Earth Changes

Indonesian Volcano Grounds Planes; Evacuated Residents Restless to Go Home

Sara Schonhardt
VOA News
Tue, 02 Nov 2010 19:55 UTC

Thousands of Indonesians forced from their homes because of Mount Merapi's continued eruptions are restless to leave the evacuation shelters. And the volcano's ash clouds now are forcing airlines to cancel some flights.

A week after Indonesia's most active volcano began shooting searing gas clouds from its crater, restless evacuees say they are tired of living in hot, cramped shelters. But repeated explosions signal that the volcano, known here as "Fire Mountain," is not ready to let them go home.

Continued blasts have not deterred many families from heading back up the mountain. They go to check on their homes and cattle. At night, they return, packing into overcrowded camps to sleep on thin mats among thousands.

Swaziland: Panic Over Sun's Strange Appearance

Cassandra Shaw
Times of Swaziland
Tue, 02 Nov 2010 13:45 UTC

Mbabane - It was an unusual day for many, and some thought the world was coming to an end yesterday.

This was due to a circle of light (a halo) that was seen in the morning hours surrounding the sun. A halo, in simple terms, refers to a circle of light or radiance. This caused a lot of panic for many people as most were of the view that the world was coming to an end.

The Times of Swaziland office was inundated with calls from the public who wanted to find out about the halo around the sun.

This is similar to a rainbow line, though this time it was just around the sun. According to a statement from the Swaziland Meteorological Department, this phenomenon is known as a 22 Degree Halo.

The rainbow-like circle around the sun is caused by the bending of the sun's light due to tiny hexagonal ice crystals in the upper atmosphere.

Monsanto's Superweeds Come Home to Roost: 11 Million U.S. Acres are Infested

Charles Margulis
foodfreedom.wordpress.com
Wed, 27 Oct 2010 23:02 UTC

There's been much recent news about Monsanto paying farmers to use its competitors' herbicides, in what many see as a last ditch effort to address the spread of superweeds created by the company's "Roundup Ready" (RR) GMO crops. Environmental scientists warned even before Monsanto's "herbicide tolerant" GMO crops were approved that they would hasten the evolution of resistant weeds.

For these scientists, the issue was obvious: introduction of high doses of a single chemical year after year would result in the exact conditions needed to breed resistance: weeds with resistance genes would be the only weeds that could survive and breed, leading to superweeds that are unaffected even by massive herbicide spraying.

Of course, Monsanto denied these early warnings. In a 1997 paper, Monsanto scientists claimed that weed resistance was such a complex genetic phenomena that Round up Ready crops would be unlikely to lead to resistant weeds.

Goodbye Global Warming, Hello Biodiversity

Alan Caruba
Eurasia Review
Mon, 01 Nov 2010 14:01 UTC

After three decades of trying to push the global warming scam to a point where billions could be made selling and trading bogus "carbon credits", the global schemers have abandoned it in the wake of 2009 revelations that a handful of rogue climate scientists were literally inventing the data to support it.

If there is one lesson to be learned from and about environmentalists, it is that they are utterly relentless. The ultimate goal is one-world government directed from the United Nations by unelected bureaucrats who are soulless strangers to the truth, to morality, to humanity.

The United States supports this abomination to the tune of billions every year.

The United Nations is a place where some of the world's dictatorships have delegates representing them on its Human Rights Council, where a vast Oil-for-Food scandal flourished while Saddam Hussein held power in Iraq, where a single agency's sole purpose is to ensure that Palestinians remain refugees six decades after the rebirth of Israel.

Frozen Ark project collects 1000th animal DNA sample

BBC
Mon, 01 Nov 2010 15:41 UTC

Scientists from the University of Nottingham's Frozen Ark project have now collected over 1000 gametes, cells and DNA from endangered animals.

The samples have been frozen for possible resurrection by cloning technology in the future.

Ann Clarke, from the project, said: "They [the samples] are all to be used for a conservation of last effort before the animal goes extinct."

The material already held includes that of the endangered yellow sea horse.

The Frozen Ark project began in 2004 after scientists witnessed the extinction of the Polynesian tree snail.

Ann Clarke said: "When you watch a species die out it sharpens the mind and we thought we had to try and do this."

Animal species are dying out at an unprecedented rate according to scientists.

New eruption could be looming in Iceland, experts warn

Agence France-Presse
Mon, 01 Nov 2010 15:32 UTC

Reykjavik - An Icelandic volcano has shown signs it could be about to burst into life, just months after an eruption from another volcano caused Europe's biggest air shutdown since World War II, experts said Monday.

