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Bizarro Earth

"Biblical" Floods Threaten Australian Homes

Torsten Blackwood
Agence France-Presse
Sat, 31 Dec 2011 08:41 UTC
foods
© Agence France-Presse
The floods prompted a message of support from the Queen, who said she had been following the news "with great concern"
Flood waters swept through vast areas of northeastern Australia Saturday, threatening to inundate thousands more homes in a disaster one official said was of "biblical proportions".

As Queen Elizabeth II sent her "sincere sympathies" to Queenslanders who rang in a damp new year, helicopters were being used to deliver food and other supplies to isolated towns.

Up to 200,000 people have been affected by the floods, which have hurt the nation's lucrative mining industry and cut off major highways as the water rushes through sodden inland regions to the sea.

"In many ways, it is a disaster of biblical proportions," Queensland State Treasurer Andrew Fraser told reporters in flood-hit Bundaberg.

Prime Minister Julia Gillard, who on Friday toured inundated regions, said the floods had been devastating and would clearly have an economic impact.

"We're still directly battling floodwaters -- we haven't seen the peak of the flood yet at centres like Rockhampton -- so the people of Queensland in many places are doing it tough today," she said.
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Evil Rays

Northern Israel rattled by 3.6 magnitude earthquake

Eli Ashkenazi and Zafrir Rinat
Haaretz
Sat, 01 Jan 2011 14:44 UTC
No injuries or damage reported; Beit She'an area felt quake the strongest but actual source has yet to be identified.

An earthquake measuring 3.6 on the Richter scale was felt by residents in the Jordan Valley area on Saturday. No injuries or damage were reported.

In the area reaching from Safed to Beit She'an to Tiberias, police received dozens of phone calls from residents saying they thought an earthquake was happening. Many residents hurried out of their homes looking for a safe place, with some seeking refuge in bomb shelters and stairwells.

According to the calls, Beit She'an residents felt the earthquake the strongest, although the actual source of the quake has not yet been identified.
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Igloo

UK: It's official: December WAS the chilliest in 120 years


The Daily Mail
Sat, 01 Jan 2011 14:19 UTC
If you thought December was the coldest you could remember, you were right... unless you are more than 120 years old.

The benchmark Central England Temperature plunged to an average of -0.6c (30.9f) over the month, making it the second harshest December since records began in 1659.

It was beaten only by the -0.8c (30.5f) average for December 1890, weather historian Philip Eden said last night. It was also the chilliest individual calendar month since February 1986.

Image
© Associated Press
An unidentified child throws snow into the frozen fountain of the Queen Victoria Memorial in front of Buckingham Palace just before Christmas. Snow and freezing temperatures continued to cause travel chaos for road, rail and air passengers in the weeks leading up to the holidays
As snow, ice and frost brought chaos to roads, airports and homes, there were ten nights in December 2010 when the temperature fell below -18c (-0.4f) somewhere in the UK.

Altnaharra in Sutherland, Scotland, experienced the coldest conditions, with the mercury plummeting to -21.1c (-6f) early on December 1.

This bitter end to this year was the result of an unusually large area of high pressure squatting over Greenland - combined with low pressure over the UK. Normally, westerly winds from the Atlantic keep the British Isles mild during the winter.
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Info

Mote Study Unlocking Riddle of Why Some Dolphins Beach Themselves

Jackie Barron
Tampa Bay Online
Sat, 01 Jan 2011 13:44 UTC
Common dolphin
© BabyNuke/Wikipedia
Common dolphin.

Sarasota - Dolphins are beautiful creatures, but mysterious, and perhaps no mystery is greater than why each year a small number of dolphins beach themselves, usually fatally.

Now a Mote Marine scientist thinks he has found at least part of the answer: Deaf dolphins.

Randy Wells, who helped author a study about dolphin strandings, said most dolphins that beach themselves have at least partial hearing loss.

The answer isn't as surprising as it seems, Wells said.

"These animals live in an environment where they can't see very far, just because it's water and it's often times murky. "So sound is a crucial player in their lives."

So crucial, Wells says, that a dolphin with hearing problems will find it almost impossible to find food, to stay with other dolphins in their pod and to keep their sense of direction.

Wells, David Mann with the University of South Florida and 14 other researchers studied numerous cases of dolphin strandings. To test their hearing, they used the same basic hearing tests doctors use on infants.

The result?
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Igloo

US: NOAA on Miami Florida: Coldest December on Record

Anthony Watts
What's Up With That?
Thu, 30 Dec 2010 00:00 UTC
Image
© unknown
From the NOAA National Weather Service Office in Miami comes this year end report:

2010 South Florida Weather Year in Review
Coldest December on Record Concludes Year of Extremes
December 30th, 2010: Temperature and precipitation extremes marked the weather of 2010 across South Florida. A cool and wet January through March was followed by the hottest summer on record, and then concluded with the coldest December on record for the main climate sites in South Florida (details on the above mentioned periods will be included below).

