Merging Waves

In March Japan was hit with a high magnitude earthquakes and then a tsunami that killed thousands. Today scientists said that the huge wave was caused by merging waves. At least two or more waves had to merge together for this wave to be so powerful. Ocean ridges and mountains below the water were able to channel the waves caused by the large earthquake.

I found this to be a great article. Researchers have not be able to observe merging waves before now. Scientists used data from satellites to observe this behavior. Also, they now are able to predict some risks for tsunamis in the future. This made me think of our labs and how some of the tools are used to prevent risk. Now scientists can better forecast the tsunami danger all around the world.
article and picture from http://www.cnn.com/2011/12/06/world/asia/japan-tsunami-nasa/

Heavy Rain in the South

A large cold front swept through the Ohio Valley to the Mississippi Valley and parts of Eastern Texas. Rain was dumped in this area which was very helpful for Texas but not needed for Ohio and Mississippi. In a days time about 3-5 inches of rain fell in these areas. This was not good because the land was already wet which could cause flooding. Some areas that could flood were roadways, farmland, and smalls streams and creeks.

The picture on the left is from weather.com and is showing precipitation levels in that area. The storm is supposed to keep moving east and maybe turning into snow.

I found this to be a rater bleak article. Texas really needs the rain and the areas north do not. I have been blogging about these areas for the last couple months. I feel like they should be focusing on the area of Texas that received the much needed rain rather than the potential 'minor' flood areas.
http://www.weather.com/outlook/weather-news/news/articles/flood-threat-south-ohio-valley_2011-12-04

Now Snow and Sleet in OK & TX

Browsing weather.com I came across a short article. I found it to be a rather rare occurrence that my last two blogs were mentioned both in this article. Texas is getting a small amount of precipitation in the north. A snow/sleet storm is moving through Oklahoma and northern Texas. Some areas have seen 1-2 inches of snow in Texas, but unfortunately would not help the drought situation because the quantities would be minimal. The image here is just the radar map from weather.com. It shows mostly Oklahoma but you can see some northern area of Texas getting hit with the storm too.
First Oklahoma is shaking with multiple earthquakes and Texas in in a historic drought. Now snow and sleet fill Oklahoma and parts of the north in Texas. Fortunately the south in this time has warm weather, making the temperature rise during the day and cause the snow to melt away.

http://www.weather.com/outlook/weather-news/news/articles/wintry-precipitation-hazardous-travel_2011-12-05

NASA Watches Texas Aquifers

As we all know Texas is in a major drought. With only receiving 12 inches of rain this year, they are down 15.5 inches. This is a big event. Texas aquifers (ground water supply) is at a record low. There is very little rain in Texas and the more people use the aquifers, the supply lessens. The aquifers haven't been this low for more than 2% of the time since 1948.
The NASA satellites measure gravity based on mass variation. He was able to put this data together with data about the rain Texas got, and is able to see the aquifers are dangerously low. This time of year is a very dry year for Texas. The next hope for rain won't be until spring.

I found this article to be very interesting. It really makes me think of 'water water everywhere but not a drop to drink.' This drought has been going on in Texas for almost a year. Most likely it will take a very long time and lots of rain to refill the aquifers to their normal level. I don't know how this will happen or how likely this is because Texas is usually in times of drought.

http://www.weather.com/outlook/weather-news/news/articles/nasa-texas-drought_2011-12-01

Oklahoma Still Shaking

I have wrote about in past blogs about the earthquakes in Oklahoma. Last week I spotted an article about their recent earthquakes. In November 23 earthquakes were recorded. I blogged about the one at a magnitude of 5.6 that caused lots of damage and had an unusually high magnitude. People say the recent tremors have been slight, only able to shake a water glass but not strong enough to knock anything to the floor. Apparently the quakes can be traced back to 2 years prior. Once again a possible cause could be the process of extracting oil from the ground.

I find this to be really interesting. Oklahoma is in the middle of the North American Tectonic plate. There are fault lines but it is not an area where plates are rubbing together, which is where you would expect multiple earthquakes. As I have stated before when you think Oklahoma you think tornadoes. I know that the oil extracting process is a thought cause of the quakes. It will be interesting to find out if it really is or not.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/28/us/oklahoma-continues-string-of-recent-mild-earthquakes.html?_r=1

Santa Ana Winds

On Thursday Southern California was hit hard by the Santa Ana winds. The winds took out power lines, windows, trees but at a much higher magnitude. The winds are currently back in Southern California, but not as bad as before. Speeds in the mountains could be from 50-60mph and in the lower elevated areas from 40-50 miles per hour. The picture is from weather.com. This illustrates areas for potential wind damages.

