(ANI): Mediation, an eastern philosophy which was once dismissed as pretentious, can be effective in treating mental illness, brain scans have proved.

The buzzword is mindfulness. Meditation, which is practiced a lot in India and in parts of Islington, is an NHS-approved treatment that combines conventional psychotherapy with meditation techniques, breathing and yoga.

It is sitting around trying to think about nothing and letting out the occasional “ommmm”.

Meditation has been around since the Seventies, but in the past decade there has been growing evidence that it is highly effective. Researchers at Britain’s most respected medical centers have found that it can halve the risk of relapse for those with depression.

“Psychotherapy involves patients analyzing thoughts and feelings, with the hope that by understanding them some kind of change can be made. Mindfulness has some of this but it also involves meditation,” the Daily Mail quoted Mark Williams, professor of clinical psychology at the University of Oxford’s Department of Psychiatry and co-developer of one of the many variants, Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT), said.

“Meditation, which is an ancient practice and part of Eastern spiritual philosophy, involves sitting, usually in silence, and focusing on one thing, such as the sensations of breathing in and out.

“The mind wanders, so you invite your attention to come back to the thing you are focusing on. People who do this regularly feel very calm. And due to modern scanning techniques that measure activity in the brain, we are beginning to understand why,” he said.

Williams’s colleagues in the US and Canada have been able to pinpoint the parts of the brain that undergo changes during meditation, and the results are astonishing.

“Meditation helps to reduce the activity of part of the brain called the amygdala, which governs feelings of stress. Those who are more stressed and anxious have an amygdala that is overactive. Meditating reduces this.

“And there is an effect on the insula, the part of the brain involved in deep emotions, including love.

“We know from other studies that the insula allows us to feel emotions, so when we are heartbroken we really do experience a kind of pain.

“Normally activity in this area is closely linked to the part of the brain involved in analytical thought. So if we have a fight with our partner, we not only feel dreadful but we start to think about why, what this says about our relationship and what might happen if we don’t put it right,” Williams said.

In those with mental illness, this loop becomes overactive – the thinking feeds the emotions, which feeds more thinking until it becomes overwhelming.

“Meditating breaks this cycle by reducing the links between the insula and the parts of the brain that analyse, as we have seen on brain scans.

“It doesn’t stop a person from feeling or thinking but it uncouples these two parts of the brain, giving the patient more control.

“Further to that, we’ve discovered in clinical trials that mindfulness works as well as antidepressants in preventing relapse of depression. It can also be used alongside drugs,” he said.

Janet Jones, 48, was diagnosed with severe depression 10 years ago. The mother of two was introduced to mindfulness in 2008.

“I was very sceptical at first. But gradually it became part of my everyday life,” she said.

“I would find it difficult to get out of bed and when I got to work, I would feel miserable. Once I committed to mindfulness, my approach changed and my life improved. Mindfulness has given me more control over my life. I now know that no matter how painful something is, it will pass,” Jones added. (ANI)

Related articles

• How Meditation Can Make You a Better Leader (openforum.com)
• How to Meditate Effectively (answers.com)
• Evidence Supports Health Benefits of ‘Mindfulness-Based Practices’ (tricitypsychology.com)
• Top Scientists Question Brain Scans for Mental Illness (madinamerica.com)
• Psych meds can shrink the brain, but meditation is found to increase brain size: heal your brain! (beyondmeds.com)
• Time Magazine: Can Meditation Make You Smarter? (karahpino.me)

Earth Watch Report – Saturday August 25th, 2012

August 25, 2012 by desertrose

Solar Activity

spaceweather,com

Solar wind speed: 576.5 km/sec density: 0.0 protons/cm3 explanation | more data Updated: Today at 0935 UT X-ray Solar Flares 6-hr max: B9 0301 UT Aug25 24-hr: C1 0236 UT Aug25 explanation | more data Updated: Today at: 0900 UT Daily Sun: 25 Aug 12 A new sunspot is emerging at the circled location. Credit: SDO/HMI Sunspot number: 69 What is the sunspot number? Updated 25 Aug 2012 Spotless Days Current Stretch: 0 days 2012 total: 0 days (0%) 2011 total: 2 days (<1%) 2010 total: 51 days (14%) 2009 total: 260 days (71%) Since 2004: 821 days Typical Solar Min: 486 days Update 25 Aug 2012 The Radio Sun 10.7 cm flux: 104 sfu explanation | more data Updated 25 Aug 2012 Current Auroral Oval: Switch to: Europe, USA, New Zealand, Antarctica Credit: NOAA/POES Planetary K-index Now: Kp= 3 quiet 24-hr max: Kp= 3 quiet explanation | more data Interplanetary Mag. Field Btotal: 6.7 nT Bz: 5.7 nT north explanation | more data Updated: Today at 0936 UT Coronal Holes: 25 Aug 12 A stream of solar wind flowing from the indicated coronal hole should reach Earth on Aug. 26-27. Credit: SDO/AIA. SPACE WEATHER NOAA Forecasts Updated at: 2012 Aug 24 2200 UTC FLARE 0-24 hr 24-48 hr CLASS M 10 % 10 % CLASS X 01 % 01 % Geomagnetic Storms: Probabilities for significant disturbances in Earth’s magnetic field are given for three activity levels: active, minor storm, severe storm Updated at: 2012 Aug 24 2200 UTC Mid-latitudes 0-24 hr 24-48 hr ACTIVE 20 % 25 % MINOR 05 % 05 % SEVERE 01 % 01 % High latitudes 0-24 hr 24-48 hr ACTIVE 20 % 15 % MINOR 30 % 30 % SEVERE 25 % 35 %

Link Found Between Cold European Winters and Solar Activity

ScienceDaily

Scientists have long suspected that the Sun’s 11-year cycle influences climate of certain regions on Earth. Yet records of average, seasonal temperatures do not date back far enough to confirm any patterns. Now, armed with a unique proxy, an international team of researchers show that unusually cold winters in Central Europe are related to low solar activity — when sunspot numbers are minimal. The freezing of Germany’s largest river, the Rhine, is the key.

Researchers have linked low solar activity to a localized, temporary cooling of Central Europe, by studying the freezing of the Rhine river. (Credit: Warburg via Wikimedia Commons, Creative Commons license)

Although Earth’s surface overall continues to warm, the new analysis has revealed a correlation between periods of low activity of the Sun and of some cooling — on a limited, regional scale in Central Europe, along the Rhine.

“The advantage with studying the Rhine is because it’s a very simple measurement,” said Frank Sirocko lead author of a paper on the study and professor of Sedimentology and Paleoclimatology at the Institute of Geosciences of Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, Germany. “Freezing is special in that it’s like an on-off mode. Either there is ice or there is no ice.”

From the early 19th through mid-20th centuries, riverboat men used the Rhine for cargo transport. And so docks along the river have annual records of when ice clogged the waterway and stymied shipping. The scientists used these easily-accessible documents, as well as other additional historical accounts, to determine the number of freezing episodes since 1780.

Sirocko and his colleagues found that between 1780 and 1963, the Rhine froze in multiple places fourteen different times. The sheer size of the river means it takes extremely cold temperatures to freeze over making freezing episodes a good proxy for very cold winters in the region, Sirocko said.

Mapping the freezing episodes against the solar activity’s 11-year cycle — a cycle of the Sun’s varying magnetic strength and thus total radiation output — Sirocko and his colleagues determined that ten of the fourteen freezes occurred during years when the Sun had minimal sunspots. Using statistical methods, the scientists calculated that there is a 99 percent chance that extremely cold Central European winters and low solar activity are inherently linked.

“We provide, for the first time, statistically robust evidence that the succession of cold winters during the last 230 years in Central Europe has a common cause,” Sirocko said.

With the new paper, Sirocko and his colleagues have added to the research linking solar variability with climate, said Thomas Crowley, Director of the Scottish Alliance for Geoscience, Environment, and Society, who was not involved with the study.

“There is some suspension of belief in this link,” Crowley said, “and this study tilts the argument more towards thinking there really is something to this link. If you have more statistical evidence to support this explanation, one is more likely to say it’s true.”

The study, conducted by researchers at Johannes Gutenberg and the Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science in Zurich, Switzerland, is set to be published August 25 in Geophysical Research Letters, a journal of the American Geophysical Union.

When sunspot numbers are down, the Sun emits less ultraviolet radiation. Less radiation means less heating of Earth’s atmosphere, which sparks a change in the circulation patterns of the two lowest atmospheric levels, the troposphere and stratosphere. Such changes lead to climatic phenomena such as the North Atlantic Oscillation, a pattern of atmospheric pressure variations that influences wind patterns in the North Atlantic and weather behavior in regions in and around Europe.

“Due to this indirect effect, the solar cycle does not impact hemispherically averaged temperatures, but only leads to regional temperature anomalies,” said Stephan Pfahl, a co-author of the study who is now at the Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science in Zurich.

The authors show that this change in atmospheric circulation leads to cooling in parts of Central Europe but warming in other European countries, such as Iceland. So, sunspots don’t necessarily cool the entire globe — their cooling effect is more localized, Sirocko said.

In fact, studies have suggested that the extremely cold European winters of 2010 and 2011 were the result of the North Atlantic Oscillation, which Sirocko and his team now link to the low solar activity during that time.

The 2010 and 2011 European winters were so cold that they resulted in record lows for the month of November in certain countries. Some who dispute the occurrence of anthropogenic climate change argue that this two-year period shows that Earth’s climate is not getting any warmer. But climate is a complex system, Sirocko said. And a short-term, localized dip in temperatures only temporarily masks the effects of a warming world.

“Climate is not ruled by one variable,” said Sirocko. “In fact, it has [at least] five or six variables. Carbon dioxide is certainly one, but solar activity is also one.”

Moreover, the researchers also point out that, despite Central Europe’s prospect to suffer colder winters every 11 years or so, the average temperature of those winters is increasing and has been for the past three decades. As one piece of evidence of that warming, the Rhine River has not frozen over since 1963. Sirocko said such warming results, in part, from climate change.

To establish a more complete record of past temperature dips, the researchers are looking to other proxies, such as the spread of disease and migratory habits.

