From the Icelandic Met Office

It is believed that a small subglacial lava-eruption has begun under the Dyngjujökull glacier. The aviation color code for the Bárðarbunga volcano has been changed from orange to red. Image follows.

About 63 trillion gallons of water have been lost to drought in the western United States, enough to blanket the region with 4 inches of water, according to a study published Thursday.

Researchers at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego, arrived at the conclusion by measuring the level of the earth's crust with a network of GPS stations that is normally used to predict earthquakes.

When water is lost because of a lack of rain and snow, the earth's crust rises. The sensors show that the earth's crust has risen an average of 4 millimeters in the western United States since last year and as much as 15 millimeters in the California mountains.

The earth's crust typically sags in the winter and spring, weighed down by water, and it rises during the dry season in summer and fall, said co-author Adrian Borsa. The authors removed those seasonal factors when analyzing about a decade of data from GPS stations within the National Science Foundation's Plate Boundary Observatory.

Event Time
2014-08-23 18:33:06 UTC
2014-08-23 18:33:06 UTC+00:00 at epicenter

Location
64.792°N 17.380°W depth=2.5km (1.5mi)

Nearby Cities
104km (65mi) SSE of Akureyri, Iceland
229km (142mi) ENE of Reykjavik, Iceland
230km (143mi) ENE of Kopavogur, Iceland
233km (145mi) ENE of Hafnarfjordur, Iceland
613km (381mi) NW of Torshavn, Faroe Islands

See the table:
Source

Daily records Tmax=368 Tmin =1072
Monthly records Tmax=6 Tmin= 17
3 new snow records.

I had noted earlier this year that the data feed from NCDC that allowed independent plotting of high/low temperature records has suddenly disappeared. HAMweather has been running this map of record events for several years, and I have used it frequently in WUWT reports.

Source

There's quite a row developing after a scathing article in the Australian, some news clips follow. h/t to Dr. Benny Peiser at The GWPF
The [Australian] Bureau of Meteorology has been accused of manipulating historic temperature records to fit a predetermined view of global warming. Researcher Jennifer Marohasy claims the adjusted records resemble "propaganda" rather than science. Dr Marohasy has analysed the raw data from dozens of locations across Australia and matched it against the new data used by BOM showing that temperatures were progressively warming. In many cases, Dr Marohasy said, temperature trends had changed from slight cooling to dramatic warming over 100 years. - Graham Lloyd, The Australian, 23 August 2014

The escalating row goes to heart of the climate change debate - in particular, whether computer models are better than real data and whether temperature records are being manipulated in a bid to make each year hotter than the last. Marohasy's research has put her in dispute with BoM over a paper she published with John Abbot at Central Queensland University in the journal Atmospheric Research concerning the best data to use for rainfall forecasting. BoM challenged the findings of the Marohasy-Abbot paper, but the international journal rejected the BoM rebuttal, which had been prepared by some of the bureau's top scientists. This has led to an escalating dispute over the way in which ­Australia's historical temperature records are "improved" through homogenisation, which is proving more difficult to resolve. - Graham Lloyd, The Australian, 23 August 2014

When I first sent Graham Lloyd some examples of the remodeling of the temperature series I think he may have been somewhat skeptical. I know he on-forwarded this information to the Bureau for comment, including three charts showing the homogenization of the minimum temperature series for Amberley. Mr Lloyd is the Environment Editor for The Australian newspaper and he may have been concerned I got the numbers wrong. He sought comment and clarification from the Bureau. I understand that by way of response to Mr Lloyd, the Bureau has not disputed these calculations. What the Bureau has done, however, is try and justify the changes. In particular, for Amberley the Bureau is claiming to Mr Lloyd that there is very little available documentation for Amberley before 1990 and that information before this time may be "classified": as in top secret. - Jennifer Marohasy, 23 August 2014

Congratulations to The Australian again for taking the hard road and reporting controversial, hot, documented problems, that few in the Australian media dare to investigate.

