What The…?
4 Feet Of Hail In Texas? Reports, Photos Cause Quite A Storm – MSLSD
Sure, everything’s bigger in Texas. But 4 feet of hail from one storm? That’s what the National Weather Service, the Texas Department of Transportation, a local sheriff and others say happened Wednesday in an area north of Amarillo when hail piled up in drifts so wide they cut off a major highway.
The National Weather Service office in Amarillo even posted a photo on its Facebook page, but that wasn’t enough to convince skeptics.
Meltwater rushes past hail several feet thick on Wednesday off Highway 287 north of Amarillo, Texas.
“Serious do not think this is 100% hail!!!” commented one person.
“It’s a lite dusting of hail on some damn rocks,” said another person, referring to the image of a firefighter standing next to what could be taken for boulders.
“I can assure you we do not have big rocks like that in West Texas,” Krissy Scotten, a spokeswoman for the weather service office in Amarillo, told msnbc.com.
“That was 4 feet of ice” that was compacted by rain and floodwater across a wide area, she added.
The National Weather Service’s office in Amarillo, Texas, posted this photo Wednesday night of a firefighter standing next to deep hail.
“It was actually the rain/water that caused the drifts,” Scotten said. “Anytime you have hail accumulate 2 to 4 feet high and get over three inches of rain, no matter how it occurs, it’s pretty incredible.”
As for the darkish color, “we’re very dusty around here” due to drought so the hail quickly darkened, Scotten said.
The image, she added, was sent by the Potter County Fire Department and the firefighter seen in it is standing where meltwater had cut through the hail.
The Texas Department of Transportation confirms it was deep hail dumped by a storm that dropped visibility to near-zero at times.
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This highway webcam image was taken at 4:10 p.m. local time Wednesday and shows hail on Highway 287.
“Heavy rain and up to 4 ft of hail has US 287 blocked north of Amarillo,” it tweeted Wednesday afternoon.
The local sheriff concurred as well.
“You’re looking at four foot deep” hail in one stretch, NBC affiliate KAMR-TV quoted Brian Thomas, sheriff of Potter County, as saying. “This was just one of those weird storms that just sat here and came down extremely heavy in this one area.”
Amarillo TV station Pronews 7 even shot video of flash flooding triggered by the pea-sized hail and several inches of rain.
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“It looked like soap suds,” said Pronews 7 meteorologist Steve Kersh. “The storm was moving really slow and a combination of the pea-sized hail and four to six inches of rain created those conditions.”
KAMR-TV reported that snow plows were called out to clear roads. Highway 287 was shut down for hours after the storm due to the cleanup.
Several vehicles got stuck in the flash flooding, and two feet of water also swamped a stretch of Highway 136, the weather service reported. One Chevy Tahoe, a large SUV, got stuck in hail up to its hood, Scotten said.
Covered in dust, this hail drift measured six feet high on April 12 and was still intact a day after it formed near Dumas, Texas, the National Weather Service said.
The pea-sized hailstones weren’t big enough to set any size records, and Scotten said the service doesn’t keep records for most hail in a given period.
But Jose Garcia, chief forecaster at the weather service in Amarillo, told msnbc.com it probably wasn’t the most hail the region has seen.
“Five to 6 feet deep hail” fell in nearby Dalhart, Texas, in 1993 during a very similar storm, he said. It took almost a month for some roads to reopen as the compact ice melted slowly. “It was almost like huge snow drifts,” he said.
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Tornadoes Slam Downtown Dallas Near DFW Airport (Video)
Tornadoes Slam Downtown Dallas Near DFW Airport – WSFA
Tornadoes have been reported in Dallas County and other nearby counties in northeast Texas on Tuesday.
A tornado passed near the Dallas/Fort Worth Airport, according to CNN, while a second was sighted on the ground in downtown Dallas. Schools in the area were secured for safety.
Airport officials have been replying to people seeking information via their Twitter account, @dfwairport. They reported no damage from the storms and that all passengers had gotten off planes safely.
“If you are inside one of our terminals, please seek shelter in one of the designated storm areas,” a DFW official tweeted earlier.
CNN showed video of 18-wheelers being lifted off the ground and thrown through the air by an apparent tornado in Dallas County. Storm spotters and radar showed more than one south of Dallas and Fort Worth, according to the Associated Press.
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WFAA reported at 1:54 p.m. CDT that no injuries had been reported at that time, although there was extensive damage. All traffic from Dallas/Fort Worth Airport has been stopped.
The AP also reported the tornado south of Fort Worth caused “considerable damage” near Cleburne, and Dallas police reported visual confirmation from the southern part of the city. Police spokeswoman Sherri Jeffrey told AP twisters have caused damage within the city limits.
The National Weather Service issued a tornado warning for eastern Hunt County, southwestern Delta County and West Central Hopkins County. A tornado warning also is in effect until 3 p.m. for southwestern Collin County, northwestern Dallas County, southeastern Denton County and northeastern Tarrant County in north-central Texas.
The NWS reported at 1:47 p.m. that storm spotters and Doppler radar observed a tornado located three miles northeast of Pantego moving northeast at 25 mph. The Euless and Irving areas were in the direct path.
Around the same time, meteorologists confirmed a “large and dangerous tornado” near Hutchins moving northwest at 30 mph and urged everyone to take shelter. Other areas in the warning area included Balch Springs, Mesquite, Sunnyvale, Buckingham, Garland, Sachse, Rowlett and Richardson, according to the NWS.
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Tornadoes Flatten Homes As More Storms Threaten South, Midwest (Video)
Tornadoes Flatten Homes As More Storms Threaten South, Midwest – GlobalPost
More suspected tornadoes flattened homes and cut power to parts of Alabama, Indiana and Tennessee on Friday, two days after deadly storms killed 13 across the South and Midwest.
Emergency officials said at least two dozen people had been injured in the Chattanooga, Tenn., area, and homes had been torn to their foundations, CNN reported.