“Disease can be transported by insects and rats, but during a strong freezing year that is not likely,” said Sirocko. “Also, Romans used the Rhine to defend against the Germanics, but as soon as the river froze people could move across it. The freezing of the Rhine is very important on historical timescales.”

It wasn’t, however, the Rhine that first got Sirocko to thinking about the connection between freezing rivers and sunspot activity. In fact, it was a 125-mile ice-skating race he attended over 20 years ago in the Netherlands that sparked the scientist’s idea.

“Skaters can only do this race every 10 or 11 years because that’s when the rivers freeze up,” Sirocko said. “I thought to myself, ‘There must be a reason for this,’ and it turns out there is.”

************************************************************************************************************

Space

Earth approaching objects (objects that are known in the next 30 days)
Object Name	Apporach Date	Left	AU Distance	LD Distance	Estimated Diameter*	Relative Velocity
(2012 FM52)	25th August 2012	0 day(s)	0.0599	23.3	510 m – 1.1 km	17.17 km/s	61812 km/h
66146 (1998 TU3)	25th August 2012	0 day(s)	0.1265	49.2	3.0 km – 6.8 km	16.03 km/s	57708 km/h
(2009 AV)	26th August 2012	1 day(s)	0.1615	62.8	670 m – 1.5 km	22.51 km/s	81036 km/h
331769 (2003 BQ35)	28th August 2012	3 day(s)	0.1585	61.7	240 m – 530 m	4.64 km/s	16704 km/h
(2010 SC)	28th August 2012	3 day(s)	0.1679	65.3	16 m – 36 m	9.56 km/s	34416 km/h
4769 Castalia	28th August 2012	3 day(s)	0.1135	44.2	1.4 km	12.06 km/s	43416 km/h
(2012 LU7)	02nd September 2012	8 day(s)	0.1200	46.7	440 m – 990 m	8.16 km/s	29376 km/h
(2012 FS35)	02nd September 2012	8 day(s)	0.1545	60.1	2.3 m – 5.2 m	2.87 km/s	10332 km/h
(2012 HG31)	03rd September 2012	9 day(s)	0.0716	27.9	440 m – 990 m	10.33 km/s	37188 km/h
(2012 PX)	04th September 2012	10 day(s)	0.0452	17.6	61 m – 140 m	9.94 km/s	35784 km/h
(2012 EH5)	05th September 2012	11 day(s)	0.1613	62.8	38 m – 84 m	9.75 km/s	35100 km/h
(2011 EO11)	05th September 2012	11 day(s)	0.1034	40.2	9.0 m – 20 m	8.81 km/s	31716 km/h
(2007 PS25)	06th September 2012	12 day(s)	0.0497	19.3	23 m – 52 m	8.50 km/s	30600 km/h
329520 (2002 SV)	08th September 2012	14 day(s)	0.1076	41.9	300 m – 670 m	9.17 km/s	33012 km/h
(2011 ES4)	10th September 2012	16 day(s)	0.1792	69.8	20 m – 44 m	12.96 km/s	46656 km/h
(2008 CO)	11th September 2012	17 day(s)	0.1847	71.9	74 m – 160 m	4.10 km/s	14760 km/h
(2007 PB8)	14th September 2012	20 day(s)	0.1682	65.5	150 m – 340 m	14.51 km/s	52236 km/h
226514 (2003 UX34)	14th September 2012	20 day(s)	0.1882	73.2	260 m – 590 m	25.74 km/s	92664 km/h
(1998 QC1)	14th September 2012	20 day(s)	0.1642	63.9	310 m – 700 m	17.11 km/s	61596 km/h
(2002 EM6)	15th September 2012	21 day(s)	0.1833	71.3	270 m – 590 m	18.56 km/s	66816 km/h
(2002 RP137)	16th September 2012	22 day(s)	0.1624	63.2	67 m – 150 m	7.31 km/s	26316 km/h
(2009 RX4)	16th September 2012	22 day(s)	0.1701	66.2	15 m – 35 m	8.35 km/s	30060 km/h
(2005 UC)	17th September 2012	23 day(s)	0.1992	77.5	280 m – 640 m	7.55 km/s	27180 km/h
(2012 FC71)	18th September 2012	24 day(s)	0.1074	41.8	24 m – 53 m	3.51 km/s	12636 km/h
(1998 FF14)	19th September 2012	25 day(s)	0.0928	36.1	210 m – 480 m	21.40 km/s	77040 km/h
331990 (2005 FD)	19th September 2012	25 day(s)	0.1914	74.5	320 m – 710 m	15.92 km/s	57312 km/h
1 AU = ~150 million kilometers,1 LD = Lunar Distance = ~384,000 kilometers Source: NASA-NEO

………………………………………..

ICELAND AURORAS:

As the midnight sun sets, aurora season has resumed around the Arctic Circle. Last night’s display was photographed by Antony Spencer from Kirkufell, Snaefellsnes, Iceland:

“The midnight sun is now long gone in Iceland,” says Spencer. “I was heading back from a sunset photo shoot when I noticed the auroras. They were bright enough to see right through the sunset colors.”

More auroras are in the offing. A stream of solar wind is heading for Earth, due to arrive on August 26-27.

STARWATER – A Look at Our Changing Planet

Published on Aug 24, 2012 by Suspicious0bservers

Was that a meteor lighting up NorCal, Reno last night?

Witnesses said it lit up the sky for four seconds

(KCRA) —Reports of a large meteor had many people buzzing Wednesday morning.

Viewers called the KCRA 3 newsroom and the sheriff’s departments in several parts of Northern California, along with Reno, to ask about a meteor that appeared about 11:15 p.m. Tuesday.

Witnesses said it lasted for about four seconds and lit up the sky.

Online meteor tracking sites and blogs report the meteor could be seen over parts of Oregon, California and Nevada.

Milky Way Now Has a Twin (or Two): Astronomers Find First Group of Galaxies Just Like Ours

ScienceDaily

Research presented Aug. 23, 2012 at the International Astronomical Union General Assembly in Beijing has found the first group of galaxies that is just like ours, a rare sight in the local Universe.

---

The Milky Way is a fairly typical galaxy on its own, but when paired with its close neighbours — the Magellanic Clouds — it is very rare, and could have been one of a kind, until a survey of our local Universe found another two examples just like us.

Astronomer Dr Aaron Robotham, jointly from the University of Western Australia node of the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR) and the University of St Andrews in Scotland, searched for groups of galaxies similar to ours in the most detailed map of the local Universe yet, the Galaxy and Mass Assembly survey (GAMA).

“We’ve never found another galaxy system like the Milky Way before, which is not surprising considering how hard they are to spot! It’s only recently become possible to do the type of analysis that lets us find similar groups,” says Dr Robotham.

“Everything had to come together at once: we needed telescopes good enough to detect not just galaxies but their faint companions, we needed to look at large sections of the sky, and most of all we needed to make sure no galaxies were missed in the survey”

Sophisticated simulations of how galaxies form don’t produce many examples similar to the Milky Way and its surrounds, predicting them to be quite a rare occurrence. Astronomers haven’t been able to tell just how rare until now, with the discovery of not just one but two exact matches amongst the hundreds of thousands of galaxies surveyed.

“We found about 3% of galaxies similar to the Milky Way have companion galaxies like the Magellanic Clouds, which is very rare indeed. In total we found 14 galaxy systems that are similar to ours, with two of those being an almost exact match,” says Dr Robotham.

The Milky Way is locked in a complex cosmic dance with its close companions the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds, which are clearly visible in the southern hemisphere night sky. Many galaxies have smaller galaxies in orbit around them, but few have two that are as large as the Magellanic Clouds.

Dr Robotham’s work also found that although companions like the Magellanic Clouds are rare, when they are found they’re usually near a galaxy very like the Milky Way, meaning we’re in just the right place at the right time to have such a great view in our night sky.

“The galaxy we live in is perfectly typical, but the nearby Magellenic Clouds are a rare, and possibly short-lived, occurrence. We should enjoy them whilst we can, they’ll only be around for a few billion more years,” adds Dr Robotham.

Dr Robotham and colleagues have been awarded further time on telescopes in New South Wales and Chile to study these Milky Way twin systems now that they’ve been found.

The Galaxy and Mass Assembly (GAMA) survey is an international collaboration led from ICRAR and the Australian Astronomical Observatory to map our local Universe in closer detail.

ICRAR is a joint venture between Curtin University and The University of Western Australia providing research excellence in the field of radio astronomy.

Earth Watch Report – Saturday August 25th, 2012

August 25, 2012 by desertrose

Climate Change

Drastic desertification: Researchers study Dead Sea climate past, finding dramatic results

Arctic cap on course for record melt: US scientists

by Shaun Tandon

 

************************************************************************************************************

Rising Seas

U.Va. institute assists Virginians with sea-level rise

Earth Watch Report – Saturday August 25th, 2012

August 25, 2012 by desertrose

Extreme Temperatures/ Weather / Drought

Today

Forest / Wild Fire

USA

State of Alaska, [Dry Creek]

Forest / Wild Fire in USA on Saturday, 25 August, 2012 at 03:54 (03:54 AM) UTC.

UN agency calls for global action plan on drought

***********************************************************************************************************

Storms 

Active tropical storm system(s)
Name of storm system	Location	Formed	Last update	Last category	Course	Wind Speed	Gust	Wave	Source	Details
Tembin (15W)	Pacific Ocean	19.08.2012	25.08.2012	Typhoon II	260 °	139 km/h	167 km/h	5.18 m	JTWC

 Tropical Storm data

Bolaven (16W)

Pacific Ocean

20.08.2012

25.08.2012

SuperTyphoon

325 °

232 km/h

278 km/h

5.49 m

JTWC

 Tropical Storm data

Isaac (AL09)

Atlantic Ocean

21.08.2012

25.08.2012

Hurricane I

310 °

111 km/h

139 km/h

4.57 m

NOAA NHC

Tropical Storm data

NASA sees an active tropical Atlantic again

by Staff Writers
Greenbelt MD (SPX)

This NOAA GOES-13 satellite image taken on Aug. 21 at 7:45 a.m. EDT shows three of the four tropical systems being watched in the Atlantic Ocean basin. From left to right are: System 95L, Tropical Depression 9 and System 96L. Post-tropical Storm Gordon is just beyond the horizon. Credit: NASA/NOAA GOES Project.