This won't be remembered as a good year for Nebraska's grape industry. The last few weeks of August are usually harvest season for Nebraska grape growers, but vineyards across the state have been affected by severe weather in the last fews months, losing crops to everything from late freezes in May to high winds and hailstorms in June and July.

Typically, grape growers have at least one severe weather event to contend with during the growing season, said Jennifer Montgomery, executive director of the Nebraska Winery & Grape Growers Association. But this year, there were at least four distinct weather events that damaged crops throughout the state.

"It's been a very interesting year," Montgomery said. "It depends on where you were. Maybe you were OK after winter, but then the wind damage did you in. (The damage) is pretty widespread. It's pretty much all over the board." Stefan Kegley, owner of George Spencer Tasting Room in Gibbon and president of NWGGA, said only 10 percent of his grape crop will be harvested this year. Kegley owns 16 acres of grapes around Gibbon and Kearney. He usually sells grapes to Miletta Vista Winery in St. Paul.

A vineyard he owns north of Kearney was ruined by the late frost and a good portion of the rest was wiped out by the July 9 storm that rolled through the Gibbon and pelted the area with large hail. "The vines were completely stripped off," Kegley said. "It looked like winter the next morning."

The dead whale which was washed ashore at Atuabo, in the Ellembelle District of the Western Region, has been buried after some rituals were performed by the traditional leaders of the area.

The mammal was left there for about three days before the community, led by some traditional rulers and the area's chief fishermen, went and buried it.

The Daily Guide gathered that before the dead whale was carried by a bulldozer from the shore for burial, some rituals, including the pouring of libation, were performed.

The dead whale was washed ashore at Atuabo in the Ellembelle District of the Western Region last Sunday morning.

Measuring about 10 metres, the sea mammal was found in-between the pre-fabrication area of the Ghana Gas Company and the Atuabo ceme­tery.

The Assembly member for Atu­abo, John Quashie, who confirmed the story, indicated that as at 3:00pm yesterday, the mam­mal was still lying at the shore.

Iceland raised its alert over the nation's largest volcano to red on Saturday, banning all air traffic in the area, after detecting a small eruption.

A major explosion at the Bardarbunga volcano could signal a replay of the global travel chaos triggered when another peak blew four years ago, creating a massive ash cloud across Europe.

"There is an ongoing eruption beneath the glacial surface, probably a small eruption which has not been able to melt the ice cap," Met Office official Theodor Hervasson said.

The authorities earlier this week evacuated tourists and hikers from the area around Bardarbunga, which kicked into seismic action on Monday with the biggest earthquake registered since 1996.

Animal Control Officer William Sage tonight killed a rabid fox which police said had bitten three people and two animals in a 12-hour period, according to police.Wicked Local reported Thursday that with the help of police and firefighters, Sage tracked down, captured and killed the animal shortly after 5 p.m. behind a Rte. 9 office building at 463 Worcester Road, police reported.

The fox had attacked initially attacked a police officer, a health aide and a dog and cat, police said. Police answered a call about the fox biting someone who works at a company in the Rte. 9 building around 2 p.m. "He didn't see it coming," Zully Gonzales said. "He felt something bite him, he turned and it was the fox. It was pretty bad. The animal attacked him and he said he tried to fight back but it kept attacking him."

Ferocious winds roared through southern California on Thursday, leaving the region covered in thick dust.The summer storm, called a haboob, swept through the area, including Palm Springs, with winds up to 40mph. One man was hospitalized at Desert Regional Medical Center with minor injuries after being hit by a fallen tree.

Road conditions were dangerous as tires kicked up dust leaving drivers with low visibility.The sky was turned completely dark by the huge cloud of dust and turned conditions at sea rough and choppy. One driver, Scott Pam told ABC that a 'huge wall of dust and sand' ripped the door straps off his Jeep.

Mr Pam, a photographer, managed to snap some shots of the swirling clouds of dust.