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An apparent tornado touched down in Madison County, Ala., damaging homes and raining golf ball-sized hail on residents. Local schools were on lockdown as the storm passed, an emergency official told CNN.
Near Huntsville, Ala., at least five people were taken to area hospitals, Huntsville-Madison County Emergency Management Agency told The Associated Press.
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Some 30,000 to 35,000 people were without power, MSNBC reported.
“Temporary shelter is being set up,” Paige Colburn, emergency management officer at the Huntsville-Madison County Emergency Management Agency, told MSNBC. “The storm has passed the county, thank goodness, and we are now working on response/recovery, life-saving and property-saving procedures.”
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In adjacent Limestone County, at least one apparent tornado was reported, Cindy Adams of the local sheriff’s office told CNN. One suspected tornado touched down at least once before authorities could sound a warning siren, she said.
A corrections official told the AP a reported tornado hit the Limestone Correctional Facility. No one was injured, but the roof suffered damage and part of the perimeter fence had been knocked down.
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Tornadoes were later reported in Indiana and Kentucky, although there was no immediate word on damage or injuries, according to CNN.
The states were among many that forecasters warned may experience severe storms and twisters on Friday.
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The strongest tornadoes were expected to hit southern Indiana, central Kentucky and northern-middle Tennessee later Friday, according to the National Weather Service’s Storm Prediction Center.
The tornado outbreak that began Tuesday night left 13 dead across Kansas, Missouri, Illinois and Tennessee and battered parts of Kentucky as well. The latest death was reported in Kansas, where authorities said 53-year-old Richard Slade died Thursday from injuries suffered when a tornado struck Harveyville on Tuesday night, according to CNN.
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Related article:
Marysville, Indiana (Town Of 1,900) “Completely Gone” – Indianapolis Star
Tornadoes have left widespread damage in Southern Indiana and a sheriff’s official says at least one town of about 1,900 people is “completely gone.”
Indiana Department of Homeland Security Spokesman John Erickson confirmed three deaths in Jefferson County.
Jefferson County Sheriff’s Department dispatcher Shelly Jones says houses are missing near the unincorporated town of Chelsea, about 30 miles north of Louisville, Ky.
National Weather Service coordinator Bill Whitlock there’s “extreme damage” in the area of Henryville, a town of about 3,000 people just north of the Kentucky border. Destruction can be seen for miles and a school district spokeswoman says heavy damage has been reported at Henryville High school.
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Your Daley Gator “Global Warming” News Round-Up (Video)
…….Europe’s Cold Snap Claims More Lives – CNN
…….Deadly Cold Front Continues As Dam Bursts In Bulgaria – NewsMeat
…….Siberian Cold Puts Deep Freeze On Germany – The Local
…….Europe Freeze Hits Transport Hubs – BBC News
…….Helicopters Used To Evacuate, Send Food In Europe Freeze – MSNBC
…….Britain On Snow Alert As Europe Freezes Over – London Telegraph
…….Deadly Freeze: Hundreds Dead In Ukraine, Russia And Eastern Europe – Russia Today
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Giant Tsunami-Shaped Clouds Roll Across Alabama Sky
Giant Tsunami-Shaped Clouds Roll Across Alabama Sky – Yahoo News
For a morning, the sky looked like a surfer’s dream: A series of huge breaking waves lined the horizon in Birmingham, Ala., on Friday (Dec. 16), their crests surging forward in slow motion. Amazed Alabamans took photos of the clouds and sent them to their local weather station, wondering, “What are these tsunamis in the sky?”
Experts say the clouds were pristine examples of “Kelvin-Helmholtz waves.” Whether seen in the sky or in the ocean, this type of turbulence always forms when a fast-moving layer of fluid slides on top of a slower, thicker layer, dragging its surface.
Water waves, for example, form when the layer of fluid above them (i.e., the air) is moving faster than the layer of fluid below (i.e., the water). When the difference between the wind and water speed increases to a certain point, the waves “break” – their crests lurch forward – and they take on the telltale Kelvin-Helmholtz shape. [Astonishing Video Shows a Face in the Clouds]
According to Chris Walcek , a meteorologist at the Atmospheric Sciences Research Center at the State University of New York, Albany , fast-moving air high in the sky can drag the top of slow-moving, thick clouds underneath it in much the same way.
“In the pictures [of the Birmingham sky] there is probably a cold layer of air near the ground where the wind speed is probably low. That is why there is a cloud or fog in that layer,” Walcek told Life’s Little Mysteries, a sister site to LiveScience. “Over this cloudy, cold, slow-moving layer is probably a warmer and faster-moving layer of air.”
Most of the time, the difference in wind speed and temperature between two layers of the atmosphere is small, and so the fast-moving air on top “simply slides smoothly over the slower-moving air like a hockey puck sliding along an ice surface,” Walcek said. At the other extreme, if the wind-speed difference is too large, the interface between the two layers breaks down into random turbulence.
Kelvin-Helmholtz waves form when the difference in the temperature and wind speed of the two layers hits a sweet spot. “What [these pictures] show is air between these two atmospheric layers that is just very close to that threshold for turbulence, and mixing to mix the two layers together,” he said.
This story was provided by Life’s Little Mysteries, a sister site to LiveScience. Follow Natalie Wolchover on Twitter @nattyover. Follow Life’s Little Mysteries on Twitter @llmysteries, then join us on Facebook.
The Mysterious Physics of 7 Everyday Things Can a Butterfly in Brazil Really Cause a Tornado in Texas? Do Ocean Waves Really Travel in Sets of 7?
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Scientists Admit They Can’t Predict Hurricanes
Scientists Admit They Can’t Predict Hurricanes – Sweetness & Light
From Canada’s Ottawa Citizen:
Hurricane predictors admit they can’t predict hurricanes
By Tom Spears
Monday, December 12, 2011Two top U.S. hurricane forecasters, revered like rock stars in Deep South hurricane country, are quitting the practice because it doesn’t work.
