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The Places in the U.S. Where Disaster Strikes Again and Again - The New York Times

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In the last 16 years, parts of Louisiana have been struck by six hurricanes. Areas near San Diego were devastated by three particularly vicious wildfire seasons. And a town in eastern Kentucky has been pummeled by at least nine storms severe enough to warrant federal assistance.

These places are part of a small fraction of the United States that has sustained most of the damage from major natural disasters, forming a pattern of destruction concentrated in particular areas.

About 90 percent of the total losses across the United States occurred in ZIP codes that contain less than 20 percent of the population, according to an analysis of data from the Small Business Administration.

The federal government, through disaster relief programs and flood insurance, subsidizes the cost of rebuilding in areas hit repeatedly by storms, floods and fires. Critics say that encourages too much development in those regions, wasting tens of billions of dollars in tax money and endangering lives.

Christina DeConcini, the director of government affairs at the World Resources Institute, said that federal programs do not adequately emphasize adapting to the risks posed by climate change. She said that instead of just being responsive, the government should stress building for resilience against disasters.

Some residents continue living in disaster-stricken areas because they cannot afford to leave. Others rebuff appeals to resettle, citing deep family ties or a sense of fatalism. Rather than move the town, "it's easier to throw your hands up and say, 'Forget it,'" said Linda Lowe, the president of a historical society in flood-prone Olive Hill, Ky.

"Abandoning a location and moving a city makes sense from a scientific, risk point of view, but the fact is that to get to a place culturally and psychologically where that conversation can be tolerated is a difficult thing to imagine," said Dr. Irwin Redlener, the director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at Columbia University. "It's not all that rational - but I guess a lot of these things are not really rational."

Aftermath of Hurricane Isaac in Slidell, La., in 2012.

Flooding after heavy rains in Morehead, Ky., in 2010.

From left: Mario Tama/Getty Images; John Flavell/The Independent, via Associated Press

As hurricane season begins, residents of Slidell, La., near New Orleans, are planning ahead. Susan McClamroch, who works at a museum there, said that locals joke that they "start eating everything in the freezer" this time of year because of the likelihood of a power failure after a hurricane.

Brian Smith, who runs a print shop in Slidell, said the business flooded in 1995 and again during Hurricane Katrina in 2005. So when Hurricane Isaac hit in 2012, flooding his shop once more, he moved it away from the vulnerable downtown area.

"I'm not going to take that chance again," Mr. Smith said.

John Flavell/The Independent, via Associated Press

Eastern Kentucky is similarly susceptible to disaster. Almost yearly, it is hit with severe storms.

Susan Thomas, who owns a bookstore and coffee shop in Morehead, Ky., said that the store flooded once when her parents owned it. When it flooded again in 2010, she had to throw away 3,000 books.

"Honestly, there was a moment where I was, like, can we recover from this?" she said, adding that she returned to check on the store every time it rained. The business moved to a new location in town the next year.

Three Brothers Bakery in Houston has flooded five times since 2001, most recently during Hurricane Harvey. But its owners, Robert and Janice Jucker, the self-proclaimed "king and queen of disaster," are not moving - and Ms. Jucker, who anticipates more storms, is unafraid.

The Juckers received low-interest disaster loans from the Small Business Administration to rebuild their business after Hurricanes Ike and Harvey. Officials verified the damage and estimated the amount of their property loss.

The agency tracks properties nationwide whose owners or renters applied for disaster loans. Data about these loans provide a window into the geographic pattern of destruction that disasters cause each year.

The pattern of disasters, year by year

Tropical storms, hurricanes

Severe weather, tornadoes, flooding

The New York Times | Source: Small Business Administration

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration attempts to calculate the full cost of major disasters, namely those that cause more than a billion dollars in damages. They estimate that 2017 was the costliest year on record, with 16 billion-dollar disasters that together cost the United States more than $300 billion.

While natural disasters are unpredictable, the annual losses from billion-dollar disasters, adjusted for inflation, have increased over the last 40 years.

Total cost of major natural disasters

For disasters causing more than $1 billion in losses.

The New York Times | Source: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

In the first three months of 2018, billion-dollar storms hit the United States three times. In the first three months of an average year, one disaster that causes more than a billion dollars in damages occurs, according to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration records dating back to 1980.

Climate change is making some kinds of disasters more frequent. Studies show that large wildfires have become more common in the western United States because global warming has made Western forests drier.

But rising damage costs are partly because of demographic shifts and development decisions that make natural disasters more destructive.

Phil Klotzbach, an atmospheric scientist at Colorado State University, said that the rise in population and wealth near the coast was contributing to most of the increase in destruction caused by hurricanes.

In the last century, there has been no clear trend in the frequency of hurricanes that made landfall in the continental United States.

Number of hurricanes that made landfall in the continental United States

Over the same period, the number of buildings has ballooned in parts of the country susceptible to tropical storms as the population in those places has also increased. In 2016, there were more than 3.6 times as many homes in states that border the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean as in 1940, according to the Census Bureau.

The effects of global warming on individual storms have been difficult to determine, scientists say, because there are only about a dozen observed even in an active season.

But scientists also contend that climate change is expected to lead to stronger, wetter hurricanes over all. It has also made them more destructive, Dr. Klotzbach said. Because global sea levels have risen, hurricanes create storm surges that go further inland, flooding homes and businesses.

"You can build your house to withstand pretty much any wind, but the surge is what will get you," he said.

Change in global sea level since 1993

The New York Times | Source: NASA

Only about 4 percent of all hurricanes that make landfall globally hit the United States, said Robert Mendelsohn, an economist at Yale University who studies the damage caused by hurricanes. Yet 60 percent of worldwide damage from hurricanes happens in the United States.

Dr. Mendelsohn attributed this partly to federal government programs that discourage citizens and local governments from building walls to protect housing near the coast. Only in the United States do relief programs and subsidized insurance make it attractive for people to move toward disaster-prone areas, he said.

Where Disaster Struck Each Year

Sources: Federal Emergency Management Agency (disaster types); National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Hurricane Research Division (tropical storm tracks)

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The Places in the U.S. Where Disaster Strikes Again and Again

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In the last 16 years, parts of Louisiana have been struck by six hurricanes. Areas near San Diego were devastated by three particularly vicious wildfire seasons. And a town in eastern Kentucky has been pummeled by at least nine storms severe enough to warrant federal assistance.

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Earth just soared past yet another climate change milestone - Mashable

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This is the highest-ever carbon dioxide level in the air in human history.

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Earth just soared past yet another climate change milestone - Mashable

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Large crack in East African Rift is evidence of continent splitting in two - PBS NewsHour

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Large crack in East African Rift is evidence of continent splitting in two - PBS NewsHour

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A large crack, stretching several kilometres, made a sudden appearance recently in south-western Kenya.

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The Washington Post: Rapid Arctic warming and melting ice are increasing the frequency of blizzards in the Northeast, study finds

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Tsunami watch canceled for West Coast after 7.9 magnitude quake - NBC News

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Tsunami watch canceled for West Coast after 7.9 magnitude quake - NBC News

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A tsunami watch issued for coastal areas from Washington state to California was canceled nearly three hours after a magnitude 7.9 earthquake struck the Gulf of Alaska.

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In case you missed it, the President of the United States called Haiti, El Salvador, and African countries "shitholes," then pretended like he didn't say it, but basically said it all over again.

This matters not just because it's racist (the President is racist, in fact, he is professionally racist), because it's vulgar ("shithole," one of the all-time great swear words, is forever sullied by this), and because it's catastrophically bad for foreign and domestic relations. It matters in part because of the history of Haiti, and the history of racist discourse about Haiti.

Ebony Elizabeth Thomas, a professor of education and scholar who's closely studied these narratives, writes:

The reason why White nationalists like 45 always name Haiti because the Haitian nation & people are unique. Haiti defeated Napoleon, threw off the chains of slavery, and exposed the lie of White supremacy & European imperialism. So there's no end to their hatred for Haiti.

Jonathan Katz, a journalist and former AP correspondent in Haiti who wrote The Big Truck That Went By about Haiti's 2010 earthquake and the cholera epidemic that followed, has a longer thread spelling out how these narratives about Haiti were generated and how they work. Here's a thick excerpt:

In order to do a victory lap around the GDP difference between, say, Norway and Haiti, you have to know nothing about the history of the world. That includes, especially, knowing nothing real about the history of the United States... You'd have to not know that the French colony that became Haiti provided the wealth that fueled the French Empire - and 2/3 of the sugar and 3/4 of the coffee that Europe consumed...

You'd have to not realize that Haiti was founded in a revolution against that system, and that European countries and the United States punished them for their temerity by refusing to recognize or trade with them for decades. You'd have to not know that Haiti got recognition by agreeing to pay 150 million gold francs to French landowners in compensation for their own freedom. You'd have to not know that Haiti paid it, and that it took them almost all of the 19th century to do so.

You'd then have to not know that Haiti was forced to borrow some money to pay back that ridiculous debt, some of it from banks in the United States. And you'd have to not know that in 1914 those banks got President Wilson to send the US Marines to empty the Haitian gold reserve... [You'd] have to not know about the rest of the 20th century either-the systematic theft and oppression, US support for dictators and coups, the US invasions of Haiti in 1994-95 and 2004...

In short, you'd have to know nothing about WHY Haiti is poor (or El Salvador in kind), and WHY the United States (and Norway) are wealthy. But far worse than that, you'd have to not even be interested in asking the question. And that's where they really tell on themselves... Because what they are showing is that they ASSUME that Haiti is just naturally poor, that it's an inherent state borne of the corruption of the people there, in all senses of the word.

And let's just say out loud why that is: It's because Haitians are black.

Racists have needed Haiti to be poor since it was founded. They pushed for its poverty. They have celebrated its poverty. They have tried to profit from its poverty. They wanted it to be a shithole. And they still do.

If Haiti is a shithole, then they can say that black freedom and sovereignty are bad. They can hold it up as proof that white countries-and what's whiter than Norway-are better, because white people are better. They wanted that in 1804, and in 1915, and they want it now.

The history of Haiti is weird because it is absurdly well-documented, yet totally poorly known. It's hard not to attribute that to ideology. We don't teach the Haitian Revolution the way we teach the American, or the French, or the Mexican, because it's a complicated story. Kids are more likely to hear variations of "Haiti formed a pact with the devil to defeat Napoleon" (this is real thing, I swear) than Toussaint Louverture's or Jean-Jacques Dessalines's names.

Also, while Haiti's revolution was an early, signature event in world history-the first time a European power would be overthrown by an indigenous army (but not the last)-the causes of Haiti's poverty are basically identical with those of almost every poor nation around the world: a history of exploitation, bad debt, bad geopolitics, and bad people profiting off of that poverty (almost all of them living elsewhere). And this is basically true about poverty in American cities as well (with all the same attendant racist myths).

Some recommended reading:

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In case you missed it, the President of the United States called Haiti, El Salvador, and African countries "shitholes," then pretended like he didn't say it, but basically said it all over again.

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US hits record for costly weather disasters: $306 billion

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WASHINGTON (AP) - With three strong hurricanes, wildfires, hail, flooding, tornadoes and drought, the United States tallied a record high bill last year for weather disasters: $306 billion.

The U.S. had 16 disasters last year with damage exceeding a billion dollars, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said Monday. That ties 2011 for the number of billion-dollar disasters, but the total cost blew past the previous record of $215 billion in 2005.

Costs are adjusted for inflation and NOAA keeps track of billion-dollar weather disasters going back to 1980.

Three of the five most expensive hurricanes in U.S. history hit last year.

Hurricane Harvey, which caused massive flooding in Texas, cost $125 billion, second only to 2005's Katrina, while Maria's damage in Puerto Rico cost $90 billion, ranking third, NOAA said. Irma was $50 billion, mainly in Florida, for the fifth most expensive hurricane.

Western wildfires fanned by heat racked up $18 billion in damage, triple the U.S. wildfire record, according to NOAA.

Besides Texas, Florida and Puerto Rico, California, Colorado, Minnesota, Nebraska, Missouri, Illinois, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee and North Carolina all had more than $1 billion in damage from the 16 weather disasters in 2017.

"While we have to be careful about knee-jerk cause-effect discussions, (many scientific studies) show that some of today's extremes have climate change fingerprints on them," said University of Georgia meteorology professor Marshall Shepherd, a past president of the American Meteorological Society.

NOAA announced its figures at the society's annual conference in Austin, Texas.

The U.S. averages six of the billion-dollar weather disasters each year, costing a bit more than $40 billion annually.

The increase in billion-dollar weather disasters is likely a combination of more flooding, heat and storm surge from climate change along with other non-climate changes, such as where buildings are put, where people move and how valuable their property is, said Deke Arndt, NOAA's climate monitoring chief.

"Perhaps it is time to mandate urban development in a more resilient and sustainable manner given the increasing frequency of weather extremes, especially along the nation's coasts," Susan Cutter, director of the University of South Carolina's Hazards and Vulnerability Research Institute, said in an email.

The weather agency also said that 2017 was the third hottest year in U.S. records for the Lower 48 states with an annual temperature of 54.6 degrees (12.6 degrees Celsius) - 2.6 degrees warmer than the 20th century average . Only 2012 and 2016 were warmer. The five warmest years for the Lower 48 states have all happened since 2006.

Arndt said the U.S. - which has had above normal annual temperatures for 21 straight years - is showing the same warming effects as the rest of the world. The burning of coal, oil and gas emits heat-trapping gases that change Earth's climate.

This was the third straight year that all 50 states had above average temperatures for the year.

Five states - Arizona, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina and New Mexico - had their warmest year ever.

Temperature records go back to 1895.

___

Follow Seth Borenstein on Twitter at @borenbears . His work can be found here .

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US hits record for costly weather disasters: $306 billion

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WASHINGTON (AP) - With three strong hurricanes, wildfires, hail, flooding, tornadoes and drought, the United States tallied a record high bill last year for weather disasters: $306 billion. The U.S. had 16 disasters last year with damage exceeding a billion dollars, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said Monday.

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The impacts of climate change are among the environmental challenges facing Iran that helped spark protests in dozens of cities across the Islamic republic.

At least 20 people have died in the uprising, driven by the sudden collapse of financial institutions, low wages and mistrust of national leaders. Rising temperatures are seen by some experts as an underlying condition for the economic hardships that led to the unrest.

A severe drought, mismanaged water resources and dust storms diminished Iran's economy in recent years, according to experts who study the region. While the protests are largely driven by resistance to the country's hardline conservative government, such environmental factors might have contributed to the largest protests inside Iran in years.

Former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad understood that climate change and water mismanagement was ravaging family farms, and his government provided subsidies to families who struggled to put food on the table, said Amir Handjani, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council's South Asia Center. When the current president, Hassan Rouhani, signaled that he would reduce those benefits, enraged Iranians across the nation's arid countryside joined the wave of protests.

"You have climate change, shortage of water, they can't grow their crops, and now they're getting their cash handouts taken away," said Handjani. "It's a panoply of issues coming together at once."

Among the sparks of activism are corruption, nepotism, rippling effects of low oil prices and sour reactions to the Trump administration's denunciations of Iran, said Barbara Slavin, director of the Future of Iran Initiative at the Atlantic Council.

She said the role of climate change on the protests is "massive" and underreported by the media. The protests have largely sprung from provincial cities that climate refugees now call home, instead of the capital, Tehran. Those areas have traditionally been more conservative and less willing to speak out against the ayatollahs, she said.

"Iran has had a drought for 14 years, and many of these people who come into these provincial cities and towns are there because they could not function as farmers anymore; there was no water for their farms," Slavin said.

While the unrest in recent weeks was initially sparked by rising egg prices and anger over planned cuts to subsidies, one of Iran's biggest economic challenges has been a cycle of extreme droughts that started in the late 1990s, said Suzanne Maloney, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution's Energy Security and Climate Initiative.

