For many in Young County, the house was a rockin' Saturday night.
Oklahoma's biggest earthquake in history, a 5.6 magnitude quake occurred late Saturday and originated near Sparks, Okla. east of Oklahoma City, more than 200 miles from Graham.
"The important thing to understand is that if you take the same magnitude earthquake and you put one here and one in California, it will be felt over a much larger area than the same magnitude in California," said Gary Patterson, geologist and director of education and outreach for the U.S. Center for Earthquake Research and Information.
He said because the geology of the central United States is different - the Earth's crust is harder, colder and denser than in California, the energy travels efficiently, like running a jack hammer on a concrete slab. "If you had a continuous slab, you'd feel it in your feet a greater distance away," Patterson said. He said 95 to 98 percent of the earthquakes in the world happen in places like California.
Earth Changes
A shallow, magnitude 4.0 earthquake was reported Tuesday night east of Reno, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. The temblor occurred at 10:40 p.m. at a depth of 0 miles.
According to the U.S. Geological Survey, the Nevada quake's epicenter was 216 miles north of Las Vegas. It also was about 19 miles from Eureka, 25 miles from Duckwater, 32 miles from Willow Grove and 47 miles from Ely.
An earthquake measuring 5.5 on the Richter scale hit eastern Turkey early Wednesday at about 00: 05 local time (2205 GMT Tuesday), said Turkey's Kandilli Observatory and Earthquake Research Institute on its website.
Turkey's institute said that the quake hit the Kaustuk village of Adilcevaz town of Bitlis province, but so far there was no reports on casualties.
The epicenter, with a depth of 9.40 km, was initially determined to be at 38.7143 degrees north latitude and 43.1330 degrees east longitude, the U.S. Geological Survey said.
Turkey's institute said that the quake hit the Kaustuk village of Adilcevaz town of Bitlis province, but so far there was no reports on casualties.
The epicenter, with a depth of 9.40 km, was initially determined to be at 38.7143 degrees north latitude and 43.1330 degrees east longitude, the U.S. Geological Survey said.
Nome starts to feel 'one of the worst' storms on record in region; surges feared in towns
A rapidly intensifying storm was hammering the west coast of Alaska on Tuesday and could become "one of the worst on record" for the region.
The storm was traveling at 60 mph, said Andy Brown, lead National Weather Service forecaster in Anchorage. It could reach the beachfront city of Nome by late Tuesday, with winds hitting 85 mph.
The storm was expected to produce a 10-foot surge, forcing dozens of coastal communities to make emergency preparations. Brown advised Bering Sea mariners and people living in coastal communities from Wales to Unalakleet to "prepare for a really nasty storm."
"It is very dangerous," Brown said. "Everybody is spreading the word to let them know this is a major storm."
That included the Coast Guard. "We are prestaging helicopters from Air Station Kodiak to parts of Western Alaska in response to severe weather advisories including hurricane force winds and high seas that are forecast all along the west coast of Alaska," said Capt. Daniel Travers.
The storm, described by Brown as "big, deep, low," was taking an unusual path through the northern and eastern Bering Sea.
The storm will likely be "life-threatening ... one of the worst on record," the service said.
"Essentially the entire west coast of Alaska is going to see blizzard and winter conditions: heavy snow, poor visibility, high winds," NWS forecaster Bob Fischer told alaskadispatch.com.
© NOAA
This satellite image shows the storm system moving into western Alaska on Tuesday afternoon.
This satellite image shows the storm system moving into western Alaska on Tuesday afternoon.
The storm was traveling at 60 mph, said Andy Brown, lead National Weather Service forecaster in Anchorage. It could reach the beachfront city of Nome by late Tuesday, with winds hitting 85 mph.
The storm was expected to produce a 10-foot surge, forcing dozens of coastal communities to make emergency preparations. Brown advised Bering Sea mariners and people living in coastal communities from Wales to Unalakleet to "prepare for a really nasty storm."
"It is very dangerous," Brown said. "Everybody is spreading the word to let them know this is a major storm."
That included the Coast Guard. "We are prestaging helicopters from Air Station Kodiak to parts of Western Alaska in response to severe weather advisories including hurricane force winds and high seas that are forecast all along the west coast of Alaska," said Capt. Daniel Travers.
The storm, described by Brown as "big, deep, low," was taking an unusual path through the northern and eastern Bering Sea.
The storm will likely be "life-threatening ... one of the worst on record," the service said.
"Essentially the entire west coast of Alaska is going to see blizzard and winter conditions: heavy snow, poor visibility, high winds," NWS forecaster Bob Fischer told alaskadispatch.com.
Last week, Oman was hit by Cyclone Keila which left 14 people dead and Oman under nearly 2 meters of water in some places. Now, the country is about to be hit again with Cyclone 4- the fourth such cyclone to form in the Arabian Sea this year. Scientists say airborne pollution from South Asia is helping to brew monster storms in the Arabian Sea that have claimed thousands of lives and cost billions of dollars, say environmental scientists.
