Weekly Water News

DATASTREME WES WEEK TWO: 10-14 September 2007

Water in the News

(Thurs.) Tropical Update -- On Wednesday an area of thunderstorms off the Texas coast became a tropical depression then storm and finally a minimal hurricane, Humberto. The center of Hurricane Humberto made landfall near High Island to the east of Galveston at 07Z (2:00 AM CDT) on Thursday, accompanied by maximum sustained winds of 85 mph, with higher gusts. Five to ten inches of rain and locally high waves and some storm surge accompanied the landfall. [CNN]
(Thurs.) Cleaning the Great Lakes could boost region's economy -- A recent analysis made by the Brookings Institution indicates that the proposed ecological restoration of the Great Lakes would generate at least $50 billion in economic gains through increased property values, tourism and recreation, which would represent twice the amount of money needed for cleanup. [US Water News Online]
(Thurs.) Cloud turbulence program tested by major airline-- United Airlines has been using a new turbulence detection system called NEXRAD Turbulence Detection Algorithm that was designed by the National Center for Atmospheric Research to alert pilots of turbulence within clouds in an effort to reduce injuries to passengers, flight delays and aviation costs. [UCAR/NCAR]
(Thurs.) Ancient marine life studied -- A professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee has been studying ancient marine fossils including brachiopods and bivalves at the time of the Permian-Triassic mass extinction, one of the greatest mass extinctions in the history of the world that occurred approximately 252 million years ago. She claims that a new theory explains this extinction was caused when too much atmospheric carbon dioxide made the ocean too toxic for the brachiopods, leaving the bivalves. [EurekAlert!]
(Tues.) Deadly flooding in Sudan seen from space -- Images made in late July and early September 20087 from data collected by the MODIS sensor on NASA's Aqua satellite show the magnitude of the flooding in the Nile watershed in Sudan that has taken place due to torrential rain that has fallen since early July. As many as 122 people have died because of the floods. [NASA Earth Observatory]
(Tues.) A major decrease in Arctic sea ice foreseen during next half-century -- NOAA scientists from the Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory (PMEL) and NOAA's Joint Institute for the Study of the Atmosphere and Ocean claim that their research indicates that the sea-ice coverage of the Arctic Ocean could decrease in area by more than 40 percent by 2050 from the size for the 1979-1999 base period. [NOAA News]
(Tues.) Acid precipitation could have a major impact on coastal waters -- Researchers at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, the University of Hawaii, NOAA's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory and the National Center for Atmospheric Research report that their studies show that the acidic precipitation caused by anthropogenic sulfur and nitrogen emissions appears to have a disproportionate impact upon coastal waters, affecting surface water acidity (pH), dissolved inorganic carbon and the trends in the flux of carbon dioxide across the air-sea interface. [Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution]
(Tues.) Wet weather may have spurred human exodus from Africa -- A team of scientists from Syracuse University and Arizona State University report that analysis of lake sediments from Africa's Lake Malawi indicates that increased precipitation across this region approximately 70,000 years ago ended a series of major droughts, permitting early humans (Homo sapiens) to begin migrating to Asia and Europe, as the search for food became easier. [New Scientist]
Eye on the tropics -- During the last week several tropical cyclones (low pressure systems that form over tropical or subtropical oceans) developed and moved across tropical waters:
- In the North Atlantic Basin, Hurricane Felix intensified to a major Category 5 hurricane (on the Saffir-Simpson Intensity Scale) as it moved across the western Caribbean, just before it made landfall along the coast of northeastern Nicaragua on Tuesday morning. As it moved across the mountainous terrain of Central America, it weakened to a tropical storm and then to a tropical depression by Wednesday. The torrential rain accompanying this system produced deadly floods and mudslides. By the end of the week, as many as 98 people had died. [USA Today] An image obtained from the MODIS sensor on NASA's Terra satellite shows the large swirl of clouds surrounding Hurricane Felix roughly at the time when this Category-5 hurricane made landfall along the Central American coast. [NASA Earth Observatory ]