"The drought has certainly impacted Iran's economy broadly, and it's impacted quality of life and living patterns, migration patterns around Iran quite considerably," she said. "It's an issue of huge political importance, one that factored into the presidential election last year, so it's certainly something I think one can say has had a role in shaping frustrations and driving some of the underlying grievances around the protests."

Iran is increasingly vulnerable to climate change, experts say. Rainfall in the Middle East is expected to fall 20 percent by the end of the century, and temperatures could rise by as much as 5 degrees Celsius, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

By 2070, the Persian Gulf could experience a spike in heat waves that are hard for humans to survive, according to a Massachusetts Institute of Technology study published in 2015. The worst effects of such extremes could be curtailed with a drop in emissions from fossil fuels, a large percentage of which come from fossil fuels derived from the Middle East.

This summer, Iran recorded one of the highest temperatures witnessed on Earth, at 128.7 degrees Fahrenheit.

A series of man-made challenges, such as a rush to put dams on many of the country's primary rivers, also complicated water access problems. Reduced water supplies placed economic pressures on rural areas and smaller cities that have suffered some of the most severe environmental impacts, observers say.

There is a growing sense of environmentalism in Iran, in response to the drought and deadly heat waves, said Kaveh Ehsani, a professor at DePaul University and an expert on Iranian politics. Extreme heat waves have hit a large percentage of impoverished Iranians in particular, he said.

While middle- and upper-class people can afford air conditioners in a region where temperatures reach 110 degrees for several days in a row, many others cannot. They are forced to work in deadly temperatures or lose paid work hours, Ehsani said. In addition, increased desertification has caused enormous dust storms that engulf cities and freeze activity, sometimes killing people caught in them, he said.

Environmental issues have brought some protesters into the streets, Ehsani said, in part because climate change is now seen as a contributor to inequity. Newscasts on the environment are potentially reinforcing Iranian views, since that topic is not generally censured by government officials. Environmental issues aren't seen through the same political lens as they are in the United States, he said.

The Trump administration's retreat from the Paris climate agreement and its larger rejection of climate policy mean that Iranian citizens are increasingly blaming environmental problems on the United States, Ehsani said.

"Environmentalism has become much more of a class issue, not just middle class anymore, but really affecting poor people," he said. "It's become a big part of everyday awareness. There are a lot of websites, a lot of activism around, and because it's not openly political and who can morally object to this or say it's Trump's doing, there has been a revolution about this in the past decade and a half."

In recent years, there's been a recognition at the highest levels of the Iranian government that climate change poses an acute threat.

Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has called on the country to address climate change. In a 2015 letter, he wrote that Iran must "manage climate change and environment threats such as desertification, especially dust pollution [and] drought."

The directive from the ayatollah and was addressed to President Rouhani, came just before world leaders met in Paris to craft the groundbreaking climate agreement. Such directives are typically used to set policy goals. Iran signed onto the Paris initiative and agreed to reduce its emissions 12 percent and to spend $5 billion on conservation efforts.

Trump has praised the Iranian protesters on Twitter, but has been less clear about what the United States would do to support the rebellion.

"The people of Iran are finally acting against the brutal and corrupt Iranian regime," Trump tweeted. "All of the money that President Obama so foolishly gave them went into terrorism and into their 'pockets.' The people have little food, big inflation and no human rights. The U.S. is watching!"

Iran's increasingly desperate situation is an opportunity for the United States to help the Islamic republic address its ecological challenges, said Slavin of the Atlantic Council. Moving away from climate investment could compound those challenges, she said.

"If the United States really cared about the welfare of the Iranian people, it would allow organizations like the U.N. environmental program to make loans to Iran, to provide expertise to Iran to help them with these issues," Slavin said. "Instead, our sanctions forbid this kind of cooperation. We really should be thinking long-term. This affects Afghanistan; this affects other countries around Iran whose welfare we're concerned with."
Reprinted from Climatewire with permission from E&E News. E&E provides daily coverage of essential energy and environmental news at www.eenews.net.

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Climate Change May Have Helped Spark Iran's Protests

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The impacts of climate change are among the environmental challenges facing Iran that helped spark protests in dozens of cities across the Islamic republic. At least 20 people have died in the uprising, driven by the sudden collapse of financial institutions, low wages and mistrust of national leaders.

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Climate Change May Have Helped Spark Iran's Protests - Scientific American

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Weather and climate disasters cost the U.S. a record $306 billion in 2017 - Mashable

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From wildfires to major hurricanes, the U.S. just endured a record year.

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Weather and climate disasters cost the U.S. a record $306 billion in 2017 - Mashable

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From wildfires to major hurricanes, the U.S. just endured a record year.

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Weather and climate disasters cost the U.S. a record $306 billion in 2017 - Mashable

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Weather and climate disasters cost the U.S. a record $306 billion in 2017 - Mashable

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We need to talk about how we talk about climate change

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Whatever you call it - climate change, global warming, or the greenhouse effect - it's increasing the frequency and severity of heatwaves. AAP Image/Dean Lewins

How we talk about climate change has a lot to do with how we feel about it, and what we're willing to do to act on it. Recent research from the US found that the terms "global warming" and "climate change" evoke different reactions: global warming is perceived as far more threatening.

While there is no similar research in Australia, over the past 25 years we've seen debate shift from the greenhouse effect to climate change to climate variability - with a corresponding decrease in action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Global warming, the US research found, is more likely to be associated with melting glaciers, world catastrophe, flooding and extreme weather than climate change. It is also perceived to be scientifically more certain.

Climate change, on the other hand, is perceived as less threatening, particularly among liberal and moderate voters in the US. Conservative voters on average don't distinguish between the two, but, to some, global warming is perceived as the greater threat.

The man behind "climate change"

Frank Luntz, a pollster and political advisor for the US Republicans, realised this phenomena several years ago. In a 2002 memo to Republicans Luntz advised:

"Climate change" is less frightening than "global warming" ... While global warming has catastrophic connotations attached to it, climate change suggests a more controllable and less emotional challenge.

Luntz also urged Republican politicians to encourage the public to believe there was no consensus on global warming:

The scientific debate is closing [against us] but not yet closed. There is still a window of opportunity to challenge the science... Therefore, you need to continue to make the lack of scientific certainty a primary issue in the debate...

Subsequently President George Bush dropped the term global warming from his speeches on the environment and the White House took up use of the term climate change. Climate change began to be used increasingly often in US documents.

What the science says

In scientific terms global warming refers to the increase in the earth's average surface temperature.

Climate change refers to the consequent range of changes in climate including changed rainfall patterns, increasing droughts and heat waves, and more extreme weather such as flooding, storms and cyclones.

Many scientists actually prefer to use the term climate change because they are concerned that global warming gives the misleading impression that there will be warmer weather everywhere. The use of the term climate change had in fact started to overtake global warming in other parts of the world even before the Luntz memo.

An even earlier term that gained popular currency in the 1980s was the "greenhouse effect". The greenhouse effect had merit in that it was educational: it explained the mechanism for global warming and gave it a physical reality for laypeople. But the greenhouse effect is also a natural and benign effect that protects the earth's atmosphere. There was a short-lived effort to change the name to enhanced greenhouse effect or anthropocentric greenhouse effect.

Around 1990 the term greenhouse effect began to be replaced by global warming and climate change. A search of the millions of English language books catalogued by Google demonstrates the changing preference for the new euphemisms.

Google

From climate change to climate variability

The upswing and downturn of the term greenhouse effect seems to coincide with the willingness of the Australian government to introduce measures to reduce greenhouse gases.

In 1988, when the National Greenhouse 88 Conference was held in Australia, there was unprecedented public interest in the issue. At the time, Australia was acclaimed as one of the most progressive governments on the issue. Now it is a climate change pariah.

Even the term climate change is too much for some present day governments. Earlier this year Professor Kate Auty, the Victorian Commissioner for Environmental Sustainability, told The Age newspaper that public servants in Victoria have been instructed to use the term climate variability rather than climate change. Because the climate is naturally variable, climate variability is a more soothing term than climate change and therefore less likely to incite calls for government action.

This squeamishness about the term climate change is apparently not confined to government circles. Gabrielle Chan reported in the Guardian:

There is a term that is not generally used in polite company in the bush. That term is climate change ... In most cases, though, the community tends to prefer the term "climate variability" than "climate change".

Names do matter. The US research quotes scholars who point out that "the terms we use to describe the world determine the ways we see it, those who control the argument, and those who control the argument are more likely to successfully translate belief into policy".

The evolution of names from greenhouse effect to global warming to climate change reflects the ongoing battle over the public perception of this phenomenon. This latest iteration into climate variability may indeed bury public concern. Perhaps in Australia it's time to resurrect the greenhouse effect.

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We need to talk about how we talk about climate change

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How we talk about climate change has a lot to do with how we feel about it, and what we're willing to do to act on it. Recent research from the US found that the terms "global warming" and "climate change...

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'A Disproportionate Hit.' 2017's Weather Disasters Are Among the Worst in U.S. History - TIME

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'A Disproportionate Hit.' 2017's Weather Disasters Are Among the Worst in U.S. History - TIME

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Satellite image captures lake effect snow over Great Lakes

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CLOSE

DETROIT - This is pretty crazy.

Chances are, you've seen a satellite photo similar to this one that shows Michigan and the Great Lakes during a snowstorm with lake effect. But the snowfall was especially amplified over the last week in places such as Erie, Pa., which was buried in more than 50 inches of snow over a 30-hour span. As of Wednesday, the area has seen more than 63 inches of snow since Saturday.

On Christmas Day, a stationary snow band off Lake Erie dumped nearly 3 feet of snow on Erie, Pa., more than four times the previous Christmas record and 14 inches more than the city's all-time record that has stood for more than 60 years.

More: New Year's Eve revelers: Get ready for one polar party

More: Wintry mess of snow and ice to linger across U.S.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Satellites Twitter account tweeted this image Wednesday that shows just how much of a lake effect the Great Lakes had on snowfall across Michigan, lower Ontario and several Eastern states such as New York and Pennsylvania.

Another blast of snow is forecast for Thursday in places such as Des Moines, Minneapolis, Chicago, Milwaukee, Detroit, Cleveland and Pittsburgh, AccuWeather said.
Contributing: John Bacon, Kim Hjelmgaard and Greg Toppo, USA TODAY. Follow Brian Manzullo on Twitter: @BrianManzullo
Read or Share this story: https://usat.ly/2Cf112j

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Stunning satellite image shows lake effect snow over Great Lakes

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CLOSE DETROIT - This is pretty crazy. Chances are, you've seen a satellite photo similar to this one that shows Michigan and the Great Lakes during a snowstorm with lake effect. But the snowfall was especially amplified over the last week in places such as Erie, Pa., which was buried in more than 50 inches of snow over a 30-hour span.

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Scientists are about to test a devastating hypothesis: 2018 will suffer a lot of big earthquakes

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We know where the next big earthquakes will happen — but not when - Vox

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We know where the next big earthquakes will happen — but not when - Vox

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We know where the next big earthquakes will happen - but not when - Vox

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With Iran and Iraq digging out from a deadly earthquake, here are eight things to know about these seismic events.

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Check out this article from USA TODAY:

Like going 'from an old flip-phone to an iPhone X:' New weather satellite promises quantum leap in forecasting

https://usat.ly/2idf90P

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Check out this article from USA TODAY:

Like going 'from an old flip-phone to an iPhone X:' New weather satellite promises quantum leap in forecasting

https://usat.ly/2idf90P

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Powerful Iran-Iraq earthquake is deadliest of 2017 - CNN

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Powerful Iran-Iraq earthquake is deadliest of 2017 - CNN

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Powerful earthquake in Iraq kills at least 100 in Iran - CNN

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A powerful 7.3 magnitude earthquake Sunday in the Iraqi city of Halabja, close to the Iraq-Iran border, killed at least 61 people, injured hundreds in Iran.

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The company photographing every spot of land on earth, every single day

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The company photographing every spot of land on earth, every single day

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Planet, the American satellite company, is now snapping a picture of every part of earth's landmass every single day.

Analyzing the imagery over time promises to unlock critical information about the economy and the environment for Planet's customers, which range from investors to activists. It's also a milestone in humanity's ongoing efforts to understand the planet it calls home.

Last year, Planet said it was photographing a third of the world's land each day. In February of this year it launched 88 satellites on an Indian rocket, and last week it launched 10 more satellites on an Orbital ATK rocket from California. Most of the images they take are at a resolution of three meters (10 feet) per pixel. By taking images daily, the company can track changes in the physical world, like how quickly the temporary city of Burning Man rises out of the desert:

Planet's imagery can track the effects of sudden events like Hurricane Harvey or long-term problems like California's drought, among many other applications.

Planet is seven years old and launched its first satellites only in 2014, but it now has more commercial satellites in orbit than any other: 182 of its Dove satellites, each of which weighs 5 kg (11 lb), plus 19 larger satellites that it acquired by buying two other earth-imaging companies.

The firm's founders-Will Marshall, Robbie Shingler, and Chris Boshuizen, now an entrepreneur-in-residence at the venture fund Data Collective-met at NASA's Ames research center in Mountain View, California. They took their understanding of small spacecraft to a garage in nearby Cupertino, and made daily imaging of the entire earth their "mission one." Designing low-cost but effective cubesats to snap pictures in orbit, they launched their satellites in waves, adding new features to each wave, and raising over $150 million to back their business.

Planet's speed and fundraising success allowed it to get ahead of a potential glut of competitors by buying them out. It purchased a satellite constellation from the German firm Blackbridge in 2015 and bought TerraBella, formerly SkyBox, from Google in 2016. These satellites take sharper pictures than the Doves, at one meter per pixel.

When I visited to Planet's San Francisco headquarters this summer, Marshall said that Planet's ultimate goal is to answer questions with the data it collects; developing space technology is just a means to that end. "We are not an aerospace company," he told me. If "mission one" was to collect the data, "mission two" appears to be making it available to and useful for people who aren't experts in geospatial information analysis.

On the software side, that means figuring out what kind of questions possible users-from a farmer in Iowa or a forest manager in Brazil to a hedge fund in Singapore or a government ministry in Nigeria-will need answered, and how to deliver that information in the most useful format. Planet will also add higher-resolution imagery from the satellites it acquired to its platform, and continue upgrading the Dove-now on its 13th operational version-to take clearer images, last longer in space, and transmit more data back to earth.

"Planet will index physical change on Earth the same way Google indexed text on the internet," CEO Marshall wrote yesterday on Planet's blog. "Questions will typically be framed to search an area for a feature (such as a plane or a road), a count of features (how many planes at San Francisco Airport), a time that a feature appeared, or to quantify some aspect of temporal or spatial change (sq km of land damaged by wildfire)."

Space market observers like Hoyt Davidson, who runs Near Earth LLC, a boutique, space-focused investment bank, tend to see Planet as the likeliest of a new generation of space companies to list on stock exchanges. The company hasn't commented on such speculation. But if that is its goal, being able to say it can now take a picture of the whole earth every day will no doubt bolster its case for getting investors, and the case for investing in space more generally.

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The company photographing every spot of land on earth, every single day

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Planet, the American satellite company, is now snapping a picture of every part of earth's landmass every single day. Analyzing the imagery over time promises to unlock critical information about the economy and the environment for Planet's customers, which range from investors to activists. It's also a milestone in humanity's ongoing efforts to understand the...

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Climate report says humans "extremely likely" to blame for warming - CBS News

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Climate report says humans "extremely likely" to blame for warming - CBS News

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Climate report says humans "extremely likely" to blame for warming - CBS News

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Government report says "there are no convincing alternative explanations" for rising temperatures and a changing climate

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Carbon dioxide in the air is skyrocketing to record levels, U.N. warns

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Carbon dioxide in the air is skyrocketing to record levels, U.N. warns

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Although many countries are making progress in slowing their emissions of carbon dioxide, a global warming pollutant, the amount of the gas in the air surged at a record pace in 2016, a new report found.

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air increased at an extreme rate last year to reach the highest amount in at least 800,000 years, according to the World Meteorological Organization's (WMO) Greenhouse Gas Bulletin. Globally averaged concentrations of carbon dioxide reached 403.3 parts per million in 2016, which was up from 400.00 ppm the year before. The culprit? Human activities, such as the clearing of rainforests and burning of fossil fuels, as well as a strong El Niño event.