Related Links
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center
Bringing Order To A World Of Disasters
When the Earth Quakes
A world of storm and tempest

Published on Aug 16, 2012 by fidockave213

The  latter  half  of  August

Fireballs impacting the ground

Honduras Investigates Alleged Meteorite Crash

Large meteorites found after fireball lands in Manitoba, Canada

Meteorite starts fire in Itatiba, Brazil following separate Fireball incident in neighbouring Campinas days earlier

Meteorite hits moving car in Sioux City

More strange sky sounds

More strange sky sounds, Sao Paulo, Brazil

Strange Sounds Over Suffern, New York

Strange Sounds in Germany

Multiple tornadoes/waterspouts

Nine waterspouts spotted on Lake Michigan

Multiple waterspouts touch down in Black Sea, near Foros, Ukraine

Multiple waterspouts touch down off Polish coast

Unusual lightning strikes

Lightning kills two brothers in Russia's Kursk region

3 Lightning strike survivors on Mt Whitney, CA: 'We thought we were on fire'

Lightning injures 10 New Jersey soldiers at New York's Ft. Drum

Lightning-sparked huge fire burns to edge of 3 small California towns

Authorities ID Wisconsin boy killed in lightning strike

Increase in Lightning Observed Across Japan... What the Hell Is That?!

Five seriously injured in French lightning strike

Lightning Strike Kills Wisconsin Boy, 9, and Injures Seven Others on Sailboat

This in from Susan...

Entire West Coast is having major precursors Alaska down to Baja:  http://quakes.globalincidentmap.com/

On the heels of the strange report and video posted last week of an 'Alien' looking creature shot dead in South Africa  - another odd one surfaces today. 

From the Hopi Prophecy

“There will be many strange beasts upon the Earth in those days, some from the past and some that we have never seen. . The nature of mankind will appear strange in these times we walk between worlds and we will house many spirits even within our bodies  After a time we will again walk with our brothers from the Stars, and rebuild this Earth But not until the Purifier has left his mark upon the universe.:

 Giant 'Gorgakh' killed in Pakistan

 Pakistan Creature: Source)

An amazing photo was posted to YouTube on Thursday of a strange, alien-like creature, locally called a "Gorgakh", and killed by villagers in Swabi, Pakistan.

The reason for all the amazement is because the creature is so unusually large. Some speculate it is a giant version of a Pangolin, an anteater or armadillo, found on the African continent.

But those animals generally don't grow beyond three feet in length. The one in the photo is as big as a full-grown man and twice as wide.

Naturally, many people are calling it an alien. That's because it bears an uncanny resemblance to the monster in the Alien movie franchise. It's got a scaly coat, a gigantic, droopy head with a long snout and thick legs with immense claws.

Locals in Pakistan are claiming the creature is responsible for digging up and eating dead bodies and possesses supernatural abilities. Perhaps that's why they killed it.

(South African Creature: Source)

Locals came across this strange creature while they were escorting a shooting party in Namibia. Witness’s state that the creature was spotted apparently foraging for food, one of the shooting party wounded it with his rifle and it escaped into the thick brush. The locals tracked it to a nearby lair or nest where they found three more creatures of similar size. The wounded creature attacked one of the shooting party and it was shot dead, the others escaped into the brush. The body of the creature was taken back to the local camp, police later removed its corpse and a full forensics investigation is under way. A video is pending on this so I will post if and when I receive it. So what is this guys, an Alien, Goblin, maybe a new species of pigmy or something more sinister, as always you decide.

 

 

http://marketdailynews.com/2012/08/23/mystery-surrounding-1-2-billion-rounds-of-ammo-solved/

What do you think? 

Politics, Legislation and Economy News

Government Overreach  :  Corruption

‘Fast and Furious’ ATF Official Granted Paid Leave to Take 6-Figure Job at JP Morgan

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Oversigh and Government Reform Committee (AP Photo)

(CNSNews.com) – The long-awaited inspector general’s report on the Justice Department’s botched gun-running scheme is finished, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) said on Wednesday.

But along with that news comes more questions: Issa and Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) are demanding to know why a top ATF official involved in Operation Fast and Furious remains on paid leave from ATF — while simultaneously drawing a six-figure salary from J.P. Morgan, a major investment bank.

In a letter to the acting head of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, Issa and Grassley asked why the Justice Department would approve such a special arrangement for Bill McMahon.

“Under any reading of the relevant personnel regulations, it appears that ATF management was under no obligation to approve this sort of arrangement,” wrote Issa and Grassley. “Given McMahon’s outsized role in the Fast and Furious scandal, the decision to approve an extended annual leave arrangement in order to attain pension eligibility and facilitate full-time, outside employment while still collecting a full-time salary at ATF raises a host of questions about both the propriety of the arrangement and the judgment of ATF management.”

Issa and Grassley say the ATF has made it possible for McMahon to “double dip for nearly half a year by receiving two full-time paychecks — one from the taxpayer and one from the private sector.”

They  noted that the treatment of McMahon is “in sharp contrast” to how the ATF has treated whistleblowers such as Special Agent John Dodson, “who is told he must wait until the Inspector General’s report is complete before the agency will even consider his simple request for a statement retracting the false statements made about him by agency leadership.”

Issa and Grassley noted that ATF approved the arrangement for McMahom before the Justice Department inspector general finished his report on the failed gun tracking scheme.

As for the IG report examining Fast and Furious, as well as the Justice Department’s knowledge of and response to it, Issa said the report is done:

“We know that the IG report is finished, we know that it’s at Justice, and we know that we can’t see it. We’re hoping, though, that they will release it,” Issa told Fox News’s Greta Van Susteren on Wednesday.

Issa said he’s “positive” that the IG’s report “is going to say the same thing our report has said, which is — this is somebody (Bill McMahon) who is responsible for and signed documents that he told our committee he didn’t see, didn’t know about. Now, the only question is — did he not read them and sign them?”

“We’re dealing with somebody who should have been fired from ATF,” Issa added.

According to the final congressional report on Fast and Furious, William McMahon was a supervisor at ATF headquarters who served as a “crucial link” between ATF headquarters and the Phoenix Field Division.

“He received a wealth of information about Fast and Furious” — including the fact that straw purchasers had bought over 900 firearms, many of which ended up in Mexico — “but did not view it as his role as supervisor to ask questions about events in the field. He has publicly admitted to having failed in his duty to read information presented to him about the case.”

The report says McMahon rubber stamped critical documents that came across his desk without reading them.

McMahon also “gave false testimony to Congress about signing applications for wiretap intercepts in Fast and Furious,” the report says.

Operation Fast and Furious began in the fall of 2009 as part of a plan to track guns illegally purchased in the U.S. to Mexican drug cartels. The ATF lost track of most of the 2,000 weapons that were allowed to “walk” into Mexico, and two of the straw-purchased guns ended up at the scene of a U.S. border agent’s murder.

(Issa told Fox News that news of McMahon’s double-dipping will produce “more outrage for the family of fallen Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry.)

According to the final congressional report, “From the outset, the case was marred by missteps, poor judgments, and an inherently reckless strategy.”

Issa, who chairs the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, has accused Attorney General Eric Holder and other Justice Department officials of undermining his investigation into Fast and Furious.

Related articles

• REPORT: Senior ATF Agent In Charge Of Fast ‘N Furious Gun Running Program Was Also Working For JPMorgan (dailybail.com)
• ‘Fast and Furious’ ATF Official Granted Paid Leave to Take 6-Figure Job at JP Morgan (weeklyintercept.blogspot.com)
• ATF official resigns after Issa, Grassley nail him in congressional Fast and Furious report (conservativeread.com)
• GOP lawmakers rip ATF double dip (thehill.com)
• Lawmakers seek answers on official at center of ‘Fast and Furious’ (cnn.com)
• OIG Report On Fast And Furious Delivered To Holder For Review (onlygunsandmoney.blogspot.com)
• Republicans Looking Into ‘Fast and Furious’ Agent Holding Second Job (foxnewsinsider.com)
• DOJ Inspector General Report On Fast & Furious Delivered (freedomoutpost.com)
• Taxpayers Subsidize Fast & Furious Supervisor- While He Works for J.P. Morgan? (shepherdspiehole.typepad.com)
• Republican lawmakers question ATF official’s ‘double-dip’ arrangement (channel6newsonline.com)

Earth Watch Report – Friday August 24th, 2012

August 24, 2012 by desertrose

Mysterious Bubbles and  Sinkholes

Officials Find Another “Bubbles on the Bayou” Site in Louisiana Near Bayou Corne

The Assumption Parish Police Jury said it was discovered Monday between two previous sites in Grand Bayou.

A news release classified the bubbling as small and added it will be monitored daily.

A meeting is scheduled for Friday at St. Joseph the Worker Church Hall in Pierre Part at 6:30 p.m.

Tuesday is day four of drilling at the observation well near the giant South Louisiana sink hole in Assumption Parish. The company believed to be responsible for the sink hole, Texas Brine, brought members of the news media to examine what they hope will be a good piece of evidence as to what exactly happened at the sink hole 18 days ago.

The observation well is being used to show Louisiana DEQ officials exactly what happened to create the sink hole, or what they call a slurry.

Texas Brine is hooking its wagon to a 140-foot, 10-story drilling rig, and placed just 1,000 feet from the sink hole. The plan is for the well to drill to the salt dome believed to be responsible for the sink hole, and take observations of the dome. Those observations will be sent topside for analysis.

John Boudreaux is tired, he has worked 18 straight days at the staging area in Bayou Corne. Because the drilling will last at least another 40 days, he hopes things will be quiet.

“You have really two different events. You have the drilling, the observation event as they call it, but you have the sink hole and monitoring that and make sure that doesn’t expand or move any further,” said Boudreaux.

“We’ve got the casing, they are now drilling into the cap rock which covers the salt dome and I think once they get through that, things may move a little more rapidly,” said Sonny Cranch with Texas Brine.

Cap rock is being pulled out of the hold at 486 feet. It is pulverized by the drill bit before being sucked out of the ground. They are drilling 24 hours a day, seven days a week and Texas Brine is hoping they get some answers once the dome is pierced.