William Gray and Phil Klotzbach say a look back shows their past 20 years of forecasts had no value.
The two scientists from Colorado State University will still discuss different probabilities as hurricane seasons approach – a much more cautious approach. But the shift signals how far humans are, even with supercomputers, from truly knowing what our weather will do next.
Gray, recently joined by Klotzbach, has been known for decades for an annual forecast of how many hurricanes can be expected each official hurricane season (which runs from June to November.) Southerners hang on his words, as even a mid-sized hurricane can cause billions in damage.
Last week, the pair dropped this announcement out of a clear, blue sky:
“We are discontinuing our early December quantitative hurricane forecast for the next year… Our early December Atlantic basin seasonal hurricane forecasts of the last 20 years have not shown real-time forecast skill…”
In other words, these two famous hurricane forecasters have decided not to issue an early December forecast for the upcoming 2012 hurricane season.
It’s the first time that William Gray has not released a hurricane forecast in 20 years. And these scientists are quitting because they admit their predictions cannot be accurate at this time.
Also, notice who is reporting this. A newspaper in (‘climate renegade’) Canada. These two gentlemen released their statement (which can be viewed here in pdf format) back on December 7th. And yet so far not one US mainstream news outlet has bothered to pick up the story.
Apparently, the public doesn’t have the need or the right to know about such things. It might undercut the idea that computer models can predict the weather even decades from now. When, it turns out, they can’t even predict how many hurricanes we will have just a few months from now.
Anyway, you really have to commend Messrs Gray and Klotzbach for having the courage to admit the truth. They are probably putting at risk both their reputations and a lot grant money at Colorado University.
A State-By-State Look At Effects Of October Snowstorm
A State-By-State Look At Effects Of October Snowstorm – ABC News
A state-by-state look at the effects, as of early Monday, of the late October storm that shocked the Northeast on Saturday and Sunday with up to 30 inches of snow in spots. The wet, heavy snow accumulated on still-leafy trees and snapped off branches or toppled them altogether, taking down power lines. Communications were disrupted by collapsed cell phone towers. More than 3 million people lost power at some point, and at least a dozen deaths are blamed on the storm through traffic accidents, electrocutions or other causes.
Snow falls on Halloween pumpkins at a stand in Westminster, Md. (Mladen Antonov, AFP/Getty Images / October 29, 2011)
CONNECTICUT: More than 750,000 customers still without power, down from more than 830,000, a number that broke the record set by the remnants of Hurricane Irene in August. At least two deaths. Passengers stranded for seven hours or more on tarmac at Hartford’s airport after being diverted from New York-area airports.
MAINE: About 41,000 without power, down from about 160,000. It could be several days before power is restored.
MASSACHUSETTS: More than 500,000 without power. Delays on commuter rail into Boston. Dozens of school districts cancel classes; many communities call off Halloween trick-or-treating because of downed power lines.
MARYLAND: A few thousand without power, down from about 43,000.
NEW JERSEY: Gov. Chris Christie says damage to utilities in the state is worse than that wrought by Irene. More than 400,000 without power, down from more than 612,000. Some rail lines still blocked by fallen branches, snarling the Monday morning commute for many people who live in suburban New York and work in the city.
NEW HAMPSHIRE: About 187,000 without power, down from more than 315,000. Seven shelters open for people without heat.
NEW YORK: More than 270,000 without power, down from more than 300,000. Dozens of motorists stranded up to 10 hours on snow-covered highways north of New York City.
PENNSYLVANIA: More than 200,000 without power, down from about a half-million. At least six deaths.
RHODE ISLAND: More than 1,700 without power, down from about 20,000.
VERMONT: About 7,500 lost power at some point. Areas devastated in August by remnants of Hurricane Irene reported 13 inches.
More Bad News For Al Gore
Nobel Prize-Winning Physicist Resigns Over Global Warming – Fox News
The global warming theory left him out in the cold.
Dr. Ivar Giaever, a former professor with Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and the 1973 winner of the Nobel Prize in physics, abruptly announced his resignation Tuesday, Sept. 13, from the premier physics society in disgust over its officially stated policy that “global warming is occurring.”
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The official position of the American Physical Society (APS) supports the theory that man’s actions have inexorably led to the warming of the planet, through increased emissions of carbon dioxide.
Giaever does not agree – and put it bluntly and succinctly in the subject line of his email, reprinted at Climate Depot, a website devoted to debunking the theory of man-made climate change.
“I resign from APS,” Giaever wrote.
Giaever was cooled to the statement on warming theory by a line claiming that “the evidence is incontrovertible.”
“In the APS it is ok to discuss whether the mass of the proton changes over time and how a multi-universe behaves, but the evidence of global warming is incontrovertible?” he wrote in an email to Kate Kirby, executive officer of the physics society.
“The claim… is that the temperature has changed from ~288.0 to ~288.8 degree Kelvin in about 150 years, which (if true) means to me is that the temperature has been amazingly stable, and both human health and happiness have definitely improved in this ‘warming’ period,” his email message said.
A spokesman for the APS confirmed to FoxNews.com that the Nobel Laureate had declined to pay his annual dues in the society and had resigned. He also noted that the society had no plans to revise its statement.
The use of the word “incontrovertible” had already caused debate within the group, so much so that an addendum was added to the statement discussing its use in April, 2010.
“The word ‘incontrovertible’ …is rarely used in science because by its very nature, science questions prevailing ideas. The observational data indicate a global surface warming of 0.74 °C (+/- 0.18 °C) since the late 19th century.”
Giaever earned his Nobel for his experimental discoveries regarding tunneling phenomena in superconductors. He has since become a vocal dissenter from the alleged “consensus” regarding man-made climate fears, Climate Depot reported, noting that he was one of more than 100 co-signers of a 2009 letter to President Obama critical of his position on climate change.