"The water levels have tripled in (the river) Gigja since last night," water measurement specialist Gunnar Sigurdsson of the Icelandic Meteorological Institute told AFP.

The water flooding into the Gigja, on the Vatnajoekull glacier in eastern Iceland, comes from an icy lake in the crater of the Grimsvoetn volcano.

Due to increased thermal temperatures, the lake and surrounding glacier area has melted, filling the crater to a point where it has spilled over and caused a so-called river-run, which in turn could easily set off an eruption.

"When a river-run occurs, the pressure, in this case, in Grimsvotn, decreases, and with less pressure, there is a chance of an eruption from the volcano," Thorunn Skaftadottir, a geophysicist also with the Icelandic Meteorological Institute told AFP.

"This is not guaranteed," she pointed out, since an eruption "can only happen if the volcano has collected enough magma."

Germany: Sinkhole Swallows Car Overnight

Thelocal.de
Mon, 01 Nov 2010 06:00 UTC

A large sinkhole opened up overnight in the middle of residential area in Thuringia, sucking a nearby auto into its depths and forcing authorities to evacuate residents, police said on Monday.

The crater, measuring some 40 by 15 metres, appeared in the town of Schmalkalden, a police spokesperson said. The hole is believed to be some 20 metres deep, she added.

No-one was injured in the incident, but another vehicle near the hole is in danger of falling into the hole.

A number of homes in the vicinity were evacuated, and a large contingent of police and fire fighters were out trying to secure the site.

Authorities remain uncertain of what may have caused the sinkhole.

Comment: From The Telegraph, UK:

An unexplained 25m "crater" has appeared beneath a village in central Germany, swallowing a car

Flash floods leave four dead in Vietnam

Press TV
Mon, 01 Nov 2010 08:20 UTC

Flash floods and landslides triggered by heavy rains have left four people dead and two more missing in south-central Vietnam, officials say.

The National Steering Committee on Flood and Storm Control reported a downpour of 165 to 545 millimeters of rain over the last three days in the worst-hit region, DPA reported.

Flood waters have destroyed nearly 600 houses in central and southern parts of the country. More than 5,000 hectares of rice paddies have gone underwater.

More rain has been forecast for the coming days.

This is the latest in a series of deadly storms hitting Vietnam this autumn. Last month's floods killed 134 and left six missing in Vietnam.

Figures show that annual heavy rains and floods have killed an average of 750 people in the pacific nation for each of the past 10 years.

Thailand's worst flooding for decades claims 100 lives, 5 million affected

Thailand News.Net
Mon, 01 Nov 2010 08:12 UTC

Extensive flooding in central Thailand this month killed up to 100 people and affected 5 million others, officials said Saturday.

Unusually heavy monsoon rains since Oct 10 caused flooding in 38 of 76 provinces, swamping 640,000 hectares of farmland and causing more than 10 billion baht ($333 million) in damage, the disaster prevention and mitigation department said.

It said 22 provinces were still partly submerged.

At least 100 people died during the past three weeks, mostly from drowning, the Emergency Medical Institute said.

Many died attempting to catch fish in the floodwaters, officials acknowledged. The institute said it would launch a campaign to teach more Thais how to swim.

Public Health Minister Jurin Laksanawisit said Friday that medical teams had treated 229,398 patients for flood-related ailments. Half of the patients suffering foot infections.

Comment: Footage from CNN:

Weather in US reflects political turmoil as Midwest battered by 56 tornadoes in two days

BBC
Thu, 28 Oct 2010 07:46 UTC

Residents of US states from North Dakota to North Carolina are cleaning up after a fierce storm unleashed driving rain, blustery winds, heavy snow and 56 tornadoes in just two days.

The National Weather Service said the storm had caused the second-largest October tornado outbreak on record.

Injuries from the storm have been reported in states across the US.

Conditions in many states returned to normal on Thursday as the storm made its way north-east toward Ontario.

But windy weather is still being felt in some regions in the Midwest, the Great Lakes and the Ohio Valley.

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Earth Changes

Indonesian Volcano Grounds Planes; Evacuated Residents Restless to Go Home

Swaziland: Panic Over Sun's Strange Appearance

Monsanto's Superweeds Come Home to Roost: 11 Million U.S. Acres are Infested

Goodbye Global Warming, Hello Biodiversity

Frozen Ark project collects 1000th animal DNA sample

New eruption could be looming in Iceland, experts warn

Germany: Sinkhole Swallows Car Overnight

Flash floods leave four dead in Vietnam

Thailand's worst flooding for decades claims 100 lives, 5 million affected

Weather in US reflects political turmoil as Midwest battered by 56 tornadoes in two days

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