“All we want to know is what has happened,” said Cranch.

The drilling platform will be drilling for at least another 40 days. Texas Brine says 40 days is an optimistic goal.

Officials said the site of the slurry is still off limits and the cleanup remains halted.

The parish has requested Texas Brine provide a plan for continued cleanup.

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Biological Hazards / Wildlife / Hazmat

23.08.2012

Biological Hazard

USA

State of California, Burbank [700 block of Screenland Drive]

Biological Hazard in USA on Thursday, 23 August, 2012 at 06:35 (06:35 AM) UTC.

24.08.2012

HAZMAT

USA

State of Washington, Richland [Hanford Nuclear Reservation]

HAZMAT in USA on Wednesday, 22 August, 2012 at 03:18 (03:18 AM) UTC.

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Space

Earth approaching objects (objects that are known in the next 30 days)
Object Name	Apporach Date	Left	AU Distance	LD Distance	Estimated Diameter*	Relative Velocity
(2012 BB14)	24th August 2012	0 day(s)	0.1234	48.0	27 m – 60 m	2.58 km/s	9288 km/h
(2012 FM52)	25th August 2012	1 day(s)	0.0599	23.3	510 m – 1.1 km	17.17 km/s	61812 km/h
66146 (1998 TU3)	25th August 2012	1 day(s)	0.1265	49.2	3.0 km – 6.8 km	16.03 km/s	57708 km/h
(2009 AV)	26th August 2012	2 day(s)	0.1615	62.8	670 m – 1.5 km	22.51 km/s	81036 km/h
331769 (2003 BQ35)	28th August 2012	4 day(s)	0.1585	61.7	240 m – 530 m	4.64 km/s	16704 km/h
(2010 SC)	28th August 2012	4 day(s)	0.1679	65.3	16 m – 36 m	9.56 km/s	34416 km/h
4769 Castalia	28th August 2012	4 day(s)	0.1135	44.2	1.4 km	12.06 km/s	43416 km/h
(2012 LU7)	02nd September 2012	9 day(s)	0.1200	46.7	440 m – 990 m	8.16 km/s	29376 km/h
(2012 FS35)	02nd September 2012	9 day(s)	0.1545	60.1	2.3 m – 5.2 m	2.87 km/s	10332 km/h
(2012 HG31)	03rd September 2012	10 day(s)	0.0716	27.9	440 m – 990 m	10.33 km/s	37188 km/h
(2012 PX)	04th September 2012	11 day(s)	0.0452	17.6	61 m – 140 m	9.94 km/s	35784 km/h
(2012 EH5)	05th September 2012	12 day(s)	0.1613	62.8	38 m – 84 m	9.75 km/s	35100 km/h
(2011 EO11)	05th September 2012	12 day(s)	0.1034	40.2	9.0 m – 20 m	8.81 km/s	31716 km/h
(2007 PS25)	06th September 2012	13 day(s)	0.0497	19.3	23 m – 52 m	8.50 km/s	30600 km/h
329520 (2002 SV)	08th September 2012	15 day(s)	0.1076	41.9	300 m – 670 m	9.17 km/s	33012 km/h
(2011 ES4)	10th September 2012	17 day(s)	0.1792	69.8	20 m – 44 m	12.96 km/s	46656 km/h
(2008 CO)	11th September 2012	18 day(s)	0.1847	71.9	74 m – 160 m	4.10 km/s	14760 km/h
(2007 PB8)	14th September 2012	21 day(s)	0.1682	65.5	150 m – 340 m	14.51 km/s	52236 km/h
226514 (2003 UX34)	14th September 2012	21 day(s)	0.1882	73.2	260 m – 590 m	25.74 km/s	92664 km/h
(1998 QC1)	14th September 2012	21 day(s)	0.1642	63.9	310 m – 700 m	17.11 km/s	61596 km/h
(2002 EM6)	15th September 2012	22 day(s)	0.1833	71.3	270 m – 590 m	18.56 km/s	66816 km/h
(2002 RP137)	16th September 2012	23 day(s)	0.1624	63.2	67 m – 150 m	7.31 km/s	26316 km/h
(2009 RX4)	16th September 2012	23 day(s)	0.1701	66.2	15 m – 35 m	8.35 km/s	30060 km/h
(2005 UC)	17th September 2012	24 day(s)	0.1992	77.5	280 m – 640 m	7.55 km/s	27180 km/h
(2012 FC71)	18th September 2012	25 day(s)	0.1074	41.8	24 m – 53 m	3.51 km/s	12636 km/h
(1998 FF14)	19th September 2012	26 day(s)	0.0928	36.1	210 m – 480 m	21.40 km/s	77040 km/h
331990 (2005 FD)	19th September 2012	26 day(s)	0.1914	74.5	320 m – 710 m	15.92 km/s	57312 km/h
1 AU = ~150 million kilometers,1 LD = Lunar Distance = ~384,000 kilometers Source: NASA-NEO

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Radiation

Fukushima fish carrying 258 times the ‘safe’ level of radiation

An official from Thailand’s Food and Drug Administration takes a sample from a shipment of frozen fish imported from Japan to test for possible radiation contamination at Ladkrabang customs in Bangkok (Reuters/Sukree Sukplang)

A pair of fish captured near Japan’s crippled Fukushima nuclear plant have shown to be carrying record levels of radiation. The pair of greenlings are contaminated with 258 times the level government deems safe for consumption.

­The fish, which were captured just 12 miles from the nuclear plant, registered 25,800 becquerels of caesium per kilo, according to Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO).

TEPCO says the high levels may be due to the fish feeding in radioactive hotspots. The company plans on capturing and testing more of the fish, as well as their feed, and the seabed soil to determine the exact cause of the high radiation.

The findings were surprising for officials, who had previously seen much lower levels of radiation in contaminated fish.

Fishermen been allowed to cast their reels in the nearby waters on an experimental basis since June – but only in areas more than 31 miles from the plant.

Previously, the highest recorded radiation seen in the captured wildlife was 18,700 becquerels per kilo in cherry salmons, according to the Japanese Fisheries Agency.

The radiation was caused by a meltdown of three reactors at the Fukushima power plant after it was damaged by an earthquake and tsunami in March 2011.

The disaster was so intense that contaminated fish were caught all the way across the Pacific Ocean, on the California coast.

But it’s not only aquatic life that is suffering from side effects of the leaked radiation.

According to researchers, the radiation has caused mutations in some butterflies, giving them dented eyes, malformed legs and antennae, and stunted wings.

The results show the butterflies were deteriorating both physically and genetically.

But the harmful risks don’t stop with butterflies. The radioactivity which seeped into the region’s air and water has left humans facing potentially life threatening health issues.

Over a third of Fukushima children are at risk of developing cancer, according to the Sixth Report of Fukushima Prefecture Health Management Survey.

­The report shows that nearly 36 per cent of children in the Fukushima Prefecture have abnormal thyroid growths which pose a risk of becoming cancerous.

The World Health Organization warns that young people are particularly prone to radiation poisoning in the thyroid gland. Infants are most at risk because their cells divide at a higher rate.

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Epidemic Hazards / Diseases

Bahamas reports 5 new cases amid bacteria outbreak

West Nile Is Spreading Farther and Faster This Season, CDC Says

West Nile Virus: 47 States Exposed

Aerial mosquito spraying is underway in Dallas County and Houston to prevent the spread of West Nile virus while the disease spreads farther, faster and earlier in the season than ever before, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Only 29 cases were reported a month ago. Now, the CDC is reporting 1,118 cases spread across 47 states, with 41 deaths.

Seventy-five percent of the cases have been reported from five states: Texas, Mississippi, Louisiana, Oklahoma and Illinois. Texas appears to be the hardest hit, with 586 reported cases in total. The death toll in Texas was 21 as of Wednesday, with Dallas County hit hardest, for a total of 270 cases and 11 deaths.

No place is striking back harder against the West Nile virus than Texas, which has launched an aerial assault against mosquitoes despite objections from environmental groups. Overnight, planes carrying pesticides took to the skies dousing more than 63,000 acres of land in Dallas and Houston to battle the disease.

“These kinds of chemicals are most toxic to young children, infants and babies,” said Jennifer Sass, senior scientist at the Natural Resources Defense Council.

Watch videos here

LM Otero/AP Photo

Mosquitos are sorted at the Dallas County… View Full Size

West Nile Virus ‘Exploding’ in U.S. Watch Video

West Nile Virus Danger Watch Video

Dallas Fights West Nile Virus With Aerial Spray Watch Video

The CDC and health officials in Texas insist the worries about the spray are overblown and pale in comparison to the devastating effects of the disease. Harris County Mosquito Control Director Dr. Rudy Bueno told ABC News that the spray is “very safe and effective.”

“We normally kill 90, 95 percent of the mosquitoes that are out flying the night we put this out,” pilot Malcolm Williams said.

The CDC says this outbreak is on track to be the worst in the country’s history. The worst year on record is 2003, in which the country saw 9,862 cases of West Nile virus infection and 264 deaths.

Many experts point to last year’s mild winter for the drastic outbreak and the scorching temperatures this summer, helping the mosquitoes thrive.

Eighty percent of the people who contract the West Nile virus have no symptoms and their body eventually gets rid of it, according to the CDC. The remaining 20 percent experience flu-like symptoms.

One in 150 people will develop more severe forms of the disease and experience neurological symptoms and brain swelling, according to ABC News’ Dr. Richard Besser.

Patient Garrick Larson told ABC News affiliate WDAY in Minnesota, “I woke up with a headache like I have never come close to feeling before. The pain was immense. I knew I was in trouble.”

Larson, a cross country coach in Moorhead, Minn., was hospitalized for a week with a high fever and meningitis.

Deputy White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest briefed reporters aboard Air Force One as President Obama traveled from Las Vegas to New York Wednesday.

“The president’s been briefed on the increase in the number of West Nile virus cases,” he said. “[The] White House staff are at regular contact with the experts at the CDC, and the president will continue to receive updates as necessary.”

Researchers identify rare adult immune disease in Asia

(CNN) — Researchers at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) have identified a new disease among people in Asia that causes AIDS-like symptoms but is not associated with HIV.

