© 20 Minuten
A heavy thunderstorm hit on Thurday evening (12/6/2014) over Emmental (near Bern)
A heavy thunderstorm hit on Thurday evening (12/6/2014) over Emmental (near Bern)
Earth Changes
Hail and heavy rain on Thursday evening caused in Switzerland damages of over ten million francs ( over $10 million). The hail caused especially damage to cars, but also agricultural areas were damaged. No one got injured.
© REX
Global average sea surface temperatures rose rapidly from the 1970s but have been relatively flat for the past 15 years. This has prompted speculation from some quarters that global warming has stalled.
Now, Stephen Briggs from the European Space Agency's Directorate of Earth Observation says that sea surface temperature data is the worst indicator of global climate that can be used, describing it as "lousy".
"It is like looking at the last hair on the tail of a dog and trying to decide what breed it is," he said on Friday at the Royal Society in London.
Climate scientists have been arguing for some time that the lack of warming of the sea surface is due to most of the extra heat being taken up by the deep ocean. A better measure, he said, was to look at the average rise in sea levels. The oceans store the vast majority of the climate's heat energy. Increases in this stored energy translate into sea level rises.
"The sea level shows us the engine of global climate not one of the consequences," said Briggs.
© NASA
Sea surface temperature using MODIS data
Sea surface temperature using MODIS data
Stephen Briggs from the European Space Agency's Directorate of Earth Observation says that sea surface temperature data is the worst indicator of global climate that can be used, describing it as "lousy".
"It is like looking at the last hair on the tail of a dog and trying to decide what breed it is," he said on Friday at the Royal Society in London.
"The models don't have the skill we thought they had. That's the problem," admits Peter Jan van Leeuwen, director of the National Centre of Earth Observation at the University of Reading.
© Getty Images
Delays: Some passengers had to wait hours for their bags
Delays: Some passengers had to wait hours for their bags
Travellers were left waiting hours for their bags following a power dip in the local area after lightning hit in the early hours of the morning, causing electrical trips to Gatwick's systems.
This affected check-in and baggage, and although all issues have been resolved and the airport is now operating as normal, passengers were affected by delays.
This morning's lightning strike was one of thousands across Europe in the early hours.
BBC weather tweeted at 6.13am: "In the last two hours across Europe, there have been over 8000 lightning strikes #flashbang"
Three buildings in Oxfordshire were set on fire after being hit by lightning
Transport was also disrupted for trains between Didcot Parkway and Reading when storms hit both counties in the early hours of Saturday morning.
Scottish and Southern Energy told the BBC lightning strikes to overhead cables had knocked out power supplies to 400 homes in Reading and 144 in Oxford.
Earlier today a lightning strike caused delays for hundreds of passengers at Gatwick Airport after causing electrical trips to the airport's systems.
© Still from YouTube video
Repair works are now under way on more than 300 sites of Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, the administrative center of Sakhalin Region, which storm unexpectedly hit late afternoon on Friday.
The hurricane in the city of Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk toppled over 1, 500 trees.
© USGS
2014-06-14 11:11:00 UTC
2014-06-14 17:11:00 UTC+06:00 at epicenter
Location
10.056°S 91.056°E depth=7.1km (4.4mi)
Nearby Cities
671km (417mi) WNW of West Island, Cocos Islands
1418km (881mi) WSW of Bengkulu, Indonesia
1439km (894mi) SW of Padang, Indonesia
1442km (896mi) SW of Sungaipenuh, Indonesia
671km (417mi) WNW of West Island, Cocos Islands
Scientific data
© Tom Farmer
Beach-goers examine a dead humpback whale near Pajaro Dunes on Friday.
Beach-goers examine a dead humpback whale near Pajaro Dunes on Friday.
An adult humpback whale was found dead on the beach near Pajaro Dunes Thursday night, and researchers are trying to determine its cause of death.
The roughly 45-foot whale was spotted after dark near the waterline at Palm Beach, said Teri Sigler, the marine mammal stranding coordinator at Long Marine Laboratory in Santa Cruz.
"It's a rare strander," Sigler said Friday.
She said the whale appeared "moderately decomposed" and had an odor. It was not immediately clear how it died, and a necropsy was expected to be performed on the beach Friday.
Results could take a day or longer, in part because the tide has been washing the animal south and making it difficult for researchers to get to it. Friday afternoon, the whale drifted to the beach in front of the Pajaro Rivermouth, authorities said.
© Erik Klemetti, taken March 2013.
The broad shield of Mauna Loa in Hawaii, the largest active volcano on Earth.
The broad shield of Mauna Loa in Hawaii, the largest active volcano on Earth.
© ROGER CLIFFORD — Alaska Volcano Observatory
Semisopochnoi Island, in November 2012.
Semisopochnoi Island, in November 2012.
The change means that five volcanoes being monitored in Alaska are now simultaneously active, the most in recent memory, said Matt Haney, a research geophysicist at the Alaska Volcano Observatory.
"We might have had four before, but we haven't had five," Haney said.
A total of 52 volcanoes in Alaska are considered by the observatory to be "historically active." All are monitored daily through satellites, and about 30 are monitored with ground-based seismometers that measure earthquake activity. On Friday, the observatory raised the color code alert level for the Semisopochnoi (pronounced Semi-so-poch-noi) volcano to "yellow," a reflection of heightened unrest.
Comment: It's interesting to note that sea levels have been much higher during previous warming and interglacial periods. They were rising during the warming period before 'the pause', but now that it isn't warming there's a correlation? What of the growth of Antarctic and Arctic ice in recent years? What of the many earth changes that simply cannot be explained away by AGW? Die hard political 'scientist' zealots have been blaming everything under the sun for a theory that...just doesn't hold water!
There's much about the ocean and how it interacts with earth systems that remain to be understood. For example, researchers just found new evidence that suggests the earth may have massive underground reservoirs that are three times the size of our surface oceans. Might these reservoirs have some influence on a rising sea level?
For those interested in a sincere investigation on actual science of what is actually happening on this planet be sure to check out the new book in the Secret History of the World series, Earth Changes and the Human-Cosmic Connection.