During strong El Niño years, when ocean temperatures are milder than average in the tropical Pacific Ocean, altering weather conditions around the world, carbon dioxide tends to increase at a faster rate. The El Niño helped cause droughts in tropical regions and reduced the capacity of carbon "sinks," such as forests and the oceans, that soak up carbon dioxide.

Image: scripps institution of oceanography

According to the report, the rate of increase of carbon dioxide in the air during just the past 70 years is about 100 times higher than at the end of the last ice age.

"As far as direct and proxy observations can tell, such abrupt changes in the atmospheric levels of CO2 have never before been seen," the report found. The amount of carbon dioxide in the air is now a staggering 145 percent of pre-1750 levels, the report found.

The observations were gathered at dozens of locations around the world, from the Arctic to a mountaintop in Hawaii and a station in Antarctica.

"Without rapid cuts in CO2 and other greenhouse gas emissions, we will be heading for dangerous temperature increases by the end of this century, well above the target set by the Paris Climate Change Agreement," said WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas, in a statement. "Future generations will inherit a much more inhospitable planet," he said.

"The laws of physics mean that we face a much hotter, more extreme climate in the future. There is currently no magic wand to remove this CO2 from the atmosphere," Taalas added.

Scientists have found that throughout history, carbon dioxide levels and the height of the Earth's oceans, existence of its ice sheets, and other key indicators of the planet's climate have marched in near lockstep. The last time Earth had a concentration of carbon dioxide comparable to today's, the report found, was 3 to 5 million years ago.

At that time, known to geologists as the mid-Pliocene Epoch, the planet's average temperature was 2 to 3 degrees Celsius, or 3.6 to 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit, warmer than it is now, and sea levels were up to 20 meters, or 65 feet higher than they are currently. The entire Greenland Ice Sheet melted during that time, as did the West Antarctic Ice Sheet and parts of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet.

If similar changes were to occur today, coastal megacities around the world would become uninhabitable. Much of the state of Florida would be lost to the sea, and extreme heat waves would become the norm rather than the exception each summer.

"The numbers don't lie. We are still emitting far too much and this needs to be reversed. The last few years have seen enormous uptake of renewable energy, but we must now redouble our efforts to ensure these new low-carbon technologies are able to thrive. We have many of the solutions already to address this challenge. What we need now is global political will and a new sense of urgency," said Erik Solheim, head of the U.N. Environment Program, in a statement.

United Nations climate negotiators will meet beginning November 7 in Bonn to iron out some of the rules under the Paris Agreement, and may commit to further emissions reductions despite the June announcement by President Donald Trump that the U.S. would exit the treaty. The U.S. is still sending a delegation to the negotiation.

Every nation in the world with the exception of just two countries: Syria and the U.S. are intent on implementing the treaty.

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Carbon dioxide levels surged at record rate in 2016, haven't been this high in 3 million years

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Although many countries are making progress in slowing their emissions of carbon dioxide, a global warming pollutant, the amount of the gas in the air surged at a record pace in 2016, a new report found.

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Temperature Is Not What You Think It Is http://flip.it/htYu1A

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Temperature Is Not What You Think It Is http://flip.it/htYu1A

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What is temperature? This question comes up quite a bit-especially in introductory science courses. The most common answer is something like this:
Temperature is a measure of the average kinetic energy of the particles in an object. When temperature increases, the motion of these particles also increases.
It's not a terrible definition, but it's not the best either. There are plenty of other crazy things about temperature that you should probably know.

Thermal Energy and Temperature Are Different

If temperature is a measure of the average kinetic energy, shouldn't thermal energy and temperature be the same thing? No. Thermal energy is the total energy an object has due to the internal motions of its particles. The temperature is related to the average kinetic energy-not the total kinetic energy.

Here's a classic example that you can try at home. Put a piece of cold pizza on top of a sheet of aluminum foil and then stick it in the oven to heat up. After about 10 minutes, the pizza should be nice and hot-the aluminum foil is the approximately the same temperature. You can pull the aluminum foil out with your fingers, but not the pizza. Although the aluminum foil has a high temperature, its low mass means it doesn't have much thermal energy. Without a lot of thermal energy in the foil, your fingers won't get burned. Meaning? Thermal energy and temperature are different things.

More Definitions of Temperature?

You already have one definition from above, but I am going to give you two more definitions. The first one is the historical version. It goes like this:
Temperature is the quantity that two objects have in common after being in contact for a long time.
This definition is based on the idea of thermal equilibrium. If you put an aluminum ball into some water, eventually the water and the ball will have the same temperature. They won't have the same thermal energy, but they will have the same temperature. It's a very operational definition of temperature-and that's not a bad thing.

But really, this temperature is the basis of most thermometers. Take your basic mercury or alcohol thermometer (the mercury ones are not so common because-you know, they contain mercury). When you put this thermometer in a liquid or something else, the temperature of the liquid inside the thermometer changes until it is the same as the object. Since both mercury and alcohol expand with an increase in temperature, you can determine the temperature based on this thermal expansion (or contraction). Really, you could say that the thermometer even came before the idea of temperature.

Now for the second definition of temperature. This one is pretty tough, so hold on to something.
Temperature is the rate that internal energy changes with respect to entropy.
It's short, but there's a lot in there. First, what is entropy? I could try to explain entropy, but this would be a complete new blog post. Instead, you can just check out this very awesome post by Aatish Bhatia in which he explains entropy using sheep. Yes, it's really good.

So, instead of a full explanation of entropy, I will just give some interesting aspects of it. Thermal equilibrium is not a purely energy phenomena. Energy is conserved when two objects reach thermal equilibrium, but it would also be satisfied if one object got hot and the other one became cold. Thermal equilibrium is a statistical process. It just so happens that the most probable outcome for two objects in contact is that they reach the same temperature. The other weird cases (one getting hot and one getting cold) can also technically happen, but their chances are way less than you winning the lottery (and your chance of winning the lottery is essentially zero).

Since temperature is really a statistical quantity, you can't have a temperature of a single particle. So, the next time someone talks about the temperature of a single electron-or worse, the temperature of a photon-maybe you should just walk away.

Which Temperature Scale Is The Best?

There are quite a few temperature scales, but these are three most common: Celsius, Fahrenheit (which I can never spell correctly), and Kelvin. I know that most of the civilized world uses Celsius, but I just have trouble training my brain to think of temperature in this scale. I'm probably too old to change. Also, I always think of this graphic display of the temperature scales which says that 0 degrees Celsius is cold, but at a temperature of 100 degrees Celsius you would be dead (the temperature of boiling water).

How do you calibrate a temperature scale? The Celsius scale is easy. The zero value is at the freezing point of water and the 100 value is at the boiling point. That's fairly easy to reproduce but these values do depend on atmospheric conditions, so it's not a perfect method to calibrate a thermometer. The Kelvin scale is just like the Celsius scale, but it is shifted by 273.15 such that 0 Kelvin (there are no degrees on the Kelvin scale) is equal to 273.15 degrees Celsius. With the Kelvin scale, you don't get negative temperatures-so that's useful in lots of calculations.

But what about the Fahrenheit scale? I think that everyone will agree that it is based on two measurements: the temperature of a human body (around 98 degrees Fahrenheit) and the temperature of salt and ice (0 °F). Actually, this is something that's interesting. If you mix ice and salt (and a little water), the coldest you can get the mixture is zero. That is surprisingly cold and why you use salt-ice mixture to make homemade ice cream.

Still, there does not seem to be complete agreement as to why the human body temperature measures at 98 °F instead of 100 °F. One idea is that the scale is broken into three parts, each of 32 °s, since 32 is the temperature of freezing water. This wouldn't quite work fitting in the human body temperature at 100 °F, but it would be close. Oh well, I guess we won't know until someone invents a time machine.

What Is So Special About -40°?

If you convert -40°F to Celsius, you get -40°C. But the correct answer to the significance of -40° is that it is the temperature on Hoth. OK, if you look at Wookiepedia (the Star Wars Wikia) it says that Hoth gets down to -60°C at night. So, I'm going to guess that maybe during the day it is -40°C (or °F). Anyway, when the MythBusters tested the thermal properties of a tauntaun they used a temperature of -40-so there.

Now for some math. How do you convert from °F to °C? Since both of these are linear temperature scales, I can find a function for the Celsius temperature as a function of Fahrenheit temperature. To do this, I need two data points to make a line. Good thing I already have them-they are the boiling and melting point of water. This gives two x-y points (except x is Fahrenheit temperature and y is the Celsius temperature) that are (32,0) and (212,100). Now I can use these points to find the slope of the line and the point-slope formula to find the equation of the line. I will skip the details (you can do it at home for fun), but I get the following equation.

You could just plug in a Fahrenheit temperature of -40 and see what you get, but how about a graph instead? Let me plot two lines on the same graph. One line will be the Celsius temperature as a function of Fahrenheit temperature and the other will be Fahrenheit vs. Fahrenheit.

Where do the Fahrenheit and the Celsius lines cross? Yes, at a value of -40. So, the next time you are on Hoth or it is just plain super cold you can say the temperature is -40. When your friend asks "is that in Celsius or Fahrenheit?" just reply "yes."

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What is temperature? This question comes up quite a bit-especially in introductory science courses. The most common answer is something like this: Temperature is a measure of the average kinetic energy of the particles in an object. When temperature increases, the motion of these particles also increases.

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Astonishing satellite images reveal islands stripped by Hurricane Irma - ABC News

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Astonishing satellite images reveal islands stripped by Hurricane Irma - ABC News

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A series of satellite images taken before and after Hurricane Irma carved a path through the Caribbean detail the extent of widespread damage left by the storm.

At least 37 people died in the Caribbean, and at least another seven in Florida, as a result of the hurricane which had wind speeds as strong as 160 miles per hour when it made landfall in Cuba.

Here's a look at the aftermath of Hurricane Irma at three locations in the Caribbean:

U.S. and British Virgin Islands

The widespread browning of the landscape across the U.S. Virgin Islands and British Virgin Islands is pictured in two images taken just over two weeks apart, before and after Irma. According to NASA, the browning is caused either by the green vegetation being ripped away or salt water being whipped up and killing leaves still on trees.

Barbuda

Homes just north of Barbuda Codrington Airport are pictured in various states of disrepair after the storm passed through the island in the eastern Caribbean. Antigua and Barbuda Prime Minister Gaston Browne compared the destruction on the island to "having a bomb literally thrown on a city."

Nanny Cay, Tortola, British Virgin Islands

Formerly lush vegetation near Nanny Cay on Tortola, the largest of the British Virgin Islands, was stripped and browned by the hurricane. Some boats docked at Nanny Cay Marina in the center of the image became unmoored.

Paraquita Bay, Tortola, British Virgin Islands

Paraquita Bay, on Tortola's southeastern coast, saw the destruction of several large structures on the left side of the image.

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Satellite images show destruction left by Hurricane Irma in Caribbean

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A series of satellite images taken before and after Hurricane Irma carved a path through the Caribbean detail the extent of widespread damage left by the storm. At least 37 people died in the Caribbean, and at least another seven in Florida, as a result of the hurricane which had wind speeds as...

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Hurricane Irma: Aerial photos show scale of devastation in Sint Maarten

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Hurricane Irma: Aerial photos show scale of devastation in Sint Maarten

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Aerial photos show enormous devastation caused by Hurricane Irma on Sint Maarten, the Dutch side of the Caribbean island of Saint Martin. The photos, released by the Dutch Ministry of Defence, show smashed hotels, a damaged marina with boats tossed into piles, submerged streets and flooded homes.

Images of the country's Juliana Airport showed the landing strips appear intact, though the navy said the airport is "unreachable" for now. Andre van der Kamp, commander of the Dutch ship Zeeland, tweeted that the Zeeland and Pelikaan would be trying to moor on Sint Maarten to deliver emergency aid on Thursday (7 September), but they needed to complete a safety check of the port first.

Dutch Interior Minister Ronald Plasterk said he briefly had contact with Saint Martin's prime minister but communications are sporadic. Sint Maarten is an independent nation within the Kingdom of the Netherlands, with a population of around 40,000 - about the same as the French side. "It is an enormous disaster, 95 percent of the island is destroyed. I am in shock," Daniel Gibbs, chairman of a local council on Saint Martin, told Radio Caribbean International.

French Interior Minister Gerard Collomb said eight people were killed and the toll was likely to rise. "We did not have the time yet to explore all the shores," Collomb told Franceinfo radio, adding that 23 people were also injured.

Irma, a Category 5 storm packing winds of 185 miles per hour (295 km per hour), is the strongest hurricane ever recorded in the Atlantic Ocean and one of the most powerful storms to hit the Atlantic basin in a century.

In all, at least 10 people were reported killed by Irma on four islands. The island of Barbuda is a scene of "total carnage" and the tiny two-island nation will seek international assistance, said Gaston Browne, prime minister of Antigua and Barbuda. Browne told the BBC about half of Barbuda's population of some 1,800 were homeless while nine out of 10 buildings had suffered some damage and many were destroyed.

The hurricane is on track to reach Florida, becoming the second major hurricane to hit the US mainland in as many weeks after Hurricane Harvey. There are another two major storms, named Jose and Katia currently swirling in the Atlantic.

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Hurricane Irma: Aerial photos show scale of devastation in Sint Maarten

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Aerial photos show enormous devastation caused by Hurricane Irma on Sint Maarten, the Dutch side of the Caribbean island of Saint Martin. The photos, released by the Dutch Ministry of Defence, show smashed hotels, a damaged marina with boats tossed into piles, submerged streets and flooded homes.

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Hurricane season hasn't peaked yet. Here's what to expect - CNN

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Hurricane season hasn't peaked yet. Here's what to expect - CNN

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Hurricane season hasn't peaked yet. Here's what to expect - CNN

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In what feels like a never-ending barrage of storms, the 2017 hurricane season is past its halfway point as three hurricanes currently churn in the Atlantic.

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Satellite images show before and after Harvey - CNN

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Satellite images show before and after Harvey - CNN

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Satellite images show before and after Harvey - CNN

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Satellite images show before and after photos of the flood devastation in Texas cities following Hurricane Harvey.

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Satellite images show Harvey's impact on Texas towns - CNN

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Satellite images show Harvey's impact on Texas towns - CNN

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Satellite images show Harvey's impact on Texas towns - CNN

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Satellite images show before-and-after photos of the flood devastation in Texas communities following Hurricane Harvey.

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The countries most likely to survive climate change in one infographic

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The countries most likely to survive climate change in one infographic

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Climate change is real, and it's coming.

The leaders of 150 nations, along with thousands of representatives of nearly 200 countries, meet today in Paris for the 20th time to try and come up with a master plan to stave off the global catastrophe ahead.

Scientists have known for decades that the problem on our generation's hands is serious, but recent reports find that even those dire warnings likely underestimated the scope of the issue.

Of course, all of us will be affected in different ways. How will your country fare?

The folks at Eco Experts put together a great infographic in June based on data from the Notre Dame Global Adaptation (ND-Gain) Index, an annual ranking of which countries are best poised to adapt to a warming world.

While the maps provide a great zoomed-out perspective of what will happen globally as the earth warms, there are a few caveats to keep in mind when checking it out:

The map is based on rankings, not comprehensive evaluations of each country. In other words, the best-ranked countries are only as great as they seem compared against the countries that aren't performing so well.

The map looks only at the country-level. All of the state-specific, region-specific, or city-specific data is somewhat lost in this zoomed-out perspective. While the US gets a green light on this map, for example, specific parts of the country are far less equipped to handle climate change, including Miami and New York City.

Developed countries as a whole have far more infrastructure to adapt to a warming planet. The government can force people in coastal cities such as Miami Beach to move inland; we can also build new airports and transit hubs closer to the center of the country. The map reflects countries' abilities to do just that.