Public perception of climate change has steadily fallen since late 2009. A Rasmussen Reports public opinion poll from August noted that 57 percent of adults believe there is significant disagreement within the scientific community on global warming, up five points from late 2009.
The same study showed that 69 percent of those polled believe it’s at least somewhat likely that some scientists have falsified research data in order to support their own theories and beliefs. Just 6 percent felt confident enough to report that such falsification was “not at all likely.”
Daily Benefactor News – Dr. Simon Atkins On The Mark Levin Show: Hurricane Irene Way Over-Hyped (Video)
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Dr. Simon Atkins: Hurricane Irene Is Being Way Over-Hyped – Right Scoop
Mark Levin had Dr. Simon Atkins on his show a bit ago, shortly after Dr. Atkins’ article was linked on Drudge, and his main beef is that Hurricane Irene is being over-hyped as if it were a much worse hurricane than it really is and it’s causing mass hysteria. He says this is no Katrina, no 1954 Hazel and it’s no Hurricane Ike. Right now it’s a strong category one hurricane and he doesn’t see it really strengthening. But his fear is that when a huge hurricane actually does hit the Northeast, it will be like the boy who cried wolf and people will simply ignore it because they’ve heard it all before.
As for this storm, he says the strongest winds are in the eastern quadrant and that he doesn’t expect many places to get sustained winds over 60mph. That’s not to say that this storm won’t do damage. In fact he believes that it will be in the top 10 for power outages and the storm surge will certainly cause problems. But again, he simply doesn’t believe this hurricane warrants the mass hysteria or the closing of mass transportation.
So I guess we’ll see if he is right. Listen to the interview below.
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Irene Takes Aim On Northeast: 2 Million Ordered Out; ‘People May Die,’ NYC Mayor Warns
Hurricane Irene caused extraordinary disruption Friday as it zeroed in for a catastrophic run up the Eastern Seaboard. More than 2 million people were ordered to move to safer places, and New York announced plans to shut down its entire network of subways for the first time because of a natural disaster.
As the storm’s outermost bands of wind and rain began to lash the Outer Banks of North Carolina, authorities in points farther north begged people to get out of harm’s way. The hurricane lost some strength but still packed winds of almost 100 mph, and officials feared it could wreak devastation in a region not used to tropical weather.
“Don’t wait. Don’t delay,” said President Barack Obama, who decided to cut short his summer vacation by a day and return to Washington. “I cannot stress this highly enough: If you are in the projected path of this hurricane, you have to take precautions now.”
Hurricane warnings were issued from North Carolina to New York, and watches were posted farther north, on the islands of Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard off Massachusetts. Evacuation orders covered 1 million people in New Jersey, 315,000 in Maryland, 300,000 in North Carolina and 100,000 in Delaware.
“This is probably the largest number of people that have been threatened by a single hurricane in the United States,” said Jay Baker, a geography professor at Florida State University.
New York City ordered more than 300,000 people who live in flood-prone areas to leave, including Battery Park City at the southern tip of Manhattan, Coney Island and the beachfront Rockaways. But it was not clear how many would do it, how they would get out or where they would go. Most New Yorkers don’t have a car.
On top of that, the city said it would shut down the subways and buses at noon Saturday, only a few hours after the first rain is expected to fall. The transit system carries about 5 million people on an average weekday, fewer on weekends. It has been shut down several times before, including during a transit workers’ strike in 2005 and after the Sept. 11 attacks a decade ago, but never for weather.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg said there was little authorities could do to force people to leave.
“We do not have the manpower to go door-to-door and drag people out of their homes,” he said. “Nobody’s going to get fined. Nobody’s going to go to jail. But if you don’t follow this, people may die.”
Shelters were opening Friday afternoon, and the city was placed under its first hurricane warning since 1985.
Transit systems in New Jersey and Philadelphia also announced plans to shut down, and Washington declared a state of emergency.
Hundreds of thousands of airline passengers were grounded for the weekend. JetBlue Airways said it was scrubbing about 880 flights between Saturday and Monday, most to and from hub airports in New York and Boston. Other airlines said they were waiting to be more certain about Irene’s path before announcing more cancellations.
Thousands of people were already without power.
In Charleston, S.C., several people had to be rescued after a tree fell on their car.
Defying the orders, hardy holdouts in North Carolina put plywood on windows, gathered last-minute supplies and tied down boats. More than half the people who live on two remote islands, Hatteras and Ocracoke, had ignored orders to leave, and as time to change their minds ran short, officials ordered dozens of body bags. The last ferry from Ocracoke was set to leave at 4 p.m. Friday.
“I anticipate we’re going to have people floating on the streets, and I don’t want to leave them lying there,” said Richard Marlin, fire chief for one of the seven villages on Hatteras. “The Coast Guard will either be pulling people off their roofs like in Katrina or we’ll be scraping them out of their yards.”
Officially, Irene was expected to make landfall Saturday near Morehead City, on the southern end of the Outer Banks, the barrier island chain. But long before the eye crossed the coastline, the blustery winds and intermittent rains were already raking the coast.
National Hurricane Center meteorologist David Zelinsky said earlier Friday that he expected the storm to arrive as a Category 2 or 3 hurricane. Later in the day, other forecasts showed it would strike most of the coast as a Category 1. The scale runs from 1, barely stronger than a tropical storm, to a monstrous 5. On Friday afternoon, Irene was a Category 2.
Regardless of how fierce the storm is when it makes landfall, the coast of North Carolina was expected to get winds of more than 100 mph and waves perhaps as high as 11 feet, Zelinsky said.
“This is a really large hurricane and it is dangerous,” he said. “Whether it is a Category 2 or 3 at landfall, the effects are still going to be strong. I would encourage people to take it seriously.”
Officer Edward Mann was driving down the narrow streets of Nags Head looking for cars in driveways, a telltale sign of people planning to ride out the storm against all advice.
Bucky Domanski, 71, was working in his garage when Mann walked in. He told the officer he planned to stay. Mann handed Domanski a piece of paper with details about the county’s evacuation order. It warned that hurricane force winds would flood the roads and there might not be power or water until well after the storm.