The study, released in the New England Journal of Medicine Thursday, found patients with the disease were making antibodies that attacked their immune systems.

“We all make molecules and proteins in the body that tell our immune system how to function properly,” said Dr. Sarah Browne, a clinical investigator at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at NIH and the lead author on the study.

“They tell different immune cells when to turn on and when to start fighting infection,” she said. “We found a large number of the patients that we studied with serious opportunistic infections make an antibody that blocks the function of one of these molecules, which is interferon-gamma.”

Without functioning interferon-gamma, people become more susceptible to certain types of infections — infections people with working immune systems normally don’t get, she said.

The disease is being called an adult-onset immunodeficiency syndrome because it strikes adults. Cases date back to 2004, with most of them occurring in Thailand and Taiwan. The NIH has been studying the disease since 2005.

“It’s rare — more prevalent over in Southeast Asia,” Browne told CNN. “But we have been diagnosing it here in the U.S. in individuals of Asian descent.”

So far NIH has seen about 12 cases, all of them in people of Asian descent. According to Browne, most patients survive. There have been deaths in other countries, she said, but did not know how many. No one has died in the United States.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of NIAID, says it’s important to note the disease is not contagious.

“It is not a virus, that’s the first thing. It’s not a new AIDS-like virus,” Fauci said. “It’s a syndrome that was noticed and discovered in Asia where people get opportunistic infections similar to HIV/AIDS, but the cause of the syndrome is not an infection like HIV.”

Fauci said researchers “found the people have an autoimmunity, where their bodies are making antibodies against a protein that’s important in fighting infection.

“The reason the body is making that antibody is unclear but it isn’t a virus like HIV that’s causing it,” he said. ” It’s autoimmune disease, and people get secondary infections similar to AIDS.”

The study was already in the early stages in 2009, when Kim Nguyen, a 62-year-old Vietnamese woman from Tennessee, came to NIH suffering from symptoms that would be linked to the mystery disease.

A little more than 200 people — almost exclusively from Thailand and Taiwan between the ages of 18 and 78 — were studied. All were HIV-negative.

“We want to understand what triggers people to make these antibodies in the first place,” Browne said. “And we want to use that information to guide treatment — because really, when you treat the infection you’re treating the symptom. You’re not treating the underlying cause.”

Right now, doctors are simply treating the infections. For many of the patients, that’s sufficient, Browne said, but for those cases where it’s not, they are trying to find ways to target the antibodies themselves by lowering the antibody levels and trying to reverse the immunodeficiency.

Both Fauci and Browne believe a combination of both genetic and environmental factors are most likely at play, but don’t yet know what those factors are.

“Overall it appears to be a chronic disease, but we have not yet studied it for a long enough period of time to know the long-term prognosis,” Browne said. “We don’t yet know what factors may distinguish those with mild versus those with severe disease.”

19.08.2012

Epidemic Hazard

Democratic Republic of the Congo

Province of Orientale, [Haut Uele District]

Epidemic Hazard in Democratic Republic of the Congo on Friday, 17 August, 2012 at 03:03 (03:03 AM) UTC.

Back

Storms / Flooding

Active tropical storm system(s)
Name of storm system	Location	Formed	Last update	Last category	Course	Wind Speed	Gust	Wave	Source	Details
Tembin (15W)	Pacific Ocean	19.08.2012	24.08.2012	Typhoon IV	245 °	185 km/h	232 km/h	5.79 m	JTWC

 Tropical Storm data

Bolaven (16W)

Pacific Ocean

20.08.2012

24.08.2012

Typhoon IV

325 °

194 km/h

241 km/h

4.88 m

JTWC

Tropical Storm data

Isaac (AL09)

Atlantic Ocean

21.08.2012

24.08.2012

Tropical Depression

290 °

74 km/h

93 km/h

5.79 m

NOAA NHC

Tropical Storm data

Joyce (AL10)

Atlantic Ocean

22.08.2012

24.08.2012

Tropical Depression

300 °

56 km/h

74 km/h

5.18 m

NOAA NHC

Tropical Storm data

………………………..

Tropical Storm Isaac takes aim at Puerto Rico, threatens Haiti

Updated at 11:12 a.m. ET: Tropical Storm Isaac brought rain and gusty winds to Puerto Rico and the eastern Caribbean Islands and was expected to gradually strengthen as it moved west through the northeastern Caribbean on Thursday.

Forecasters said it was too soon to gauge Isaac’s potential impact on Tampa on Florida’s Gulf Coast, where the Republican National Convention is to run from Monday through Thursday.

Related: Track Tropical Storm Isaac

Some computer models showed Isaac shifting slightly to the west and eventually moving parallel to Florida’s western coastline. Others forecast the storm to make landfall in South Florida and then move inland.

Forecasters predict Isaac will become a hurricane by Friday morning, but perhaps the more ominous threat in the short term is the potential for extremely heavy rainfall over the islands near Isaac’s path, weather.com reported.

More than a foot of rainfall, and potentially as much as 20 inches in some places, was possible on the island of Hispaniola, home to Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Life-threatening flash floods and mudslides could result from that amount of rain.

Residents and visitors of the northern Caribbean, Yucatan Peninsula, southeastern United States and the central/eastern Gulf Coast should watch the progress of Isaac closely over the next week or more, weather.com reported.

Numerous watches and warnings have been issued, including a hurricane warning for Haiti and the south coast of the Dominican Republic. Puerto Rico was under a tropical storm warning, and it was expected to see its greatest impacts from Isaac on Thursday.

Get the latest on this story from weather.com

On Thursday, Isaac was passing just south of Puerto Rico. As the storm approached, Puerto Rico Governor Luis Fortuno declared a state of emergency, canceled classes, closed government agencies and activated the National Guard.

The government also froze prices on basic necessities such as food, batteries and other supplies and prepared emergency shelters at schools and other facilities.

Isaac was projected to weaken to a tropical storm over Haiti and then pass over Cuba before strengthening into a hurricane in the Florida Straits between Cuba and Florida. Its exact path after that remained uncertain.

Heavy rainfall, flooding and mudslides will be threats in all of the northern Caribbean islands regardless of how strong the system becomes, weather.com reported.

Isaac may also threaten U.S. energy interests in the Gulf of Mexico, weather experts said. It was centered about 265 miles southeast of San Juan, Puerto Rico, early on Thursday, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said. Isaac had top sustained winds of 45 miles per hour.

From weather.com: Isaac’s looming US threat

At the Guantanamo Bay U.S. Naval Base in southeast Cuba on Wednesday, authorities said Isaac forced the postponement of pretrial hearings that were to begin on Thursday for five prisoners accused of plotting the September 11 attacks.

The U.S. military was preparing flights to evacuate the base of lawyers, paralegals, interpreters, journalists, rights monitors and family members of 9/11 victims who had traveled there for the hearings.

From weather.com: Track Isaac’s path

Lixion Avila, a senior hurricane specialist at the hurricane center, suggested it would be foolish for anyone to think Tampa — where Republicans will nominate Mitt Romney as their presidential candidate — was out of harm’s way.

Hurricane expert Jeff Masters of private forecaster Weather Underground said Tampa had a 9 percent chance of getting hit with tropical storm-force winds for a 24-hour period ending on the morning the Republican convention kicks off. But that could make the storm a non-event in terms of the convention itself.

“I put the odds of an evacuation occurring during the convention in the current situation at 3 percent,” Masters said in his blog on the weatherunderground.com website.

Tropical Storm Isaac churns over Caribbean, could threaten GOP convention

Orange juice prices rise
Florida has not been hit by a major hurricane since 2005 and forecasts showed Isaac was not expected to strengthen beyond a weak Category 1, with top sustained wind speeds of about 80 mph.

The threat to Florida triggered a nearly 6 percent jump in orange juice prices on Wednesday as they surged to a six-week high in trading in New York.

Florida produces more than 75 percent of the U.S. orange crop and accounts for about 40 percent of the world’s orange juice supply.

Lurking behind Isaac, the hurricane center said another tropical depression grew into Tropical Storm Joyce on Thursday.

Located about 1,045 miles west of the Cape Verde Islands, it was packing winds of 40 mph and was moving northwest at 17 mph.

Forecasts predicted it will eventually veer toward the open Atlantic and away from the Caribbean. No coastal watches or warnings were in effect for Joyce.

Reuters and weather.com contributed to this report.

2pm Update: Isaac not strengthening … yet

Tropical Storm Isaac has strengthened slightly, data from the hurricane hunters show, but the storm remains disorganized and difficult to forecast. If you have to make decisions based upon what Isaac will do, I highly recommend that you wait until at least Friday morning to make a decision, if at all possible, as the forecasts then should be of significantly higher accuracy. Isaac continues to have a large area of light winds about 50 miles across near its center. This makes the storm subject to reformations of the center closer to areas of heavy thunderstorms that form, resulting in semi-random course changes. Until Isaac consolidates, the lack of a well-defined center will make forecasts of the storm’s behavior less accurate than usual. An Air Force Reserve hurricane hunter aircraft is in Isaac this afternoon, and has found that surface tropical storm-force winds on the east side of the storm, south of Puerto Rico, have undergone a modest expansion. These winds were mostly in the 40 mph range, with a few areas of 45 mph winds. The surface pressure remained fairly high, at 1004 mb. Infrared and visible satellite loops show that Isaac has fairly symmetric circular cloud pattern, with developing spiral bands that are contracting towards the center, which suggests intensification. However, the storm has a very clumpy appearance, and is a long way from being a hurricane. Given the storm’s continued reluctance to organize, Isaac is unlikely to reach hurricane strength before encountering Haiti and Cuba. An analysis of upper level winds from the University of Wisconsin CIMSS shows an upper-level outflow channel well-established to the north, and an intermittent outflow channel to the south. Radar imagery from Puerto Rico shows some weak low-level spiral bands that haven’t changed much in intensity or organization this afternoon. NOAA buoy 42060 reported 1-minute mean winds of 35 mph and a wind gust of 40 early this afternoon. At St. Thomas in the Virgin Islands, wind gusts up to 45 mph were observed early this afternoon. Isaac’s rains caused major flooding last night in Trinidad and Tobago, the southernmost islands of the Lesser Antilles chain, according to the Trinidad Express. Isaac’s rains have not been heavy enough today to cause flooding problems on other islands.