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Erin Brodwin and Matt Johnston, Business Insider

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The countries most likely to survive climate change in one infographic

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Climate change is real, and it's coming. The leaders of 150 nations, along with thousands of representatives of nearly 200 countries, meet today in Paris for the 20th time to try and come up with a master plan to stave off the global catastrophe ahead.

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FAA warns to keep drones out of the sky as Tropical Storm Harvey rescues mount - Chron.com

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FAA warns to keep drones out of the sky as Tropical Storm Harvey rescues mount - Chron.com

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FAA warns to keep drones out of the sky as Tropical Storm Harvey rescues mount - Chron.com

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Houstonians with drones mounted with cameras might want to use their machines to get footage of flood waters but the Federal Aviation Administration has bad news.

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This is What a Solar Eclipse Looks Like to a Weather Satellite

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This is What a Solar Eclipse Looks Like to a Weather Satellite

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Yesterday, we shared what a total solar eclipse looks like to a weather balloon floating in near space. If you want to zoom out even more, check out this amazing video captured by a weather satellite from outer space.

The video, released by scientists at UW-Madison's Space Science and Engineering Center (SSEC), was captured by the GOES-16, one of the world's most advanced weather satellites.

The satellite photographed the Earth once every five minutes during the eclipse, and the resulting timelapse video shows the shadow of the moon crossing the United States from west to east.

But that's not all. GOES-16 has another camera system on board that can capture single-channel, near-infrared images that detect the presence of lightning. Using this camera, the satellite also created a timelapse video showing the moon's shadow passing through severe weather formations filled with flashes of lightning.

"The first instrument of its kind in geostationary orbit, GLM observes total lightning (both in-cloud and cloud-to-ground), and offers a constant vigil for lightning flashes day and night across the Western Hemisphere," NOAASatellites writes. "Rapid increases of lightning are a signal that a storm is strengthening and could become more dangerous."

(via UW-Madison via Fstoppers)

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This is What a Solar Eclipse Looks Like to a Weather Satellite

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Yesterday, we shared what a total solar eclipse looks like to a weather balloon floating in near space. If you want to zoom out even more, check out this amazing video captured by a weather satellite from outer space.

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Harvey could be 1st hurricane to hit Texas since 2008 - CNN

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Harvey could be 1st hurricane to hit Texas since 2008 - CNN

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national oceanic and atmospheric administration

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'Life-threatening' rainfall expected in Texas, hurricane center says | CNN

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Highways in Texas filled with cars Thursday into the night as coastal residents made their way north and out of the path of a hurricane that forecasters say will bring "life-threatening" amounts of rain.

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Parts of National Monument in Utah May Lose Federal Protection - NYTimes.com

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Parts of National Monument in Utah May Lose Federal Protection - NYTimes.com

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BEARS EARS NATIONAL MONUMENT, Utah - Parts of this sprawling region of red-rock canyons, towering mesas and ancient Native American sites in southeastern Utah could lose their strict federal protection as a national monument, under a recommendation that Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke is expected to issue on Thursday.

Shrinking the Bears Ears National Monument and reopening much of the land for possible mining and drilling would be widely seen as a direct blow to former President Barack Obama's environmental legacy, and the first major test of a century-old conservation law.

In April, President Trump ordered a sweeping review of 27 national monuments that were designated or expanded in recent years under the Antiquities Act. Along with Bears Ears, the review included monuments like Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks in New Mexico, Mojave Trails in California and Katahdin Woods and Waters in Maine. National monuments are strictly protected from new development in much the same way the national parks are.

Mr. Zinke told the Associated Press on Thursday morning that he would propose boundary changes to a "handful" of national monuments, but that he would not recommend eliminating any of them. Mr. Zinke, who was in Billings, Mont., for a briefing on wildfires, was expected to release his recommendation later in the day.

Native American tribes in the Southwest, who lobbied for years to get the Bears Ears region designated a national monument, are expected to fight any move to reduce its size. Charles Wilkinson, a professor of public land law and adviser to the tribes, called Mr. Zinke's expected decision "an attack on a significant part of the foundation of American conservation law" and said, "We have our complaint already ready to file."

Outdoor recreation and environmental groups are also expected to fight to preserve the monuments.

Mr. Trump said in April that the goal of the review was to end "another egregious use of federal power" and give the states more say in how public lands are used.

Mike Noel, a Utah state representative, said that reducing or eliminating Bears Ears would be "a victory for our state." Federal management of land in his state had constrained drilling, mining and grazing, he said, adding that Washington had no business setting aside so much land for the strict protection that monument status affords.

"When you turn the management over to the tree-huggers, the bird and bunny lovers and the rock lickers, you turn your heritage over," Mr. Noel said.

The vast majority of the territory that Mr. Trump targeted for review - about 553 million acres of land and sea in all - was given monument protection by Mr. Obama, who set aside more such territory than any of his predecessors. But the review also included areas designated by Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton.

The Antiquities Act, signed into law in 1906 by President Theodore Roosevelt, gives presidents the power to designate national monuments that safeguard "historic landmarks, historic and prehistoric structures and other objects of historic or scientific interest." Sweeping landscapes like the Canyons of the Ancients in Colorado and ocean areas like the Mariana Trench in the Pacific have been protected under the law, along with sites like the Statue of Liberty and parts of the Underground Railroad.

Past presidents have altered the boundaries of national monuments before, including about 19 occasions when acreage was removed from them, according to federal data.

Those reductions were often small, and were sometimes offset by enlargements elsewhere. The largest reduction by far came in 1915 when President Woodrow Wilson cut 313,280 acres from the monument in Washington State that later became Olympic National Park.

Scholars are divided over whether the Antiquities Act authorizes a president to do that. But none of the previous reductions were contested in court, Mr. Wilkinson said.

Monument designations have been particularly contentious in Utah since 1996, when President Clinton made a surprise announcement that he was putting aside 1.9 million acres in the state for the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. The designation halted a proposed coal project, the Smoky Hollow mine. Residents of Kane County, who had been expecting the mine to pump money and jobs into the region, gathered at a local high school after the announcement to cry, releasing bouquets of black balloons.

For some in southern Utah, it was a wound that never healed. Twenty years later, when Mr. Obama declared Bears Ears a national monument in the final weeks of his presidency, the step divided the region.

Supporters of the monument, many of them Navajo, saw its creation as a victory for indigenous rights. But opponents, many of them descended from Mormon settlers, said it would strangle the region economically by barring future mining and drilling.

It is not clear, however, that any mining or energy companies would rush in if Bears Ears' protections are removed. A study by the left-leaning Center for American Progress found that the land did not offer especially strong prospects for mineral resources - mostly uranium - or oil or gas.

"The area has slightly above-average resource potential, but there are no signs that it's a big play," said Matt Lee-Ashley, a spokesman for the center.

The Antiquities Act limits monument designations to the "smallest area compatible with proper care and management of the objects to be protected," a requirement that many conservative lawmakers have accused presidents of ignoring.

Mr. Zinke, in announcing the review, called it "long overdue" and pointed out that the average size of national monuments had grown over the years from 442 acres to more than a million.

During the review process, Mr. Zinke visited eight of the monuments on the list and met with local officials, business leaders and members of Native American tribes. He also opened an online forum for comments, and announced that no changes would be recommended for six other monuments. But environmental groups criticized the process, likening it to the television show "Survivor," announcing here and there which monuments were deemed safe.

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Parts of National Monument in Utah May Lose Federal Protections

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BEARS EARS NATIONAL MONUMENT, Utah - Parts of this sprawling region of red-rock canyons, towering mesas and ancient Native American sites in southeastern Utah could lose their strict federal protection as a national monument, under a recommendation that Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke is expected to issue on Thursday.

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Total solar eclipse 2017: How rare is the Aug. 21 eclipse path? - Washington Post

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Total solar eclipse 2017: How rare is the Aug. 21 eclipse path? - Washington Post

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Sierra Leone mudslide: Death toll climbs ahead of mass burial - CNN

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Sierra Leone mudslide: Death toll climbs ahead of mass burial - CNN

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Rescue workers have recovered the bodies of 122 children, 111 men and 98 women from the wreckage, Sidie Yahya Tunis, the country's Minister for Tourism and Cultural Affairs, told CNN.

Around 600 people are still unaccounted for after heavy rains struck the Regent district in the early hours of Monday morning, causing torrents of mud to wash down Mount Sugar Loaf, about 5 miles outside the capital, Freetown, according to government officials and aid agencies.

Houses that hugged the slopes, many of them little more than wooden shacks with tin roofs, were buried after a chunk of the mountain came down under the force of the water.

The mass burial, initially planned for Wednesday, was postponed for a day to allow families to identify their loved ones. The country's President, Ernest Bai Koroma, and other dignitaries are expected to attend the afternoon ceremony.

The city morgue at the Connaught Hospital has been overwhelmed by the influx of victims in what is one of the deadliest natural disasters to hit Africa in recent years.

Between 2,000 and 3,000 people have also been displaced, Abu Bakarr, spokesman for the Red Cross in Sierra Leone, told CNN on Tuesday.

Britain's Queen Elizabeth II sent her condolences Thursday to the people of Sierra Leone.

"Our thoughts and prayers are with all who have lost loved ones and those whose homes and livelihoods have been affected," she said in a statement posted on her official Twitter account.

Flooding is not unusual in the region, which is experiencing its rainy season.

But this year has been particularly wet, with Freetown receiving more than 27 inches of rain between July 1 and August 13 -- more than double the average of 11.8 inches, according to the US National Weather Service's Climate Prediction Center.

CNN's Hilary McGann contributed to this report.

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sierra leone mudslide: death toll climbs ahead of mass burial - cnn

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Stephanie Busari and Laura Smith-Spark, CNN

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Mass burial for Sierra Leone mudslide victims

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Rescue workers have recovered the bodies of 122 children, 111 men and 98 women from the wreckage, Sidie Yahya Tunis, the country's Minister for Tourism and Cultural Affairs, told CNN.

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Why Oklahoma is getting so many more earthquakes - Business Insider

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Why Oklahoma is getting so many more earthquakes - Business Insider

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USGS

In less than 28 hours, Oklahoma has been pummeled by earthquakes.

The wave started on Tuesday night, when five quakes struck the central part of the state, and extended into the early hours of Thursday as two more hit, according to the United States Geological Survey.

All of the earthquakes were between magnitude two and five and no significant damage was reported. However, the shaking is part of a troubling recent phenomenon. The disposal of wastewater from hydraulic fracturing (also known as fracking), appears to have spiked the likelihood of earthquakes in Oklahoma, potentially raising the state to the same earthquake threat level as California, according to a recent USGS forecast.

Until recently, earthquakes in Oklahoma were few and far between. In 2010, the state experienced just 41 tremors. By comparison, each year the southern California area alone has about 10,000 earthquakes.

But "seismic activity has surged in [Oklahoma] in recent years," reporter Joe Wertz of StateImpact Oklahoma told NPR on Thursday. In the last few years, Oklahoma has weathered hundreds of significant quakes each year, along with parts of several other Midwestern states.

"Scientists link the quake boom to the widespread oil industry practice of pumping waste fluid into underground disposal wells," Wertz told NPR.

The rise in earthquakes, in other words, can be attributed to the injection of large quantities of wastewater into wells deep below the Earth's surface. According to USGS, the majority of the underground wastewater comes from oil and gas operations - it is created when clean water mixes with dirt, metals, and other toxins below the Earth's surface during extraction operations.

The contaminated water becomes too dangerous to dump anywhere, since it could seep into regular groundwater, so companies shoot the wastewater deep into the earth, between layers of hard rock. That buried water can fracture and move previously stable rock, causing earthquakes under certain circumstances.

Much ( but not all) of that wastewater injection is associated with the fracking boom, which has led the practice to become more common in recent years, especially in Oklahoma. Although the state isn't the only one experiencing a spike in wastewater injections, Oklahoma is full of eons-old fault lines that went quiet long ago. Wastewater operations seem to be shaking some of those faults loose, making the land especially vulnerable to earthquakes.

The 2017 USGS predictions for Oklahoma are actually less intense than they were in 2016, because earthquakes were somewhat less frequent there than expected last year. USGS scientists suggest that might be due to stricter regulations that have been put in place to control wastewater injection.

Environmental Protection Agency administrator Scott Pruitt previously served as Oklahoma's attorney general, and has come under fire from some in the state for failing to take action against wastewater injection and fracking.

Rafi Letzter contributed to an earlier version of this post.

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7 earthquakes struck Oklahoma in 28 hours for a disturbing reason

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In less than 28 hours, Oklahoma has been pummeled by earthquakes. The wave started on Tuesday night, when five quakes struck the central part of the state, and extended into the early hours of Thursday as two more hit, according to the United States Geological Survey.

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Meat industry runoff has created a massive dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico / Boing Boing

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Meat industry runoff has created a massive dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico / Boing Boing

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Over 8,000 square miles of the Gulf of Mexico has been turned into a dead zone, thanks to manure and chemical runoff from massive meat processing factories spilling into the Mississippi River delta.

The report by nonprofit Mighty Earth links the record-breaking dead zone to clearance of prairie grassland to make room for factory farms. Once they overlaid locations of processing facilities on maps of grassland losses, they pinpointed the key culprit:

America's largest meat company, Tyson Foods, stood out for its expansive footprint in all the regions suffering the worst pollution impacts from industrial meat and feed production. Tyson produces one out of every five pounds of meat produced in the United States, and owns brands like Jimmy Dean, Hillshire Farm, Ball Park, and Sara Lee, in addition to selling to fast food retailers like McDonalds. The company is consistently ranked among the top polluters in America, although Tyson's new CEO has declared that a focus on sustainability will be at the center of the company's future plans. The report found:
* Tyson is the only meat company with major processing facilities in each of the states listed by the USGS as contributing the highest levels of pollution to the Gulf;

* Tyson and Smithfield have the heaviest concentration of meat facilities in those regions of the country with the highest levels of nitrate contamination;

Read the full report.

* New Investigation Identifies Companies Responsible for Massive Dead Zone in Gulf of Mexico (mighty via The Guardian)

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Meat industry runoff has created a massive dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico

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Over 8,000 square miles of the Gulf of Mexico has been turned into a dead zone, thanks to manure and chemical runoff from massive meat processing factories spilling into the Mississippi River delta.

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Yemen food crisis is man-made; economic strangulation used as war tactic: UN – The Indian Express

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Yemen food crisis is man-made; economic strangulation used as war tactic: UN – The Indian Express

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The UN development chief in Yemen says the crisis that has left millions hungry and on the brink of famine. It is "a man-made disaster" driven not only by decades of poverty and lack of investment but also by economic strangulation used as a tactic of war.

Auke Lootsma told UN reporters yesterday by video conference from the capital of Sanaa that "there is no end in sight" to the civil war, which began in September 2014.

He said about 70 per cent of the country's 27 million people need humanitarian aid and nearly 7 million are close to famine. He said the UN has recorded almost 400,000 cases of cholera and nearly 1,900 related deaths the past four months. There also has been a meningitis outbreak in the last two weeks.

For all the latest World News, download Indian Express App

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Yemen food crisis is man-made; economic strangulation used as war tactic: UN

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The UN development chief in Yemen says the crisis that has left millions hungry and on the brink of famine. It is "a man-made disaster" driven not only by decades of poverty and lack of investment but also by economic strangulation used as a tactic of war.

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Earth Overshoot Day: Mankind has already consumed more natural resources than the planet can renew throughout 2017

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Earth Overshoot Day: Mankind has already consumed more natural resources than the planet can renew throughout 2017

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Humans have already used up their allowance for water, soil, clean air and other resources on Earth for the whole of 2017.

Earth Overshoot Day is on 2 August this year, according to environmental groups WWF and the Global Footprint Network.

The date, earlier this year than in 2016, means humanity will survive on "credit" until 31 December.

"By August 2 2017, we will have used more from Nature than our planet can renew in the whole year," the groups said in a statement.

"This means that in seven months, we emitted more carbon than the oceans and forests can absorb in a year, we caught more fish, felled more trees, harvested more, and consumed more water than the Earth was able to produce in the same period."