“You understand we can’t help you during the storm,” Mann said.
“I understand,” Domanski replied.
After the Outer Banks, the next target for Irene was the Hampton Roads region of southeast Virginia, a jagged network of inlets and rivers that floods easily. Emergency officials have said the region is more threatened by storm surge, the high waves that accompany a storm, than wind. Gas stations there were low on fuel Friday, and grocery stores scrambled to keep water and bread on the shelves.
In Delaware, Gov. Jack Markell ordered an evacuation of coastal areas.
“We could be open tonight for business, but there’s a very fine line between doing the right thing and putting our staff at risk,” said Alex Heidenberger, owner of Mango Mike’s restaurant in Bethany Beach, who expects to lose $40,000 to $50,000 in business. “It’s not so much we’re worried about the storm coming tonight, but we want to give them a chance to get out of town and get their affairs in order.”
Officials at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington said they were speeding the transfer of their last remaining patients to the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md. The transfer had been planned for Sunday.
In Baltimore’s Fells Point neighborhood, one of the city’s oldest waterfront neighborhoods, people filled sandbags and placed them at the entrances to buildings. A few miles away at the Port of Baltimore, vehicles and cranes continued to unload huge cargo ships that were rushing to offload and get away from the storm.
In Atlantic City, N.J., all 11 casinos announced plans to shut down Friday, only the third time that has happened in the 33-year history of legalized gambling in that state.
“I like gambling, but you don’t play with this,” Pearson Callender said as he waited for a Greyhound bus out of town. “People are saying this is an act of God. I just need to get home to be with my family.”
Click HERE For The National Hurricane Center Website
Click HERE For The Weather Underground Website
Click HERE For The AccuWeather Website
Click HERE To Watch The Weather Channel Online
Daily Benefactor News – NC Counties Tell Thousands To Leave As Hurricane Irene Looms
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NC Counties Tell Thousands To Leave As Hurricane Irene Looms – ABC News
Thousands were fleeing an exposed strip of coastal villages and beaches off North Carolina on Thursday as Irene approached, threatening to become the first major hurricane to hit the East Coast in seven years.
Hours after a hurricane watch was issued for much of the state’s coast, emergency officials expanded evacuation orders to include hundreds of thousands of tourists and locals in three counties. The areas include the barrier island chain known as the Outer Banks, which is expected to take the brunt of Irene’s first hit over the weekend.
The governors of North Carolina and Virginia also made emergency declarations to free up storm recovery resources, while the Navy began moving dozens of ships out to sea from ports in Irene’s path. And emergency officials all the way to New England were urging residents in low-lying areas to gather supplies and learn the way to a safe location.
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The storm is expected to come ashore Saturday in North Carolina with winds of around 115 (185 kph). Forecasters predict it will then chug up the East Coast, dumping rain from Virginia to New York City before a much-weakened form trudges through New England.
As the sun rose over North Carolina’s barrier islands, tourists packed suitcases in their cars, while locals stocked up on food, water and gas. Traffic was moving briskly Thursday morning on the two-lane highway that cuts through many of the coastal communities, but many feared that would change.
“It’s going to be a mess,” said 66-year-old Buxton resident Leon Reasor as he stood inside a local bait shop. “Anyone who tells you they’re not worried is a liar.”
An evacuation order for an estimated 150,000 visitors took effect Thursday in Dare County, while its 35,000 permanent residents were told to begin leaving the next day. Tourists and locals in Hyde County were also told to move inland, as were visitors in Currituck County.
“It wouldn’t behoove anyone to stay in these circumstances,” Dare County emergency management spokeswoman Sharon Sullivan said. “Businesses are boarding up. Nobody can guarantee their safety.”
Craig Fugate, the head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, said residents should pay attention to local broadcasters to see if an evacuation order is made. Among the most important tasks, he said, was figuring out a safe place to go before hitting the road.
“When you evacuate, you want to know where you’re going and make sure you have somewhere to go, not just get on the road with everybody else and hope you find some place,” Fugate said Thursday on CBS’s “The Early Show.”
All along the East Coast, officials were calculating what they needed to do as Irene continued its march across the Caribbean toward the U.S. The Navy ordered 64 ships to leave Norfolk and other Virginia ports, saying they can better weather the storm at sea.
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg urged residents living in low-lying areas on Thursday to line up a place to stay on high ground ahead of possible evacuations this weekend. He said he would make a decision by late Friday on whether to evacuate neighborhoods along the water in several boroughs.
Even without hurricane-force winds, northeastern states already drenched from a rainy August could see flooding and fallen trees from Irene.
“You want to go into a hurricane threat with dry soil, low rivers, a half moon,” New Jersey state climatologist David Robinson said.
Early Thursday, the storm was pounding the Bahamas with widespread damage reported on at least two southern islands. It was a powerful Category 3 hurricane with winds at 115 mph (185 kph). Forecasters said the winds will ramp up quickly over the next day and Irene was expected to blow into a monstrous Category 4 with winds at least 131 mph (210 mph).
While the storm’s path isn’t definite, officials are taking nothing for granted.
In Maryland, inspections of bridges looking for cracks in the support piers and other structural features found no damage, according to state transportation agency spokeswoman Teri Moss. In Virginia, with a southeastern corner that could be in Irene’s way, cities along the coast are reviewing their evacuation plans, said Laura Southard, spokeswoman for the state Department of Emergency Management.
North Carolina’s Outer Banks, which look the likeliest to get a serious hit from Irene, have a long history of hurricanes, and building codes and emergency plans reflect that. Structures in the region are designed to withstand up to 110 mph sustained winds and gusts of up to 130 mph for three minutes. Evacuation routes are meticulously planned, down to the order in which counties hit the road.
Ocracoke Island, a tiny Outer Banks community, has already ordered visitors off, but it has special challenges since it’s only accessible to the mainland by boat.