Figure 1. True-color MODIS image of Isaac taken at 1:40 pm EDT August 23, 2012. Image credit: NASA.

Latest model runs for Isaac
The latest set of 12Z (8 am EDT) model runs have shifted to the west compared to the previous set of runs. The models continue to show a west-northwestward track to a point on the south coast of Hispaniola, then across eastern Cuba and into the Florida Straits between Florida and Cuba. A trough of low pressure is then expected to pull Isaac to the northwest and then north, towards the Florida Panhandle. The big news in this model cycle is that both of our top models–the GFS and ECMWF–predict that 5 – 6 days from now, the trough of low pressure pulling Isaac to the north may not be strong enough to finish the job. These models predict that the trough will lift out and a ridge of high pressure will build in, forcing Isaac more to the west. The GFS predicts this will occur after Isaac makes landfall in the Florida Panhandle, resulting in Isaac moving slowly to the west over land, from Georgia to Alabama. The ECMWF predicts the westward motion will happen while Isaac is in the northern Gulf of Mexico, resulting in an eventual landfall near the Louisiana/Texas border on Thursday. There are some huge issues to resolve to make an accurate long-range track forecast for Isaac. Where will its center consolidate? How will the interaction with the mountains of Hispaniola and Cuba will affect it? Where will Isaac pop off the coast of Cuba? Hopefully, the data being collected by the NOAA jet this afternoon will give us a more unified set of model forecasts early Friday morning. For now, pay attention to the cone of uncertainty. If you’re in the cone, you might get hit.

By Wang Qian  (China Daily)

A worker tapes the window of a convenience store in Hualien, Taiwan province, on Wednesday, in preparation for typhoon Tembin. (Photo/China Daily)

Two powerful typhoons are heading toward China, putting the weather-beaten nation on alert again after four storms have caused landfalls across the country since the start of August.

“Typhoons Tembin and Bolaven may have a combined impact on coastal areas in the coming 10 days,” Zhang Chang’an, chief forecaster at the China Meteorological Administration, said on Wednesday.

Both storms are strengthening, with Bolaven expected to be the strongest typhoon to hit China this year if it lands in the country, Zhang said, adding that the storm will bring maximum winds of 220 km/h.

The National Commission on Disaster Reduction issued a typhoon alert on Wednesday, warning authorities to make emergency plans.

Tembin was about 2,000 km from the coast of Zhejiang province on Wednesday, moving at a speed of 5 km/h.

The administration has asked authorities in potential affected areas to set up warning signs in high-risk areas such as construction sites and low-lying areas, and open emergency shelters including schools and stadiums for evacuation of affected people.

The Fujian Meteorological Bureau urged boats to take shelter in ports by Wednesday to avoid possible damage brought by Tembin.

Oregon Coast residents stash tsunami survival kits on high ground

Cannon Beach City Councilor Sam Steidel displays the three containers residents can choose from to store their emergency supplies on Aug. 10, 2012 in Cannon Beach, Ore. By Oct. 18, when a statewide earthquake drill called the “Great Oregon Shakeout” is planned, city officials expect to complete the placement of at least one shipping container on Elk Creek Road, east of U.S. Highway 101. (AP Photo/The Daily Astorian, Nancy McCarthy)

 

CANNON BEACH, Ore. (AP) — What does one stash for a tsunami? Residents of Cannon Beach are thinking about that.

They’re planning to store drums full of survival gear far enough inland and high enough to be safe if the big one hits the Oregon coast and sends a tsunami wave ashore.

The Daily Astorian reports the city is offering residents space in a shipping container and various sizes of drums, barrels and buckets that can be stored inside.

Cannon Beach held a workshop on how to pack for the days after the big one, the equivalent of last year’s Japanese earthquake that could send a deadly tsunami across West Coast beaches and flood coastal towns.

Essential items would include a shelter, such as a tent or tarp; sleeping bags or blankets; food with a long shelf life, such as ready-to-eat meals or canned goods, and a can opener; a basic first-aid kit, either pre-assembled or one containing personal medical items; a survival knife; axe or hatchet; garden trowel or folding shovel; flashlights with extra batteries; matches or lighter with a fire starter; water purification; and bottles or canteens for water storage.

“We’re encouraging people not to turn this into a big to-do,” said City Council member Sam Steidel. “Most things they will need they can find at rummage sales, or they could be surplus stuff they find around the house that they’re not using all the time.”

“I have packed my barrel with enough things for a two-person camp,” said Steidel, who participates in Civil War re-enactments. “The things are pretty much up-to-date items that are in the re-enactment trailer. A simple pot or Dutch oven is all you really need to cook with. Just about everyone has an old cast iron fry pan.”

Cannon Beach is a popular tourist destination on the north Oregon coast, at the other end of a highway from Portland. It’s also known for thinking hard and creatively about tsunamis — something critics say has been lacking along the West Coast.

A few years ago, Cannon Beach looked at the idea of rebuilding City Hall on stilts to provide refuge for people fleeing a tsunami. Computer modeling showed that the location wasn’t the best, and a study of alternative ideas continues.

Recently, state and federal officials said they plan to use Cannon Beach in a pilot study of how landscape and a town’s demographics affect how long it takes for people to flee a tsunami.

For the storage exercise, the city is preparing a 2,000-square-foot pad for at least one, and perhaps two shipping containers, each 20 feet long, 8 feet wide and 8 feet high. The pad is inland, east of the coastal highway, and planned for an elevation above the expected inundation level.

Each shipping container could hold at least 50 of the largest containers offered, those of 55-gallon capacity, Steidel said.

There also are 30-gallon plastic barrels and five-gallon buckets.

In October, the shipping container is to be opened for families to store their emergency stashes. Unless there’s a disaster, the container wouldn’t be reopened until spring, when the caches could be restocked.

Earlier this year, 53 people at a forum signed up for the small containers, and orders are being accepted for more. City officials said some families are buying more than one.

In addition to a purchase fee, the city is charging an annual maintenance fee based on capacity. A 55-gallon plastic barrel costs $57.90, and the annual fee is $55.

___

Information from: The Daily Astorian, http://www.dailyastorian.com

Photos »

• Packing for the Tsunami
• Packing for the Tsunami

Related Content

• Weekly strolls aim to ease tsunami’s toll on Oregon Coast town
• Who lives and who dies in an Oregon tsunami?
• NW coastal towns rethink tsunami evacuation plans

Fresh flood kills four in southern Russia

by Staff Writers
Moscow (AFP)

Russian authorities said Wednesday that a flash flood had killed four people in the southern Krasnodar region where 172 people drowned in rising waters last month, many trapped in their homes.

“Four people have died,” a spokeswoman for the regional emergency situations ministry told AFP.

“Three people are listed as missing,” the Krasnodar regional government said in a statement.

Heavy rain battered the coastal Tuapse area overnight causing many rivers to overflow and flood the houses and apartments of around 1,837 people, the regional authorities said.

In July, 172 people were found dead after severe flooding in the Krymsk area not far from Tuapse. Around 35,000 people lost some or all of their possessions.

The local authorities faced widespread censure for their failure to warn people in time of the need to evacuate. Three officials have been arrested and accused of negligence leading to the deaths.

On Wednesday the regional government stressed that this time the warning system had functioned “in time” so that the public was not caught unaware by the flooding.

“There will not be a second Krymsk,” the regional government promised, saying that residents had been warned this time with an onscreen message on local television and officials driving the streets with loudspeakers.

Related Links
Bringing Order To A World Of Disasters
When the Earth Quakes
A world of storm and tempest

23.08.2012

Flash Flood

Pakistan

MultiStates, [States of Punjab and North West Frontier ]

Flash Flood in Pakistan on Thursday, 23 August, 2012 at 04:53 (04:53 AM) UTC.

