DataStreme ECS WEEK TWELVE: 26-30 April 2010

ITEMS OF INTEREST

• Celebrating Arbor Day -- This coming Friday, 30 April 2010, many locations across the nation will celebrate Arbor Day, a day when the planting of trees is encouraged. Arbor Day was originally proposed in 1872 by J. Sterling Morton, Nebraska's first newspaper editor, and continues to be most often celebrated by individual states on the last Friday in April. However, since planting conditions vary greatly due to the state's climate it may occur from September to May. In Arkansas, Arbor Day is celebrated on the third Monday in March, but in Alaska, the date is the third Monday in May. For your state's observance (and name of the official state tree), please consult the National Arbor Day Foundation.
• Climate science activities placed on "WebRangers" site --
In honor of Earth Day, a team from NASA, the National Park Service and the US Fish and Wildlife Service posted the first of three interactive, educational activities on the National Park Service WebRangers website that will focus on climate science. The activities in this series developed by the team are designed to provide guided exploration of changes occurring around the globe by introducing young people to climate change and its potential impact on them, their families, their neighborhoods and their national parks. [NASA GSFC]
• New book on climate change authored by a NASA climate scientist --
A new book designed to answer questions concerning climate change was published last week. The book, with the title " Coming Climate Crisis? Consider the Past, Beware the Big Fix," was written by Claire L. Parkinson, a well-known climate scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. [NASA Earth Observatory]
• National Science Bowl set for next weekend --
The US Department of Energy (DOE) National Science Bowl®, a nationwide academic competition for middle and high school students will be held this coming weekend (29 April-4 May 2010) in Washington, DC. This event will test students' knowledge in all areas of science and is meant to encourage high school students to excel in science and math and to pursue careers in those fields. [DOE Office of Science]
• Icelandic volcano continues to make news --
The eruption of a volcano under the Eyjafjallajokull glacier of Iceland nearly two weeks ago continued to make news, as the ash plume continued to disrupt flights across northwestern Europe. The following items of interest concerning the eruption include:
• The movement of the volcanic ash has been monitored by the network of nine Volcanic Ash Advisory Centers dispersed around the globe that issue advisories. NOAA operates two Volcanic Ash Advisory Centers. [NOAA]
• A series of images of the volcanic plume have been generated by a variety of sensors onboard American and European satellites. Some of the images that have been posted recently include images from :
  • The Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR/3) onboard the MetOp-A satellite developed by the European Organization for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT). The AVHRR/3 instrument was developed and by NASA and NOAA. [NASA GSFC]
  • The Advanced Land Imager (ALI) sensor on NASA's Earth Observing-1 (EO-1) satellite. [NASA Earth Observatory]
  • The Multi-angle Imaging SpectroRadiometer (MISR) on NASA's Terra satellite. [NASA Earth Observatory]
  • The Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) on NASA's Terra satellite [NASA Earth Observatory]
  • The Medium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer sensor on the European Space Agency's Envisat satellite. [ESA]
• Watching the seasons -- phenology observations and climate change --
Learn about phenology and the phenological network designed to study the effects of climate change on the seasonal growth of plants and the migration of animals in this week's Supplemental Information…In Greater Depth.

CURRENT CLIMATE STATUS

• State and city weather extremes for March 2010 -- The National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) has posted a listing of some of the notable extremes in temperature, precipitation and other weather elements across the nation for the recently completed month of March in "Selected U.S. City and State Extremes for March 2010." Note that this site may be updated during the following several weeks as more data are received and analyzed.
• The 2009 hurricane season reviewed --
The 2009 hurricane season in both the North Atlantic and North Pacific is reviewed and compared to the more than 150 years of record keeping in the North Atlantic and the 40 years in the eastern North Pacific. [AMS DataStreme Atmosphere]

