August 5, 2013 – TOKYO — A strong 5.8 magnitude earthquake shook northeastern Japan on Sunday in the same region devastated by a giant tsunami and temblor 2-1/2 years ago, but there were no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The quake had a preliminary magnitude of 6.0 struck shortly after midday, and was centered off the coast of Miyagi Prefecture, and 50 kilometers (30 miles) below the seabed. The earthquake was later downgraded to a 5.8 event by the USGS.
August 5, 2013 – JAPAN - Highly radioactive water seeping into the ocean from Japan’s crippled Fukushima nuclear plant is creating an “emergency” that the operator is struggling to contain, an official from the country’s nuclear watchdog said on Monday. This contaminated groundwater has breached an underground barrier, is rising toward the surface and is exceeding legal limits of radioactive discharge, Shinji Kinjo, head of a Nuclear Regulatory Authority (NRA) task force, told Reuters.
August 5, 2013 – DETROIT - A massive cloud of black dust that swept across the Detroit River into Windsor, Canada this week has been linked to piles of petroleum coke, a by-product of tar sands oil illegally stored in Detroit by Koch Carbon. Though much has already been said of the tar sands oil industry, which is currently experiencing a boom and has spurred several high profile pipeline expansions across the US, the accumulation of the petroleum coke, commonly referred to as pet coke, along the Detroit riverfront went largely unnoticed until this week. A dust cloud which flew over Detroit and into Windsor this week was found to carry elevated traces of lead, sulfur, zinc and vanadium, which is possibly cancer-causing in humans in prolonged or elevated exposure, according to the International Agency for Research on Cancer, a France-based organization. The US Department of Health and Human Services and the US has not yet classified whether vanadium is carcinogenic.
August 5, 2013 – KAMCHATKA – Russia’s northernmost active volcano churned out ash to a height of up to five kilometers (three miles) in the country’s Far East, local Emergencies Ministry’s department reported on Monday. The 3,283-meter (10,771 feet) Shiveluch volcano increased activity in May 2009 and has been periodically spewing ash from three to ten kilometers.
Paluweh Volcano (Indonesia): A partial collapse of the lava dome occurred yesterday and produced an explosion and (probably) pyroclastic flows. An ash plume rose to about 3 km (9,000 ft) altitude. Our friend Aris who visited the area after the event reported that bombs were ejected to up to 1 km distance and estimates that the collapse removed about 20% of the dome. –Volcano Discovery
August 2, 2013 – NORWAY – Researchers at the University of Bergen (UiB) has discovered hundreds of volcanoes in the deep sea around Norway. The area may be Norway’s new National Park or billion-profit generating region.The unique findings were discovered in Norwegian waters along a 1500 km long volcanic mountain range, which stretches from Jan Mayen to the Fram Strait between Svalbard and Greenland. Prior to this white spots on the map, we knew nothing about what was there. But using technological tools we have been able to map the ocean floor. The last volcano was found a few weeks ago and is just 20 meters below sea level, – says Rolf Birger Pedersen, professor at the Centre for Geobiology (UiB). By discovering Loki’s Castle, as the area is called, now researchers from UiB can observe unknown volcanic underwater world toogether with hundreds of undersea volcanoes and various heat sources. There is not only a totally unique wildlife, but also rich metal deposits. Each field has an estimated value of 1-3 billion NOK. How much economic value they may have in the future is too early to say. The environmental and legal aspects are important issues. Iron, zinc and copper are just some of the metal deposits that exist, but the unique microorganisms will also be an important step in bioprospecting. That searching for valuable biological and active components from marine organism, which can be used for research and development of new medicines. – The Nordic Page
August 2, 2013 – WYOMING – The world’s largest geyser has exploded to life at Yellowstone National Park for the first time in eight years, sending a high-pressure burst of steamy water 300 feet into the air, a park official said on Thursday. The stream of 160 degree water released on Wednesday night by the so-called Steamboat Geyser lasted for roughly 10 minutes, delighting a small number of “geyser gazers” who have waited years for such a show, Yellowstone spokesman Dan Hottle said.