  A subtropical system developed well off the Georgia coast and intensified into Subtropical Storm Gabrielle late Friday night as it moved to the north-northwest toward the North Carolina coast. At midday Sunday, it made landfall along North Carolina's Outer Banks and then curved toward the northeast, moving out over the western Atlantic and away from the coast. (Editor's note: A subtropical storm is one that forms over the subtropical ocean and has both tropical characteristics of a warm center similar to a hurricane and extratropical characteristics associated with a transition between tropical and polar air masses. EJH) [USA Today]
- In the eastern North Pacific basin, Tropical Storm Henriette intensified to become the third hurricane of the 2007 eastern North Pacific hurricane season as it traveled to the northwest paralleling the Mexican coast, making an initial landfall briefly Tuesday afternoon near the southern tip of the Baja California Peninsula. The hurricane then continued moving to the north across the Gulf of California before making a second landfall along the western coast of mainland Mexico late Wednesday afternoon. Traveling northward across northwest Mexico it weakened to a tropical storm and then a tropical depression by Thursday morning. An image made from data collected by NASA's Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) shows the precipitation intensity (or rainfall rate) in the rain bands surrounding Hurricane Henriette as it was moving across the Gulf of California following its initial landfall and before its second landfall. [NASA Earth Observatory] A composite MODIS image made on Labor Day from two successive orbits of NASA's Aqua satellite shows the clouds surrounding both Hurricane Felix along the eastern coast of Central America and Hurricane Henriette near Baja California off the western coast of Central America. [NASA Earth Observatory]
- In the western North Pacific basin, Typhoon Fitow, which had formed more than one week ago near the Northern Marianna Islands moved initially northward, then curved to the west and finally to the north-northeast before making landfall on Japan's main island of Honshu last Friday, accompanied by torrential rain, strong winds and a storm surge. At least one fatality was reported. [USA Today] An image of the near surface winds of Typhoon Fitow made from data collected by the scatterometer on NASA's QuikSCAT satellite just as the typhoon made landfall on Honshu shows the characteristic counterclockwise inward flow surrounding the central eye. [NASA Earth Observatory] An image from the Japanese MTSAT satellite made several hours earlier shows the clouds surrounding the typhoon's eye. [NOAA OSEI]
An updated hurricane forecast -- Hurricane forecasters Phil Klotzbach and Professor William Gray of Colorado State University, recently updated the seasonal forecast of the 2007 Atlantic hurricane season that their team had made earlier. He foresees the formation of six more hurricanes, with three becoming major hurricanes by reaching an intensity of Category 3 or higher on the Saffir-Simpson Scale. [USA Today]
Flooding in the Upper Midwest -- Images of the upper Mississippi Valley near La Crosse, WI made nearly one year apart by the Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) on one of NASA's satellites shows the effects of the recent torrential rain on the Mississippi River and its tributaries. [NASA Earth Observatory]
Monitoring melting of Greenland's ice sheet -- An image produced by the Special Sensor Microwave/Imager onboard satellites from the Defense Meteorological Satellites Program shows that as many as 20 more days experienced melting conditions during the 2005 summer melt season than the average number of melt days since 1988, with much of the increased number of melt days occurring around the periphery of the ice sheet. [NASA Earth Observatory]
Tsunami threat remains in South Asia -- A researcher with Geoscience Australia in Canberra claims that based on his analysis of collected GPS data, the threat of a major tsunami-producing earthquake in the northern Bay of Bengal remains because the boundary between the Indian and Southeast Asian tectonic plates where such a earthquake could occur is farther offshore than previously thought. [New Scientist]
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]
Global Water News Watch -- Other water news sources can be obtained through the SAHRA Project at the University of Arizona [SAHRA Project]
Earthweek -- Diary of the Planet [earthweek.com] Requires Adobe Acrobat Reader.