Description

Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa are facing the threat of floods because of heavy rains which various districts of the two provinces are likely to receive over the next two days. The late spell of monsoon has already claimed 11 lives in parts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Bajaur Agency while eight people have died in Azad Kashmir. Officials said that torrential rains triggered flash floods in hill torrents in Nowshera, Mansehra and Bajaur Agency. The provincial disaster management authority said that floods had killed three people in Nowshera and six in Mansehra districts. A landslide blocked a portion of the main highway near Garhi Habibullah, Mansehra district. In Rawalpindi’s Kotli Sattiyan area, Ahmed Nawaz, a retired army man, lost three children-a son and two daughters- when a wall of their room collapsed after heavy rain. The three children were asleep when the wall collapsed on them, killing them on the spot. National Disaster Management Authority chairman Dr Zafar Iqbal Qadir told Dawn on Wednesday that catchment areas of Chenab and Ravi rivers’ distributaries were expected to receive heavy rains over the next two days. This may cause floods in Lahore, Faisalabad and Gujranwala divisions. He said the District Management Authority had been placed on alert.Areas around Jhelum river are also likely to receive rains which will raise the level of Mangla dam and will be of benefit to agriculture. He said the level at Mangla had risen by five feet over the past three days to reach 1,173 feet and was expected to go up by another 10-15 feet during the upcoming spell – sufficient for the irrigation requirements. He said there were fears of flash flood in urban areas of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, particularly in Nowshera, Peshawar, Mardan, Swat and Buner. He said the PDMA was fully operational in the province and working round the clock to cope with any situation and minimise losses. In reply to a question, he said the threat of drought was not yet fully over, but it had substantially fallen. He said Makran, Kharan, Chaghai and Washuk areas in Balochistan were not receiving rains and might face drought if the dry weather persisted. “There is no possibility of massive flooding and the heavy downpour is likely to cause medium-level floods.” The country saw worst flooding of its history in 2010. It affected one-fifth of the population and rendered several hundred thousand people homeless right from Himalayas in the north to the deserts of Sindh in the south. The following year, comparatively low-intensity floods hit the country again, especially parts of lower Sindh. This year the monsoon spell in the middle of July and August was predicted to cause disaster with a forecast of 15 per cent more than the usual rains, but the situation suddenly changed and the threat of flood turned into one of drought. The situation has once again changed and now moderate floods are likely in at least two provinces.According to the Flood Forecasting Division (FFD), heavy rains triggered a low flood in the Ravi river at Shahdara on Wednesday. The Ravi, Jhelum and Chenab rivers were expected to attain medium to high flood by Friday. The three rivers swelled because of rains in their catchment areas during Eid holidays. The FFD centre in Lahore forecast fairly widespread thunderstorm/rain, with isolated heavy to very heavy falls (extremely heavy at one or two places) over Azad Kashmir, northern and north-eastern Punjab (mostly areas falling within Lahore, Gujranwala and Rawalpindi divisions) for Thursday. Azad Kashmir covers the upper and low catchments of the Jhelum river while northern and north-eastern Punjab constitutes the lower catchments of the Chenab and Ravi. The rain forecast means the water level will shoot up by Friday. Riaz Khan, the FFD chief, however said the situation was not alarming. Rain in the Jhelum catchments would help fill Mangla Dam. The Chenab and Ravi were approaching flood level because of rain in their lower catchments in Pakistan while rain in their upper catchments in India was being stored in dams. “Hence there is no threat of devastating floods.” The FFD reported that a peak of 40,000 cusecs was passing the Ravi at Shahdara on Wednesday evening and the level was rising. The river was in low flood and was expected to attain medium flood level on Thursday. The FFD expected medium to high flood in Jhelum river at Mangla and in Chenab at Marala and Khanki on Thursday or Friday. Heavy rains flooded the Dek and Basantar nullahs in Sialkot region, submerging hundreds of acres of agricultural land. Traffic also remained suspended on Narowal-Pasrur road because of the flooding. The FFD expected more flooding of almost all nullahs in the region over 24 hours. The Met office reported that Kakul had received 84mm of rain, Murree 77mm, Jhelum 76mm, Sialkot airport 74mm, Mandi Bahauddin 60mm, Mangla 39mm, Kotli 37mm, Sialkot Cantt 32mm, Cherat 29mm, Saidu Sharif 21mm, Islamabad 14mm, Rawlakot 12mm, Muzaffarabad 10mm, Gujranwala 8mm, and Balakot 4mm. It also forecast scattered thunderstorm/rain with isolated heavy showers over Khyber Pakhtunkhwa as well as Sahiwal, Faisalabad and Sargodha divisions of Punjab for Thursday. Azad Kashmir Prime Minister Chaudhry Abdul Majeed on Wednesday appealed to the federal government to help his administration in rehabilitation of rain victims. A spell of relentless rain since Sunday has displaced thousands of people in the region, besides leaving eight dead. In Muzaffarabad, the capital, one person was killed and landslides threatened over 100 families living on the outskirts of the city. Within the city area, many areas were virtually buried under a huge rock that the gushing rainwater had brought with it. Four people were killed in Bagh district on Eid day and two children died in Mirpur on Wednesday in incidents of house collapse and drowning. Officials said almost all inter-city roads had been cleared for traffic.

Today

Flash Flood

USA

State of Nevada, [Henderson and Las Vegas region]

Flash Flood in USA on Friday, 24 August, 2012 at 03:33 (03:33 AM) UTC.

Description

A teenager was missing Thursday after heavy rain in southern Nevada brought flash flooding to both Las Vegas and Henderson. The 17-year-old disappeared late Wednesday morning in Henderson. He was swept into flood waters in Pittman Wash. Firefighters say the teen was with friends who witnessed his disappearance. Bud Cranor, a spokesman for the city, said a search for him turned up nothing. “I noticed a man go right through, right in the middle of it,” Mike Harms said. “I got in the car and rode down. I saw him one more time, he was waving his arms and yelling for help, but it was hopeless because he was going so fast, he was gone.” While the water had receded in most areas, it left debris behind. The Desert Rose Golf Course in Las Vegas was covered with trash, including a shopping cart and bottles. For some daredevils, the flood was a chance to show off, authorities said. A Metro Las Vegas helicopter pilot, sent to check out a report of teens riding an air mattress down a flooded wash, saw them leave the water without injury

Earthquakes

RSOE  EDIS

Date/Time (UTC)	Magnitude	Area	Country	State/Prov./Gov.	Location	Risk			Source	Details
24.08.2012 05:56:57	2.3	North America	United States	Alaska	Petersville				USGS-RSOE
24.08.2012 05:50:58	2.4	North America	United States	Hawaii	Fern Forest				USGS-RSOE
24.08.2012 05:55:45	2.6	Europe	Greece	Peloponnese	Methoni				EMSC
24.08.2012 05:56:05	4.1	Europe	Greece	Peloponnese	Methoni				EMSC
24.08.2012 04:20:30	2.6	North America	United States	Alaska	Anchor Point				USGS-RSOE
24.08.2012 04:50:20	2.3	Europe	Czech Republic		Horni Sucha				EMSC
24.08.2012 03:05:36	2.5	North America	United States	California	Mammoth Lakes				USGS-RSOE
24.08.2012 03:50:19	2.5	Europe	Greece	West Greece	Kaminia				EMSC
24.08.2012 02:20:24	2.3	North America	United States	California	Redwood Valley				USGS-RSOE
24.08.2012 02:10:28	2.4	North America	United States	California	Pearsonville				USGS-RSOE
24.08.2012 01:10:27	2.0	North America	United States	Alaska	Lake Minchumina				USGS-RSOE
24.08.2012 00:40:24	3.1	Europe	Greece	West Greece	Andritsaina				EMSC
24.08.2012 02:45:31	2.1	Asia	Turkey	Van	Yuvacik				EMSC
24.08.2012 02:45:53	2.1	Asia	Turkey	Van	Yuvacik				EMSC
24.08.2012 00:25:30	2.1	North America	Canada	British Columbia	Princeton				USGS-RSOE
24.08.2012 01:45:44	2.1	Europe	Greece	North Aegean	Agios Dimitrios				EMSC
24.08.2012 03:25:26	3.3	North America	United States	Alaska	False Pass				USGS-RSOE
23.08.2012 22:40:22	2.1	Europe	Italy	Sicily	Panarea				EMSC
23.08.2012 23:40:26	2.2	Europe	Czech Republic		Albrechtice				EMSC
23.08.2012 22:40:50	2.6	Europe	Italy	Veneto	Galzignano				EMSC
23.08.2012 22:41:12	2.0	Asia	Turkey	Edirne	Enez				EMSC
23.08.2012 21:40:25	3.0	South-America	Chile	Maule	Molina				EMSC
23.08.2012 21:40:47	2.4	Europe	Italy	Emilia-Romagna	San Prospero				EMSC
23.08.2012 22:41:56	4.2	Indonesian Archipelago	Indonesia	Maluku Utara	Tobelo				EMSC
23.08.2012 20:56:11	2.6	Middle America	Mexico	Baja California	Progreso				USGS-RSOE
23.08.2012 20:40:21	3.3	Europe	Romania		Racovita				EMSC
23.08.2012 20:40:43	2.4	Europe	Italy	Calabria	Salerni				EMSC
23.08.2012 19:30:32	2.8	North America	United States	Alaska	Aleneva				USGS-RSOE
23.08.2012 19:30:56	2.6	North America	United States	Alaska	Mentasta Lake				USGS-RSOE
23.08.2012 19:35:24	4.6	Indonesian Archipelago	Indonesia		Komodo				EMSC
23.08.2012 19:35:48	2.1		Montenegro		Trsa				EMSC
23.08.2012 19:01:24	5.0	North Pole	Nepal		Tulsipur				USGS-RSOE
23.08.2012 19:36:08	5.1	Asia	Nepal		Tulsipur				EMSC
23.08.2012 17:35:30	3.4	North America	United States	Alaska	Aleneva				USGS-RSOE
23.08.2012 18:30:47	2.4	Europe	Italy	Emilia-Romagna	Solignano Nuovo				EMSC
23.08.2012 17:20:28	2.1	North America	United States	Hawaii	Waimea				USGS-RSOE
23.08.2012 17:25:26	2.0	Asia	Turkey	Mu?la	Yatagan				EMSC
23.08.2012 18:31:28	3.7	Europe	Russia	Sakhalin	Vostok				EMSC
23.08.2012 17:25:48	3.8	Asia	Kazakhstan	Zhambyl	Khantau				EMSC
23.08.2012 16:15:33	2.4	North America	United States	Alaska	Ugashik				USGS-RSOE
23.08.2012 16:16:01	2.1	North America	United States	California	Cobb				USGS-RSOE
23.08.2012 16:25:21	3.2	Europe	Greece	Crete	Platanos				EMSC
23.08.2012 15:10:39	2.1	North America	United States	Alaska	Ninilchik				USGS-RSOE
23.08.2012 13:10:35	2.2	North America	United States	California	Indio Hills				USGS-RSOE
23.08.2012 13:25:51	4.4	Asia	Russia		Shikotan				USGS-RSOE
23.08.2012 14:20:19	4.8	Europe	Russia		Shikotan				EMSC
23.08.2012 13:45:38	4.7	Pacific Ocean	Fiji	Northern	Lambasa				USGS-RSOE
23.08.2012 14:20:47	4.6	Pacific Ocean – East	Fiji	Northern	Lambasa				EMSC
23.08.2012 19:36:43	2.3	North America	United States	California	Furnace Creek				USGS-RSOE
23.08.2012 12:10:34	2.3	North America	United States	California	Furnace Creek				USGS-RSOE

……………………………..

East Coast earthquake created a ‘new normal’

BEN NUCKOLS, Associated Press, STEVE SZKOTAK, Associated Press

• 
  FILE – In this Aug. 23, 2011, file photo, a U.S. Park Service helicopter flies between the Washington Monument and the Capitol on the National Mall in Washington, following an earthquake in the Washington area. The unexpected jolt cracked the Washington Monument in spots and toppled delicate masonry high atop the National Cathedral. The shaking was felt far along the densely populated Eastern seaboard from Georgia to New England. While West Coast earthquake veterans scoffed at what they viewed as only a moderate temblor, last year’s quake has forever changed the way officials along the East Coast view emergency preparedness. Photo: AP / AP

Earth Watch Report – Friday August 24th, 2012

by desertrose

Extreme Temperatures/ Weather

Climate vs. weather: Extreme events narrow the doubts

An aerial view of New Yorkers taking in the sun on a beach at Coney Island on August 4, 2012 in the Brooklyn borough of New York City. (Mario Tama/Getty Images/AFP)

PARIS: Heat waves, drought and floods that have struck the northern hemisphere for the third summer running are narrowing doubts that man-made warming is disrupting Earth’s climate system, say some scientists.