CURRENT CLIMATE MONITORING

• Satellites show extent of Arctic Sea ice for last winter -- Two images made from data collected by the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer for EOS (AMSR-E) onboard NASA's Aqua satellite show the seasonal expansion of sea ice covering the Arctic Ocean during the recently concluded 2009-10 winter season in the Northern Hemisphere. One of the images was made in September 2009 when the seasonal ice cover was at a minimum, while the other image was in March 2010 near the winter maximum. Researchers at the National Snow and Ice Data Center claim that while the areal extent of the ice at winter maximum was greater than the March 2006 record low extent, the peak in this winter's sea ice was still smaller than the long-term (1979-2000) mean. [NASA Earth Observatory]
• An All-Hazards Monitor--
This Web portal provides the user information from NOAA on current environmental events that may pose as hazards such as tropical weather, fire weather, marine weather, severe weather, drought and floods. [NOAAWatch]
• Global and US Hazards/Climate Extremes --
A review and analysis of the global impacts of various weather-related events, including drought, floods and storms during the current month. [NCDC]

CLIMATE FORCING

• Images of the sun from a new space observatory -- NASA recently released images of the sun from its newly launched Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) spacecraft in geosynchronous orbit about the Earth that include a full-disk multiwavelength extreme ultraviolet image. Several other sensors are also onboard this satellite. [NASA SDO] At the end of March, images captured by the new observatory’s Atmospheric Imaging Assembly provide an animation of a solar prominence on the surface of the sun. [NASA Earth Observatory]
• Lightning used to show effects of pollution on thunderstorm intensity --
Researchers at Israel's Tel Aviv University, the Weizmann Institute and the Open University of Israel have found that their study of lightning patterns over the Amazon Basin indicates particulate matter emitted by fires used to clear the Amazon forests affect thunderstorm cloud development and intensity. These researches claim that this pollution could impact global weather and climate patterns. [American Friends of Tel Aviv University]
• Ocean acidification due to carbon emissions progresses at rapid pace--
In a report requested by the US Congress, the National Research Council warns that changes in ocean chemistry due to increased emissions of atmospheric carbon dioxide had resulted in ocean acidification, which has become a growing global problem, ultimately affecting the ecosystem. The report also indicates that the National Ocean Acidification Program, which is being developed by the federal government, has been charged with coordinating efforts to understand and respond to the problem; six key elements were deemed necessary for this program to be a success. [National Academies]
• Tracking volcanic ash plumes near the jet stream --
A volcanologist from the University at Buffalo and colleagues from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the University of Alaska, Michigan Technological University and the University of South Florida have been developing a set of new tools that would permit help forecast the movement of volcanic ash plumes near the upper tropospheric jet stream through a project that they call "VHub – Cyberinfrastructure for Volcano Eruption and Hazards Modeling and Simulation." [University at Buffalo]

CLIMATE IMPACTS ON THE BIOSPHERE

• List of "Ten Most Wanted" plants could provide climate change clues -- Project Budburst, a program developed by the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research and the Chicago Botanic Garden, with other partners, has developed a list of the "Ten most wanted" tree and flower species that could be used to help monitor the early signs of the impact of increased global temperatures could have on the environment. Volunteer observers from around the nation would record the dates of the emergence of tree buds, flowers and other phenological phenomena of these widely distributed species and then file these data into a national database. [NCAR/UCAR]

CLIMATE MODELING

• Mountain topography could complicate rates of global warming -- Researchers at Oregon State University report that based upon their research into the regional variations in temperature across Oregon's central Cascade Mountains, future impacts due to global increases in temperature could be significantly different across short distances over complex mountainous terrain because of local air movement above this terrain. [EurekAlert!]
• Website for human dimensions of climate change --
An interagency effort within the US federal government that included NOAA, the Bureau of Land Management and the US Forest Service, has resulted in a website called HD.gov (for HumanDimensions.gov) that provides users, such as natural resource managers, with information on the human dimensions on a variety of topics of interest such as climate change. [HD.gov]

COMPARATIVE PLANETOLOGY

• Earthweek -- Diary of the Planet [earthweek.com] Requires Adobe Acrobat Reader.

Concept of the Week: Human health and climate change

Climate scientists and other experts studying the projected changes in the global climate have been concerned that these changes can have potentially adverse effects upon human health. The specific health outcomes are highly uncertain. However, according to the U.S. Global Change Research Program’s (USGCRP) Global Climate Change Impacts in the United States Report, several key health-related issues on the national level that could be affected by climate are: heat issues and heat waves, air quality, extreme weather events, heat associated diseases, pollen effects, and vulnerable groups.