According to campaigners, the equivalent of 1.7 planets would be needed to produce enough natural resources to match our consumption rates and a growing population.

Uh oh, it's #EarthOvershootDay 🌏 This means we've used more resources than our planet can renew in the whole year! pic.twitter.com/e5TQinbe3c
- WWF_Australia (@WWF_Australia) August 1, 2017

The Earth Overshoot Day measure has been calculated since 1986 and the day has never fallen so early as in 2017. It looks at the balance between global footprint - what humans take from the earth - and biocapacity, which allows us to produce resources and absorb our waste.

In the 1980s, the overshoot day fell in November, shifting back to October by 1993 and to September just after the millennium.

By 2016 it had reached 8 August.

The grim mark may have reversed throughout the calendar, but campaigners said the move had slowed down.

Scientists also calculate the overshoot day for individual countries, providing a measure of where the day would fall if the whole world consumed the same as one country.

In the UK, the day is even earlier, on 4 May.

Campaigners and charities advised individuals to help reverse the trend by eating less meat, burning less fuel and cutting back on food waste.

The Global Footprint Network reported that food makes up 26 per cent of our global footprint, and if we cut food waste in half, ate less protein-intensive foods and consumed more fruit and vegetables, it could be reduced to 16 per cent.

Our carbon footprint has the largest impact at 60 per cent.

You can calculate your own overshoot day here.

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Today is Earth Overshoot Day: From today we have used more natural resources than the planet can produce

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Humans have already used up their allowance for water, soil, clean air and other resources on Earth for the whole of 2017. Earth Overshoot Day is on 2 August this year, according to environmental groups WWF and the Global Footprint Network. The date, earlier this year than in 2016, means humanity will survive on "credit" until 31 December.

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On August 21, 2017 an eclipse will take place across the United States. If you could watch the celestial event from space, what would it look like?

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Meat industry blamed for largest-ever 'dead zone' in Gulf of Mexico | Environment | The Guardian

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Meat industry blamed for largest-ever 'dead zone' in Gulf of Mexico | Environment | The Guardian

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The global meat industry, already implicated in driving global warming and deforestation, has now been blamed for fueling what is expected to be the worst "dead zone" on record in the Gulf of Mexico.

Toxins from manure and fertiliser pouring into waterways are exacerbating huge, harmful algal blooms that create oxygen-deprived stretches of the gulf, the Great Lakes and Chesapeake Bay, according to a new report by Mighty, an environmental group chaired by former congressman Henry Waxman.

It is expected that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa) will this week announce the largest ever recorded dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico. It is expected to be larger than the nearly 8,200 square-mile area that was forecast for July - an expanse of water roughly the size of New Jersey.

Nutrients flowing into streams, rivers and the ocean from agriculture and wastewater stimulate an overgrowth of algae, which then decomposes. This results in hypoxia, or lack of oxygen, in the water, causing marine life either to flee or to die.

Some creatures, such as shrimp, suffer stunted growth. Algal blooms themselves can cause problems, as in Florida last summer when several beaches were closed after they became coated in foul-smelling green slime.

America's vast appetite for meat is driving much of this harmful pollution, according to Mighty, which blamed a small number of businesses for practices that are "contaminating our water and destroying our landscape" in the heart of the country.

"This problem is worsening and worsening and regulation isn't reducing the scope of this pollution," said Lucia von Reusner, campaign director at Mighty. "These companies' practices need to be far more sustainable. And a reduction in meat consumption is absolutely necessary to reduce the environmental burden."

The Mighty report analyzed supply chains of agribusiness and pollution trends and found that a "highly industrialized and centralized factory farm system" was resulting in vast tracts of native grassland in the midwest being converted into soy and corn to feed livestock. Stripped soils can wash away in the rain, bringing fertilisers into waterways.

Arkansas-based Tyson Foods is identified by the report as a "dominant" influence in the pollution, due to its market strength in chicken, beef and pork. Tyson, which supplies the likes of McDonald's and Walmart, slaughters 35m chickens and 125,000 head of cattle every week, requiring five million acres of corn a year for feed, according to the report.

This consumption resulted in Tyson generating 55m tons of manure last year, according to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), with 104m tons of pollutants dumped into waterways over the past decade. The Mighty research found that the highest levels of nitrate contamination correlate with clusters of facilities operated by Tyson and Smithfield, another meat supplier.

This pollution has also been linked to drinking water contamination. Last week, a report by Environmental Working Group found that in 2015 water systems serving seven million Americans in 48 states contained high levels of nitrates. Consuming nitrates has been linked to an increased risk of contracting certain cancers.

Large parts of America are being plowed up for corn and soy to raise meat. There is very little regulation

Lucia von Reusner, Mighty

"Large parts of America are being plowed up for corn and soy to raise meat," said von Reusner. "There is very little regulation so we can't wait for that.

"The corporate agriculture sector has shown it is responsive to consumer concerns about meat production so we hope that the largest meat companies will meet expectations on this."

The report urges Tyson and other firms to use their clout in the supply chain to ensure that grain producers such as Cargill and Archer Daniels Midland employ practices that reduce pollution flowing into waterways. These practices include not leaving soil uncovered by crops and being more efficient with fertilizers so plants are not doused in too many chemicals.

The US is an enormous consumer of meat, with the average American chewing through 211lbs in 2015. A study released earlier this year found that US beef consumption fell by nearly one fifth from 2005 to 2014, possibly due to concerns over health or the environment. A new increase is now expected.

According to the US Department of Agriculture, beef and pork production is forecast to grow significantly over the next decade, driven by lower feed costs and healthy demand. By 2025, the average American is expected to eat 219lbs of meat a year. Just 3% of Americans follow a vegetarian or vegan diet.

This voracious appetite for meat has driven the loss of native forests and grasslands in the US and abroad, releasing heat-trapping gases through deforestation and agricultural practices. Agriculture produced 9% of US greenhouse gas emissions in 2015, according to the EPA.

A spokesman for Cargill said the company was an "industry leader" for sustainable practices, pointing to its efforts with environment groups to address air, water and soil quality in Illinois, Iowa and Nebraska.

"Protein consumption is growing globally and we are working to meet increased consumer demand with sustainably and responsibly produced foods and supply chains," said the spokesman. "We are dedicated to protecting animal welfare, reducing environmental impact, increasing transparency and keeping workers and consumers safe.

"We also continue to improve livestock feed efficiency. Over the last 15 years we have seen an overall trend in reducing the volume of feed for each pound of beef produced."

A Tyson spokeswoman said "we don't agree with the group's characterization of our company but share its interest in protecting the environment."

"It's true the livestock and poultry industry is a major buyer of grain for feed, however, the report fails to note that a large percentage of corn raised in the US is used for biofuel and that a significant portion is used for human consumption," she added.

"Tyson Foods is focused on continuous improvement. We are constantly looking to improve and lead the industry, so that we can deliver sustainable food to people every day at a scale that matters to the world."

Archer Daniels Midland were also contacted for comment prior to publication.

This article was amended on 1 August 2017 to clarify a previous version of the standfirst that incorrectly identified the source of the toxins.

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Meat industry blamed for largest-ever 'dead zone' in Gulf of Mexico

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A new report shows toxins from suppliers to companies like Tyson Foods are pouring into waterways, causing marine life to leave or die

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Why you need to be prepared: These are the 3 big earthquake threats | KING5.com

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Why you need to be prepared: These are the 3 big earthquake threats | KING5.com

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The western half of Washington state is considered earthquake country, with the potential for very large quakes.

Scientists have their top three.

First, there's the Cascadia Subduction Zone running roughly parallel to the Pacific Coast from northern California past the northern tip of Canada's Vancouver Island.

Second, the Seattle Fault, which runs east to west just south of downtown Seattle. It ends up near the Cascade Mountains and west onto the Olympic Peninsula.

Third, the South Whidbey Island Fault running from northwest to southeast of the southern tip of the island.

These quakes are capable of magnitudes from 7 to over 9.

Every year Western Washington undergoes hundreds of earthquakes. Most of them are tiny, magnitude 1 or 2, and a map shows them since 1970 around the Puget Sound area.

All remind scientists of the potential that's placed on larger faults, as the region is compressed by geological forces beyond anyone's control.

On the map, a larger red dot near Olympia show the 6.8 Nisqually quake of February 2001. The 1965 and 1949 earthquakes of similar magnitude are shown on larger red dots nearby. Nisqually was responsible for $4 billion in damage, but nobody died as a direct result. Unlike California, we are reminded less often of the potential devastation.

"There is so much more work to be done within the basin and within all of Washington to understanding these faults," said Corina Forson, the state's chief hazards geologist for the Washington Geological Survey, part of the Department of Natural Resources.

Let's take those faults in order.

Cascadia Subduction Zone

The Cascadia Subduction Zone is a giant fault running from Cape Mendocino, Calif. past Oregon and Washington and doesn't end until it's north of Vancouver Island in Canada.

You saw its potential in the 9.1 magnitude Tohuku earthquake and tsunami that hit northeastern Japan in March 2011. Tohoku killed nearly 16,000 people; most died as a result of drowning or being crushed in the tsunami.

Because Japan was so well prepared, most retrofitted buildings outside of the tsunami zone survived. This part of the Japanese coast had not seen this type of seismic rupture in some 800 years, and what failed was that walls built to keep tsunami waves were not high enough.

In Washington, we do not have tsunami walls. Along the coast residents may have between 20 and 30 minutes to get to higher ground. The Westport area is now the first in North America to have a community vertical evacuation structure, a building strong enough to resist earthquake and tsunami wave forces and give people a platform above the expected wave heights. That place is the Ocosta School.

But the Cascadia Subduction Zone isn't just a fault; it's an overlapping joint between tectonic plates, parts of the Earth's crust that float on layers of molten rock.

There's a reason the lands around the Pacific Ocean are called the "Ring of Fire." The earthquakes, tsunamis, and the proximity of volcanos are all part of the same system.

The coast is now the home of one of the state's largest network of warning sirens called All Hazard Alert Broadcast (AHABs). But Forson says you also need to know what to do when the shaking happens.

There are also tsunami evacuation signs on the highways. Westport currently is the only location with a vertical evacuation structure designed for a tsunami.

"We do not encourage people to evacuate in vehicles. We're working on pedestrian evacuation maps that show the best routes for pedestrians to take to evacuate," said Forson. "You just need one person to crash or a power line to fall over the road, and the roads are unusable."

"That's why we're pushing for a lot of vertical evacuation structures to be built - hotels or schools, because it's not an easy problem to solve," he said.

Seattle Fault

Moving inland, consider the Seattle Fault.

It's considered capable of a magnitude 7. That may not sound like much more than the magnitude 6.8 quake of 2001 based on the numbers, but that the Nisqually quake occurred some 30 miles underground. Then consider that the Seattle Fault is a complex of faults with various branches that run at or just below the surface.

"The risk is complicated, but there are millions of people who live in the Seattle area," said Forson. "What we know about this fault is that it's ruptured may times in the past...it will happen again. We just don't know when."

Across the northern portion of Bainbridge Island, light radar or lidar images taken from airplanes clearly show what geologists say is the Seattle Fault running right on the surface. Another piece can be seen under the elevated lanes of northbound Interstate 5 in South Seattle not far from the Rainier brewery.

The Seattle Fault is also likely to create a tsunami that would inundate Harbor Island and much of SODO, Interbay, and the waterfront. It could also create dangerous currents and hazards to the north including Everett.

Related: Geological hazard maps via Department of Natural Resources

What scientists don't know is its timing interval.

"The last time was 1,000 years ago between 900 and 903 A.D.," said Forson. "It will happen; we don't know when."

What about the localized tsunami risk? In the 1990's, scientists produced an animation that shows inundation, and people won't have much time to run to higher ground. In some areas getting up a hill to higher ground will be difficult. Some people in places like SODO and Harbor Island may have to flee to higher floors in a building.

South Whidbey Island Fault

The South Whidbey Island Fault is also dangerous.

It's significantly larger than the Seattle Fault, and South Whidbey could hand us a magnitude 7.5 earthquake. That could spell trouble not only for its namesake island but for south and north King County and further west.

"The crustal faults - the Seattle Fault, the South Whidbey Island Fault, the Tacoma Fault - those are less well known," said Forson.

Forson said more research needs to be done.

And while scientists keep digging for more information and more situational awareness of what we face, the other problem is human.

"A lot of people are transplants," Forson said. "They didn't grow up here, they haven't heard this story. So they don't necessarily know the threats they face."
Join KING 5's Disaster Preparedness Facebook group and learn how you and your community can get ready for when disaster strikes. Join KING 5's full day of Disaster Preparedness coverage on Monday, July 24 Why is KING 5 focusing so much on disaster preps? It's certainly not to scare you. Earlier this year, we began the task of creating a disaster plan - how this station would deliver the news if a major disaster struck the Pacific Northwest. We began by consulting state emergency planners, the Red Cross, medical professionals, even other newsrooms. What we got was a BIG wakeup call. Emergency planners all had a simple message: It's not IF a disaster will happen, it's WHEN. Earthquakes. Volcanic eruptions. Devastating wind storms. Floods. Mudslides. The experts say few are ready. And being ready means being able to support yourself, your loved ones, your neighborhood for 2 weeks. Because after a region-wide event, it could take that long for help to come from the rest of the country and world. So our plan to make a plan for KING... inspired us to help all our viewers understand what they need to do to get prepared. The people of KING 5 are like you: We live and work here. Most of us have families, friends and pets who we will need to care for. Our full day of coverage is a first step ... for us ... and, we hope, for you. Watch day-long coverage Monday on KING and KONG, on our king5.com, our Facebook page, and Twitter and Instagram with the hashtag #AreYouPrepared.
© 2017 KING-TV

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Why you need to be prepared: These are the 3 big earthquake threats

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The western half of Washington state is considered earthquake country, with the potential for very large quakes. Scientists have their top three. First, there's the Cascadia Subduction Zone running roughly parallel to the Pacific Coast from northern California past the northern tip of Canada's Vancouver Island.

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Half of All Plastic Was Made in the Past 13 Years - The Atlantic

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Half of All Plastic Was Made in the Past 13 Years - The Atlantic

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Packaging is now the largest plastic market, and it's still tied to fossil fuels. In June, The Wall Street Journal reported on how the United States' natural gas boom was translating into cheaper plastic pellets. The Dow Chemical Company wants to send its plastic pellet to places like Brazil, where it's betting that a rising middle class will want the convenience of single-use plastic baby-food containers. Developing countries in South America and Asia account for much of the recent growth in plastics consumption.

These economic forces also govern how plastic gets recycled-or doesn't. It's often cheaper just to make virgin plastics, especially if you need plastic of a certain hardness or durability. Plus, there are so many different types of plastics that need to be sorted. "Plastic recycling just suffers from poor economics," says Geyer.

It wasn't always obvious that petroleum-based plastics would dominate. In the early 20th century, scientists experimented with plastics made from plant-derived carbon-based molecules. Henry Ford unveiled the " soybean car " in 1941. The car had a hard plastic shell, made of soybean fiber. The field of chemurgy-dedicated to turning agricultural materials into industrial products-rose and quickly fell, thanks to the ascendance of petroleum. It's come full circle in a way. Now there are bioplastics, made out of biological materials like corn starch.

Related Story

A Remote Paradise Island Is Now a Plastic Junkyard
I asked Geyer if he thought we would eventually move beyond petroleum-based plastics, given a long-term move away from fossil fuels. "Unfortunately, my answer will be no," he said. He gave two reasons. First, plastic production uses only a tiny fraction of the fossil fuel that we currently use for energy, so there will be plenty to go around for a long time. And second, he's not convinced that bioplastics have less of an environmental impact. They aren't necessarily more biodegradable, and they divert crops away from food. Since large-scale agriculture also relies on fossil fuels for fertilizer, there's no way to go completely fossil fuel-free yet.

So our plastic age goes on. We will keep adding plastiglomerate to the geological record of the Anthropocene.