Some of the region’s most popular destinations rely on the ailing Bonner Bridge, which was built in 1963 and intended to last 30 years, to connect Hatteras Island to the northern Outer Banks. There’s no other way to reach Hatteras except by boat.
The bridge handles about 2 million cars a year and the state DOT ranks it a 2 on its safety meter, with 100 being the highest, or most safe, designation.
“We’re going to shift people and resources around to do what we need to do and keep the roads open,” said North Carolina Department of Transportation spokeswoman Nicole Meister. The 2.7-mile bridge won’t stay open if it’s deemed unsafe – which happened during Hurricane Earl last year – but the state has an emergency ferry terminal ready in that case to get people off the island, Meister said.
Farther north, precautions so far were mainly wait-and-see as officials watched for developments in the forecast.
New York City officials had begun preparations to evacuate residents from low-lying areas of the city if necessary. The city’s subway stations and tunnels would likely be flooded in places, and officials plan to shut the system down ahead of time to reduce damage to the infrastructure.
“The sense is that we’re going to be facing a strong tropical storm” with winds of 40 to 60 mph, said Office of Emergency Management Commissioner Joseph F. Bruno.
But Bruno added that the city’s agencies were preparing for a Category 1 hurricane with winds surpassing 74 mph and waters surging dangerously in low-lying areas. With five hospitals and nursing homes in the area, officials were readying to possibly evacuate the most frail and needy.
Roads and bridges in Massachusetts are likely to bear the weather in good condition, said Peter Judge, a spokesman for the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency. But the agency is planning for flooding and is keeping an eye on the 3,000 public and private dams throughout the state.
Meanwhile, a new tropical depression formed far out over the Atlantic on Thursday, with the National Hurricane Center saying it would likely become a tropical storm later in the day.
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Earth May Be Headed Into A Mini Ice Age Within A Decade
Earth May Be Headed Into A Mini Ice Age Within A Decade – The Register
What may be the science story of the century is breaking this evening, as heavyweight US solar physicists announce that the Sun appears to be headed into a lengthy spell of low activity, which could mean that the Earth – far from facing a global warming problem – is actually headed into a mini Ice Age.
The announcement made on 14 June (18:00 UK time) comes from scientists at the US National Solar Observatory (NSO) and US Air Force Research Laboratory. Three different analyses of the Sun’s recent behaviour all indicate that a period of unusually low solar activity may be about to begin.
The Sun normally follows an 11-year cycle of activity. The current cycle, Cycle 24, is now supposed to be ramping up towards maximum strength. Increased numbers of sunspots and other indications ought to be happening: but in fact results so far are most disappointing. Scientists at the NSO now suspect, based on data showing decades-long trends leading to this point, that Cycle 25 may not happen at all.
This could have major implications for the Earth’s climate. According to a statement issued by the NSO, announcing the research:
An immediate question is whether this slowdown presages a second Maunder Minimum, a 70-year period with virtually no sunspots [which occurred] during 1645-1715.
As NASA notes:
Early records of sunspots indicate that the Sun went through a period of inactivity in the late 17th century. Very few sunspots were seen on the Sun from about 1645 to 1715. Although the observations were not as extensive as in later years, the Sun was in fact well observed during this time and this lack of sunspots is well documented. This period of solar inactivity also corresponds to a climatic period called the “Little Ice Age” when rivers that are normally ice-free froze and snow fields remained year-round at lower altitudes. There is evidence that the Sun has had similar periods of inactivity in the more distant past.
During the Maunder Minimum and for periods either side of it, many European rivers which are ice-free today – including the Thames – routinely froze over, allowing ice skating and even for armies to march across them in some cases.
“This is highly unusual and unexpected,” says Dr Frank Hill of the NSO. “But the fact that three completely different views of the Sun point in the same direction is a powerful indicator that the sunspot cycle may be going into hibernation.”
Hill’s own research focuses on surface pulsations of the Sun and their relationship with sunspots, and his team has already used their methods to successfully predict the late onset of Cycle 24.
“We expected to see the start of the zonal flow for Cycle 25 by now,” Hill explained, “but we see no sign of it. This indicates that the start of Cycle 25 may be delayed to 2021 or 2022, or may not happen at all.”
Hill’s results match those from physicists Matt Penn and William Livingston, who have gone over 13 years of sunspot data from the McMath-Pierce Telescope at Kitt Peak in Arizona. They have seen the strength of the magnetic fields which create sunspots declining steadily. According to the NSO:
Penn and Livingston observed that the average field strength declined about 50 gauss per year during Cycle 23 and now in Cycle 24. They also observed that spot temperatures have risen exactly as expected for such changes in the magnetic field. If the trend continues, the field strength will drop below the 1,500 gauss threshold and spots will largely disappear as the magnetic field is no longer strong enough to overcome convective forces on the solar surface.
In parallel with this comes research from the US Air Force’s studies of the solar corona. Richard Altrock, in charge of this, has found a 40-year decline in the “rush to the poles” – the poleward surge of magnetic activity in the corona.
“Those wonderful, delicate coronal features are actually powerful, robust magnetic structures rooted in the interior of the Sun,” Altrock says. “Changes we see in the corona reflect changes deep inside the Sun …
“Cycle 24 started out late and slow and may not be strong enough to create a rush to the poles, indicating we’ll see a very weak solar maximum in 2013, if at all. If the rush to the poles fails to complete, this creates a tremendous dilemma for the theorists … No one knows what the Sun will do in that case.”
According to the collective wisdom of the NSO, another Maunder Minimum may very well be on the cards.
“If we are right,” summarises Hill, “this could be the last solar maximum we’ll see for a few decades. That would affect everything from space exploration to Earth’s climate.”
The effects on space exploration would be benign, as fewer or no solar storms would make space a much less hostile environment for human beings. At the moment, anyone venturing beyond the Earth’s protective magnetic field (the only people to have done so were the Apollo moon astronauts of the 1960s and ’70s) runs a severe risk of dangerous or fatal radiation exposure during a solar storm.