August 1, 2013 – JEDDAH, SA – Three more confirmed cases of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) coronavirus infections in Saudi Arabia have been recorded, the Ministry of Health said on Thursday. A statement posted on the ministry’s website said one of the patients is a 67-year-old woman in Riyadh, who had been suffering from various chronic diseases. She is now under intensive care, receiving the health care and proper treatment. The two other cases are both women health workers, one of them living in Asir region and the other in Riyadh. “They have mild symptoms but their health status is stable,” said the MOH. The new cases bring to 92 the total number of people who have contracted the virus worldwide, including 71 in Saudi Arabia.
July 30, 2013 – MILAN, Italy - A tornado has ripped through a suburb of Milan, injuring 12 people and damaging buildings and vehicles. Video shot by witnesses on their mobile phones captured the twister tearing through an industrial region in Grezzago, leaving a trail of devastation as it destroyed cars, overturned trucks and uprooted telegraph poles. “We were inside there and a lorry crashed into the wall and came through it,” said Stefano Grimoldi, who was caught up the carnage. “Then all the windows broke and we couldn’t understand what was happening.” He added: “Look there is no more roof, no more doors, there’s nothing left. Witnesses described the incident as terrifying. “It came from over there – the next little town along in Pozzo D’Ada,” explained witness Luca Mariani. “Then it came through here, Grezzago, then it went towards Trezzo,” added his friend Anthony Farchica. “It lasted, I’m not sure, the time it took, ten minutes or a quarter of an hour,” they added. Firemen, civil protection and other rescue services rushed to the scene. Although no deaths have been reported there are reports of a dozen injuries. –
July 30, 2013 – HAWAII - A flood advisory remains in effect for Hawaii Island at least through 6:15 p.m. as the brunt of Tropical Storm Flossie moved past Hilo and East Hawaii and began pestering Kailua-Kona and West Hawaii with heavy rains and high winds. The lower Puna and Kau areas appeared to be the most badly hit portions of East Hawaii. The Hawaii Police Department reported fallen trees on Highway 132, the Pahoa-Kapoho Highway in the area of Lava Tree State Park. The highway was closed around noon but reopened about 2:30, Hawaii County Civil Defense officials said. More than 6,000 customers of the Hawaii Electrical Light Co., mostly from Volcano to Pahoa, lost power after high winds knocked down power lines in various areas of Puna, said Kristin Okinaka, HELCO deputy corporate communications officer. At the peak there were about 6,300 homes and businesses without power, according to Hawaii Electric Light Co. That included 2,800 customers from Volcano to Glenwood, 2,200 customers from Kalapana to Nanawale and 1,300 in Panaewa.
July 29, 2013 – SIBERIA, RUSSIA - Did the Arctic region break a heat record? According to English-language outlet The Siberian Times, temperatures of 32 degrees Celsius, or 89.6 degrees Fahrenheit, were recorded in the Siberian city of Norilsk on July 21. The average temperature in July in the region is 13.6 C, or 56.48 F. Weather historian Christopher C. Burt explains on the website Weather Underground that the entire Russian Arctic region has seen warm weather as of late. Burt adds that Norilsk has seen its warmest nights in recent days — some 20.2 C, or 68.26 F — and that wildfires have erupted in the region. However Burt and The Siberian Times disagree as to whether the warm weather spell is a record. According to the Siberian Times, the recent spike broke the 31.9 C (89.42 F) record set three decades ago, while Burt believes the current record stands at 32.2 C (89.96 F).
July 29, 2013 – FRANCE – Seven people died yesterday on a series of beaches in the south of France which are hugely popular with British tourists. High winds which reached speeds of up to 80 mph and unpredictable currents were blamed for the so-called ‘Black Sunday’ in the Herault department, which is on the Mediterranean coast. At least three other people were tonight in a ‘serious condition’ after escaping from the sea. Like the deceased, they had been enjoying high summer temperatures on the beaches of Palavas-les-Flots, Carnon, La Grande-Motte, Valras and Vendres. ‘Conditions were hugely treacherous, yet many people did not seem aware of this,’ said a spokesman for the local lifeguards. ‘Swimmers who ventured out too far found themselves swept further out by high winds and big waves. Four of the victims died on the beaches, at sea or inland after resuscitation attempts failed, while three others died in hospital.