One of the more obvious consequences of changes in climate is the increased incidence of temperature-related illnesses and deaths, especially those that would occur with heat waves, or episodes of extreme heat. Projected increases in air temperature and rising humidity levels across the nation during the 21st century would also be accompanied by increased frequency and intensity of heat waves, where air temperature and heat indices would exceed certain threshold levels for several days. In the United States, recent heat waves have resulted in numerous deaths, especially in large metropolitan areas. The elderly, the poor in urban areas and those with underlying health issues (such as diabetes and hypertension) appear to be the most susceptible to higher air temperatures and extended heat waves. Some models indicate that mortality rates would increase more rapidly in northern cities, where populations are less accustomed to the less-frequent heat waves. Using a model that includes a high emissions scenario, the average annual number of heat-related deaths in the Chicago (IL) metropolitan area could reach 700 by 2050 and 1200 by 2100.

Exposure to air pollution that would include a variety of gas species and particulate matter could result in health-related problems, especially those people with respiratory and cardiovascular diseases. Changes in climate could increase air pollutant exposure in several ways. Large-scale atmospheric circulation patterns resulting in heat waves are often stagnant, which reduce dispersion and create environmental conditions for photochemical reactions that increases ground-level ozone concentrations. Increased ozone has been shown to cause reduction in lung function. These heat waves associated with stagnant weather patterns would also increase fuel combustion for power generation needed for air conditioning. Changes in climate could also affect emissions of natural air pollutants and airborne allergens.

Certain health effects would be related to extreme weather events. In addition to above-described heat waves, increases in injuries and deaths could occur if extreme weather events such as tropical cyclones (hurricanes or tropical storms) and floods would increase in frequency. The disaster wrought by Hurricane Katrina on New Orleans, LA and the Gulf Coast in 2005 could serve as an example. Water-borne diseases can be related to water contamination caused by heavy precipitation events. A Cryptosporidium outbreak in Milwaukee, WI occurred in 1993 in which 54 people died when the municipal drinking water supply became contaminated by sewage that was not properly treated because of overtaxed storm sewers. Some climate models suggest an increased incidence of extreme weather events across the nation during a warmer 21st century, especially in the frequency of excessive precipitation events. If improvement in the sewerage and water treatment facilities are not made, projected in creases in intense precipitation events could pose an increased health risk to many people, especially in the Northeast and Midwest. Chicago could have sewer overflow events going up by 50 to 120 percent in the future. In addition to the casualties that would be directly related to the natural disasters, such as drowning, some secondary effects to these disasters have been suggested, including problems with public health infrastructures and with post traumatic stress disorder following the event.

Increases in those infectious diseases borne by insects, ticks and rodents could be possible with future changes in climate. Temperature appears to serve as a major constraint on the range of microbes and vectors, meaning that some diseases could be spread poleward with higher temperatures. While malaria, yellow fever and dengue fever have been nearly eradicated across the nation, some other diseases, such as Lyme disease and encephalitis, transmitted between humans by blood-feeding insects, ticks and mites, may occur in some areas as the result of extended spells of warm wet winters, cold springs. Rising temperatures and carbon dioxide concentrations appear to increase pollen production and lengthen the pollen season. Consequently, highly allergenic pollen could pose an increased health risk to many people.

The report also cautions that particular groups of people could be especially vulnerable to future climate change, highlighting the increases in the incidence of diabetes and obesity, which make individuals more susceptible to disease or air quality or heat.

While a range of negative health impacts would be possible from future climate change, adaptation would likely help protect the majority of the nation's population. This adaptation would entail maintenance of the public health and community infrastructure across the nation. Adequate water treatment systems would help curb waterborne diseases, while health care facilities and emergency shelters would help minimize the impacts of heat stress, air pollution, extreme weather events, and diseases transmitted by insects, ticks, and rodents.

Concept of the Week: Questions

(Place your responses on the Chapter Progress Response Form provided in the Study Guide.)

1. The number of deaths that could occur in a Chicago heat wave by 2050 under the highest danger estimates could reach [(350), (700), (1200)].
2. The incidence of water and food borne diseases [(are),(are not)] likely to increase.