One interesting thing is that with these winds the humidity drops at a sharp rate. This is why there is high fire danger, and if a fire would start combining with the winds, it could be an even bigger disaster.

Below are some pictures from the damage the winds on Thursday caused. After looking at these pictures it makes me think a tornado went through Southern California. I thought this was interesting because the cause of this damage was only winds.

Reno Wildfires

On November 18th about 10,000 people in Reno were evacuated from there homes. The fire chief said the cause of the blame could have been anything from down power lines, to homeless people, to children trying to stay warm. It was a very windy night and the fire spread fast. People who were evacuated said they could see an orange glow outside, as if the mountain was on fire.

This article was interesting to read. I think that the fire spread so fast because of the high winds, but I just wonder how it really started. I feel like if someone would be trying to stay warm, they would build there fire in a place out of the wind, which in turn would not let the fire spread. But then again who knows, if the fire was started by down power lines from the wind that would seem to make more sense. As I looked up videos some stated that the fire was caused by down power lines. A large about of damage by the wind. 

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-201_162-57327823/wildfire-tears-through-reno-10000-evacuated/

Rare Tornado?

When talking about Oklahoma, tornado is not a rare or unusual term. But in November, large strength tornadoes are considered to be rare and unusual. On November 7th a tornado hit Oklahoma. Yearly about 3400 tornadoes have been in Oklahoma, but on this day it was different. The tornado  pictured on the right is what hit Oklahoma. As you can see from the picture, it had a very high intensity and was very large, registering at EF4.

I found this to be very interesting. Oklahoma is hit with multiple tornadoes a year but only a couple reach the EF4/EF5 range in the month of November. Last record of one with this large of intensity was back in 1930.

article from: http://www.weather.com/outlook/weather-news/news/articles/tornado-oklahoma-unusual_2011-11-11

Earthquakes in Oklahoma Caused By Energy Drilling?

The 5.6 magnitude quake that hit Oklahoma was under investigation. Scientists thought that it was very unusual and could be connected to the energy drilling going on. This process for energy drilling is called fracking; they pump water into the earth to release natural gas and oil. The fluid is used to break apart shale and rock, the injection wells dispose of the fluid by injecting it back into the ground. Scientists thought this was interesting because they saw small earthquakes near fracking sites but nothing ever this extreme. Another piece to their argument is how Arkansas has been having many small earthquakes too said to be caused by fracking (or injection wells).  Natural gas companies say there is no connection with the 181 injection wells and the earthquakes over the weekend. Geologists said the quakes are a real mystery but that there is no reason to think that the injection wells are causing the quakes. 

article from: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2060798/Oklahoma-earthquake-possibly-caused-controversial-energy.html

Alaska Hit By Huge Sea Storm

A very large sea storm hit Alaska yesterday morning. Alaska is used to these types of storms, but this storm came earlier than normal and had a very large magnitude. This storm had winds between 60-80 mph, and blizzard like conditions. Usually these types of storms come after the first of December, then the shores have iced over. The iced shores are a natural protection, because it isn't cold enough to freeze, the villages near by are threatened by heavy wind and flooding. The picture above is from www.foxnews.com. I thought this was a very interesting article because of the timing of the storm. Alaska was not ready for this because the shores were not iced over due to warmer weather. Alaska could see massive flooding soon, this storm could cause the sea to rise 7 feet. That's crazy! The last time they have seen this was November 1974, where the surge of the sea was over 13 feet.
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/11/09/alaska-prepares-for-storm-epic-magnitude/

Tornado State Rattled by Earthquake

Normally when we talk about environmental hazards in Oklahoma, we are talking about tornadoes. Not the case this weekend. Saturday morning an earthquake hit Oklahoma that measured a 4.7 magnitude. Later that day the record for largest earthquake was beat in Oklahoma measuring at 5.6.

Oklahoma has bee hit with multiple earthquakes but the one on Saturday was abnormally large.  The picture shown is from Jeff J Mitchell/Getty, from the site http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/06/earthquakes-oklahoma-biggest-ever?newsfeed=true.

I found this to be a pretty interesting story because usually in Oklahoma you here about tornado disasters. This was also interesting because Oklahoma has been hit with multiple tornadoes, that can be felt within 100 miles of the epicenter, when the magnitude is in the 4s. This earthquake was felt, around 300 miles away, in Kansas City. There is a big different in the distance with only about one magnitude higher.