July 29, 2013 – NEW ZEALAND - A ‘‘severe’’ quake this morning in Cook Strait caused damage and was felt as far away as Auckland. It also increased the probability of further severe aftershocks, GeoNet seismologist John Ristau said. Did this morning’s quake cause any damage for you? The 5.4-magnitude quake struck at 1.07am today, just over a week since a 6.5 magnitude Cook Strait earthquake, which caused damage around Wellington. Today’s quake was 12km deep and 20km east of Seddon in Cook Strait. It was followed by a swarm of smaller quakes.
July 29, 2013 – SAUDI ARABIA – A Saudi man has died of the coronavirus Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS), the Saudi Health Ministry said on Saturday, raising to 39 the number of deaths from the SARS-like virus in the kingdom where it first emerged last year. “The Ministry of Health has announced the death of one case, who had been previously announced to be infected with this virus in Asir, may Allah have mercy upon him,” the ministry said in a statement.
July 26, 2013 – GUATEMALA - Seismic and surface activity have increased during the past days, characterized by the appearance of continuous tremor and more frequent strombolian explosions, the latest special bulletin of INSIVUMEH notes. This suggests a batch of fresh magma is currently rising. The Guatemalan scientists think that it is likely that strombolian activity will increase and perhaps a lava flow will appear on the flanks of the volcano in the coming days. Already, the intra-crater cone has surpassed the rim of the crater by 4 meters and is now visible from outside. – Volcano Discovery
July 26, 2013 – HEALTH - Researchers found evidence of a “lunar influence” in a study of 33 volunteers sleeping in tightly controlled laboratory conditions. When the Moon was round, the volunteers took longer to nod off and had poorer quality sleep, despite being shut in a darkened room, Current Biology reports. They also had a dip in levels of a hormone called melatonin that is linked to natural-body clock cycles. When it is dark, the body makes more melatonin. And it produces less when it is light. Being exposed to bright lights in the evening or too little light during the day can disrupt the body’s normal melatonin cycles.
July 25, 2013 – TEXAS – (backwards storm) On July 14, a low pressure system that started in the Eastern United States retrograded under a ridge of high pressure to the north over the last couple of days. This storm system moved from east to west, which is extremely unusual for this hemisphere. We’ve seen these move east to west for a short period of time, but this one will make it to Southern California by the time it weakens. The upper level system is known as an easterly wave; however I’d like to call it a super easterly wave based on the distance it is going to travel. This particular system will have traveled from one side of the country to the other once it has stopped moving west, diving from there into Mexico, gathering up monsoonal moisture to be put into Nevada and Southern California later in the week into next week. Rainfall estimations across parts of Central Texas could be over 2-4″ of rain, with more rain (above 6+” possible in parts of South-Central Texas. Severe storms, including tornadoes, hail, and damaging winds will be possible from Texas, New Mexico, and parts of Arizona through the next few days. –The Weather Space
July 24, 2013 – SEATTLE - A new study has found that heat waves are increasing in the western portions of the Pacific Northwest, but not the kind most people envision, with scorching hot days of temperatures reaching triple digits. These heat waves occur at night. Researchers documented 15 examples of “nighttime heat waves” from 1901 through 2009 and 10 of those have occurred since 1990. Five of them took place during a four-year period from 2006-09. And since the study was accepted for publication in the Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology, another nighttime heat wave took place at the end of this June, the authors point out. “Most people are familiar with daytime heat waves, when the temperatures get into the 100s and stay there for a few days,” said Kathie Dello, deputy director of the Oregon Climate Service at Oregon State University and a co-author on the study. “A nighttime heat wave relates to how high the minimum temperature remains overnight. “Daytime events are usually influenced by down slope warming over the Cascade Mountains, while nighttime heat waves seem to be triggered by humidity,” said Dello, who is in OSU’s College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences. “Elevated low-level moisture at night tends to trap the heat in.” In their study, Dello and co-authors Karin Bumbaco and Nicholas Bond from the University of Washington defined heat waves as three consecutive days of temperatures at the warmest 1 percentile over the past century. Using that standard criterion, they documented 13 examples of daytime heat waves during the time period from 1901 to 2009. Only two of those occurred in the last 20 years.
