An international team of researchers from the UK and New Zealand has discovered a previously undocumented type of eruption in underwater volcanoes.

Volcanic eruptions are commonly categorized as either explosive or effusive.

Inside volcanoes, gases are dissolved in the molten magma as a function of the very high pressures and chemistry of the magma. In the same way that gases dissolved in carbonated drinks bubble up when you take the lid off, when magma is erupted as lava, the pressure is relieved and the gases exsolve to form small gas bubbles or so-called 'vesicles.'

In explosive eruptions these vesicles expand so quickly they fragment the magma, violently ejecting lava, which cools and degasses to form solidified pumice that can be sufficiently light to float on water.

In air pumice is obviously associated with violent, explosive eruptions. Consequently underwater volcanoes flanked by highly vesicular pumice have, to date, also been interpreted as having erupted explosively.

The U.S. Geology Survey confirms a 4.1 magnitude earthquake hit East Texas around 1:01 a.m. The earthquake struck at a depth of 5 km (3.1 miles). Friday morning with an epicenter 2 miles from Timpson, Texas. KSLA News 12 phone lines started ringing after numerous people felt the 'quake from Shelby County all the way to Bossier City. It woke me up out of a dead sleep," said Amanda Jones who lives on Highway 7 E between Center and Joaquin. Jones tells us it felt stronger than the last earthquake that hit East Texas last summer. Jones says she is unsure about damage but will wait until the sun comes up to check.

Jamie Ward in Center, TX tells us her house shook for at least 20 seconds. A man from Carthage, TX who was working the night shift at a gas plant says "it felt like it was coming from the bottom of my feet up." He described what he felt "like the wind was shaking the travel trailer." He tells us he looked for damage but didn't see any. A woman who lives on W. 70th in Shreveport tells us she was laying in bed when "stuff started shaking." Bossier City resident Sarah Rains, who lives off of Sligo Rd., says she and her roommate felt their trailer shake and thought it might have just been heavy winds. Katy Cash of Keatchie says she felt her house shake but thought she was just imagining it when her chandelier over the dining table started swaying. Katy tells us her mom in Florien, Louisiana also felt it. - KSLA

Sixteen small quakes hit an area near Topaz Lake early Thursday, but there have been no reports of damage or injury. The quakes hit an area southwest of the lake between midnight and 5AM. They ranged from 1.1 to 3.7 in magnitude, and were between three and nine kilometers deep. Another handful of small quakes hit several hours later, in the afternoon and evening. The remote area is about 45 miles southeast of Gardnerville. Another small swarm hit an area about 20 miles west northwest of Donner Lake between 5:45AM and 6:15AM Thursday. They ranged between 0.5 and 2.1 in magnitude, with no reports of damage or injury. - KOLOTV

The "Queen of Hills" was witness to the record breaking single day highest snowfall in the month of January in the last eight years.

The heavy snowfall continued on second consecutive day on Friday till late night and recorded a total of 63.6 cms of snow in two days in Shimla.

Arctic air sweeping through Canada and parts of the United States sent temperatures plunging to record lows on Wednesday with a wind chill of minus 40 degrees (Celsius and Fahrenheit).

Canada was the coldest nation in the world at the start of the day with with temperatures as low as minus 43.1 degrees Celsius (-45.6 Fahrenheit) in the Northwest Territories, according to public broadcaster CBC.

In Ottawa, buildings cracked in the cold, making sounds like the crash of a wrecking ball.

Tropical Storm Oswald's heavy rains have caused flooding in Queensland, Australia and NASA's TRMM satellite measured almost two feet of rain fell in certain areas.

Tropical cyclone Oswald's sustained winds have never been greater than 35 knots (~40.2 mph) but the storm's extreme rainfall has resulted in widespread flooding in Australia over northern Queensland. Many roads have been reported flooded resulting in some communities being cut off.

Floods in southern Mozambique have displaced up to 70 000 people and cut power exports to energy-hungry neighbour South Africa in half, officials said on Thursday.

The south and centre of the country have been placed on red alert after experiencing the heaviest rainfall since devastating floods killed some 800 people in 2000.

In some places current water levels are higher than they were during that disaster.

As the Limpopo River raged through the southern town of Chokwe, people slept in the open, many by the roadside, local media reported. The record flood levels submerged houses in some places, emergency officials said.

"We are sending seven days of food for 70 000 people," the country's international humanitarian head Lola Castro told AFP.

Report says thousands of lives could have been saved and damage to ecosystems avoided if early warnings heeded.

Europe has failed to learn the lessons from many environmental and health disasters like Chernobyl, leaded petrol and DDT insecticides, and is now ignoring warnings about bee deaths, GM food and nanotechnology, according to an 800-page report by the European Environment Agency.

Thousands of lives could have been saved and extensive damage to ecosystems avoided if the "precautionary principle" had been applied on the basis of early warnings, say the authors of the 2013 Late Lessons from Early warnings report published on Wednesday.

They accuse industry of working to corrupt or undermine regulation by spinning and manipulating research and applying pressure on governments for financial benefit. "[It has] deliberately recruited reputable scientists, media experts and politicians to call on if their products were linked to possible hazards. Manufacturing doubt, disregarding scientific evidence of risks and claiming over-regulation appear to be a deliberate strategy for some industry groups and think tanks to undermine precautionary decision-making."

The peer-reviewed study, which is aimed to improve understanding of scientific information, looks at 18 areas including radiation from mobile phones, birth control pills in the aquatic environment, and invasive species. It found that governments often introduced laws much too late to prevent deaths and massive financial costs, but were highly likely to ignore scientific warnings and resist any regulation. The authors found more than 80 cases where no regulation was introduced when it later turned out that the risk from a technology or chemical was real, or still unproven.

More counterpunch to Obama's recent speech.

Rocket scientists -vs- James Hansen, "in God we trust, all others bring data"

WASHINGTON, Jan. 23, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ - A group of 20 ex-NASA scientists have concluded that the science used to support the man-made climate change hypothesis is not settled and no convincing physical evidence exists to support catastrophic climate change forecasts.

Beginning in February 2012, the group of scientists calling themselves The Right Climate Stuff (TRCS) team received presentations by scientists representing all sides of the climate change debate and embarked on an in-depth review of a number of climate studies.

If you have not read this yet, now is the time. Given what president Obama recently said about skeptics in his inauguration address, I thought this 2010 article would be worth revisiting.

In Germany, there's a revolution going on. That revolution is that they are backing away from the global warming issue, and taking on much more pragmatic outlook on it an many things "green". For example, they are going big on coal power. Below is one excerpt from the series, describing the David and Goliath story of Steve McIntyre. Links to all eight articles of the series follow. I suggest sharing this far and wide, because it tells the skeptic story quite well. - Anthony