Earth ChangesS


Phoenix

New Zealand: Ruapehu activity slowing but still elevated

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© Ray MaxwellEarly winter snow on Mt Ruepehu
Volcanic activity on Mt Ruapehu appears to be slowing according data monitored by GNS Science.

While activity seems to be decreasing overall, and there are no data to suggest an imminent eruption, the volcano remains in a state of elevated unrest above the typical background level.

The Aviation Colour Code remains at Yellow and the Volcanic Alert Level remains at Level 1.

The temperature of Crater Lake is down to around 33-34C from a peak of 41C in March 2011.

Bizarro Earth

US: Tornadoes, flash floods, hail tear through six states; 39 people dead

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© Jim R. Bounds/APEmergency personnel work around a Lowes Home Improvement store after it was hit by a tornado in Sanford, N.C., Saturday.
The massive storm system ripping through the South had killed 39 people in six states as of Sunday morning, and the death toll was expected to rise.

The wave of tornadoes, flash floods and chunks of hail began in Oklahoma on Thursday, killing people there before it claimed lives in Alabama, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Mississippi and North Carolina.

North Carolina's governor declared a state of emergency after 62 tornadoes touched down, the most in two decades.

Ten people were already confirmed dead in Bertie County, a hamlet of 21,000 people about 130 miles east of Raleigh, North Carolina, county manager Zee Lamb said.

The tornado crashed through at about 7 p.m. on Saturday, destroying homes and sending cars flying through the air as they drove along the county's small rural roads.

Info

US: Mississippi River hits 19 feet

At mid-day, the Mississippi River is at 19 feet in the Quad-Cities and is projected to hit 20.5 feet by Friday, according to the latest information from the National Weather Service.

That would make it the 6th worst floods in Quad-City history.

Watch out for detours along flood-prone areas in Moline and Davenport.

At 20 feet water is over the top of the jetty at Lindsay Park Yacht Club in Davenport and affects buildings at Sunset Marina in Rock Island. Water also affects the Quad-City Sports Center and in Davenport and Moline River Drive from the 2300 to 5500 block. Water is at the foundations of Davenport's Union Station and Freight House buildings.

At 19 feet, water affects Rock Island's Sunset Marina parking lot and from 2700 to 4800 River Drive in Moline. LeClaire Park in Davenport is entirely underwater and water is over most of River Drive from Division to Federal streets. Water is also at the base of the loading docks of the 2nd Street Post Office in Davenport.

Bizarro Earth

US: After Storms, a Path of Death and Damage

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© James Robinson/The Fayetteville Observer, via Associated PressA tornado ripped apart a home in Fayetteville, N.C. At least 23 people were reported dead throughout the state.
The reality of the devastation of a storm that sent more than 200 tornadoes ripping across the South, killing at least 45 people and causing millions of dollars in damage, began to sink in Monday morning.

In North Carolina, where the storm killed at least 23 people and put hundreds in the hospital, federal and local emergency workers were fanning out to the areas hardest hit and residents were scrambling to figure out how to help their neighbors or, for the dozens who lost their homes, how to start over.

In the Raleigh area, the police kept residents from a mobile home park with about 200 homes where three young siblings were killed. In sections of this city of about 400,000, several major buildings were damaged and several schools and government offices were closed for the day. Traffic into downtown Raleigh was snarled.

In rural areas, downed cellphone towers and severed utility lines were likely to hamper clean-up efforts.

The storm, which began Wednesday in Oklahoma and charged east for the rest of the week, brought winds as high as 165 miles per hour and spread challenging weather from New York to South Carolina.

Bizarro Earth

California: Dead dolphins and sea lions along coast

dead sea lion
© Jebb Harris

Two dead dolphins that washed up on the shores of Newport Beach on Sunday appear to have died from domoic acid, a poison that can be deadly to large sea mammals and birds.

Mike Teague, animal control officer for Newport Beach, said experts at the Natural History Museum are also reporting that dead dolphins have also washed up in Los Angeles County.

On Sunday, an adult dolphin washed up at 15th Street in Newport Beach, and another at 61st Street later that afternoon. He said the domoic acid seems to affect male species. The symptoms include floppiness, dizziness and tremors; the acid can cause brain damage.

