Week of 6/31/13 through 7/6/13

July 6, 2013 – HAWAII – Very weak unrest in the form of inflation and seismic activity continues at the largest active volcano of our earth, which has not erupted since 1984. However, this activity is not strong enough to justify a raise of the alert level from green “normal” to yellow “unrest.” There is currently no sign that Mauna Loa will erupt any time soon. HVO reports in its monthly update: “Minor inflation of a shallow magma reservoir beneath Mauna Loa may be occurring. Seismicity rates were slightly elevated.

July 6, 2013 – INDONESIA – A strong 6.4-magnitude quake struck off the Indonesian island of Sumatra on Saturday, the US Geological Survey said, but no tsunami warning was issued.

July 6, 2013 – NEPAL - Landslides and floods triggered by several weeks of monsoon rains have killed at least 50 people in mainly remote parts of Nepal, a government official said Thursday. “So far, 50 people from across the country have been killed by landslides and floods,” said Lakshmi Prasad Dhakal, chief of National Emergency Operation Centre, which monitors natural disasters in Nepal.

July 5, 2013 – SOLOMON ISLANDS – A strong 6.1-magnitude earthquake struck off the Solomon Islands on Friday, the US Geological Survey (USGS) said, but there was no immediate tsunami warning issued. The tremor, at a depth of 72 kilometers (45 miles), hit at 4.16am local time (17:16 GMT Thursday) 81km south of the town of Panguna in Papua New Guinea.

July 5, 2013 – CANADA - Half a million Hydro-Québec customers were without power at rush hour for the second straight day, as widespread outages caused by forest fires in northern Quebec affected transmission lines.

July 5, 2013 – MEXICO – Four U.S. airlines temporarily suspended flights to and from Mexico City on Thursday after a volcano 50 miles from the capital spewed ash, a spokesman for the city’s international airport said. Three to eight flights on American Airlines, U.S. Airways, Delta Air Lines and Alaska Air Group have been postponed so far, Richard Jimenez, a representative for Mexico City’s international airport told Reuters.

July 5, 2013
Valley Fever might be enough to scare you off moving to California. Officially called coccidioidomycosis, or cocci for short, it's wreaking all sorts of havoc, including forcing the California Department of Corrections to move 2,600 Central Valley prisoners at high risk for contracting it to new digs. Doctors fighting the airborne fungal infection, which is especially prevalent in California and Arizona, describe hellish symptoms from skin lesions to stroke. It can also eat away bones and attack the brain. Winemaker Todd Schaefer, 48, thinks he contracted the disease 10 years ago while riding around on his tractor. Since then, he has suffered a stroke, a hole in his lung and near-fatal heart episodes. Not to scare you any more, but there is no known cure and incidents are on the rise with over 20,000 cases reported annually.[Source]

July 4 2013

Preliminary Earthquake Report
Magnitude	6.1
Date-Time	·         4 Jul 2013 17:16:00 UTC ·         5 Jul 2013 04:16:00 near epicenter ·         4 Jul 2013 12:16:00 standard time in your timezone
Location	7.039S 155.644E
Depth	72 km
Distances	·         81 km (50 mi) SSE of Panguna, Papua New Guinea ·         92 km (57 mi) S of Arawa, Papua New Guinea ·         478 km (296 mi) SE of Kokopo, Papua New Guinea ·         543 km (336 mi) WNW of Honiara, Solomon Islands ·         630 km (390 mi) ESE of Kimbe, Papua New Guinea

July 4, 2013 – LONDON - A man infected with a SARS-like respiratory illness has died in London, officials said. The Qatari man, who was being treated in an intensive care unit at St Thomas’s hospital in central London, had contracted the Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus – or MERS-CoV. Hospital officials said that the man, who was 49 when he was admitted, died after his condition deteriorated. 

  

July 3, 2013 – CAIRO — An adviser to Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi said Wednesday that a military coup was underway, that tanks were on the move outside Cairo and that communication with the president had been cut off. As a military deadline came and went for Morsi to step aside, the army took control of state television, and boisterous crowds opposed to the regime cheered and danced in Tahrir Square. Representatives of the Muslim Brotherhood, which supports Morsi, also said that some of its leaders had been rounded up and arrested. Earlier in the day, both the president and the military had sworn a fight to the death.  

July 3, 2013 – SAUDI ARABIA – Two more Saudi Arabians have died of MERS-CoV (Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus) infections, the Saudi Ministry of Health (MOH) reported today. 