Manned missions beyond low Earth orbit, a stated aspiration of the USA and other nations, might become significantly safer and cheaper to mount (cheaper as there would be no requirement for possibly very heavy shielding to protect astronauts, so reducing launch costs).
The big consequences of a major solar calm spell, however, would be climatic. The next few generations of humanity might not find themselves trying to cope with global warming but rather with a significant cooling. This could overturn decades of received wisdom on such things as CO2 emissions, and lead to radical shifts in government policy worldwide.
New Round Of Deadly Tornadoes Kills Nine In Oklahoma, Kansas And Arkansas
New Round Of Deadly Tornadoes Kills Nine In Oklahoma, Kansas And Arkansas – New York Daily News
Another round of killer tornadoes tore through the Midwest on Tuesday, leaving at least five people dead in Oklahoma and two both in Kansas and Arkansas.
Several twisters shot through Oklahoma City and its suburbs during rush hour, killing five and leaving 60 injured, including three kids in critical condition.
The new line of high-powered storms struck just two days after a massive tornado barreled through Joplin, Mo., killing at least 122 people and injuring 750, officials said.
Four people died in El Reno, west of Oklahoma City, where winds were clocked up to 151 mph. A 26-year-old woman died when a tornado smashed into her mobile home in Chickasha, southwest of Oklahoma City, said police.
In Kansas, a twister hurled a huge tree onto a car in the town of St. John, killing two people.
Storm systems spawning tornadoes and baseball-sized hail also moved north and east across north Texas last night, filling the sky with debris but causing noinjuries.
In Arlington, Tex., tornado sirens began screaming in Rangers Ballpark during the fourth inning of the Rangers-White Sox game.
.
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As the sky turned pitch black, the game was called and fans were evacuated through service tunnels. Thunderstorms, but no tornados, passed over the stadium.
But tornadoes were reported moving north and east across north Texas during the night. They caused damage but no injuries in parts of Dallas and Tarrant counties.
And officials warned that more severe weather was expected.
“Unfortunately, this event will likely continue for some time,” Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin said. “I am asking all Oklahomans to stay aware of the weather and to take proper precautions to keep themselves out of harm’s way.”
Meanwhile, rescue crews toiled throughout the day in Joplin in a desperate search for survivors amid the splintered homes, fallen trees and crushed cars. It was the deadliest tornado there in 60 years.
President Obama, who is planning to visit Joplin on Sunday, said in London yesterday, “The American people are by your side. We’re going to stay there until every home is repaired, until every neighborhood is rebuilt, until every business is back on its feet.”
Efforts focused on the remains of a Home Depot store and a Walmart, withsearch-and-rescue dogs hunting for survivors.
Rescuers in Joplin were given some reason for hope as they pulled 17 survivors from the rubble.
But the blue-collar town of 50,000 was far from out of the woods. Fire from gas leaks continued to burn, and weather forecasters said similar conditions could emerge to set off other large tornado outbreaks in the Midwest.
The National Weather Service said last Sunday’s crippling twister appeared to be a rare “multivortex” tornado, with two or more small and intense centers of rotation orbiting the larger funnel.
It ranked as an EF5 – the highest on a scale used by weather experts – with winds greater than 200 mph. At its peak, the massive funnel cloud was three-quarters of amile wide.
Until now, the single deadliest twister killed 116 in Flint, Mich., in 1953.
Daily Benefactor News – NYC Sanitation Department’s Slow Snow Cleanup Was A Union Budget Protest
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NYC Sanitation Department’s Slow Snow Cleanup Was A Union Budget Protest – New York Post
Selfish Sanitation Department bosses from the snow-slammed outer boroughs ordered their drivers to snarl the blizzard cleanup to protest budget cuts – a disastrous move that turned streets into a minefield for emergency-services vehicles, The Post has learned.
Miles of roads stretching from as north as Whitestone, Queens, to the south shore of Staten Island still remained treacherously unplowed last night because of the shameless job action, several sources and a city lawmaker said, which was over a raft of demotions, attrition and budget cuts.
“They sent a message to the rest of the city that these particular labor issues are more important,” said City Councilman Dan Halloran (R-Queens), who was visited yesterday by a group of guilt-ridden sanitation workers who confessed the shameless plot.
Halloran said he met with three plow workers from the Sanitation Department – and two Department of Transportation supervisors who were on loan – at his office after he was flooded with irate calls from constituents.
The snitches “didn’t want to be identified because they were afraid of retaliation,” Halloran said. “They were told [by supervisors] to take off routes [and] not do the plowing of some of the major arteries in a timely manner. They were told to make the mayor pay for the layoffs, the reductions in rank for the supervisors, shrinking the rolls of the rank-and-file.”
New York’s Strongest used a variety of tactics to drag out the plowing process – and pad overtime checks – which included keeping plows slightly higher than the roadways and skipping over streets along their routes, the sources said.
The snow-removal snitches said they were told to keep their plows off most streets and to wait for orders before attacking the accumulating piles of snow.
They said crews normally would have been more aggressive in com bating a fierce, fast-moving bliz zard like the one that barreled in on Sunday and blew out the next morning.
The workers said the work slowdown was the result of growing hostility between the mayor and the workers responsible for clearing the snow.
In the last two years, the agency’s workforce has been slashed by 400 trash haulers and supervisors – down from 6,300 – because of the city’s budget crisis. And, effective tomorrow, 100 department supervisors are to be demoted and their salaries slashed as an added cost-saving move.
Sources said budget cuts were also at the heart of poor planning for the blizzard last weekend. The city broke from its usual routine and did not call in a full complement on Saturday for snow preparations in order to save on added overtime that would have had to be paid for them to work on Christmas Day.
The result was an absolute collapse of New York’s once-vaunted systems of clearing the streets and keeping mass transit moving under the weight of 20 inches of snow.