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Half of All Plastic That Has Ever Existed Was Made in the Past 13 Years

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Packaging is now the largest plastic market, and it's still tied to fossil fuels. In June, The Wall Street Journal reported on how the United States' natural gas boom was translating into cheaper plastic pellets.

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Earth is on its way to the biggest mass extinction since the dinosaurs, scientists warn

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Earth is on its way to the biggest mass extinction since the dinosaurs, scientists warn

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Have humans damaged the Earth's ecosystems so severely that we're well on our way to the biggest mass extinction since the dinosaurs vanished 66 million years ago? And are we running out of time to reverse the negative impacts of our actions?

Three scientists who have studied extinctions of thousands of species of vertebrates believe so, though others are skeptical of the doomsday-like findings.

A new study published Monday paints a grim picture: The populations of nearly 9,000 vertebrate species, including mammals, such as cheetahs, lions and giraffes, have significantly declined between 1900 and 2015. Almost 200 species have gone extinct in the last 100 years alone. The study says the losses are indicative of the planet's "ongoing six major extinction events" and has cascading consequences for human life on Earth.

"This is the case of a biological annihilation occurring globally, even if the species these populations belong to are still present somewhere on Earth," Rodolfo Dirzo, the study's co-author and a Stanford University biology professor, said in a news release.

The researchers analyzed 27,600 species of birds, amphibians, mammals and reptiles - about half of all known vertebrate species - and found that 8,851 (about 32 percent) have seen declining populations and shrinking areas of habitat. A more detailed analysis on 177 mammal species found that more than 40 percent have experienced significant drops in population. The findings, the study says, mean that billions of animal populations that once roamed the Earth are now gone.

The authors describe the shrinking population of species as "a massive erosion of the greatest biological diversity in the history of Earth."

"Thus, we emphasize that the sixth mass extinction is already here and the window for effective action is very short, probably two or three decades at most," the authors wrote. "All signs point to ever more powerful assaults on biodiversity in the next two decades, painting a dismal picture of the future of life, including human life."

A few examples: There were only a little more than 7,000 cheetahs in existence last year, and their population may drop another 53 percent over the next 15 years, according to National Geographic. Borneo and Sumatran orangutans have been considered endangered for years mainly because of loss of habitat.

The population of African lions has dropped by more than 40 percent in the last 20 years. West African lions, in particular, are nearing extinction, with only about 400 animals left. Historically, lions roamed southern Europe, the Middle East, northwestern India and most of Africa. Today, there are only scattered populations in sub-Saharan Africa and a few remnants at Gir Forest National Park in India, according to the study.

The driving force is a steady drumbeat of human activities that result in habitat losses, pollution and climate disruption, among others.

"The massive loss of populations and species reflects our lack of empathy to all the wild species that have been our companions since our origins," the study's lead author, Gerardo Ceballos, an ecology professor at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México in Mexico, said in the news release. "It is a prelude to the disappearance of many more species and the decline of natural systems that make civilization possible."

Some in the scientific community disagree with the study's grim findings.

Stuart Pimm, head of the conservation ecology at Duke University in North Carolina, said the study unnecessarily raises alarms by saying the Earth is already in the midst of a cataclysmic event. Pimm believes the sixth mass extinction is just beginning, and not well on its way.

"It's a little bit dramatic," Pimm said. "Yes, we are driving species to extinction a thousand times faster than we should. So yes, there is a problem. But on the other hand, telling people that we're all doomed and going to die isn't terribly helpful."

Doug Erwin, curator at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, said placing the ongoing extinctions of animal species in the same playing field as the mass extinction events in history, or the Big Five, amounts to "junk science."

"Many of those making facile comparisons between the current situation and past mass extinctions don't have a clue about the difference in the nature of the data, much less how truly awful the mass extinctions recorded in the marine fossil record actually were," he told the Atlantic last month. "It is absolutely critical to recognize that I am NOT claiming that humans haven't done great damage to marine and terrestrial, nor that many extinctions have not occurred and more will certainly occur in the near future. But I do think that as scientists we have a responsibility to be accurate about such comparisons."

Others say the study's findings are bleak - and rightly so.

Kieran Suckling, executive director of the Center for Biological Diversity, said the researchers accurately show that population losses are not just confined to a certain geographic area or within certain species of animals.

"What they show is it's a mass, global phenomenon," Suckling said. "I think they made the case very strongly that we are right now in the sixth extinction, and if we continue the trend we're on, we're going to be looking at 50 to 75 percent of our species lost over the next hundred years."

Noah Greenwald, endangered species director for the Center for Biological Diversity, agreed with the researchers' conclusion that the window for humans to take action is quickly getting narrow.

"The study is right in raising alarm bells . . . especially with our change in climate," Greenwald said. "We really need to protect as much habitat as we can now. Our population continues to expand, our consumption continues to expand. We're going in the wrong direction, quickly."

The concept of a sixth mass extinction is not new, and the study is not the first to make the case that Earth is already in the middle of it.

Two years ago, some of the same researchers argued that species are disappearing at a rate unparalleled since the Cretaceous mass extinction of dinosaurs. The 2015 study found that vertebrate species have been disappearing up to about 100 times faster than the normal rate over the last century.

On a happier note, scientists point to ongoing efforts to save endangered species and their habitats.

"We've dramatically increased the area protected by national parks, increased the area of the oceans that's being protected. We have reduced deforestation rate in the Amazon," Pimm said. "I'm not trying to say that it's all good news, but there's good news out there."

And there's a chance to save endangered species - as long as humans fully commit to it, Suckling said.

"Because once they go on endangered species list, they go from neglect or maybe tacit management to very active, focused efforts to save them. And those work," Suckling said. "The good news here is that once humans decide to save individual species - and we're quite good at it - we can actually reverse this negative trend."

Concerned citizens can do practical things like planting native plans in their yard. They can also contact their representatives in Congress to show their support for habitat protection, Greenwald said, though he cautioned that the current Congress is "the most anti-endangered species in history."

The Center for Biological Diversity has tallied 34 pending legislations that would weaken protections for endangered species, Greenwald said.

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Earth is on its way to the biggest mass extinction since the dinosaurs, scientists warn

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Have humans damaged the Earth's ecosystems so severely that we're well on our way to the biggest mass extinction since the dinosaurs vanished 66 million years ago? And are we running out of time to reverse the negative impacts of our actions?

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Arctic tundra contaminated with high levels of mercury pollution, scientists warn | The Independent

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Arctic tundra contaminated with high levels of mercury pollution, scientists warn | The Independent

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The remote Arctic tundra may seem like the last place on Earth human pollution should be causing a problem - yet it's filled with mercury contamination. And that mercury leaks from the soil into rivers and ultimately the Arctic Ocean, contaminating the fish and other sea life that native communities rely on for survival.

Now, in a new study, published Wednesday in the journal Nature, scientists have begun to outline how the mercury is getting into and moving through the landscape in the first place. And the short answer is: It's our fault it's there in the first place, and climate change could now make that even worse.

The study finds that the majority of the contamination in the Arctic tundra came from a gaseous form of elemental mercury, carried through the atmosphere from other parts of the world, where it was emitted to the atmosphere as a result of the burning of coal and other industrial activities.

Once it reaches the Arctic, the scientists believe the mercury is sucked up by plants - mainly in the summer, when snow cover is at its lowest and the tundra is at its greenest - in much the same way that vegetation pulls carbon dioxide out of the air. As the plants shed their leaves or die, the mercury moves into the soil and eventually may leach into rivers and waterways, which carry it into the Arctic Ocean.

And as climate change continues to heat up the Arctic, the scientists are concerned about the ways that the resulting landscape changes - which may include less sea ice, less snow and more vegetation - could affect the cycling of mercury through the ecosystem.

"This is really important in the sense of new work, because no one's really take a look at the Arctic tundra and the impact that it has on the mercury cycle," said Alexandra Steffen, an atmospheric mercury specialist with Environment Canada, who was not involved with the new research. And the work is likely to help scientists better understand the ways this mercury cycle may be affected by future climate change, she added.

"A huge amount of Canada and Russia is covered in this tundra, and it's melting," she told The Washington Post. "So to understand what's going on, where mercury is being housed, where it's coming from, will help us to understand what's going to happen when the tundra continues to melt."

Scientists have known about the high levels of mercury pollution in the Arctic for a long time, said the new study's lead author Daniel Obrist, an atmospheric chemistry and environmental pollution expert at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. But the processes by which it was actually being deposited there have remained poorly understood. In the past, some scientists had theorized that the mercury pollution in the Arctic was reaching the landscape mainly through rain and snow, an idea that's been largely overturned by the new study.

"The question was really what's causing all that mercury presence and accumulation up there in the Arctic," Obrist said.

To investigate, Obrist and a team of colleagues from institutes in the United States and France spent two years collecting field data from the Alaska tundra, measuring mercury levels and conducting chemical analyses to determine what state the mercury was in and how it likely got out of the atmosphere.

They're still exploring some of the reasons the Arctic is such a mercury hot spot when it's so far removed from the industrial activities that release the pollution into the air. For one thing, once mercury is in the atmosphere, it's free to travel all over the world - it doesn't necessarily just stay in the spot where it was emitted. It can move out of the atmosphere and into plants and soil in other parts of the world just as it does in the Arctic, Obrist noted - but in places with more sun and higher temperatures, chemical reactions often cause it to move right back into the atmosphere, he said.

In the Arctic, on the other hand, conditions are a bit different. The new study suggests that a great deal of the mercury in the landscape is taken up by vegetation during a small portion of the year, when snow is melting and plants are growing. The vegetation has a relatively short window of time to flourish, and afterward it becomes covered up with snow and ice again for seven or eight months of the year. The result is that the mercury becomes more or less sequestered in the soil, without access to the sunlight and heat that might cause it to react and move back into the air.

"So we believe the Arctic really is an important depository for global mercury pollution," Obrist told The Post. "Once it reaches these Arctic soils, it's building up to high levels."

The scientists can't say for sure that their findings hold true all across the Arctic, since their study only focused on one region of the Alaskan tundra. But they suspect that similar processes are occurring all across the landscape.

Despite the growing concern about mercury contamination in the Arctic, there is some good news - research shows that global mercury emissions have been falling for the past two decades, meaning human efforts to curb the pollution are starting to work. And just a few years ago, nations around the world designed a global treaty called the Minamata Convention, which is an agreement to protect humans and the environment from mercury pollution. Some of its major points include banning new mercury mines, phasing out existing ones and cutting down on the use of mercury in other products and industrial processes.

Still, the future of the mercury that's already in the Arctic or will be deposited there in the future remains a concern as temperatures continue to climb. Vegetation, snow cover, sunlight and heat all play major roles in the way mercury moves through the atmosphere and the terrestrial earth, and climate change is already having a significant effect on all of them. Careful monitoring and continued investigation of the processes affecting the mercury cycle will be key to understanding how this contaminant may affect the ecosystem and the human communities that depend on it in the future.

"Temperatures in the Arctic are among the fastest rising ones, increasing at a rate about double what we see here in these areas farther south," Obrist said. " And given how much mercury we find now in these tundra soils, we have a concern that this may start to mobilize some of these mercury pools that reside in these tundra soils."

What will happen next, he said, remains unknown.

"Will it result in increased mobilisation... into the ocean? We don't know, and that's a concern," he said.
The Washington Post
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The Arctic is full of mercury and scientists think they know how it's getting there

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The remote Arctic tundra may seem like the last place on Earth human pollution should be causing a problem - yet it's filled with mercury contamination. And that mercury leaks from the soil into rivers and ultimately the Arctic Ocean, contaminating the fish and other sea life that native communities rely on for survival.

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Sixth mass extinction: The era of 'biological annihilation' - CNN

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Sixth mass extinction: The era of 'biological annihilation' - CNN

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Sixth mass extinction: The era of 'biological annihilation' - CNN

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Many scientists say it's clear that Earth is entering its sixth mass-extinction, meaning three-quarters of all species could disappear in the coming centuries.

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Climate Change Map Shows Where Huge Floods Will be Normal by 2050 | Inverse

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Climate Change Map Shows Where Huge Floods Will be Normal by 2050 | Inverse

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Thanks to climate change, the frequency of major flooding events is increasing at an alarming rate. While many cities are doing what they can to prepare for the upcoming deluge, new research suggests that they might not be prepared soon enough: In a new study in Nature Communications, scientists report that a flood level with a one-percent chance of occurring this year (also known as a 100-year flood) will, in some parts of the world, have a 50- or even a 100- percent chance of occurring in 2050.

That's astonishing. And what's worse still is that previous predictions have drastically underestimated how quickly flooding rates are changing on many of the world's coastlines, including the United States' Pacific coast.

In the new study, published Friday, scientists at the University of Central Florida used a new modeling technique to examine the future likelihood of extreme floods. "The likelihood increases faster than we previously understood," Thomas Wahl, a civil engineer and the lead author of the research, tells Inverse.

Wahl and his research team, looking to improve on the predictive ability of existing flood models, developed a more flexible statistical model to estimate rates of future flooding. While previous projections only took into account the uncertainties around how sea levels will behave in the future, Wahl's model also considers the uncertainties of what we think we know about extreme floods today.

With the new method, the outcome shifts dramatically The old model underestimated predicted flood rates, in particular along the West Coast of both North and South America, in Southern Europe, and in Australia. But with Wahl's new assessment, it appears that people on many more coastlines of the world will see extreme floods become common within a few decades.

Each year, the United States loses 82 lives and $8 billion to floods. If those numbers are bound to rise, we need to know how quickly that will happen in order to prepare for and prevent those damages. Getting it wrong, we've learned, has expensive and disastrous consequences. Unfortunately, many cities are equipped only with flooding protection systems that are already strained by 100-year floods. In areas where the floods are coming faster than previously thought, disaster managers won't have much time left to react.

"Once policymakers decide to adapt, that does not mean that it is in place tomorrow; it takes a long time," says Wahl. Major flood protection systems can take decades to plan and implement. "If we can show that by 2050 things are already so critical, that means we should probably not wait until 2045 to start thinking about it."

Abstract
One of the main consequences of mean sea level rise (SLR) on human settlements is an increase in ﬂood risk due to an increase in the intensity and frequency of extreme sea levels (ESL). While substantial research efforts are directed towards quantifying projections and uncertainties of future global and regional SLR, corresponding uncertainties in contemporaryESL have not been assessed and projections are limited. Here we quantify, for the ﬁrst time at global scale, the uncertainties in present-day ESL estimates, which have by default been ignored in broad-scale sea-level rise impact assessments to date. ESL uncertainties exceed those from global SLR projections and, assuming that we meet the Paris agreement goals, the projected SLR itself by the end of the century in many regions. Both uncertainties in SLRprojections and ESL estimates need to be understood and combined to fully assess potential impacts and adaptation needs.

Photos via Wahl et al. / Nature Communications

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New Maps Reveal Cities That Will Get Flooded by Climate Change by 2050

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Thanks to climate change, the frequency of major flooding events is increasing at an alarming rate.

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18 maps that explain America - Business Insider

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18 maps that explain America - Business Insider

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A series of maps illustrating various aspects of American life.

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This Map Shows How Badly Climate Change Will Impact Each County In The US

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This Map Shows How Badly Climate Change Will Impact Each County In The US

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US counties face steep economic damages tied to future global warming, with the poorest counties to be hit hardest, according to a county-by-county analysis published on Thursday.

The warmer it gets, the worse that farms, businesses, and people will be hammered.

"As temperatures goes up, the economy gets damaged," study author Amir Jina of the University of Chicago told BuzzFeed News, adding that "for each additional degree, there's increasing damages done."

The world has already warmed more than 1 degree Celsius in the industrial era, and scientists say manmade climate change is largely to blame. How much warmer it gets in this century depends on how quickly humans can bring down their greenhouse gas emissions. Most countries have set a shared goal of limiting future global warming below 2 degrees Celsius to prevent the worst climate impacts, under 2015 Paris climate accord. The Trump administration announced his intention to withdraw from that accord in May.

The new findings, published in the journal Science, offer the most detailed breakdown available of the local economic impacts of climate change in the US.