Climate experts as a group are reluctant to ascribe a single extreme event or season to global warming.

Weather, they argue, has to be assessed over far longer periods to confirm a shift in the climate and whether natural factors or fossil-fuel emissions are the cause.

But for some, such caution is easing.

A lengthening string of brutal weather events is going hand in hand with record-breaking rises in temperatures and greenhouse-gas levels, an association so stark that it can no longer be dismissed as statistical coincidence, they say.

“We prefer to look at average annual temperatures on a global scale, rather than extreme temperatures,” said Jean Jouzel, vice chairman of the U.N.’s Nobel-winning scientists, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Even so, according to computer models, “over the medium and long term, one of the clearest signs of climate change is a rise in the frequency of heat waves”, he said.

“Over the last 50 years, we have seen that as warming progresses, heat waves are becoming more and more frequent,” Jouzel said.

“If we don’t do anything, the risk of a heat wave occurring will be 10 times higher by 2100 compared with the start of the century.”

The past three months have seen some extraordinary weather in the United States, Europe and East and Southeast Asia.

The worst drought in more than 50 years hit the U.S. Midwest breadbasket while forest fires stoked by fierce heat and dry undergrowth erupted in California, France, Greece, Italy, Croatia and Spain.

Heavy rains flooded Manila and Beijing and China’s eastern coast was hit by three typhoons in a week.

Last month was the warmest ever recorded for land in the northern hemisphere and a record high for the contiguous United States, according to the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Globally, the temperature in July was the fourth highest since records began in 1880, it said.

James Hansen, arguably the world’s most famous climate scientist (and a bogeyman to climate skeptics), contends the link between extreme heat events and global warming is now all but irrefutable.

The evidence, he says, comes not from computer simulations but from weather observations themselves.

In a study published this month in the peer-reviewed U.S. journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Hansen and colleagues compared temperatures over the past three decades to a baseline of 1951-80, a period of relative stability.

Over the last 30 years, there was 0.5-0.6 C (0.9-1.0 F) of warming, a rise that seems small but “is already having important effects”, said Hansen, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies.

During the baseline period, cold summers occurred about a third of the time, but this fell to about 10 percent in the 30-year period that followed.

Hot summers, which during the baseline period occurred 33 percent of the time, rose to about 75 percent in the three decades that followed.

Even more remarkable, though, was the geographical expansion of heat waves. During the baseline period, an unusually hot summer would yield a heat wave that would cover just a few tenths of 1 percent of the world’s land area.

Today, though, an above average summer causes heat waves that in total affect about 10 percent of the land surface.

“The extreme summer climate anomalies in Texas in 2011, in Moscow in 2010 and in France in 2003 almost certainly would not have occurred in the absence of global warming with its resulting shift of the anomaly situation,” says the paper.

In March, an IPCC special report said there was mounting evidence of a shift in patterns of extreme events in some regions, including more intense and longer droughts and rainfall.

But it saw no increases in the frequency, length or severity of tropical storms.

Costs of big wildfire season hurting some states

Budgets leave governments in tough spot to get people, planes, bulldozers to beat back flames

Jeff Barnard  /  AP

A damaged truck sits among other remains on Wednesday at a rural house site outside Manton, Calif., where a huge wildfire burned through on Saturday, forcing residents to evacuate.

By Jeff Barnard and Nicholas K. Geranios

MANTON, Calif. — Twisted sheets of metal, the hulks of pickup trucks and brick walls were all that was left of homes once sheltered by green pine and cedar trees.

In a rural Northern California subdivision that was the latest to feel the wrath of massive western wildfires, long pine needles bent back on themselves, unburned but dried to a brittle dusty gray by the intensive heat of the Ponderosa fire.

Thousands of residents of tiny rural communities just outside Lassen Volcanic National Park who had been forced to flee soon after the fire was ignited by lighting on Saturday were allowed to return home on Wednesday. But hundreds of other homes were threatened as the fire burned a new front on the southern flank.

The blaze has grown to 44 square miles in the hills about 30 miles east of Redding.

Bob Folsom, who works at a nearby hydroelectric facility, tended the gasoline generator that is keeping his refrigerator running while utility crews worked to replace power lines destroyed by the blaze when it roared through the area last weekend.

“I was ready for this day,” he said. “I try to be self-sufficient.”

Folsom and his son never left their home as the fire burned within a half mile of them last weekend, close enough that they heard trees exploding and the flames roaring like a freight train. Over the past 10 years, they had thinned hundreds of trees, dug a pond to store water, and installed hydrants to fill fire hoses.

“When it comes through, it’s gonna come fast,” he said. “You don’t have time to cut down trees.”

Fires across the West have left some states with thin budgets to scramble to get people, planes, bulldozers and other tools on fire lines to beat back the flames.

And that’s with about a third of the annual wildfire season remaining.

Video: Ponderosa blaze prompts state of emergency (on this page)According to the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise, Idaho, the nation as of Wednesday had seen 42,927 wildfires this year, which burned just over 7 million acres.

While the number of fires is down from the 10-year average of 54,209 as of Aug. 22, the acreage was well above the average of 5.4 million acres, said Don Smurthwaite, a NIFC spokesman.

“The fires are bigger,” he said.

In Colorado Springs, Colo., this summer, about 350 homes were burned in the most destructive wildfire in state history. Another fire in northern Colorado just before it scorched 257 homes.

The costs have mounted, not just in the damage to houses and other buildings.

In Utah, for example, officials have spent $50 million as of mid-August to fight more than 1,000 wildfires, far surpassing the $3 million a year the Legislature budgeted for fighting wildfires.

The state’s share is estimated at $16 million, said Roger Lewis of the Utah Division of Forestry, Fire and State Lands. He said lawmakers will need to figure out how to come up with $13 million.

That’s the largest-ever supplemental appropriation request needed for firefighting in the state, agency spokesman Jason Curry said. He said, “It’s obviously been a big year.”

Washington state fire officials project that they will spend about $19.8 million on emergency fire suppression activities in the current fiscal year that ends next June.

That is expected to far surpass the $11.2 million the agency was allotted for such work, meaning the Department of Natural Resources will have to ask the Legislature for supplemental funds.

Not all Western states are seeing their budgets busted because of fires.

In Oregon, the state estimated it had spent $3.4 million through last Saturday to fight wildfires, with more than two months of the season left. Last year, it spent $6.6 million.

In Montana, forest managers told Gov. Brian Schweitzer that long-term forecasts call for fire conditions through the end of September, which is longer than normal.

The Northern Rockies Coordination Center put the total cost of fighting large wildfires in Montana, including costs to federal and state agencies, at $64 million so far this season. The state’s share is about $25 million to fight fires that have burned about 1,100 square miles.

Schweitzer said the state has already burned through cash reserves set aside for such natural disasters, but that plenty of money is available from surplus general funds.

While parts of the Southwest, particularly Southern California, still have three months of fire season left, Smurthwaite said, shorter days, declining temperatures and higher humidity will help curtail fires.

“That’s almost like putting a little wet blanket over a fire,” he said.

Firefighters in Northern California on Thursday made progress in containing a huge wildfire that has burned 80 homes and other buildings and is threatening 900 more. It was 57 percent contained on Thursday.

Fire crews assessing the rural area determined Thursday that 84 buildings had been destroyed since it was sparked by lightning Saturday. It was unclear when the structures burned and how many were homes.

More than 2,500 firefighters were battling the fire near several remote towns about 170 miles north of Sacramento.

Elsewhere in California, a large wildfire in Plumas National Forest continued to expand, helped by gusty winds.

In Washington state, fire crews still hoped to fully contain a week-old wildfire that has destroyed 51 homes and 26 outbuildings and damaged at least six other homes, authorities said.

The fire, about 75 miles east of Seattle, has caused an estimated $8.3 million in property damage.

In south-central Idaho, authorities have spent more than $23 million fighting a fire near the towns of Pine and Featherville and another in a forest near the resort town of Stanley.

Those wildfires have each consumed about 150 square miles, and will not be extinguished for some time, Smurthwaite said.

“We expect to be managing them for weeks to come,” he said.

Associated Press writers Haven Daley in Manton Calif., Jonathan Cooper in Salem, Ore., Brian Skoloff in Salt Lake City, Terry Collins, John S. Marshall and Terence Chea in San Francisco, Shannon Dininny in Yakima, Wash., Mike Baker in Olympia, Wash., and Jessie Bonner in Boise, Idaho, contributed to this report.

23.08.2012

Forest / Wild Fire

USA

State of California, [Plumas National Forest]

Forest / Wild Fire in USA on Wednesday, 01 August, 2012 at 02:59 (02:59 AM) UTC.

Back

23.08.2012

Forest / Wild Fire

USA

State of Washington, [Ahtanum Forest, Yakima County]

Forest / Wild Fire in USA on Thursday, 23 August, 2012 at 09:54 (09:54 AM) UTC.

Crossroads News : Changes In The World Around Us And Our Place In It

Community  :  IT / Emergency Networks

Home Wi-Fi routers could operate as emergency network, say scientists

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• Wi-Fi Routers Could Become Emergency Backup Networks in a Pinch (news.softpedia.com)
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• Home wifi can become emergency responders (abc.net.au)
• “Knitted” Wi-Fi Routers Create Failover Network For First Responders (science.slashdot.org)
• Town in Israel Puts Wi-Fi Routers On Its Donkeys (tomshardware.com)
• Proposed emergency communications system borrows neighborhood Wi-Fi connections (theverge.com)

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2192471/Theres-clouds-dull-grey-white-fluffy-These-incredible-pictures-variety-sky.html

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-205_162-57499034/2011-virginia-earthquake-felt-by-third-of-u.s/

http://andromedacouncil.com/TheHardRealityAndDifficultTruth.html