July 2, 2013 – MICHIGAN - An earthquake of preliminary magnitude 3.6 struck early yesterday, beneath Lake Erie, just outside of Cleveland, according to the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). . – Live Science , Fox8

 July 2, 2013 – ELMWOOD - Local beekeepers are finding millions of their bees dead just after corn was planted here in the last few weeks. Dave Schuit, who has a honey operation in Elmwood, lost 600 hives, a total of 37 million bees. “Once the corn started to get planted our bees died by the millions,” Schuit said. He and many others, including the European Union, are pointing the finger at a class of insecticides known as neonicotinoids.

      

July 2, 2013 – ANTARCTICA – Scientists have seen evidence for a colossal flood under Antarctica that drained six billion tonnes of water, quite possibly straight to the ocean. The cause is thought to be a deeply buried lake that suddenly over-topped. Satellites were used to map the crater that developed as the 2.7 km-thick overlying ice sheet slumped to fill the void left by the escaping water.       

July 2, 2013 – NICARAGUA – A seismic swarm has been occurring at the volcano during the past 24 hours, including a magnitude 3.0 earthquake yesterday. This could indicate a magmatic intrusion happening at depth, but so far, no unusual surface activity has been noted. On the other hand, Momotombo volcano is one of Nicaragua’s most frequently active, with 10 recorded historic eruptions between 1524 and 1905, so new activity would not be a big surprise. The last time the volcano erupted was in 1905. –Volcano Discovery      

July 2, 2013 – INDONESIA – Soldiers, police and volunteers fanned out across an earthquake-damaged region of western Indonesia on Wednesday, scouring the debris of fallen homes and landslides for possible victims of a temblor that killed at least 29 people and injured hundreds. The magnitude- 6.1 quake struck Tuesday afternoon at a depth of just 10 kilometers (6 miles) and was centered on the far western tip of Sumatra island in Aceh province. 

 July 2, 2013 – THAILAND – Twenty two schoolchildren aged 13 to 15 were taken to Patong hospital for treatment after they collapsed screaming and crying at morning assembly today (July 1) at Wat Suwankeereewong School in Patong. Dr. Sirichai Silpa-archa, director of Patong Hospital, said that he first heard about the incident from the Narenthorn Emergency Center, which informed him that one boy and 21 girls had been affected. At the hospital staff calmed them down, though some of the more serious cases, suffering from anxiety, seizures, muscle spasms or hyperventilation, were given Valium to calm them down. Psychiatrists were also drafted in to talk to the children. Health staff found that this was the second time in four days that this group had experienced mass hysteria. On Friday (June 28) they were on a visit to the Anti-Narcotics Training Project at Chulabhorn Marine Park Conservation Centre in Thap Lamu, Phang-Nga. After their outbreak of screaming there, they had to be taken to hospital in Phang Nga but all appeared to recover quite quickly. However, this morning, something once again sparked off the hysterics at a perfectly normal morning ceremony at the school. Today, 13 of the students were released and told to go home, another six were also released but were told to call the hospital if they felt strange again, while three remain in hospital for observation. Dr. Sirichai characterized the incidents as “mass psychogenic illness”. – Phuket News

Supernatural culprit? PHUKET: — Nearly two dozen Phuket students were rushed to Patong Hospital this morning after they collapsed screaming and convulsing during morning assembly – three out of the nine students who were administered anesthesia by doctors at the hospital remain there.  According to reports, the culprit seems to be a ghost in the tourist haven Khao Lak who was offended by a girl putting her sarong in an “inappropriate place.” The students, 21 girls and one boy between 13 and 15 years old, collapsed into their screaming frenzy while at morning assembly at Wat Suwan Khiri Wongwere School  at about 8:20am. A teacher at the school who declined to be named told the Phuket Gazette that all of the students affected were taken to Khao Lak on a Scouts camping trip on Friday.  The troop returned yesterday. “While we were on the camping trip, one of the girls hung her sarong in an inappropriate place,” he said, declining to be more specific about where the sarong was placed. “Later, other students reported seeing what seemed to be a woman sitting on that girl’s shoulders.” Stranger, “While we were in Khao Lak, I even had a dream in which a voice told me to take the girl back to where she hung her sarong and apologize,” said the teacher. “But I ignored the dream. It didn’t make sense… Then this happened this morning,” the teacher said. Dr Sirichai Silapa-archa, director of Patong Hospital, told the Gazette, “They were all in shock. They were hyperventilating, so we calmed them down and aided in slowing their breathing.” Thirteen of the students were released from the hospital before lunch, but the other nine were still screaming and convulsing, he said. “We had to put them under general anesthesia so they could sleep and recover while they were unconscious,” said Dr Sirichai. -TVF

