WEEKLY CLIMATE NEWS

26-30 July 2010

DataStreme Earth Climate Systems will return for Fall 2010 with new Investigations files starting during Preview Week, Monday, 30 August 2010. All the current online website products will continue to be available throughout the summer break period.

ITEMS OF INTEREST

Sunday, 1 August 2010, is the ancient Celtic holiday of Lammas that corresponds to one of the cross quarter days, lying nearly halfway between the summer solstice (21 June 2010) and the autumnal equinox (23 September 2010). This holiday, also known as "loaf-mass day", originally marked the first wheat harvest of the year in the British Isles. [Editor's note: Next Wednesday, 7 August 2010 represents the exact halfway point between the dates of the solstice and equinox. EJH]
Antenna system for geosynchronous satellites --NOAA officials recently announced that Harris Corporation has been selected to develop a ground-based antenna system including components and infrastructure designed to provide support for the agency's next generation series of geosynchronous satellites, commencing with GOES-R that is scheduled for launch in 2015. The new antenna system should increase the temporal resolution of viewing storm systems, including tornadic thunderstorm cells and hurricanes from 7.5 minutes to 30 seconds, resulting in faster forecasts of these systems. [NOAA News]
A noted "climate warrior" passes --Professor Stephen Schneider of Stanford University died early last week at the age of 65. He had written numerous popular books on climate and climate change and had been influential in the public debate over climate change. Steve was a lead scientist on the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which shared the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize with former Vice President Al Gore. [NYTimes Dot Earth]
The solar eclipse from space and Easter Island--A composite image was recently constructed showing the 11 July 2010 solar eclipse from a photograph made by the Williams College Expedition to Easter Island that was superimposed upon an image of the outer solar corona made from data collected by Large Angle Spectrometric Coronagraph (LASCO) on NASA's SOHO spacecraft. [NASA]
Violent storm killed half a billion trees in Amazon forest --Scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Tulane University and Brazil's National Institute for Amazon Research report that their research indicates a major storm containing a squall line, or linearly arranged strong to severe thunderstorm cells, was responsible for killing approximately 500,000 trees in the Amazon forest in 2005. Previously, the trees were assumed to have been killed by drought. [NASA JPL]
Major collaboration on weather and climate research by US and UK centers -- Officials with the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in the US and the United Kingdom's UK Met Office recently signed a memorandum of agreement that launched a major collaboration on weather and climate research between these two leading research centers. [UCAR/NCAR]
"Footloose" glaciers behave erratically --A glaciologist with Scripps Institution of Oceanography and his colleagues who studied several glaciers in Alaska report that those "footloose" glaciers that become detached from the seafloor appear to be more erratic in behavior, with bigger icebergs than those that remain grounded and attached. [USGS Newsroom]

CURRENT CLIMATE STATUS

Monitoring global surface temperatures for early July 2010 from space --An image prepared by scientists at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, shows the departures of the land surface temperature for the week of 4-11 July 2010 from the long-term averages for that week as obtained from data collected by the MODIS instrument on NASA's Terra satellite. While many of the large metropolitan areas in eastern North America, China and western Eurasia experienced near-record heat waves, other areas had below average temperatures. [NASA Earth Observatory]
Coastal areas threatened by rising Indian Ocean level --Scientists at the University of Colorado at Boulder and the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) have found that the sea level of the Indian Ocean has been rising at an uneven rate and that the rise could be partially due to changes in climate. The largest sea level rise has been along the coasts of the Bay of Bengal, the Arabian Sea, Sri Lanka, Sumatra and Java, which could threaten residents of some of the densely populated regions. [UCAR/NCAR]

CURRENT CLIMATE MONITORING

Increases in humid air leads to heavy rain --Researchers at the National Center for Atmospheric Research have been studying the increases in the water vapor content of the atmosphere as denoted by the precipitable water, a measure of the total water vapor in an air column as obtained from measurements made by a radiosonde, or a balloon-borne instrument package. The near record setting levels of precipitable water during this summer appear to explain in part the torrential rains that have caused flooding in sections of the Midwest and Northeast. [UCAR News]
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

Key chemical compound that destroys ozone detected in polar upper atmosphere --Using balloon-borne spectrometers, scientists at Germany's Karlsruhe Institute of Technology have found the chlorine compound ClOOCl in the stratospheric ozone layer of the polar regions at altitudes exceeding 20 km. This unstable chlorine monoxide dimer plays an important role in the depletion of stratospheric ozone. [Karlsruhe Institute of Technology]
Determining global forest canopy heights from space--A scientist at Colorado State University and his colleagues have collected data from NASA's ICESat, Terra, and Aqua satellites to produce the first uniform global maps that depict the forest canopy height on essentially all continents. Production of these maps provide an inventory of carbon sequestered in the world's forests and an estimate of how rapidly carbon cycles through the forest ecosystems and the atmosphere. In addition to the usefulness of the global map to the carbon inventory, the knowledge of forest canopy height has relevance to the study of the interaction between ground cover and winds, weather and climate. [NASA Earth Observatory] (Editor's Note: A detailed national map of forest canopy heights is also available. NASA GSFC EJH)

CLIMATE FORECASTS

Improvements made in winter climate forecasting --Atmospheric scientists at North Carolina State University claim that they have developed a new methodology capable of improving the accuracy of winter (December, January and February) precipitation and temperature forecasts over the continental US. [North Carolina State University Newsroom ]
Last week.