REPORTS FROM THE FIELD --

A request: If you have some water-related experience that you would like to share with other DataStreme WES participants, please send them to the email address appearing at the bottom of this document for possible inclusion in a News file. Thank you. EJH

Concept of the Week: Water Chill

The Titanic disaster of April 1912 dramatically portrayed how immersion in cold water can be deadly. After abandoning ship, passengers and crew who were floating in relatively calm seas perished within a short time. Residents of cold climates are warned of the dangers posed by a combination of low air temperature and strong winds (the wind-chill). Because of the special thermal properties of water, immersion in cold water can be even more hazardous. A boating accident or a plunge through thin ice on a lake can have deadly consequences.

One of the principal hazards of cold water immersion is a lowering of body temperature due to excess heat loss. (Perhaps half of all drowning victims actually die from this effect of cold water rather than water-filled lungs.) Heat is energy that is transferred between two objects at different temperatures, always flowing from the warmer to the colder object. The human body can regulate its core temperature so that it normally varies by no more than about 2 Celsius degrees (3.6 Fahrenheit degrees) above or below 37 °C (98.6 °F). Hence, heat usually flows from the human body to its cooler surroundings. Core temperature refers to the temperature of vital organs such as the heart, lungs, and kidneys.

When immersed in cold water, a body may lose heat at such a high rate that natural thermoregulatory processes cannot prevent a steady drop in core temperature and the victim may exhibit symptoms of hypothermia. These symptoms set in when a person's core temperature falls below 36 °C (96.8 °F). Shivering (a thermoregulatory process) becomes violent and uncontrollable and the victim has difficulty speaking and becomes lethargic. If the core temperature drops below 32 °C (90 °F), shivering ceases, muscles become rigid, and coordination deteriorates. At a core temperature of 30 °C (86 °F), a person may drift into unconsciousness and death may ensue at a core temperature below 24 °C (75 °F).

A person runs a greater risk of developing hypothermia when immersed in water than air at the same temperature. Water conducts heat at a rate that is more than 20 times greater than still air and water's specific heat is almost 6 times that of dry air. Whereas the risk of hypothermia due to low air temperature primarily occurs in winter, cold water immersion is possible any time of year in many locations. Ocean or lake temperatures may remain relatively low throughout the summer months because of water's relatively great thermal inertia.

For more information on hypothermia, including expected survival time for various water temperatures, got to: http://www.seagrant.umn.edu/tourism/hypothermia.html.

Concept of the Week: Questions

Water is a [(much better)(poorer)] conductor of heat than still air.
Hypothermia is a potentially lethal [(rise)(fall)] in the temperature of the human body's vital organs.