    Secret Information Societies: “I want to know what you’re thinking. There are some things you can’t hide.” – Information Society, 1988 – “If you want to keep a secret, you must also hide it from yourself.”  -George Orwell, 1984

July 1, 2013 – EUROPE - The saga of National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden took several more twists over the weekend as new revelations about US electronic snooping emerged. Susan Rice says Snowden leaks have no significant diplomatic consequences but Europeans are outraged at the US allegations of espionage. The German magazine Der Spiegel reported Saturday that the NSA had bugged European Union offices and gained access to EU internal computer networks where it was able to read documents and emails. United Nations offices were similarly targeted, reports Der Spiegel based on information provided by Mr. Snowden. Martin Schulz, the president of the European Parliament, said that if the report was correct, it would have a “severe impact” on relations between the EU and the United States, reports Reuters. “On behalf of the European Parliament, I demand full clarification and require further information speedily from the US authorities with regard to these allegations,” he said in an emailed statement. Luxembourg Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn told Der Spiegel: “If these reports are true, it’s disgusting. The United States would be better off monitoring its secret services rather than its allies. We must get a guarantee from the very highest level now that this stops immediately.”

 Rise of the police state: Surveillance of our society is everywhere and will become increasingly more so with time. As prison populations continue to swell, sky-rocketing rates of crime and lawlessness ravage cities, and as terrorism goes high-tech; the emphasis of combating crime will undoubtedly shift more to the arena of prevention and monitoring. Cameras, eavesdropping, digital message intercepts and flying overhead drones, blimps, and satellites will saturate the planet- all furiously and meticulously searching the trail left by your digital information fingerprint. –The Extinction Protocol, pp 460, 461

    July 1, 2013 – EGYPT - The armed men who ransacked the Muslim Brotherhood headquarters in Cairo on Monday had crossed a red line of violence, the ruling movement told Reuters, adding that it was considering action to defend itself. Gehad El-Haddad, spokesman of the Islamist movement, told Reuters in a telephone interview that Egyptians would not sit by and tolerate attacks on their institutions. “It’s very dangerous for one entity in society to take up violence as a means of change because it may entice others to do so. The Muslim Brotherhood is a disciplined organization,” he said, criticizing the security forces for failing to protect the headquarters in Sunday’s attack. “The people will not sit silent,” the spokesman said.  –Al Alarabiya 
    

      July 1, 2013 – YARNELL, Ariz.— Gusty, hot winds blew an Arizona blaze out of control Sunday in a forest northwest of Phoenix, overtaking and killing 19 members of an elite fire crew in the deadliest wildfire involving firefighters in the U.S. for at least 30 years. The “hotshot” firefighters were forced to deploy their emergency fire shelters — tent-like structures meant to shield firefighters from flames and heat — when they were caught near the central Arizona town of Yarnell, state forestry spokesman Art Morrison told The Associated Press. The flames lit up the night sky in the forest above the town, and smoke from the blaze could be smelled for miles. The fire started after a lightning strike on Friday and spread to 2,000 acres on Sunday amid triple-digit temperatures, low humidity and windy conditions. Officials ordered the evacuations of 50 homes in several communities, and later Sunday afternoon, the Yavapai County Sheriff’s Office expanded the order to include more residents in Yarnell, a town of about 700 residents about 85 miles northwest of Phoenix. Prescott Fire Chief Dan Fraijo said that the 19 firefighters were a part of the city’s fire department. “We grieve for the family. We grieve for the department. We grieve for the city,” he said at a news conference Sunday evening. “We’re devastated. We just lost 19 of the finest people you’ll ever meet.” Hot shot crews are elite firefighters who often hike for miles into the wilderness with chain saws and backpacks filled with heavy gear to build lines of protection between people and fires. They remove brush, trees and anything that might burn in the direction of homes and cities. The crew killed in the blaze had worked other wildfires in recent weeks in New Mexico and Arizona, Fraijo said. “By the time they got there, it was moving very quickly,” Fraijo told the AP of Sunday’s fire. He added that the firefighters had to deploy the emergency shelters when “something drastic” occurred. “One of the last fail safe methods that a firefighter can do under those conditions is literally to dig as much as they can down and cover themselves with a protective — kinda looks like a foil type — fire-resistant material — with the desire, the hope at least, is that the fire will burn over the top of them and they can survive it,” Fraijo said. “Under certain conditions there’s usually only sometimes a 50 percent chance that they survive,” he said. “It’s an extreme measure that’s taken under the absolute worst conditions.” -DMN