The Sanitation Department last night denied there was a concerted effort to slow snow removal.
“There are no organized or wildcat actions being taken by the sanitation workers or the supervisors,” said spokesman Matthew Lipani.
Joseph Mannion, president of the union that represents agency supervisors, said talk of a slowdown “is hogwash.” But he admitted there is “resentment out there” toward Mayor Bloomberg and his administration because of budget cuts.
His counterpart at the rank-and-file’s union, Harry Nespoli, has also denied there is a job action, though he admitted his guys are working lucrative 14-hour shifts.
Bloomberg spokesman Stu Loeser said only: “We would hope this is not the case.”
But multiple Sanitation Department sources told The Post yesterday that angry plow drivers have only been clearing streets assigned to them even if that means they have to drive through snowed-in roads with their plows raised.
And they are keeping their plow blades unusually high, making it necessary for them to have to run extra passes, adding time and extra pay.
One mechanic said some drivers are purposely smashing plows and salt spreaders to further stall the cleanup effort.
“That is a disgrace. I had to walk three miles because the buses can’t move,” said salesman Yuri Vesslin, 38, of Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn.
Meanwhile, Bloomberg – quickly becoming the public face of failure this week – spent a second consecutive day yesterday defending himself to critics of his administration’s handling of the storm.
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Daily Benefactor News – Blizzard Horror Stories In New York City As Nanny Bloomberg’s Government Drops Ball
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A blizzard baby delivered inside the lobby of a snowbound Brooklyn building died after an emergency call of a woman in labor brought no help for nine excruciating hours.
The baby’s mother, a 22-year-old college senior, was recovering Tuesday night at Interfaith Medical Center, where her newborn was pronounced dead at 6:34 p.m. on Monday. That was 10 hours after the first 911 call from the bloody vestibule on Brooklyn Ave. in Crown Heights.
“No one could get to her. Crown Heights was not plowed, and no medical aid came for hours,” said the student’s mother.
By the time a horde of firefighters and cops finally trooped to her aid through snow-covered blocks, the baby was unconscious and unresponsive, sources said.
Details of the tragedy emerged as the abominable snowstorm continued to wreak havoc across a city still digging out from the wintry blast. Some of the other blizzard horrors include:
In Queens, a woman tried to reach 911 operators for 20 minutes Monday and then waited for three hours for first responders to arrive. By then, her mom had died, state Sen. Jose Peralta’s office said.
Laura Freeman, 41, said her mother, Yvonne Freeman, 75, woke her at 8 a.m. because she was having trouble breathing. When the daughter couldn’t get through to 911, she enlisted neighbors and relatives, who also began calling.
One of the callers reached an operator at 8:20 a.m., but responders stymied by snow-clogged streets didn’t reach the Corona home until 11:05 a.m., said Peralta, who wants the death investigated.
“The EMS workers walked down the block trudging through snow,” Freeman said. “They tried. I could tell by the look on their faces. I really would just like [Mayor] Bloomberg to admit that there were casualties.”
A woman in Sunset Park, Brooklyn, was forced to spend the night with her dead father after the medical examiner’s office took more than 24 hours to claim his body. Ismael Vazquez died at 10:31 a.m. on Monday, and the 82-year-old man’s body remained in his bed until 1 p.m. yesterday. His daughter kept vigil in the living room.
“This is New York City, and I’m a New Yorker, and this is not the first storm we’ve ever had,” said Florence Simancas, 51, holding back tears. “Somebody dropped the ball … big-time.”
A Brooklyn woman was left sobbing at a Bay Ridge bus stop yesterday when the driver said there was no way to get her to a doctor’s appointment in Bensonhurst.
“Please help. I have a doctor’s appointment that is important and I can’t get nowhere,” 64-year-old Ludmila Kowalow said. “I don’t know what to do,” she added, throwing her hands in the air.
A 76-year-old Bay Ridge heart attack victim nearly died when an FDNY ambulance became stuck in a snowbank, but he was rescued by a gang of good Samaritans lugging him through the unplowed streets on a sled fashioned from a gurney.
“My husband could be dead right now,” said Lucy Pastore, whose husband, Salvatore, was in stable condition at Lutheran Medical Center. “The mayor acts like this is a minor inconvenience. Makes me sick.”
Still, nothing approached the tragedy of the newborn on the busiest day for 911 calls since Sept. 11, 2001.
The pregnant woman was walking from her home to the nearby hospital in the still-swirling snow when she ducked into the building lobby, unable to make it any farther.
The young woman had not told her family she was pregnant – she didn’t want to disappoint relatives – or that she and her college boyfriend had decided to put the child up for adoption.
An 8:30 a.m. 911 call was made, with the caller saying the birth wasn’t imminent, a Fire Department source told the Daily News. The call received a low priority, and the city unsuccessfully tried twice to contact the caller during the next few hours, the source said. A second, more urgent 911 call at 4:30 p.m. reported the woman was bleeding and the baby was crowning – and the call was upgraded to level two, the source said.
An hour later, the NYPD contacted the FDNY/EMS to report the baby had been delivered but was unconscious. Cops cut the umbilical cord and tried to revive the newborn, police source said.
The call was then upgraded to level one – highest priority – and an FDNY crew arrived in 12 minutes, sources said. EMTs were on the scene at 6 p.m.
“The mayor was spouting nonsense to say Crown Heights was plowed. It wasn’t,” the woman’s mother said. “No one could get to her … any other day she would have gotten to a hospital.”
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Flag Removed: Interview with school Superintendent — KTXL
KTXL FOX40 - This is simply unacceptablde! The “supervisor” who told the child to take the flag off should be fired! Luckily the outrage made the wimps and political correctors eat their words and retreat. And the kids who might cause problems over an American flag need to be dealt with, and if they cannot learn to be tolerant, they ought to be booted out of school! If safety is a concern, then by George punish those who use threats of violence, not those exercising their rights!
Gatordoug
darcprynce
Dave C
