteria. So what's really going on?

The hype appears to have started with these videos from Kiev, Ukraine, posted on 3 August and 11 August 2011, respectively. (Although, as we'll see later, these were not the first accounts.)

(See here for a translation of the uploader's account of the sounds and analysis and here for a summary of the associated thread, with additional analyses and accounts.)

Dozens of videos have been uploaded since then, some obviously faked, others perhaps not. For example, at least 28 videos posted in the months since Kiev obviously use the sound from the original video played over random video footage, sometimes with staged 'Oh-my-God-what-is-that?' dialogue. And, no, as far as I can tell, none of them use samples from the films Red State or War of the Worlds, as some have claimed. The similarity is striking (trumpet-like blasts, metallic rumbles and such), but truth has been known to resemble fiction. And it wouldn't be the first time that similar strange noises have been heard, both in recent times and the murky depths of history recorded in myth and legend.

Mutated, Two-Headed Trout Found in Idaho, US

Gayne C. Young
Outdoor Life.com
Tue, 28 Feb 2012 11:14 UTC

I'm not a scientist -- I don't even play one on TV.

But even with my limited knowledge of the scientific world, I know enough to say without fear of reprisal that two-headed fish are not generally an indicator of a healthy watershed. The two-headed fish in question is a trout and was just one of many abnormal fish that were regulated to an appendix of a scientific study commissioned by the J.R. Simplot Company.

Despite the presence of fish with two heads and fish with facial, fin, and egg deformities, the mining company's report concluded that the waters it is accused of polluting in southern Idaho are fairly safe. So safe in fact that the company feels it would be just peachy to allow the water's high selenium (a metal byproduct of mining that is toxic to wildlife) levels to remain as is, even though they are higher than are permitted under regulatory guidelines.

In a move that's stranger than a multi-headed fish, the EPA actually described the mining company's report as "comprehensive." This led many scientists to shake their single head in disbelief and call for further investigation. Among those that found the EPA's assessment fishy was Democrat Senator Barbara Boxer of California, who heads the chamber's Environment and Public Works Committee. According to the New York Times, she requested the federal Fish and Wildlife Service to go over the initial report. The agency did and concluded that the study was "biased" and "highly questionable."

Rare whale caught on film for first time

The Mirror, UK
Tue, 28 Feb 2012 17:55 UTC

Australian scientists have captured what they believe to be the first video of an extremely rare whale, the Shepherd's beaked whale, which has been spotted for sure only a handful of times since its discovery a little over 70 years ago.

A pod of the unusual cetacean, which can grow as long as a bus (7 metres or 21 ft) and weigh as much as a sedan car (up to 3 tonnes) was spotted frolicking amongst dolphins and pilot whales in the Eastern Bass Strait, off the coast of Victoria and Tasmania, in January.

"What is so unique about this sighting is, we got so many photographs and HD video, so really it's indisputable," said Mike Double, a research scientist at the Australian Antarctic Division, a government research unit for Antarctica.

Known as Tasmacetus shepherdi, the whales are distinguished by their melon-shaped foreheads, fat bellies and a prominent beak. They were first discovered in 1937 but because they are an offshore species, they have remained elusive.

Dozens of dead marine mammals, turtles in Gulf this year, NOAA says

Mark Schleifstein
The Times-Picayune
Mon, 27 Feb 2012 17:07 UTC

© Ted Jackson / The Times-Picayune
Scientists run tests on a pregnant female dolphin during a research study trip in Barataria Bay, Monday August 15, 2011.

Reports of dozens of stranded dolphins, whales, and sea turtles in the Gulf of Mexico continue to pile up in the first two months of 2012, with federal officials tallying 48 marine mammals, mostly dolphins, and 87 sea turtles. Only a handful of marine mammal strandings were of live animals that may have been saved. None of the turtles were alive.

There continues to be concern that the high numbers of dead animals, especially the dolphins and whales, may be linked in some way to health problems either caused or exacerbated by toxic chemicals left behind by the BP Gulf oil spill.

The new tally comes as BP prepares to defend itself in federal court against charges it violated the Oil Pollution Act and the Clean Water Act.

In October, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientists announced that tests on five of 21 bottlenose dolphins found dead in Louisiana waters or stranded on beaches since February 2010 showed they were infected with brucellosis, a bacterial infection more often linked to death of cattle, bison and elk in the United States.