CLIMATE IMPACTS ON THE BIOSPHERE

Unsettled seasonal weather patterns could put the squeeze on Florida's citrus crops --Using more than 50 years of climate and agricultural data, researchers at the University of Central Florida warn that more frequent winter frosts and larger swings between winter and spring temperatures could adversely affect subtropical crops across Florida, resulting in a shortening of the growing season that could potentially force the famed citrus crops from the Sunshine State. [University of Central Florida Newsroom]
Identifying the aquatic dead zones from space --A global map was recently produced by NASA's Earth Observatory mission that displays the size and number of marine dead zones where the deep water is sufficiently depleted of dissolved oxygen to limit marine life. The map also shows the particulate organic matter in the water as determined from satellites such as NASA's Aqua satellite and the population density along coastal regions, which indicates the amount of fertilizer-laden runoff. [NASA Earth Observatory]

CLIMATE AND SOCIETY

Scientist discusses development of global landslide dataset-- A scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Dalia Kirschbaum, discussed her development of a global landslide inventory in a recent question-and-answer session. She claims that this inventory is important to assessing the historical trends and the seasonal patterns in those landslides that have been triggered by excessive rainfall events, especially in developing nations. [NASA Earth Observatory]
Climate uncertainties tied to economies of the 48 states --A study conducted at the US Department of Energy's Sandia National Laboratories modeled the potential economic effects of varying precipitation in each of the nation's 48 contiguous states that could be associated with climate change over the next 40 years. This study suggested that while the economies of many of the states would languish due to less precipitation, California, the Pacific Northwest and Colorado could have positive net impacts. [Sandia National Lab News Releases]
Information and communication needed for national response to climate change--A report, which is a part of a congressionally requested suite of studies known as America's Climate Choices, was released recently by the National Research Council. This report, entitled "Informing an Effective Response to Climate Change", recommends that improvements in availability of reliable data and the communication of information concerning climate science are needed to guide a comprehensive national response to climate change. Therefore, the federal government needs to establish information and reporting systems, such as climate services and a greenhouse-gas accounting system, designed to inform decision makers and assist them in managing climate-related risks. [National Academies News]
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

Moon may have widespread quantities of water--A team of scientists from the University of Tennessee, CalTech and the University of California, Los Angeles have discovered "lunar dew", a widespread layer of absorbed water in the upper layers of the lunar soil. [EurekAlert!]
Earthweek -- Diary of the Planet [earthweek.com] Requires Adobe Acrobat Reader.

Historical Events:

26 July 1943...Tishomingo, OK baked in the heat as the mercury soared to 121 degrees, a Sooner State record high temperature. (The Weather Channel)
26 July 1960...The temperature at Salt Lake City, UT hit 107 degrees, an all-time record high for that location. (The Weather Channel)
27 July 1897...Jewell, MD received 14.75 inches of rain, which was a 24-hour rainfall record for Maryland. (NCDC)
27 July 1939...The temperature at Lewiston, ID hit 117 degrees to establish an all-time record high for that location. (The Weather Channel)
27-28 July 1984...Unprecedented rainfall fell at Alvsbyn in Sweden (approximately 62 miles south of the Arctic Circle), which was remarkable for such a northern location that is at about the same latitude as Fort Yukon, AK. On the 26^th, 5.51 inches fell and on the 27^th, an additional 5.63 inches were recorded. (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)
27 July 1989...Thunderstorms produced locally heavy rains in the southwestern U.S. Yuma, AZ experienced their most severe thunderstorm of record. Strong thunderstorm winds, with unofficial gusts as high as 95 mph, reduced visibility to near zero in blowing dust and sand. Yuma got nearly as much rain in one hour as is normally received in an entire year. The storm total of 2.55 inches of rain was a record 24-hour total for July. Property damage due to flash flooding and high winds was in the millions. (Storm Data)
28 July 1930...The temperature at Greensburg, KY soared to 114 degrees to set a state record. (The Weather Channel)
28 July 1934...The temperature at Orofino, ID climbed to 118 degrees to establish a record for Idaho. (The Weather Channel)
28 July 1995...Yuma, AZ reached its all-time high temperature reading with 124 degrees. (Intellicast)
29 July 1898...The temperature at Prineville, OR soared to 119 degrees to establish a state record, which was tied on the 10^th of August of that same year at Pendleton. (The Weather Channel)
29 July 1930...Mississippi's record high temperature of 115 degrees was set at Holly Springs. (Intellicast)
30 July 1949...The state record temperature for Connecticut was established when the town of Greenville registered an afternoon high of 102 degrees. (The Weather Channel)
30 July 1965...The temperature at Portland, OR reached 107 degrees to equal their all-time record high. (The Weather Channel)
31 July 1861...Numerous world rainfall records were set at Cherrapunji, India as of this last day of July. These records include: 366.1 inches for a single 31-day month (during July 1861); 502.63 inches for two months (June-July 1861); 644.44 inches for three months (May-July 1861); 737.72 inches for four months (April-July 1861) and 1041.78 inches for 12 months (Aug. 1860-July 1861). (WMO, NWS)
31 July 1991...Roswell, NM closed out the month with a total of 6.68 inches of rain to set a new record for the month. (Intellicast)
31 July 1986...The temperature at Little Rock, AR soared to 112 degrees to establish an all-time record high for that location. Morrilton, AR hit 115 degrees, and daily highs for the month at that location averaged 102 degrees. (The Weather Channel)
1 August 1977...Excessive rains at Muduocaidang, China were responsible for establishing two world records, to include 33.07 inches in 6 hours and 55.12 inches in 10 hours. (WMO, NWS)
1 August 1985...A nearly stationary thunderstorm deluged Cheyenne, WY with rain and hail. Six inches of rain fell in six hours producing the most damaging flash flood of record for the state; a 24-hour precipitation record for the Cowboy State was also established with 6.06 inches. Two to five feet of hail covered the ground following the storm, which claimed twelve lives and caused 65 million dollars property damage. (Storm Data)
1 August 1993...San Francisco, CA hit 98 degrees, the hottest ever recorded for the city in August. (Intellicast)

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