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Severe floods claim 11 lives in southern Thailand
BANGKOK, March 30 — The number of current flood-related deaths in the southern provinces now stands at 11 with the most casualties–seven persons–registered in Nakhon Si Thammarat followed by three victims in Surat Thani and one in Phatthalung, Disaster Prevention and Mitigation Director-General Vibul Sanguanpong said on Wednesday.
Their Majesties the King and Queen have given funds to the Red Cross for emergency help to flood victims in southern provinces, naval and other ships are involved in rescue and supply operations, and the prime minister and flood relief coordinator Satit Wonghnongtaey have Read more…
California water future called ‘bleak’
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by Staff Writers
Sacramento (UPI) Feb 24, 2011
Scientists say the water situation in California is “bleak” and the state needs to act to bolster its entire aquatic ecosystem.
“Our assessment of the current water situation [in California] is bleak,” says Ellen Hanak, a Public Policy Institute of California economist. “California has essentially run out of cheap, new water sources.”
The institute has released its findings in a publication written by a team of scientists, engineers, economists and legal experts from three University of California campuses and Stanford University, AAA ScienceMag.org reported Thursday.
Their report says water quality is deteriorating, pollution from agricultural runoff is increasing, and efforts to manage water and species recovery are Read more…
China’s droughts nears worst in 200 years, adding pressure to world food prices
The recent unrest in the Middle East, which has been attributed, in part, to high food prices, gives us a warning of the type of global unrest that might result in future years if the climate continues to warm as expected. A hotter climate means more severe droughts will occur. We can expect an increasing number of unprecedented heat waves and droughts like the 2010 Russian drought in coming decades. This will significantly increase the odds of a world food emergency far worse than the 2007 – 2008 global food crisis. When we also consider the world’s expanding population and the possibility that peak oil will make fertilizers and agriculture much more expensive, we have the potential for a perfect storm of events aligning in the near future, with droughts made significantly worse by climate change contributing to events that will cause disruption of the global economy, intense political turmoil, and war. Read more…
Flooding Risk Raised for Midwest, Northeast, Neighboring Canada
Concerns for flooding continue through next week as two storms roll through the Midwest and the Northeast and adjoining areas of southern Canada.
First Storm
The storm coming today into Friday traveling from the Midwest to the Northeast U.S. will be the colder of the two storms.
What this means is that snow or a wintry mix will fall from around the central and lower Great Lakes through the northern mid-Atlantic and into New England. Rain will fall over the Ohio Valley through most of the balance of the mid-Atlantic and into southeastern New England and Nova Scotia.
Up north and well inland of the coast the snow and wintry mix will add to the water equivalent of the existing snowpack or will reduce that snowpack by very little.
According to Chief Meteorologist Elliot Abrams, “Farther south and along the coast, heavy rain or the combination of rain and melting snow and ice will lead to urban flooding problems and perhaps some rises on streams and rivers.”
With the ground still frozen in some areas, the water will run off crossing roads, collect in fields, backyards and city streets.
According to Senior Meteorologist and Indiana native Jim Andrews, “In the Ohio and Tennessee valleys into Friday, enough rain can fall without the aid of melting snow to lead to rises on rivers and small stream flooding.” Read more…
UA climate research: Big stretch of US coast at risk of rising seas
If global temperatures continue to rise and polar ice continues to melt, 9 percent of the land in our coastal cities and towns will be beneath sea level by the end of the century, University of Arizona researchers say.
Climate researchers Jeremy Weiss and Jonathan Overpeck, along with Ben Strauss of Climate Central in Princeton, N.J., mapped the U.S. coastline, using elevations provided by the U.S. Geological Survey. They applied the most recent predictions of a sea level rise of 1 meter (3.28 feet) by 2100 to produce a map that predicts big trouble for 20 cities with more than 300,000 people and for 160 smaller municipalities.
Weiss is a senior researcher in geosciences. Overpeck is a professor of geosciences and atmospheric sciences and co-director of the UA’s Institute of the Environment.
The report was published last week in Climatic Change Letters.
The biggest impact will be felt in low-lying, heavily populated places such as New Orleans, Miami Beach and Virginia Beach, the report says.
Subsequent centuries will bring even higher sea levels that could completely submerge Read more…
Stonehenge Beneath the Waters of Lake Michigan
Has a Stonehenge like structure been discovered underneath the waters of Lake Michigan. If so, the site could be around 10,000 years old!