The scientists, led by Amato Evan of the University of Virginia, point the finger at a haze known as the 'Asian brown cloud', which hangs over parts of the northern Indian Ocean, India and Pakistan. Several kilometres thick, the cloud comprises brownish particles of carbon soot and sulphates spewed by factories, diesel exhaust and poorly-burnt biomass. "In addition to the multitude of known health impacts associated with aerosols that comprise the 'Asian brown cloud', we suggest that the increasing intensity of landfalling tropical cyclones is a consequence of regional emissions of pollution aerosols," they write in today's issue of Nature.
© Weather Underground
© Tornadovideosdotnet/YouTube
Storm chasers caught up with one tornado during the Oklahoma outbreak.
Storm chasers caught up with one tornado during the Oklahoma outbreak.
One twister has been confirmed by the National Weather Service (NWS) in Norman, Okla., and today, their storm damage survey teams will deploy to investigate the tornado tracks. They will most likely confirm other tornadoes and rate their strength.
"There were probably quite a few more than one tornado," said Mark Austin, a meteorologist at the NWS office in Norman.
Baseball-size hail pounded the state. Wind gusts up to 92 mph were reported. A twister flipped a storm-chaser's car, but he escaped unscathed.
Many buildings in Oklahoma are vulnerable to severe weather after a magnitude 5.6 earthquake rocked the state this past weekend. The earthquake was the largest in the state's history, and was bookended by a magnitude 4.7 foreshock and a magnitude 4.7 aftershock, which struck last night.
No twister-related injuries have been reported, but an Oklahoma State University extension office was destroyed in Tillman County, in the southwest part of the state.
Gusts up to 80 mph as well as storm surge will test towns
A rapidly intensifying storm was approaching the west coast of Alaska on Tuesday and could become "one of the worst on record" for the region, the National Weather Service said in an alert.
The alert, issued by the NWS in Fairbanks, said the "extremely dangerous" storm would lash coastal areas from Tuesday night into Wednesday. It was expected to be just west of the Bering Strait by Tuesday night and then move into the southern Chukchi Sea on Wednesday.
The storm will likely be "life-threatening ... one of the worst on record," the service said.
"Essentially the entire west coast of Alaska is going to see blizzard and winter conditions: heavy snow, poor visibility, high winds," Bob Fischer, lead NWS forecaster in Alaska, told alaskadispatch.com.
© GOES Satellite/NOAA
The alert, issued by the NWS in Fairbanks, said the "extremely dangerous" storm would lash coastal areas from Tuesday night into Wednesday. It was expected to be just west of the Bering Strait by Tuesday night and then move into the southern Chukchi Sea on Wednesday.
The storm will likely be "life-threatening ... one of the worst on record," the service said.
"Essentially the entire west coast of Alaska is going to see blizzard and winter conditions: heavy snow, poor visibility, high winds," Bob Fischer, lead NWS forecaster in Alaska, told alaskadispatch.com.
Some areas of Oklahoma experienced hail and even tornadoes Monday as severe weather blanketed the region. A number of storm chasers were out capturing video of the tornadoes as they touched down and a number of videos have already been posted of the twisters.
The submarine volcanic eruption that began in mid-October in the Canary Islands continued in early November 2011. The volcanic island of El Hierro sits on a tectonic hot spot in the Atlantic Ocean off of North Africa and Spain.
The Advanced Land Imager (ALI) on NASA's Earth Observing-1 (EO-1) satellite acquired this natural-color image of El Hierro and a plume of volcanic material in the surrounding waters on November 2, 2011. The waters south of the island have been bubbling and fizzing with heat, sediment, bits of volcanic rock, and minerals for weeks, with the plume stretching tens of kilometers.
The eruption is believed to be venting about 50 to 100 meters below the water surface, and it is warming the waters by as much as 10 degrees Celsius, according to geologist and blogger Erik Klimetti. The temperature of erupting basalt can be as hot as 1100 to 1200 degrees C, he notes.
The Advanced Land Imager (ALI) on NASA's Earth Observing-1 (EO-1) satellite acquired this natural-color image of El Hierro and a plume of volcanic material in the surrounding waters on November 2, 2011. The waters south of the island have been bubbling and fizzing with heat, sediment, bits of volcanic rock, and minerals for weeks, with the plume stretching tens of kilometers.
© NASA, Jesse Allen and Robert Simmon
ALI data from the EO-1 Team, November 2, 2011.
ALI data from the EO-1 Team, November 2, 2011.
Vietnamese officials say some of the country's worst flooding in a decade has killed 88 people and left four others missing in the central and southern regions.
Central Quang Nam province disaster official Nguyen Minh Tuan says recent floods have killed eight people there, leaving another missing as large swaths of land remain submerged.
The government says two other people have drowned in central Vietnam and three more are missing.
Tuan said Tuesday that large parts of Hoi An ancient town, a UNESCO heritage site popular with tourists, were inundated, but that no landmarks were under threat of damage.
Central Quang Nam province disaster official Nguyen Minh Tuan says recent floods have killed eight people there, leaving another missing as large swaths of land remain submerged.
The government says two other people have drowned in central Vietnam and three more are missing.
Tuan said Tuesday that large parts of Hoi An ancient town, a UNESCO heritage site popular with tourists, were inundated, but that no landmarks were under threat of damage.