July 22, 2013 – JAPAN – A strong vulcanian explosion occurred last night at 11:02 GMT (20:02 local time), following several hours of near complete calm at the volcano. A loud cannon-shot bang accompanied the explosion, which generated a large mushroom cloud that reached 12,000 ft (3.7 km) altitude and engulfed the NE half of the Sakurajima peninsula and was followed by several smaller ones within about half an hour. The volcano and much of the surrounding areas remained under the ash plume for several hours until it started to clear up again. In the hours after the explosion, the Showa crater continued to emit ash plumes in often near-continuous pulses, sometimes reaching several 100 m height, but with no visible incandescence or audible sounds. –Volcano Discovery
Large explosions at Ecuador volcano: An increase of activity occurred yesterday. IGPEN recorded 3 strong pulses of volcanic tremor since midnight 20-21 July (local time), which were accompanied by strombolian activity and strong explosions that produced loud roars, heavy gunfire sounds, and vibrations that rattled floors, windows and doors of houses in areas nearby.
July 22, 2013 – CHINA – Two powerful earthquakes have struck China’s north-west Gansu province, killing at least 94 people and leaving more than 400 others injured. The first earthquake near Dingxi city had a magnitude of 5.9 and was shallow, with a depth of just 9.8 km (6 miles), the US Geological Survey said. Just over an hour later, a magnitude 5.6 quake hit the same area, it added. In 2008, an earthquake in Sichuan province left up to 90,000 people dead and millions homeless. A factory worker in Minxian county told AFP that he felt “violent shaking” and “ran to the yard of the [factory] plant immediately. Our factory is only one floor. When I came to the yard, I saw an 18-storey building, the tallest in our county, shaking ferociously, especially the 18th floor,” he said. The area has been hit by 371 aftershocks, according to the Earthquake Administration of Gansu province. Tremors were felt in the provincial capital, Lanzhou, and as far away as Xian, 400km (250 miles) to the east.
July 22, 2013 – INDONESIA - One of Indonesia’s most dangerous volcanoes spewed material a kilometer into the air near Yogyakarta, a university town and center of Javanese culture, sending hundreds of villagers fleeing. A short, massive rumbling was heard from Mount Merapi in the predawn hours Monday, the country’s disaster agency said, after which a cloud of ash and fine sand fell for several hours as far as 14 kilometers from the peak on the island of Java.
July 21, 2013 – WELLINGTON, NZ - A 6.9-magnitude earthquake has struck New Zealand, rattling the capital Wellington and some other cities. The quake was later downgraded to a 6.5 by the USGS. The quake on Sunday hit 57km southwest of Wellington at a depth of 10.1km, the US Geological Survey said. There were no immediate reports of major damage and injuries after the earthquake but some water mains were broken, windows smashed and power lines downed.
July 19, 2013 – WELLINGTON, NZ – A 4.3 quake hit the east coast of New Zealand tonight, following a 4.5 magnitude quake in central New Zealand this afternoon, and a 5.7 earthquake that rattled people in Wellington and Blenheim this morning. Geonet reported tonight’s quake was 20 km east of Te Araroa, a settlement on the east coast of the north island, near the southern edge of the Bay of Plenty. The quake was 62 km deep and hit at 11.42pm. GeoNet reported this afternoon’s was of a “strong” intensity, 35 km east of Seddon, at a depth of 15 km. The quake hit at 3.21pm. The first quake struck at 9.06 am and was centered 30km east of Seddon, south of Blenheim, at a depth of 8 km. Rated as severe, it turned Wellington office workers white-knuckled as it swayed high-rises in the capital, with buildings also being rocked in Blenheim. The shallow tremor was felt as far away as Christchurch and New Plymouth.