Arctic Melt Could Fuel Deep Freezes, Big Snows

OurAmazingPlanet
Tue, 28 Feb 2012 12:01 UTC

The winter weather that has socked parts of the Northern Hemisphere in recent years has been extreme enough to spawn a new vocabulary: "Snowpocalypse" and "snowmageddon" were invented to describe the huge blizzards that dumped record-breaking snows on the Midwest and Northeast in 2010.

Overall, the winters of 2009-10 and 2010-11 saw the second and third largest snow cover levels ever recorded in the Northern Hemisphere. And this year extreme, record-breaking cold has gripped Europe.

What's to blame? New research indicates that these winter extremes could be tied to a surprising culprit: a steep decline in sea ice in Arctic, following a warming of the polar region.

"We conclude that the recent decline of Arctic sea ice has played a critical role in recent cold and snowy winters," researchers wrote in a study published Feb. 27 in the online early edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Deadly Nighttime Tornadoes in Winter

Brett Israel
OurAmazingPlanet
Tue, 28 Feb 2012 10:09 UTC

As recent tornado outbreaks around the country have shown, severe weather is getting a jump on the spring season. The main tornado season may still be weeks away, but the twisters of winter pack an extra threat. The odds of a killer tornado are greatest at night, and the shorter daylight hours of winter increase the chance of nighttime tornadoes.

Nocturnal tornadoes are more than twice as likely to kill people than daytime tornadoes, researchers have found.

More severe weather, and tornadoes, are possible today (Feb. 28) as storms roll across the mid-South. So far, the largest tornado outbreak of the year - 45 twisters - came on Jan. 22. Last Friday (Feb. 24) was the second busiest day for severe weather of the year to date.

While the main tornado season runs from spring to early summer, this year's early outbreaks show that tornadoes can form under a variety of conditions and strike during fall and winter, too. During this period, when the days are short, nighttime tornadoes are a big risk.

Why Britain Could Face Years of Arctic Winters Because of Dramatic Decline in Arctic Sea Ice

Ted Thornhill
Dailymail.co.uk
Mon, 27 Feb 2012 07:11 UTC

There is less Arctic sea ice now than there has been at any time in the past 1,450 years

Britain is facing years of freezing winters because of the dramatic decline in Arctic sea ice, say scientists.

Global warming means autumn levels of sea ice have dropped by almost 30 per cent since 1979 - but this is likely to trigger more frequent cold snaps such as those that brought blizzards to the UK earlier this month.

And Arctic sea ice could be to blame.

© Associated Press
Cold facts: A reduction in Arctic ice is being blamed for increasingly severe winters in the Northern Hemisphere.

Jet Lag: What's Causing One of the Driest, Warmest Winters in History?

Mark Fischetti
Scientific American
Thu, 12 Jan 2012 12:35 UTC

© National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
An unusual region of atmospheric pressure over the Arctic has kept the polar jet stream (green) locked up at far northern latitudes, causing a warm, dry U.S. winter.

A little snow and rain are falling in a few states today, but the 2011 - 12 winter has been extremely warm and dry across the continental U.S. Meteorologists think they have figured out why.

First, a few records: The initial week of January was the driest in history. And more than 95 percent of the U.S. had below-average snow cover - the greatest such percentage ever recorded - according to some intriguing data maps generated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. During December, approximately half of the U.S. had temperatures at least 5 degrees Fahrenheit above average, and more than 1,500 daily record highs were set from January 2 to 8. Europe has seen similar extremes.

The chief suspect behind the mysterious weather is an atmospheric pressure pattern called the Arctic Oscillation, which circles the high Northern Hemisphere. Its lower edge is known as the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO). Together, the related features influence the path and strength of the jet stream. The jet itself is an air current that flows west to east across the northern latitudes of the U.S., Europe and Asia, altering temperature and precipitation as portions of it dip southward or crest northward. A strong jet stream that flows in a somewhat straight line from west to east, with few southward dips, prevents cold arctic air from drifting south. "The cause of this warm first half of winter is the most extreme configuration of the jet stream ever recorded," according to Jeffrey Masters, a meteorologist who runs the Weather Underground, a Web site that analyzes severe weather data.