The negative economic impacts won't be felt equally by everyone. Poorer counties, which are largely clustered in the southern half of the US, are expected to experience the brunt of the damages. Unless country's meet their Paris goals, the poorest third of US counties could potentially see damages between 2% to 20% of their income in the second half of this century, according to the study.

One surprise, Jina said, "is the fact that the southern counties, which are already on average poorer, are going to suffer large damages." Northern counties, in contrast, see only some damages and potentially even benefit from global warming.

Jina and his 11 colleagues analyzed how a changing climate would impact six area of the US economy-agriculture, crime, coastal properties, electricity demand, human mortality and labor supply-on a county-by-county level. The researchers focused on economic areas where the most complete data was available.

"This is truly an amazing study," said Don Fullerton, a finance professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. "It's the most detailed, comprehensive analysis anywhere ever of climate change damages in the United States."

In the study, the scientists used real-world data to measure how weather and climate currently affect key areas of the economy. Using this same relationship, and holding population and economy constant at 2012 levels, they turned their attention to the future. They calculated different future warming scenarios using global climate models and projecting possible economic impacts.

When it comes to what sector is driving future damages, "the major impact is on mortality from heat," said Fullerton, where higher temperatures can lead to more heat exhaustion and strokes. This largely explains the glaring gap between economic damages predicted for northern US counties versus southern US counties.

In many southern states, for example, summer daytime temperatures can frequently reach or exceed 95 or 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Those are already life-threatening temperatures for some people. With continued climate change, summer days there will get hotter and more deadly. In contrast, summer temperatures in the North are lower and won't reach the same high temperatures as quickly.

Hsiang, Kopp, Jina, Rising, et al. (Science)

Estimated total direct damage to US economy due to temperature rise.

While Fullerton doesn't dispute the finding that soaring temperatures will threaten human health triggering negative economic impacts, he suggested the study may be overstated. That's in part because it does not account for how communities can-and likely will-adapt to future climate changes. More families and businesses may invest in air conditioning, for example, to handle the heat.

For countries in southern states such as Florida, Georgia and Texas, it's not just the impacts of rising temperatures on human health that threaten to take a high economic toll. It's also how sea level rise and increasing storm intensity threatens the economies of coastal communities. Jina described these places as facing a "perfect storm" of climate risks.

Meanwhile, in the Midwest, where Jina now lives, the big threat to the economy is how climate change impacts local agriculture.

"If you want to avoid the worst effects, we should aim to keep warming as low as possible," Jina said.

Zahra Hirji is a science reporter for BuzzFeed News and is based in San Francisco

Contact Zahra Hirji at zahra.hirji@buzzfeed.com.

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These Scientists Mapped How Badly Climate Change Will Impact Each County In the US

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US counties face steep economic damages tied to future global warming, with the poorest counties to be hit hardest, according to a county-by-county analysis published on Thursday. The warmer it gets, the worse that farms, businesses, and people will be hammered.

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What the World Will Look Like 4°C Warmer | Big Think - bigthink.com

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What the World Will Look Like 4°C Warmer | Big Think - bigthink.com

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Micronesia is gone - sunk beneath the waves. Pakistan and South India have been abandoned. And Europe is slowly turning into a desert. This is the world, 4°C warmer than it is now.

But there is also good news: Western Antarctica is no longer icy and uninhabitable. Smart cities thrive in newly green and pleasant lands. And Northern Canada, Scandinavia and Siberia produce bountiful harvests to feed the hundreds of millions of climate refugees who now call those regions home.

This map, which shows some of the effects a 4°C rise in average temperature could have on the planet, is eight years old, but it seems to get more contemporary as it ages (and the planet warms). Antarctica is white with snow and ice, on the ground and, traditionally, on most maps. This map has turned the continent's western end incongruously green. And recent reports confirm that Antarctica is indeed turning green.

Few serious scientists doubt that climate change is happening, or that it is man-made. But the fact remains that many still have a hard time grasping global warming, partly as a convenient way of ignoring the destructive impact it is predicted to have.

Those on the fact-based side of this argument should realise that continuously bombarding the opposition with doom and gloom is likely to reinforce their resistance to accepting the new paradigm.

This map offers an alternative: lots of misery and disaster, but also plenty of hope and solutions. Not solutions that will lead us back to the climate of a few decades ago - costly and pointless - but solutions that work for the world as it will be, when it will be much warmer than it is now.

First, the bad news. Brown indicates 'Uninhabitable due to floods, drought or extreme weather'. Say goodbye to the Eastern Seaboard of the U.S., to Mexico and Central America, to the middle third of South America. In Africa, Mozambique and Madagascar are gone; Asia loses much of the Indian subcontinent, including all of Pakistan; Indochina is abandoned, as is most of Indonesia. As the map mentions, "The last inhabitants of (the South-west U.S. are) migrating north. The Colorado river is a mere trickle"; "Deglaciation means (Peru) is dry and uninhabitable"; and "Bangladesh is largely abandoned, as is South India. (In) Pakistan, isolated communities remain in pockets".

Orange is not much better: 'Uninhabitable desert'. That's most of the U.S. and the rest of South America, almost the entirety of Africa and the southern halves of Europe and Asia. "Deserts have encroached on (Southern Europe), rivers have dried up and the Alps are now snow-free. Goats and other hardy animals are kept at the fringes", the map predicts.

Red is for lands lost to the rising tide (assuming +4°C adds two metres to ocean levels). This may not seem a lot, but this is where populations are concentrated. In the U.S. for instance, counties directly on the shoreline constitute less than 10% of the total land area (not including Alaska), but account for 40% of the total population.

But there is a flipside. Light-green stands for food-growing zones, and compact high-rise cities. That's Western Antarctica, "unrecognisable now. Densely populated with high-rise cities". New Zealand, sparsely populated in our time, will also be transformed into a high-density population centre. There will be a lot more room for this in the northern hemisphere: Siberia and Canada, where "reliable precipitation and warmer temperatures provide ideal growing conditions for most of the world's subsistence crops." And the UK, Scandinavia, Greenland and northern Russia, which will be dotted with compact high-rise cities to "provide shelter for much of the world's population".

A warmer climate could even lead to reforestation in certain areas of the world, including the Sahel and Western Australia. The regions abandoned to desertification are empty, but not useless: they will be used for solar farming (green dots) and geothermal energy (red dots). Giant wind farms off the coasts of South America, Alaska and in the North Sea will generate the remainder of the planet's energy needs.

This map was first published by New Scientist, and republished by Parag Khanna for his book Connectography. Khanna speculates: "The entire population of the Arctic region today is less than 4 million. Could it be 400 million within the coming 20 years?"

Now is the time to buy property in Greenland - before it too turns green...
Strange Maps #842 Got a strange map? Let me know at strangemaps@gmail.com.

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What the world will look like 4°C warmer

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Micronesia is gone - sunk beneath the waves. Pakistan and South India have been abandoned. And Europe is slowly turning into a desert. This is the world, 4°C warmer than it is now. But there is also good news: Western Antarctica is no longer icy and uninhabitable.

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Satellite Eye on Earth: May 2017 – in pictures - the guardian

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Satellite Eye on Earth: May 2017 – in pictures - the guardian

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Satellite Eye on Earth: May 2017 - in pictures (the guardian)

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Vesuvius in Italy and volcanoes in northern Tanzania, lights going out in Syria, and flooding in Sri Lanka are among images captured by Nasa and the ESA this month

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The Mercator projection distorts countries - Business Insider

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The Mercator projection distorts countries - Business Insider

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Maps shape our understanding of the world - and in an increasingly interconnected and global economy, this geographic knowledge is more important than ever.

The funny thing is, almost everyone actually has a skewed perception of the true size of countries thanks to a cartographic technique called the Mercator projection.

Used just about everywhere, from textbooks to Google Maps, the Mercator projection map is the way most of humanity recognizes the position and size of Earth's continents.

Visual Capitalist

In 1569, the great cartographer, Gerardus Mercator, created a revolutionary new map based on a cylindrical projection. The new map was well-suited to nautical navigation since every line on the sphere is a constant course, or loxodrome. In modern times, this is particularly useful since the Earth can be depicted as seamless in online mapping applications.

That said, the true sizes of landmasses become increasingly distorted the further away from the equator they get. Mercator's map inadvertently pumps up the sizes of Europe and North America. Visually speaking, Canada and Russia appear to take up approximately 25% of the Earth's landmass, when in reality they occupy a mere 5%. When Antarctica is excluded (as it often is), Canada and Russia's visual share of landmass jumps to about 40%!

Canada is the second largest country in the world, but not by much. Here is an " at scale " look at Canada, the United States, and Mexico.

Visual Capitalist

Africa, South Asia, and South America all appear much smaller in relation to countries further from the equator.

And from a North American perspective, countries such as Australia and Indonesia appear much smaller than they actually are. Comparing the landmasses on the same latitude as Canada helps put sizes into perspective.

Visual Capitalist

Greenland is the world's largest island, but looking at its hyper-exaggerated depiction in the map below, you'd be forgiven for wondering why it isn't a stand-alone continent. In reality, Greenland is about fourteen times smaller than Africa.

Visual Capitalist

IS BIGGER BETTER?

Though Mercator's map was never intended for use as the default wall map in schools around the world, it has shaped the worldviews of billions of people. Critics of the map - and similar projections - suggest that distortion reinforces a sense of colonialist superiority. As well, the amount of territory a country occupies is often correlated with power and access to natural resources, and map distortions can have the effect of inadvertently diminishing nations closer to the equator.

A prime example of this argument is the "True Size of Africa" graphic, which demonstrated to millions of people just how big the continent is.

Visual Capitalist

Growing awareness of map distortion is translating into concrete change. Boston public schools, for example, recently switched to the Gall-Peters projection , which more accurately depicts the true size of landmasses.

Visual Capitalist

Visual Capitalist

THE ROAD TO EQUAL-AREA MAPPING

In 1805, mathematician and astronomer, Karl Mollweide, created a namesake projection that trades accuracy of angles and shape for accuracy of proportion. The Mollweide projection has inspired many other attempts at a user-friendly equal area map.

Visual Capitalist

John Paul Goode's attempt, known as the Goode Homolosine Projection, took this concept a step further by adding interruptions at strategic locations to help reduce the distortion of continents. The resulting shape is sometimes referred to as an "orange peel map".

Visual Capitalist

Another evolution in cartography was the Dymaxion map, invented by Buckminster Fuller and patented in 1946. In this version, the continents are no longer in their familiar positions - however, there is more spacial fidelity than in previous projection methods. We're able to see the true proportions of Africa, Northern Canada, Antarctica, and other distortion hot spots.

The Dymaxion map wasn't created for purely practical purposes. Fuller believed that humans would be better equipped to address global challenges if they were given a way to visualize the Earth's continents in a contiguous manner.

Visual Capitalist

THE AUTHAGRAPH MAP

Using a new map-making method called AuthaGraph, Japanese architect, Hajime Narukawa, may have created the most accurate map of the world yet. AuthaGraph divides the globe into 96 triangles, transfers them to a tetrahedron and unfolds into a rectangle.

The end result? Landmasses and seas are more accurately proportioned than in traditional projections.

Visual Capitalist

The biggest downfall of the AuthaGraph map is that longitude and latitude lines are no longer a tidy grid. As well, continents on the map are repositioned in a way that will be unfamiliar to a population that is already geographically challenged.

That said, depicting our round world on a flat surface will always come with some trade-offs. As demand grows for a true equal-area map, it will be exciting to see what the next generation of map projections have to offer.

Read the original article on Visual Capitalist. Get rich, visual content on business and investing for free at the Visual Capitalist website, or follow Visual Capitalist on Twitter, Facebook, or LinkedIn for the latest. Copyright 2017. Follow Visual Capitalist on Twitter.

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SEE ALSO: 15 overlay maps that will change the way you see the world

NOW WATCH: Here's why the American flag is reversed on military uniforms

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Maps shape our understanding of the world - and in an increasingly interconnected and global economy, this geographic knowledge is more important than ever. The funny thing is, almost everyone actually has a skewed perception of the true size of countries thanks to a cartographic technique called the Mercator projection.

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These 20 images of Earth over the past 70 years show why countries signed the Paris Agreement

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These 20 images of Earth over the past 70 years show why countries signed the Paris Agreement

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President Donald Trump is expected to announce on Thursday whether the US will withdraw from the landmark Paris Agreement on climate change.

The international accord, which was signed by every country except Nicaragua and Syria, lays out a framework for countries to reduce their fossil-fuel emissions to help keep the planet's overall temperature from rising by more than 2 degrees Celsius.

Since the Industrial Revolution, humans have had an unmistakable impact on Earth that has accelerated over time. This impact pops out in sharp relief when you look at this collection of images of what specific areas look like now compared with about 70 years ago.

In some cases, the images - mostly from NASA, unless otherwise noted - were taken as far as 50 years apart; in others, they were snapped within 10 to 15 years of each other.
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These 20 images of Earth over the past 70 years show why countries signed the Paris Agreement

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President Donald Trump is expected to announce on Thursday whether the US will withdraw from the landmark Paris Agreement on climate change. The international accord, which was signed by every country except Nicaragua and Syria, lays out a framework for countries to reduce their fossil-fuel emissions to help keep the planet's overall temperature from rising by more than 2 degrees Celsius.

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NASA just released this eye-popping photo of the Grand Canyon

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NASA just released this eye-popping photo of the Grand Canyon

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CLOSE

NASA has released an incredible photo of the Grand Canyon taken from a camera controlled by students aboard the International Space Station.

The photo was taken from low-Earth orbit on April 3 by the Sally Ride EarthKAM, a Nikon digital camera named after the first American woman in space and attached to a window on the space station.

Working through their teachers, students can request images of specific locations on Earth during the camera's four scheduled missions each year. They can request pictures of the Earth's coasts, mountain ranges or other geological features.

Think you can top this image?

The next EarthKAM mission begins in fall 2017.

Teachers can get information on how to get their students involved at the EarthKAM website.
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Read or Share this story: http://azc.cc/2sfd4EY

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NASA just released this eye-popping photo of the Grand Canyon

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CLOSE NASA has released an incredible photo of the Grand Canyon taken from a camera controlled by students aboard the International Space Station. The photo was taken from low-Earth orbit on April 3 by the Sally Ride EarthKAM, a Nikon digital camera named after the first American woman in space and attached to a window on the space station.

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More Than 31 Million People Were Internally Displaced In 2016: Report

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More Than 31 Million People Were Internally Displaced In 2016: Report

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Crises of violence, conflict and disaster caused more than 31 million people to flee their homes in 2016. That's about one person internally displaced per second, a new joint report from the Norwegian Refugee Council and Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre reveals.

There are currently twice as many internally displaced persons, or IDPs, as refugees worldwide, but the issue of internal displacement remains largely neglected on the global policy agenda, the organizations warned Monday. Many people who flee their countries as refugees are later forced to return home, only to become displaced internally, the report said.

Last year, natural disaster was by far the largest source of displacement.

Violence and conflict together resulted in nearly 7 million new cases, at a rate of about 15,000 per day. This included some 922,000 cases in the Democratic Republic of Congo, 824,000 in Syria and 659,000 in Iraq. The global population of such IDPs has been on the rise since 2003, and now exceeds 40 million.

Natural disasters led to a sobering 24.2 million internal displacements in 2016, including more than 7.4 million in China, 5.9 million in the Philippines and 2.4 million in India.

In countries like Nigeria, South Sudan and Somalia, the combined detrimental effects of disaster and violent conflict are fueling rapid displacement and extreme food shortages.

Did you know that most people displaced by conflict are displaced in their home country? #InternalDisplacement pic.twitter.com/NteaqEFqJv
- NRC (@NRC_Norway) May 19, 2017

The NRC and IDMC stress that insufficient monitoring practices make it impossible to reflect the true scale, nature and patterns of the global internal displacement phenomenon. The humanitarian groups identify issues like poverty, inequality, weak systems of governance, rapid urbanization, climate change and environmental degradation as some of the primary triggers of forced displacement.