[Image: Standing stones beneath Lake Michigan? View larger].
In a surprisingly under-reported story from 2007, Mark Holley, a professor of underwater archaeology at Northwestern Michigan University College, discovered a series of stones – some of them arranged in a circle and one of which seemed to show carvings of a mastodon – 40-feet beneath the surface waters of Lake Michigan.
If verified, the carvings could be as much as 10,000 years old – coincident with the post Read more…
New York State Begins Planning for Sea Level Rise Major changes to development planning an
Major changes to development planning and conservation along coastlines from the tip of Long Island all way up the Hudson River Valley are recommended
RISING TIDE: Rising sea levels will not just affect New York City but communities from Long Island all the way up the Hudson River in New York State. Image: Photo by aturkus, courtesy Flickr
NEW YORK — New York state is beginning to take the threat of sea level rise attributed to climate change seriously as a new government prepares to settle in next year.
Starting Monday, state officials in Albany will gather with members of the public to discuss a recently released 93-page report that recommends major changes to development planning and conservation along coastlines from the tip of Long Island all way up the Hudson River Valley.
Any reforms to come from the process, starting next week, would affect about 62 percent of New York state’s population, the proportion estimated to reside now in areas that could be hard hit as rising land and ocean temperatures raise average sea levels around the globe.
“We’ve had an enormous variety of partners involved in this project,” said Kristen Marcell, special projects coordinator at the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation. “We do have to take leadership from the new government, but I think there’s a lot of support in the state agencies for these recommendations and making sure that we’re heading in the right direction.”
Among other changes, report authors say some Read more…
Russian volcano activity causes global concern
Now the world has something else to grip about when it comes to Russia – the weather.
A string of volcanoes on Russia’s eastern seaboard of Kamchatka have been unusually active for the last six months. The dust they threw up diverted winds in the Arctic, pushing cold air over Europe and North America and causing the unusually cold winter this year, say scientists.
The volcanoes (160 in total, of which 29 are active) are still on the go and could create more problems this year, depressing harvests around the world just as global food prices soar and Read more…
Australian ‘inland sea’ flood threatens towns
MELBOURNE — Australia’s flood crisis deepened Saturday with a giant “inland sea” threatening more communities in the southeast, as officials continued the grim search for bodies in worst-hit Queensland.
Sandbagging was underway in some villages in Victoria, where weeks of floods have affected as much as one-third of the state, with swollen rivers overflowing in 75 towns and flooding some 1,770 properties.
“We know that this is the most significant flooding in the north west of Victoria since records began… about 130 years ago,” a spokeswoman for the State Emergency Service told AFP.
“We are still on alert for towns in the north of the state.”
Floodwaters which national broadcaster ABC described as a moving “inland sea” covering an area 90 kilometres (56 miles) long and 40 kilometres wide, were threatening towns around Swan Hill, some 300 kilometres northwest of Melbourne.
“In the actual Swan Hill township itself, we are very confident that the levee system around the town is built to a very high grade and will protect the township,” Mayor Greg Cruickshank told ABC radio.
But rural and outlying areas “will have significant amount of inundation through them,” he said.
While thousands of people around the state have been urged to evacuate, emergency services warned that those people who choose to remain on their properties in the rural areas could be stranded by the floods.
“A number of these communities will be isolated for days as this huge amount of floodwater comes through,” SES spokesman Kevin Monk said. Read more…
Brazil flood and mudslide deaths rise
More than 420 people have now been killed by flooding and mudslides in south-eastern Brazil, officials say.
About 200 people have died in the town of Nova Friburgo, some 175 in Teresopolis and dozens more in Petropolis, media report. Thousands of people have been made homeless.
Rio de Janeiro Governor Sergio Cabral blamed local governments for allowing poor building and illegal occupations.
President Dilma Rousseff has toured damaged areas in Nova Friburgo.
She vowed that there would be “firm action” by the government.
Ms Rousseff was accompanied by Mr Cabral and other politicians and later left for a press conference in Rio, where she spoke of the “dramatic” scenes she had seen.
Expressing solidarity with the victims, she said: “The suffering of the people is very great.”
‘It was hell’
Heavy rain fell early on Thursday as rescuers resumed their search but l Read more…
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