 

July 1, 2013 – ECUADOR - The number of earthquakes associated with fluid movement within the volcano has risen from 10 daily earthquakes on June 20 to 54 earthquakes on 29 June. These so-called long period (LP) earthquakes often reflect an increase in pressure inside the volcano. So far, the earthquakes are small and not felt by people. In the afternoon of 29 June, mild fumarolic activity was observed in the crater area. Gas sensors installed near the volcano showed no increase in the concentration of SO2 gas, which suggests that the conduit is currently blocked by a plug, which supports the idea of increasing pressure inside the volcano. Based on the above, IGPEN warns that the pressure build-up could lead to an explosion that destroys the plug, as has happened on other occasions, such as on 16 December last year, and result in new activity of the volcano such as in March and May this year. –Volcano Discovery     

     July 1, 2013 – GEOLOGY - Massive earthquakes can cause distant volcanoes to sink, according to research in Japan and Chile published on Sunday. The magnitude 9.0 tsunami-generating quake that occurred off northeastern Japan in 2011 caused subsidence of up to 15 centimeters (9.3 inches) in a string of volcanoes on the island of Honshu as much as 200 kilometers (120 miles) from the epicenter, a Japanese study said. And the 8.8 magnitude Maule quake in Chile in 2010 caused a similar degree of sinking in five volcanic regions located up to 220km (130 miles) away, according to a US-led paper. It was not clear whether the phenomenon boosted eruption risk, the authors wrote. Both the Japan and Chile quakes were of the subduction type, caused when one part of Earth’s crust slides beneath another. If the movement is not smooth, tension can build up over decades or centuries before it is suddenly released, sometimes with catastrophic effect.  In both cases, the sinking occurred in mountain ranges running horizontally to the quake. The 2011 quake “caused east-west tension in eastern Japan,” Youichiro Takada of the Disaster Prevention Research Institute at Kyoto University told AFP in an email. “Hot and soft rocks beneath the volcanoes, with magma at the centre, were horizontally stretched and vertically flattened. This deformation caused the volcanoes to subside.” The researchers for the Chilean volcanoes said subsidence occurred along a stretch spanning 400km (250 miles).

 June 30, 2013 – HAWAII – Breakouts from the Kahaualea 2 lava flow burned forest areas north of Kilauea’s middle east rift zone today as eruption activity continued with little change. Tiltmeters at the Kilauea summit recorded only minor fluctuations, according to the U.S. Geological Survey’s Hawaiian Volcano Observatory. Seismic tremor levels were also low, according to the observatory. The tiltmeter at Puu Oo cone in the middle east rift zone also recorded only minor fluctuations. According to the observatory, the northeast spatter cone continued to feed the Kahaualea 2 flow, which extended about 1.6 miles to the north. Breakouts fro the flow burned forest at the north edge of a flow field created between 1983 and 1986. A second active front, about 1.2 miles north-northwest of Puu Oo, expanded to the west and burned the edge of the forest to the north, the observatory reported. Meanwhile, the so-called Peace Day flow fed a pair of ocean entries via lava tubes. The main entry area was just east of the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park boundary; a smaller entry was located just inside the park. –Star Adviser

Lava Lake: Lava lakes are large volumes of molten lava, usually basaltic, contained in a volcanic vent, crater, or broad depression. The term is used to describe both lava lakes that are wholly or partly molten and those that are solidified (sometimes referred to as frozen lava lakes in this case). There is a lava lake in Marum crater, Ambrym in Vanuatu. Hawaii’s Kilauea has the distinction of having two persistent lava lakes: one in the Halemaʻumaʻu vent cavity within the summit caldera, and another located within the Puʻu ʻŌʻō cone located on the east rift zone of the volcano. The number of lava lakes being reported in volcanoes has increased dramatically in the last 25 years, suggesting more magma from the planet’s interior is seeping towards the surface. – Wikipedia