Here are December 2010 temperature averages for select sites (through 7 AM Dec 30th):
Image
© unknown
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Bizarro Earth

Argentina - Earthquake Magnitude 7.0 - Santiago Del Estero


USGS
Sat, 01 Jan 2011 11:41 UTC
Argentina Quake_010111
© USGS
Earthquake Location
Date-Time:
Saturday, January 01, 2011 at 09:56:59 UTC

Saturday, January 01, 2011 at 06:56:59 AM at epicenter

Time of Earthquake in other Time Zones

Location:
26.758°S, 63.103°W

Depth:
583.6 km (362.6 miles) set by location program

Region:
SANTIAGO DEL ESTERO, ARGENTINA

Distances:
160 km (100 miles) NE of Santiago del Estero, Argentina

185 km (115 miles) SSE of El Quebrachal, Salta, Argentina

190 km (120 miles) N of Anatuya, Santiago del Estero, Argentina

960 km (600 miles) NNW of BUENOS AIRES, D.F., Argentina
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Igloo

Las Vegas sets record for coldest New Year's Eve high temperature

Kyle Hansen
Las Vegas Sun
Fri, 31 Dec 2010 19:31 UTC
coldest new year Las Vegas
© Leila Navidi
Robert Inga, a pyrotechnician with Fireworks by Grucci, sets up New Year’s Eve fireworks and covers them with plastic on the roof of Treasure Island Thursday, December 30, 2010.
It's going to be a chilly start to 2011: 28 degrees in Las Vegas at midnight, if the National Weather Service's prediction is correct.

Las Vegas set a record today with the coldest high temperature ever recorded in Las Vegas on New Year's Eve: just 38 degrees. The temperature was well below the old record for the coldest high, 45 degrees set in 1975, the National Weather Service said.

The last time the high temperature reached only the 30s was during a snowstorm on Dec. 17, 2008, when the high was 39 degrees.

Overnight temperatures aren't expected to reach record lows, but "we're definitely going to be looking at very cold temperatures for an extended period," weather service meteorologist Larry Jensen said.

At 5 p.m. Friday, Jensen said some parts of the valley already were close to freezing and would stay that way for most of the night.
      Read More...
Umbrella

200,000 Displaced in Australia Floods

Torsten Blackwood
Agence France-Presse/Raw Story
Fri, 31 Dec 2010 19:08 UTC
flood, Emerald, Australia
© Philip Norrish/AFP
A suburb in the Queensland town of Emerald in Australia taken over by flood water yesterday.
Australia started forced evacuations of a major town on Friday as floods that have already affected 200,000 people swamped more communities in the stricken northeast.

As Prime Minister Julia Gillard consoled evacuees, police moved the elderly and those in low-lying areas from Rockhampton, where 4,000 homes are at risk from floods paralysing an area the size of France and Germany combined.

"Police will order people in affected areas to leave their homes," Rockhampton mayor Brad Carter told AAP news agency.

Meanwhile military Blackhawk helicopters evacuated residents and dropped batches of food in Emerald, population 11,000, after 80 percent of the rural town was deluged by mucky waters.

Floods triggered by tropical cyclone Tasha have hit the farming and mining belt near Brisbane particularly hard, cutting road and rail links and crippling the region's all-important coal production.

As river levels continued to rise, some 22 towns were inundated or isolated, with sugar cane centre Bundaberg, known for its rum, divided in two by the floodwaters.

Shops, homes and businesses have been swamped by the murky tide, with cars submerged and caravan parks sitting metres (feet) deep, as residents take to boats and kayaks to negotiate the waters.
      Read More...
Cloud Lightning

New Twister Alerts in US After 6 Killed in Arkansas and Missouri


MSNBC.com
Fri, 31 Dec 2010 17:00 UTC
Stretch from Chicago to New Orleans on watch; survivor recalls 'Superman' flight


Tornadoes fueled by unusually warm weather pummeled the South and Midwest on Friday, killing at least six people and injuring dozens more across Arkansas, Missouri and Illinois.

Forecasters said storms later in the evening could hit as New Year's Eve celebrations begin along a stretch from near Chicago to New Orleans. Forecasters posted tornado watches for the region that were set to run until 8 p.m.

Three people died in the northwestern Arkansas hamlet of Cincinnati when a tornado touched down just before sunrise, and three others died when a storm spawned by the same weather system ripped up the Missouri countryside near Rolla. A number of storms were also reported in the St. Louis area.
      Read More...
Bizarro Earth

Indiana: What's So Special About This Quake?


Indystar
Fri, 31 Dec 2010 14:55 UTC
Although earthquakes are fairly common in the southwestern part of Indiana and occasionally happen along the edge of Lake Michigan, earth scientists say there has never been an earthquake confirmed in north central Indiana.

"Unprecedented," said Walter Gray, an official with the Indiana Geological Survey, a research group at Indiana University. "There is no historical evidence of quakes in that area. We have no events that have been recorded."

Seismologist Michael Hamburger, an IU professor of geological sciences, called north central Indiana "a really quiet corner of the seismic world."

"This is an interesting little peculiar earthquake that happened in a strange place," Hamburger said of Thursday's quake. "It is a reminder that earthquakes can happen almost anywhere in the central U.S."

The southern half of Indiana, which includes the Wabash Valley Fault System, is more prone to quakes. There was a 3.8 magnitude quake as close as Shelbyville in 2004. The last major quake centered in Indiana was a 4.6 magnitude earthquake near Evansville in June 2002, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
      Read More...
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