Earth ChangesS


Phoenix

Spain, Portugal fight wildfires

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© Francisco Seco, APPeople fight a fire on the Peneda-Geres mountain near Pardela, northern Portugal.
Madrid - Officials say emergency services in Spain and Portugal are combating 19 sizable wildfires as cooler weather is now easing firefighting.

The regional government of Galicia, in the northwestern corner of Spain, says firefighters are working to control outbreaks in four areas of the province, including one "very large forest fire" in Negreira.

A fire in Barjas, in the neighbouring province of Leon, is being brought under control, mayor Alfredo de Arriba says.

Portugal's Civil Protection authority said on Sunday its forces had fought fires in 14 different areas and cooler conditions presented "a much more favourable scenario".

Comment: Footage of the fires in Portugal from Russia Today:




Cloud Lightning

Russia lashed by storm after heatwave

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© UnknownThe storm battered St Petersburg on Sunday before moving towards Moscow
Russia's record-breaking heatwave looks set to come to a dramatic end, with a severe storm now heading for Moscow after battering St Petersburg.

Nearly 100,000 people around St Petersburg were left without power, rail services were halted and trees felled amid high winds and heavy rains.

Moscow is expected to be hit later. Temperatures there dropped to 25C on Monday after nearing 40C for weeks.

Fires that have raged across western Russia are being brought under control.

The emergencies ministry said the area affected by peat and forest fires was down to 45,800 hectares, compared to a peak of almost 200,000 hectares.

Arrow Down

Russian wheat export ban threatens higher inflation and food riots

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© AP Photo/Mikhail Metzel
The world faces an inflationary time bomb as shortages of food threaten to push prices to fresh all-time highs.

A variety of freakish weather conditions across the world has sent the price of staples including wheat, pork, rice, orange juice, coffee, cocoa and tea to fresh highs in recent weeks. Yesterday's decision by the Russian government to ban the export of wheat to protect home consumers saw grain prices jump 8 per cent on the day, on what was already a two-year high. Meanwhile, the burgeoning demand for foodstuffs and raw material growth in the resurgent economies of China and India has also driven oil, copper and other industrial commodities higher.

Bizarro Earth

Tornado hits North Hungary


Comment: From RSOE: Two tornadoes touched down last evening in two hungarian counties. First tornado landed in the Diósjenő, Nógrád County and tornado-like storm hit the Mezőkövesd, Borsod-Abaúj-Zemplén County. A violent storm caused heavy damage but no personal injury. A tornado-like storms are becoming more common lately.


A tornado swept through Diósjenő, Nógrád county on Monday, uprooting trees and tossing them onto electricity poles and cars.

Gale-force winds lashed Mezőkövest, Borsod county early Monday evening, pelting residents with hailstones as large as walnuts.

It was not immediately known whether the hail caused significant damage, but the downpour of water on the streets halted vehicle traffic.

Sunday evening's storm affected about 40 villages in Szabolcs county, causing damage to houses in 15 villages. Some houses were so damaged that residents had to stay with neighbours and relatives.

tornado hungary
© Idokep

Phoenix

Russia Burns (Radiation Alert)

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A hasty evacuation of diplomatic staff from foreign embassies, like a stampede, began in Moscow. Many embassies are trying to hide the evacuation for political reasons. Mass evacuation of the embassies of Canada and Poland was officially reported at night on August 7. Russia is sending 10,000 children and hundreds of elderly to Bulgaria and the Ukraine to save them from the smoldering heat and overpowering smog in Moscow, the city's Mayor, Yriy Luzhkov, announced Tuesday. Seventeen regions of Russia are currently aflame. Seven of them, including the Moscow region, have declared a state of emergency.
Physicians have urged Muscovites to avoid leaving their homes. They warn that breathing the toxic air for just a couple of hours has the same harmful effect as smoking two packs of cigarettes.
The U.S. State Department is allowing nonessential staff and dependents of the embassy in Moscow to leave if they want. Carbon monoxide in the Moscow air was 1.4 times higher than acceptable levels Tuesday, the state pollution watchdog said, a slight improvement from the day before. On Saturday the levels had been an alarming 6.6 times worse. The Canadian government has also initiated a partial evacuation of embassy staff and family members from Moscow due to the choking smog caused by raging fires around Russia's capital. Foreign Ministries of Germany, Bulgaria, France, Italy and other countries also appealed to their citizens not to travel to Russia.