Historical Events

10 September 1900...Elk Point, SD received 8.00 inches of rain that set a 24-hour maximum precipitation record for the state. (NCDC)
10 September 1919...A hurricane struck the Florida Keys drowning more than 500 persons. (David Ludlum)
10-11 September 1963...A 24-hour rainfall record for the Northern Hemisphere was set at Paishih, Taiwan as 49.13 inches of rain fell as the result of Typhoon Gloria. (Accord Weather Guide Calendar)
10 September 1965...Hurricane Betsy slammed Louisiana with wind gusting to 130 mph at Houma, resulting in 58 deaths and over 17,500 injured. The storm surge and flooding from torrential rains made Betsy the first billion-dollar hurricane with losses exceeding $1.4 billion.
10 September 1976...Kathleen was the first tropical cyclone to hit southern California since 1939. A wall of water cut a 700-foot wide gap some 40-foot deep at the Myer Creek Bridge on I-8. The 4 to 6-foot wall of water also destroyed 70% of the homes in Ocotillo. Five people were killed and more than $160 million in damage were sustained. (Accord Weather Guide Calendar)
11 September 1900...The remnants of the Great Galveston Hurricane moved across southern Ontario. In the Niagara Peninsula and along the Lake Erie shore, apples, pears and peaches ready for harvest were ripped from the trees; half the crop, about $1 million in value, was destroyed. (The Weather Doctor)
11 September 1961...Very large and slow moving Hurricane Carla made landfall near Port Lavaca, TX. Carla battered the central Texas coast with wind gusts to 175 mph, and up to 16 inches of rain, and spawned a vicious tornado (F4 on the Fujita tornado intensity scale) which swept across Galveston Island killing eight persons and destroying 200 buildings. A storm surge of up to 18.5 feet inundated coastal areas and Bay City was deluged with 17.1 inches of rain. The hurricane claimed 45 lives, and caused $300 million damage. The remnants of Carla produced heavy rain in the Lower Missouri Valley and southern sections of the Upper Great Lakes Region. (David Ludlum) (Storm Data) (Intellicast)
11 September 1970...A steam yacht on the Gulf of Venice in Italy was sunk by a tornado near the Isle of Santa Elena. Of the 60 on board, 36 died. The same tornado destroyed a campsite on the lagoon border in Iesolo, with 11 deaths. (Accord Weather Calendar)
11 September 1976...Up to five inches of rain brought walls of water and millions of tons of debris into Bullhead City, AZ via washes from elevations above 3000 feet. Flooding caused more than $3 million in damage. Chasms up to forty feet deep were cut across some roads. (The Weather Channel)
11 September 1997...An all-day rain with 0.4 inches in 9 minutes fell over the Boise Mountains in Idaho. A 15-foot high wall of mud and debris breached six flood-control dams and washed over a golf course in the north end of Boise. Most of the damage was to roads and the golf course, with some damage to 12 homes. In the Grand Canyon country of Arizona, two people died in flash flooding as they attempted to cross Phantom Creek. A German couple was injured by lightning while they were watching a thunderstorm at an isolated point overlooking the Grand Canyon. (Accord Weather Guide Calendar)
11-12 September 1976...Japan's 24-hour rainfall record was set as 44.80 inches of rain fell at Hiso in Tokuhima Prefecture as a result of Typhoon Fran, which also was responsible for 167 deaths in Japan. (Accord Weather Guide Calendar)
12 September 1775...The Independence Hurricane caught many fishing boats on the Grand Banks off Newfoundland killing 4000 seamen, most from Britain and Ireland. (The Weather Doctor)
12 September 1857...The S.S. Central America sank while in the midst of a hurricane off the North Carolina coast after beginning to take on water the previous day (11^th). Approximately 400 people onboard were lost, the greatest single loss from a commercial ship due to a hurricane. (Accord Weather Guide Calendar)
12 September 1960...Hurricane Donna made landfall on central Long Island and then tracked across New England. Wind gusts reached 140 mph at the Blue Hills Observatory in Milton, MA and 130 mph at Block Island, RI. MacDowell Dam in New Hampshire recorded 7.25 inches of rain. Although a record tide of 6.1 feet occurred at the Battery in New York City, elsewhere fortunately the storm did not make landfall at the high tides so its effects were minimized. This was the first hurricane to affect every point along the East Coast from Key West, FL to Caribou, ME. (Intellicast)
12 September 1979...Hurricane Frederick smashed into the Mobile Bay area of Alabama packing 132-mph winds. Wind gusts to 145 mph were reported as the eye of the hurricane moved over Dauphin Island, AL, just west of Mobile. Frederick produced a fifteen-foot storm surge near the mouth of Mobile Bay. Winds gusted to hurricane force at Meridian, MS although the city is 140 miles inland. The hurricane was responsible for five fatalities and at the time was the costliest in U.S. history with $2.3 billion damage. (David Ludlum) (The Weather Channel)
13-16 September 2004….Hurricane Ivan affected coastal Alabama and the western Florida Panhandle with landfall near Gulf Shores, AL early on the 16th. Before breaking loose of its mooring, a buoy just south of the Alabama coastal waters reported a peak wave height of 52 feet on the 15th. (Accord Weather Guide Calendar)
14 September 1988...Pressure in the eye of Hurricane Gilbert moving across the Caribbean Sea fell to 885 millibars (26.17 inches of mercury), the lowest recorded barometric pressure in the Western Hemisphere. Ultimately, 318 died in seven countries across the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico.
15 September 1752...A great hurricane produced a tide (storm surge) along the South Carolina coast that nearly inundated downtown Charleston. However, just before the storm surge reached the city, a shift in the wind caused the water level to drop five feet in ten minutes. (David Ludlum)
16 September 1928...Hurricane San Felipe, a monster hurricane, which left 600 dead in Guadeloupe and 300 dead in Puerto Rico, struck West Palm Beach, FL causing enormous damage, and then headed for Lake Okeechobee. Peak winds were near 150 mph. The high winds and storm waves broke the eastern dike on Lake Okeechobee, inundating flat farmland. When the storm was over, the lake covered an area the size of the state of Delaware, and beneath its waters were 1836 victims. The only survivors were those who reached large hotels for safety, and a group of fifty people who got onto a raft to take their chances out in the middle of the lake. (David Ludlum) (Intellicast)
15 September 1995…Heavy rain from remnants of Hurricane Ismael that had formed in the eastern North Pacific produced up to ten inches of rain in southeastern New Mexico. In Hobbs water was waist deep on some streets and eight feet deep on soccer fields. (Accord Weather Guide Calendar)
16 September 1988...Hurricane Gilbert made landfall 120 miles south of Brownsville, TX in Mexico during the early evening. Winds gusted to 61 mph at Brownsville, and reached 82 mph at Padre Island. Six-foot tides eroded three to four feet of beaches along the Lower Texas Coast, leaving the waterline seventy-five feet farther inland. Rainfall totals ranged up to 8.71 in. at Lamark, TX. Gilbert caused $3 million in property damage along the Lower Texas Coast, but less than $1 million in damage along the Middle Texas Coast. During its life span, Gilbert established an all-time record for the Western Hemisphere with a sea-level barometric pressure reading of 26.13 inches. Winds approached 200 mph, with higher gusts. Gilbert devastated Jamaica and Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula. (The National Weather Summary) (Storm Data) (The Weather Channel)