Bangkok Floods Still Taking Lives

The Thailand Government has had warnings out to evacuate for the flooding. Currently there are 11 districts that have been ordered to evacuate and 7 others for partial evacuation. Evacuations are not mandatory in the districts, and many people are not evacuating because they want to protect their homes and businesses. Thailand has been hammered with heavy rainfall since late July leaving the country in a swampy mess and death tolls around 500. Majority of the people have drown or died from water electrocutions.

Bangkok does have a drainage system to siphon off water during the monsoon season, but this system is efficient for the average rainfall, and the rainfall that Thailand is seeing is not average.

I found this article on news.google.com. I thought it was very interesting because it reminded me of the earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan. Japan had tsunami walls up but the earthquake was so large, and made the ground sink about 3 feet into the ground, that the tsunami walls were no match. In this case, the drainage system is effective and efficient for average monsoon rainfalls, but are not up to the amounts of rain Thailand has gotten this year.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/evacuations-ordered-in-bangkok-after-floods-kill-more-than-500/article2227071/

First Snow First Snow!

Well it's that time of year again for the snow to fall. Last week 8.5 inches fell on Denver Colorado. Compared to last year this is an abnormally large snowfall. On another note some of the snow went as far as Amarillo Texas which needed some moisture. But in our case, as the storm moves east, what we have now for rain will turn to snow.

This picture is from weather.com, it shows what is expected for snowfall in Colorado and Wyoming.

I find this to be an interesting article because the trend is changing. In the last two years the normal maximum amount of snow was around 6 inches. Even though this snowfall was only 2 inches more, it makes that much of a difference.

Rina Heads for Cancun

Cancun, a large tourist spot is setting up emergency shelters and evacuations in place because of Hurricane Rina. Currently it is a Category 2 storm and wind speeds are supposed to be around 105 mph. Near future reservations have been changed due to the storm. Even in the low season for tourism, there still will be around 22,000 tourist in Cancun!
Boats and jet skis have been moved to safer land and cruise ships have cancelled port in the area to stay away from the storm. Currently there are 1,100 shelters that could handle 200,000 people. If the storm hits Cancun damages could be in the millions.

http://www.usatoday.com/weather/storms/story/2011-10-25/hurricane-rina-category-2/50901584/1

Amazing Save after Turkey Earthquake

A large 7.2 magnitude earthquake hit Turkey on Tuesday. This story is of a family where three generations survived after their home, and 7 other stories collapsed on them from the earthquake. The baby Azra was pulled first from the apartment rubble with only minor scratches on her. The rescuers we then able to save her mother and grandmother that were buried in the rubble. All were reported to have minor injuries.
I found this story to be very interesting because of the golden hours after an earthquake. The rescuers were luckily there on time and were able to find and save the new baby, mother and grandmother. If they wouldn't have been there during the most important hours this could have been a sad story instead of amazing and bittersweet story for the family. Bittersweet because the father was still being searched for in the rubble. 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-15448055

San Francisco Shook Up

San Francisco held a drill today for the 'Big One.' Geologists have stated that California will be hit sometime in the next 30 years by a large earthquake that could kill many people and cause a lot of damage to homes and buildings. I found this article on Google under news. I thought this was very interesting considering the movie we watched today.
In this case I think it is very good that they are holding drills. After seeing what happened to Japan, and how they thought that they were ready for a large earthquake, it is good for them to prepare. The earthquake that hit San Francisco today only had a magnitude of 3.9 but caused no injuries. What a coincidence on the day they hold a drill (about 8.2 million people were supposed to take place in the drill), that San Francisco is hit by a minor earthquake.

Flooding In Thailand

The floods that have hit Thailand have been the worst in many years. Almost 300 people have died and the floods have left thousands stranded. Besides taking out about 700,000 peoples homes, the floods and mudslides have destroyed a huge amount of farmland.  Damage costs have totaled up to over 500 thousand. The floods are threatening Bangkok which could raise the damage total significantly.

Weather.com stated that people have little trust in the Bangkok flood command center. The Prime Minister says that hey are doing all that they can. This flood crisis is one of the largest in years and has the government overwhelmed. The general public of Thailand has mixed feelings with the government and it's efforts.