Bizarro Earth

Can a Tornado Have More Than One Funnel?



A deadly three-day storm spawned a reported 267 tornadoes over the weekend, according to the Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Oklahoma. But not all of these were single funnel clouds - some were what you might call tornado twins and triplets.

Storm chasers following the course of the raging storm captured spectacular footage of a phenomenon called a multivortex tornado as the storm barreled through Oklahoma. In these twisters, multiple funnel clouds rotate around each other in a single storm.

The multivortex twister - one of five confirmed tornadoes that hit Oklahoma on April 14 - was the largest, an EF-3 tornado on the Enhanced-Fujita tornado damage scale. It had winds of up to 165 mph (266 kph) and killed two people near the towns of Tushka and Atoka.

Oklahoma is in the heart of Tornado Alley, where textbook tornadoes form when warm, moist Gulf of Mexico air collides with cool, northern air, creating massive storms. The warm air rises and hits wind shear, a layer of the atmosphere where the winds change direction over a short height and create rotation - think of a pinwheel with air pushing in opposite directions on the top and bottom.

Bad Guys

Storm Dumped Record Rainfall On Philly

Storm Dumped Record Rainfall On Philly: MyFoxPHILLY.com

Philadelphia - The same storm system that spawned more than 240 tornadoes to the South brought record rainfall to Philadelphia and other areas.

The rain caused widespread flooding and power outages, and spawning high winds and prompted tornado warnings.

Info

Japan Earthquake Triggered Smaller Quakes Around World

Magnitude of Recent Earthquakes
© OurAmazingPlanet
The earthquake that launched a series of disasters in Japan in March triggered micro-quakes and tremors around the world, scientists find.

The catastrophic magnitude 9.0 earthquake that struck off the coast of the Tohoku region of Japan March 11 set off tremors mostly in places of past seismic activity, including southwest Japan, Taiwan, the Aleutians and mainland Alaska, Vancouver Island in Canada, Washington state, Oregon, central California and the central United States. It was unlikely that any of these events exceeded magnitude 3.

Researchers noted, however, that temblors also were detected in Cuba. "Seismologists had never seen tremor in Cuba, so this is an exciting new observation," Justin Rubinstein, a seismologist with the U.S. Geological Survey at Menlo Park, Calif., told OurAmazingPlanet.

Part of the excitement of the find is the insight it could add into the inner workings of earthquakes.

"Studying long-range triggering may help us to better understand the underlying physics of how earthquakes start," explained seismologist Zhigang Peng at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta.

Bizarro Earth

Camp Lejeune housing community ravaged by storm

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© John Althouse/The Daily NewsA home along Hagaru Drive aboard Tarawa Terrace II, stands damaged after a tornado passed through the area late Saturday night.
North Carolina - Following a Saturday night tornado that tore through Camp Lejeune's Tarawa Terrace, residents of the base family housing area wandered around in the sunlight Sunday morning examining the devastation.

The storm's aftermath was astonishing: Roofs were ripped cleanly off of brand-new base houses while other adjoining homes were left unscathed. Gaping holes in apartments left dining rooms and breakfast nooks exposed, and in one cul-de-sac, three cars were stacked against each other like fallen dominoes, with another flipped on its side only yards away.

According to Lejeune officials, upwards of 130 homes aboard Tarawa Terrace I and II were affected, between 40 and 60 of them heavily damaged in the storm and at least 10 effectively destroyed.

Igloo

US: Winter storm watch issued for northern Wisconsin

While southeast Wisconsin saw a few flakes Monday, central Wisconsin could see a shovel-worthy winter storm Tuesday.

Forecasters don't have a clear picture of where the storm will go, but if the system targets central Wisconsin, it could bring 6 to 10 inches of snow to the area, according to the National Weather Service.

The weather service forecast calls for possible snow at the beginning of Tuesday in the south. The precipitation should turn to rain in southeast Wisconsin later in the day and could switch back to snow at the end of the system.That storm system, which is organizing in the West, could reach Wisconsin by Tuesday night.

The total accumulation in southeast Wisconsin could reach 1 or 2 inches.

"We'll be dealing with a good chance of precipitation through Wednesday," weather service meteorologist Penny Zabel said.