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Bizarro Earth

Canada: Heavy rain floods roads west of Ottawa

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© Shannon Purcell/CBCWater floods the road at 5 E Concession and Gold Mine Road, about a 10 km drive northwest from a section of Highway 148 that was closed due to flooding.
A main road for people west of Ottawa has been closed due to flooding following a severe thunderstorm Sunday.

Police closed Dunrobin Road to all but local traffic from Kinburn Road all the way to Constance Bay Road after heavy rain raised water levels of a normally calm creek.

Water that usually drains into Buckham's Bay instead washed over Dunrobin Road and the surrounding area.

While thunderstorms were seen across the region on Sunday, Environment Canada said a localized storm in the Constance Bay and Woodlawn areas dropped between 75 and 100 mm of rain.

Woodlawn resident Lynne Wilson, whose property backs onto the creek, said the water from the creek came gushing down making the water level several feet higher than normal.

"We couldn't believe it," said Wilson. "There was so much rain."

Bizarro Earth

Three people die in flash floods in Cordoba, Spain

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© EFEFlash floods in Cordoba, Spain.
The Interior Ministry says one man was found dead Tuesday morning in a car that had been washed away in torrential overnight rain in the small town of Aguilar de la Frontera.

Spain's government says three people have died in flash floods in towns close to southern city of Cordoba.

The Interior Ministry says one man was found dead Tuesday morning in a car that had been washed away in torrential overnight rain in the small town of Aguilar de la Frontera.

The ministry says the body of a woman who also had been in the vehicle was found some 150 meters (165 yards) away.

Another man was killed when an exterior wall of his house collapsed on top of him in the nearby town of Bujalance.

Television images showed damaged cars piled together along mud-packed streets in Aguilar while people mopped out their houses.

Roses

Australia: Surfer Bleeds to Death After Grisly Shark Attack

Nicholas Edwards
© PerthNow/Channel 9Tragic: Father of two Nicholas Edwards was fatally attacked by a shark in Gracetown on Tuesday morning.
The family of the man fatally mauled by a shark have spoken for the first time.

Nicholas Edwards, 31, bled to death after being attacked at South Point at Gracetown, just north of Margaret River at 8.15am.

His wife Melissa tonight asked for privacy as the family, including the couple's children aged seven and two, struggled to come to terms with the tragedy.

Speaking from the couple's Broadwater home near Busselton, Mrs Edwards' mother Helen said news of the attack had devastated the family.

"It's a very hard time, it's the day we lost Nick," she said.

"We're just trying to deal with it, and come to terms with it.

"We'd like to ask for privacy to grieve."

Cloud Precipitation

Third of Pakistan under water: more rain expected

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© Desconocido
Islamabad - Pakistan's worst floods in 80 years have left 20 million people homeless and six million without food, medicine, or shelter.

United Nations aid agencies have provided assistance to hundreds of thousands of victims of floods but relief operations have yet to reach an estimated six million people, a UN report said.

The lives of 16 million people have been disrupted by one of the worst catastrophes in Pakistan's history. Six million still need food, shelter and water, the UN said in a statement.

Highlighting the scale of the disaster, Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani said in an Independence Day speech that the country faces challenges similar to those during the 1947 partition of the subcontinent, Reuters reported.

A third of Pakistan is now under water, and fresh rainfall threatens two more waves of flooding in the southern Sindh province.

Better Earth

Scientists baffled by mysterious 'corkscrew' deaths of seals off British coast

Scientists and marine biologists are at a loss to explain the mystery 'corkscrew' deaths of almost 40 seals off the east coast of Scotland and England.

Bearing distinctive and horrific wounds, the seals have now been found on beaches in Fife, as well as in Norfolk, in the past year.
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This seal was washed up on Scotland's east coast earlier this month. The severe injuries appear to be caused by a bladed device. Scientists have ruled out military craft, fishing nets and boat propellers

The injuries are so severe that marine biologists say the seals look as if they had been put through a giant pencil sharpener.

Now a team of scientists has launched an urgent investigation into the seal deaths in an effort to find out what is causing them.

Unless the experts work out the cause of these 38 bizarre deaths, it is feared more seals will suffer the same fate.

Dr Dave Thompson, seal biologist at the Sea Mammal Research Unit at St Andrews University, is leading the investigation.

Seals with similar injuries have also been found on beaches in Canada over the last decade.