Received from http://beta.weather.com/outlook/weather-news/news/articles/thailand-flooding_2011-10-17
Received from http://www.sos-usa.org/newsroom/press-releases/Pages/Thailand%27s-Floods-Wipe-Out-Homes.aspx?gclid=CPuC9IuE9asCFVPGKgodDxJCpQ

Double Whammy in Pacific

Hurricane Irwin and Tropical Storm Jova are building up in the Southern Pacific. Both storms are heading in a Northeastern direction and might possibly hit land sometime early this week. Hurricane Irwin is number 8 of hurricanes in the Pacific and Jova is close behind. Jova the tropical storm is gaining strength and could become a hurricane in the next day or so.
Picture from (http://www.usatoday.com/weather/hurricane/story/2011-10-07/hurricane-irwin-pacific-ocean/50685196/1).
On the left is a picture of Hurricane Irwin and its path and strength over the next couple days. Irwin is expected to turn back towards land and maybe make landfall in Mexico.
www.usatoday.com

Wet and Windy Sunshine State

This weekend storms passing through the Atlantic were suppose to bring much needed rain to the Northeast. Unfortunately for Florida, this storm could cause damage and potentially be a flood warning. In the picture to the right, the East coast beaches are warned of rip currents, rough surfing and boating and gusty winds. (picture from http://beta.weather.com/outlook/weather-news/news/articles/poor-florida-weather-watching-tropics_2011-10-05)

The direction of the storm will hit Florida on the East coast moving in strong tides and winds. Storm watchers are watching the storm because of a possible development of low pressure that could effect the Southeast. Currently in the United States drought is a huge problem, but for the sunshine state of Florida the East coast could see up to 5+ inches of rain and multiple showers are suppose to compromise the rest of the Florida peninsula.

Texas Wildfires

To go along with my current blogging topics. There was a wildfire in Bastrop, Texas yesterday. Due to low rain conditions, this is the last thing this town wants to see because of the long-burning wildfire that occurred last month. As of last night the fire had spread to 900 acres. The photo below is from  Mediad.publicbroadcasting.net.

As I touched on in one of my last blogs some rain was supposed to fall in Texas to relieve them from the drought. The forecast this week shows an increase in the chance of rain.





http://beta.weather.com/outlook/weather-news/news/articles/new-wildfire-bastrop-texas_2011-10-04

Earthquake in Chile Sending Tsunamis accross the Pacific (2010)

In February 2010, a massive earthquake hit Chile. The magnitude of the quake was 8.8, one of the largest earthquakes recorded. Soon after the quake tsunami waves rushed though the Pacific ocean threatening Chile itself, Japan, Hawaii, and multiple other countries along the Pacific coast.

The earthquake happened at about 3:34 in the morning in Chile and happened right over the epicenter. The authorities did not send out alarms after the huge quake, and about 30 minutes after tsunami waves were washing people out in Chile and being sent across the Pacific. Because the alarms were not immediately sent out many people did not have time to escape to higher ground. The authorities later sent out an alarm that did give Chileans time to evacuate. The picture below shows the tsunamis direction and strength. After the massive earthquake and warning for the tsunamis went out, Pacific countries also sent out warnings to evacuate people and ships in path of the traveling tsunamis.

This hazard fits the behavioral paradigm and the development paradigm. The quake that hit Chile was very large recorded at Mw 8.8. This large of an earthquake is unusual and sent out tsunami waves which is behavioural because of the nature of the quake. Even though Chile is a developed country, the lack of preparedness from the authorities contributed to the tsunami disaster. Authorities did not sent out an alert right after the massive earthquake which did not give people enough time to evacuate properly. In the complexity paradigm the earthquake was very large and unusual, which evolved into tsunami waves all over the Pacific, the quake happened very early in the morning in Chile and the authorities did not warn people of the tsunami in time which lead to this hazard resulting in high death rates.

http://nctr.pmel.noaa.gov/chile20100227/

 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/27/chile-earthquake-tsunami_n_479393.html

Flooding in the Philippines

Early Tuesday morning Typhoon Nesat struck the Philippines. This power full storm sent water rushing in  flooding areas neck deep and washing away some homes. Luckily residents acted quickly and more people evacuated safely to higher ground. Compared to a cyclone in 2009 which killed hundreds of people which in part was due to poor evacuation techniques. Unfortunately the damage total is still large but the death toll has decreased significantly.

http://www.weather.com/maps/maptype/satelliteworld/asiasatellite_large_animated.html

The image below is a satellite image of the storm. By using the link above, there is an interactive simulation to see where the storm is moving.