Historical Events:

• 24 April 2003…The temperature at Juneau, AK soared to a maximum of 70 degrees, the earliest occurrence of a 70-degree reading for the period of record in Alaska's capital city. (The Weather Doctor)
• 25 April 1875...New York City received three inches of snow, the latest measurable snow of record for that location. (David Ludlum)
• 25 April 1898...The temperature at Volcano Springs, CA hit 118 degrees to establish an U.S. record for the month of April. (The Weather Channel)
• 27 April 1915...The temperature at Washington, DC hit 92 degrees, the highest ever in April. New York City hit 92 degrees as well. (Intellicast)
• 27 April 1931...The temperature at Pahala, located on the main island of Hawaii, soared to 100 degrees to establish a state high temperature record. (The Weather Channel)
• 27 April 1960…The highest temperature ever recorded in Thailand reached 112 degrees at Uttaradit, Thailand . (The Weather Doctor)
• 27 April 1988...Mount Washington, NH reported seven ft of snow in ten days, pushing their snowfall total for the month to 89.9 in., surpassing the previous record of 89.3 in. set in 1975. Records have been kept at the Observatory on the summit since December 1932. (The National Weather Summary) (Intellicast)
• 27 April 2003…The largest hail storm ever recorded at Key West, FL was reported between 4:10 and 4:20 PM, hailstones ranging in size from one-half inch up to one and three-quarter inches fell. It is the eleventh recorded hail event (since 1871) at Key West. (The Weather Doctor)
• 28 April 1973...The all-time record crest of the Mississippi River at St. Louis, MO was recorded at 43.3 ft, exceeding the former 1884 mark by 1.9 ft. (Intellicast) This record has since been exceeded by a record flood level of 49.6 feet on 1 August 1993. (National Weather Service)
• 29 April 1910... The temperature at Kansas City, MO soared to 95 degrees to establish a record for the month of April. Four days earlier the afternoon high in Kansas City was 44 degrees, following a record cold morning low of 34 degrees. (The Weather Channel) (The Kansas City Weather Almanac)
  North America's deadliest rockslide was caused by snowmelt followed by temperatures near zero degrees Fahrenheit that caused water in the rock joints under Turtle Mountain in the Canadian Rockies to freeze and expand. Ninety million tons of limestone fell some 3000 ft onto Frank, AB. As many as 70 people died as the result of the rockslide. (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)
• 29 April 1912…The highest temperature ever recorded in Oceania was 108 degrees that occurred on this date at Tuguegarao, Philippines. (The Weather Doctor)
• 29 April 1973...The Mississippi River reached a crest of 43.4 ft at St. Louis, MO, breaking the previous record of 42 ft established in 1785. (David Ludlum)
• 30 April 1888...World's deadliest hailstorm occurred at Moradabad, India as enormous hailstones killed 230 persons and many livestock. An additional 16 people died in another town. (The Weather Doctor)
• 30 April 1991...Memphis, TN set a new monthly rainfall record for April with 17.13 inches of rain. The old record was 13.90 inches set back in 1877. (Intellicast)
• 30 April 1994…The rain finally stopped on the Kaneohe Ranch on the Hawaiian island of Oahu, ending a streak of 247 consecutive days of rain that began 27 August 1993. (The Weather Doctor)
• 1 May 1854...After 66 hours of steady rain, the Connecticut River reached a level of nearly twenty-nine feet (28 feet 10.5 inches) at Hartford, CT (the highest level of record until that time). The record height was reached in the midst of a great New England flood that followed sixty-six hours of steady rain. (David Ludlum) (Intellicast)
• 1 May 1935...Snow, ice and sleet brought winter back to parts of southeast Minnesota. Minneapolis received three inches of snow to tie their May record that was established in 1892. (1^st-2^nd) (The Weather Channel)
• 1 May 1954...The temperature at Polebridge, MT dipped to 5 degrees below zero to establish a state record for the month of May. (The Weather Channel)
• 2 May 1899...A storm buried Havre, MT under 24.8 inches of snow, an all-time record for that location. The water equivalent of 2.48 inches was a record 24-hour total for the month of May. (The Weather Channel)

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Prepared by Edward J. Hopkins, Ph.D., email hopkins@meteor.wisc.edu
© Copyright, 2010, The American Meteorological Society.