July 19, 2013 – DR CONGO, Africa – Recent NASA satellite images from 11 June 2013 show a thick steam and gas plume rising from a pit crater in the summit caldera of Nyamuragira volcano. No evidence of lava close to the surface was found, while the lava lake in neighboring Nyiragongo remains well active and visible on the same images. Nyamuragira’s plume was rich in water vapor — which condenses rapidly in the humid tropical air — and sulfur dioxide, which lends a blue tint in natural-color satellite imagery.
July 19, 2013 – HEALTH – Health authorities in the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia have reported six new cases of the SARS-like coronavirus, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Thursday. The latest infections of four women and two men aged between 26 and 42 bring the global total to 88 cases, including 45 deaths, the United Nations agency said in a statement.
July 18, 2013 – PERU – The man in charge of monitoring the Sabancaya Volcano confirmed to the Peruvian daily, El Comercio, that the recent wave of earthquakes in the Arequipa region were caused by the volcano. “We´re in the sphere of influence of the Sabancaya Volcano, so all of the earthquakes we´ve experienced in the last few days were in fact caused by the volcano,” Domingo Ramos Palomino told the daily. He went on to explain that though there has been increased activity around the Sabancaya, there is not enough evidence to predict an eruption in the near future.
July 17, 2013 – QUITO, Ecuador (AP) — Scientists say lava flow and ash and gas emissions have intensified at a second Ecuadorean volcano, Reventador, as the full-bore eruption of the Tungurahua cone continues. Ecuador’s Geophysics Institute says the lava flow on Reventador’s southern flank has increased since Saturday but poses no immediate threat to villagers in the region 60 miles (100) kilometers) east of the capital, Quito. The 11,400-foot (3,475-meter) volcano is nearly three times that distance from Tungurahua to the southwest. It has been roaring since Sunday, when 200 people were evacuated from its flanks and one pyroclastic blast was heard as far away as the coastal city of Guayaquil. Tungurahua is 16,480 feet (5,023 meters) high and has been active since 1999. Reventador had its last big eruption in November 2002. –Big Story
July 15, 2013 – COSTA RICA - A significant earthquake swarm has started late on 13 July at the volcano and is continuing. This could indicate a rise of magma in progress and could eventually lead to new eruptions in the near future. The stratovolcano is 3,340 m (10,958 ft) high and is about 45 minutes from the Atlantic slope town of Turrialba. The summit has three craters, one of which has fumaroles and sulfur pits. The largest of the craters has a diameter of 164 feet (50 m). Turrialba is adjacent to the Irazú volcano and both are among Costa Rica’s largest volcanoes. It had at least five large explosive eruptions in last 3500 years. The Turrialba volcano last erupted in 2011. –Volcano Discovery
July 15, 2013 – ANTARCTICA – A 7.3 magnitude earthquake has struck south of Bristol Island in the South Sandwich Islands. No tsunami alert exists, however. The massive 7.3 magnitude earthquake began today July 15, 2013 far out to sea, far from Argentina and Chile’s coast, officials tell news. It was initially reported as a 6.8 magnitude quake before being upgraded. The large earthquake today began moments ago. It erupted at 12:03 pm local time, officials tell news. It also posted a moderate depth. USGS indicates to news that the quake starting twenty miles below sea level. But the quake was far from land when it began. Officials tell news that the quake was closest only to one island. The quake began one hundred thirty miles southeast of Bristol Island in the South Sandwich Islands.
July 15, 2013 – ECUADOR – At least 200 people have been evacuated after a volcano in Ecuador erupted and spewed ash miles into the air. The “strong explosion” at the Tungurahua volcano could be felt hundreds of miles away, the Geophysics Institute reported. It spewed stones, gases and ash more than 5 km (3.1 miles) into the sky, authorities said. The clouds of ash and gas could be seen as far away as the capital Quito, about 153km (95 miles) north of the volcano.
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