"Significant new internal displacement associated with conflict and disasters takes place every year, mainly in low and lower-middle income countries," the report said. "Those affected join the many millions of people already living in displacement, reflecting the intractable nature of the phenomenon, and the inability of governments to cope."

Without adequate attention and response to the underlying factors driving internal displacement around the globe, these numbers will continue to rise, the report warns. It calls on members of the international community to commit to "a conscious, deliberate and sustained political effort to improve the many millions of lives blighted by internal displacement and preventing others from suffering the same upheaval and trauma in the future."

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More Than 31 Million People Were Internally Displaced In 2016: Report

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Crises of violence, conflict and disaster caused more than 31 million people to flee their homes in 2016. That's about one person internally displaced per second, a new joint report from the Norwegian Refugee Council and Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre reveals.

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Where Is America’s Heartland? Pick Your Map - The New York Times

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Where Is America’s Heartland? Pick Your Map - The New York Times

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Thanks for your vote!

The heartland is, by definition, somewhere central. But where the center begins and ends - what it encompasses and excludes - is harder to say. Here's how your answer compares with those of other Times readers:

What the maps actually show, and what other Times readers thought

Illinois? Definitely the heartland. The South Side of Chicago? Not so clear. Philadelphia? Too close to the coast. But coal country, 120 miles inland, may be. Cumberland County, Tenn., is in the South, not the Midwest. But is it also in the heartland? What about Detroit, with its demographics and politics that little resemble rural Iowa? Or the Standing Rock Indian Reservation straddling the Dakotas?

The word captures an idea that is more expansive than the Midwest, harder to map than Appalachia, more evocative than the Great Plains. But now we are searching for its boundaries, after an election that pundits proclaimed cast the heartland against the rest of America.

"It's much more a state of mind than an actual place," suggests the historian William Cronon (who teaches in Madison, Wis., which is surely the heartland, unless your heartland omits liberal college towns). "It describes a deep set of beliefs about places that somehow authentically stand for America."

In that sense, the word is not purely about geography. It's a value judgment. "Who's authentically from the middle? Who's from implicitly the heart? Who represents the core?" Mr. Cronon said. Any of those questions could have a dual meaning. Who's mainstream? Whose traditions are "traditional"? Who claims the political center? "There's a slippage here," Mr. Cronon said.

To pin down this elusive place, we used data from the presidential election, the census, the Bureau of Labor Statistics - even data about television preferences from Facebook - to map the many meanings of the word, if we're really being honest about what we mean. This map is our point of departure:

The heartland as a synonym for "the Midwest"

That's roughly the Midwest, a contiguous though still contested place. The black line captures the region as the Census Bureau defines it. The shaded states beyond add data from 1,357 respondents who said they identified "a lot" or "some" as Midwesterners in a survey for FiveThirtyEight. Even Midwesterners can't agree on what's in the Midwest.

The idea of the heartland is closely linked to the Midwest, although the earliest use of "heartland" in this sense had nothing to do with America. Halford Mackinder, a British geographer, coined the word in 1904 to refer to the heart of the Eurasian land mass: a strategic center of industry, natural resources and power. Whoever controlled that region, Mr. Mackinder argued, could control the world (a theory the Germans adopted during World War II).

Postwar, the language came to apply to the middle of America, too, not just for its centrality, but also its national importance. "In this classic European Mackinder sense, this is where the industrial heartland of the country was," said Jon Lauck, a Midwestern historian and an adviser to Senator John Thune, a South Dakota Republican. "This is where they brought all those bombers out of Willow Run to bomb Hitler and Japan," he said, referring to the manufacturing complex in Michigan. "This is where all the railroads met. This is where all the coal and iron ore came from."

It's where the grain was grown and the cars were built. The region has since lost some of that might, with deindustrialization and the depopulation of family farms. But Mr. Lauck argues that the heartland and the Midwest remain synonymous, in large part because of this history.

The heartland as "far from the coasts"

The heartland can also be defined by what it's not - the coasts. And in many ways its cultural values have been framed in opposition to that Other America. "The suspicion persists," wrote the English professor and critic Barry Gross in 1977, "that what goes on at either coast is the extreme, the perverse and bizarre, the grotesque and the Gothic, unreal and worse, unAmerican."

The center of the country is the normal against which the coasts are abnormal, or merely peripheral. The above map defines the heartland by this relationship to the coasts, counting inland by county from the ocean on both sides.

But where the interior lies has shifted historically, and it has long been the hardest part of the country to map precisely because it lacks the clear natural boundaries of the coasts. "The West" was once west of the Appalachian Mountains. Today's Illinois once sat in the "Northwest Territory." The "middle" moved as white settlers and cartographers did. And this process of revision still hasn't halted.

"These things aren't absolute," said James Akerman, the curator of maps at the Newberry Library in Chicago, describing how we conceive of "region" in America. "And the electorate is showing these things change constantly."

The heartland as "America's breadbasket"

Look through newspaper articles, and references to the American "heartland" proliferate in the 1980s with stories about the struggles of the middle part of the country. Toby Higbie, a U.C.L.A. historian who has traced the word's use over time, pegs its growing prominence to the farm crisis of the 1980s and the economic shifts that began to turn parts of the Midwest into the "Rust Belt."

"To me, the very ideological or cultural formulation that people are using - whether they're aware of it or not - comes out of that moment of confronting globalization," Mr. Higbie said. "And it's a reaction to that, to sort of say: 'We are the authentic, quintessential American location. And we want to reinvest in that.' "

To the extent that the heartland conjures an America of wheat fields and barns in graceful decay - two images prominent in political ads - it's capturing the geography mapped above. That picture, which encompasses much of the Great Plains, shows a swath of land down the center of the country, from the Dakotas to Texas, east into Illinois, Indiana and Ohio, and south along the Mississippi River. It also includes California's Central Valley, which produces about a quarter of the nation's food.

Add in Manufacturing America, and you pull in more of the Great Lakes states, farther east into Pennsylvania and across much more of the rural South:

The heartland as "home to American manufacturing"

It's notable, though, Mr. Higbie adds, that stock images of heartland America tend to turn up few faces of color, whether on the farm or in nostalgic manufacturing. When people use the term, he suspects, they're often envisioning a white version of the Midwest without its most diverse pockets, circumscribing Detroit, Chicago and St. Louis, and its Native American reservations.

Map America by at least part of its European heritage (German Americans are the nation's largest ethnic group, at about 46 million), and you get a patchy Midwest that looks more like this:

The heartland as German-settled America

By that definition, the heartland becomes much harder to map than the Midwest. It's not just the borders that are in dispute, but the redactions as well. Is the heartland really the middle of America minus the minorities? Or the middle, rural parts only? Or the middle, in an election year, discounting its islands of blue?

Expand the heritage map to include what are today the whitest parts of the country, and you get this:

The heartland as predominantly white America

That map overlaps significantly with the places where Donald J. Trump fared well this fall (and excludes those Midwestern cities where he did poorly). And, in fact, in its loosest definition postelection, the heartland has been used to describe virtually anywhere in America that tilted toward the Republican candidate.

Breitbart, the site formerly run by Mr. Trump's campaign chief executive and adviser, Stephen K. Bannon, declared in a viral headline and misleading map after the election that Trump won a "7.5 million-vote popular landslide" in the heartland. The contorted math behind that figure counted Trump's margin in 3,084 of 3,141 American counties, excluding big urban centers like New York and Los Angeles - a convenient way of defining nearly all of the country's land area (if not all of its people) as heartland.

In that context, the word heartland was used to suggest that Mr. Trump won the popular vote in authentic America - or, put another way, the true American vote. Taken to this extreme, the word loses all geographic meaning; it no longer even describes the interior. This is what the heartland looks like as Trump's America:

The heartland as "Trump's America"

That last map recalls a 1969 book by the Republican strategist Kevin Phillips, " The Emerging Republican Majority." In it, he predicted Republican success from a new coalition of the interior "heartland" - "the land of Methodist church suppers, mile-high mining camps, county fairs, steamboats, round the bend, cattle drives, waving wheat" - with suburbia, the South and the Sun Belt.

"His heartland strategy only works if you close your eyes and imagine any urban space or place with significant people of color as not part of the heartland," Mr. Higbie said. Geographically, that definition falls apart. Politically, Mr. Higbie says, it was genius, tying to the Republican Party deeply rooted ideas about "real" America. "You take a regional name, detach it from the actual physical region," Mr. Higbie said, "and move it around the country selectively to the places that match your electoral strategy."

That is essentially what Breitbart did.

These maps highlight how the heartland is usually about more than geography - whether it's also about demographics, economics, ideology or history. And so we close with a couple of maps that seek, in the end, to define this place through cultural ties. The first brings us most closely back to Mr. Lauck's Midwest:

The heartland as sports fandom

There's no box to check on the census for which team you root for, but millions of fans make their preferences public on Facebook. In 2014 we mapped the borders of baseball fandom, and the map above uses the same data with a small twist. It shows where the league's "Central" divisions - that is, the American League Central and National League Central - hold the most regional sway.

That picture neatly reflects much of the Midwest without need for state borders and creeps over the state lines, as with Pennsylvania, where the Midwest grows hazy. It offers the cleanest, most compact idea of the heartland of any map shown here. As with the others, it reveals a place that is whiter and more Republican than the country as a whole.

Of course, the heartland is about more than baseball, should you believe in the heartland at all. But seemingly trivial maps - think too of soda vs. pop in our dialects - can capture much more complex differences among us. With that in mind, here is the map we at The Upshot believe comes closest to capturing what many people mean by the heartland in this hyper-partisan moment:

The heartland as a cultural taste test

With thanks to our colleague Josh Katz, that's a map of where people are most likely to prefer television shows like "Duck Dynasty," "N.C.I.S." and "The Voice" most distinctly. It's messier than the Midwest. It clips out major metro areas. It pulls in a big stretch of the Great Plains and some of the South, unifying through cultural taste places that are variously rural, red and for the most part interior. Maine, admittedly, is something of an anomaly.

* Midwest maps are defined by the U.S. " Regions and Divisions of the United States"; survey data from a FiveThirtyEight/SurveyMonkey survey of 1,357 people who identified "somewhat" or "a lot" as a Midwesterner.

* Distance from the coast data based on this demonstration.

* Farm maps from the U.S.D.A. Census of Agriculture.

* Manufacturing data is the share of manufacturing jobs among all the employed population age 16 and older from the 2015 American Community Survey (five-year estimates).

* Ancestry data is people reporting single ancestry from the 2015 American Community Survey (five-year estimates).

* Race and ethnicity data from the 2015 American Community Survey (five-year estimates). Race/ethnicity categories are mutually exclusive (i.e., white non-Hispanic, black non-Hispanic and Hispanic any race).

* Election results are from The Associated Press.

* Baseball fan zones are estimates based on how many Facebook users "liked" each team in a ZIP code in April 2014. We applied an algorithm to smooth the data and fill in gaps where data was missing.

* Television show preference is based on how many Facebook users "liked" a television program in a ZIP code in June 2016. We found that the 50 most-liked shows clustered into three groups with distinct geographic distributions; the one shown here represents the rural white cluster.

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Where Is America's Heartland? Pick Your Map

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Thanks for your vote! The heartland is, by definition, somewhere central. But where the center begins and ends - what it encompasses and excludes - is harder to say. Here's how your answer compares with those of other Times readers: What the maps actually show, and what other Times readers thought Illinois?

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World's Smallest Satellite Created for NASA by 18-Year-Old Indian Teen | Teen Vogue

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World's Smallest Satellite Created for NASA by 18-Year-Old Indian Teen | Teen Vogue

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Although the space shuttle program may have been temporarily halted in the United States, NASA is still alive and well - and now, thanks to 18-year-old Rifath Sharook of India, are launching their smallest-ever satellite into space. The satellite is called 'KalamSat,' named after Indian nuclear scientist, pioneer in the aeronautics field, and former president, Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam, and is the first-ever to be manufactured by 3-D printing, a tech trend we don't see disappearing (or even going away a bit) anytime soon. NASA is planning on launching it off of Wallops Island, Virginia, on June 21, according to the Business Standard.

Rifath's satellite beat out of a slew of other inventions at a competition jointly sponsored by NASA and 'I Doodle Learning' called 'Cubes in Space,' in an effort to bring new technologies and devices to space and solve current quandries as well as new ones. "The main role of the satellite will be to demonstrate the performance of 3-D printed carbon fibre. We did a lot of research on different cube satellites all over the world and found ours was the lightest," he told the Times of India. Despite being from a small town in Tamil Nadu called Pallapatti, Rifath does have bigger than big-city dreams for the 240 minute-long mission and his aeronautics career - and has proved his scientific prowess in the past, too.

When he was just 15, he invented a two-and-a-half pound helium weather balloon from a ground in Kelambakkam, as a part of the Young Scientist India-2015 competition held by Space Kidz India. (Plus, in the past, NASA's also had assistance from other teens, like the 17-year-old Brit who noticed an error in the International Space Station data.)

But it was this victory that has Rifath particularly stoked about his future in space. " One of the scientists from [the] Colorado Space Grant Consortium has appreciated us using an idiom, saying 'we nearly fell out of the chair,' because he was so excited and amazed, Rifath said. And if scientists are falling out of their chairs over this invention, we're beyond impressed. We can't wait to see what you do next, Rifath!

Related: NASA Asked Twitter to Help Name 7 New Planets
You might also like:

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NASA's Smallest Satellite Ever Was Built by a TEEN

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Although the space shuttle program may have been temporarily halted in the United States, NASA is still alive and well - and now, thanks to 18-year-old Rifath Sharook of India, are launching their smallest-ever satellite into space.

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An Ebola outbreak has been declared by the World Health Organization (WHO) in the Democratic Republic of Congo. A cluster of cases have so far been identified, and although the virus has only been confirmed in one of these, medical professionals are preparing for the worst.

The outbreak is thought to have begun on April 22, in the Likati Health Zone, Bas Uele Province, a remote area in the far north of the country that borders with the Central African Republic. Nine people have been found displaying hemorrhagic symptoms indicative of the virus, and three of these have died. Of the tests so far carried out, only one has tested positive for the Zaire subtype Ebola virus (a different strain to the 2014 epidemic), though the results from other tests are currently being awaited.

Even though there has only been a single confirmed case, as the co-discoverer of Ebola, Peter Piot, has said: "All epidemics start with one case." This is the first outbreak of the disease to have occurred since the epidemic that claimed the lives of more than 11,000 people in West Africa two years ago. The response by the Health Ministry and the WHO has been swift, mobilizing experts and biologists to work fast to contain the outbreak.

"The first teams of epidemiologists, biologists, and experts in the areas of social mobilization, risk communication, and community engagement, and also personnel specializing in water, hygiene, and sanitation, are scheduled to reach the affected area today or tomorrow," explained Dr Yokouidé Allarangar, the WHO representative in the DRC. "The Likati health district is in a remote area, but contact tracing is essential to contain the outbreak in its focus; the DRC can rely on very experienced health workers for this purpose."

The first case is thought to have been a 39-year-old man who was admitted to the health care facility on April 22, with blood in his diarrhea and urine, bleeding from the nose, and vomiting blood, and who subsequently died. Professionals worked quickly to identify who was caring for him on the way to the facility. That person has now developed symptoms themselves, as well as the moto-taxi driver who took them there, and who is now also dead.

The fear is that as the patient traveled to the health facility in the back of the moto-taxi, he may have spread the disease. In response to the West African outbreak, research into an effective vaccine was fast tracked, and concluded with the development of one that appeared to work in trials held in 2015 in Guinea. The maker of the vaccine, Merck, has stated that they are ready and prepared to ship them to the DCR as soon as the government requests it.

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Ebola Outbreak Has Been Confirmed In The Democratic Republic Of Congo

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An Ebola outbreak has been declared by the World Health Organization (WHO) in the Democratic Republic of Congo. A cluster of cases have so far been identified, and although the virus has only been confirmed in one of these, medical professionals are preparing for the worst.