WEEKLY WATER NEWS

4-8 June 2007

Water in the Earth System will return for Fall 2007 with new Investigations files starting during Preview Week, Monday, 27 August 2007. All the current online website products will continue to be available throughout the summer break period.

Water in the News:

• World Ocean Day to be celebrated -- World Ocean Day or a "Celebration of the Sea" will be celebrated on Friday, 8 June 2007 to increase public awareness and to foster public involvement in the management of the ocean and its resources. Although this date was created at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, it has not been officially recognized by the United Nations. A partial listing is provided for events across the US and other nations that will celebrate World Ocean Day. [The Ocean Project]
• "Break the Grip of the Rip®" -- NOAA officials have designated this upcoming week of 3-9 June 2007 as national Rip Current Awareness Week. Using the theme, Break the Grip of the Rip®, efforts are meant to heighten public awareness of rip currents at surf beaches that claim the lives of as many as 100 people in the United States annually. [NWS Rip Current Safety] New York and Wisconsin also have identified this upcoming week as Rip Current Awareness Week.
• Eye on the tropics -- The 2007 North Atlantic Hurricane season began last week with some activity:
  • Tropical Storm Barry, the second named tropical cyclone (low-pressure system) of the season formed in the southern Gulf of Mexico late Friday afternoon and moved to the northeast toward the central Florida Peninsula, making landfall near Tampa Bay on Saturday morning. Barry moved northeastward across Florida and weakened to a tropical depression near Jacksonville by early evening. [USA Today]
  • Tropical Storm Barbara, the second named tropical cyclone of the 2007 eastern North Pacific season, formed off the Mexican coast early last week and drifted slowly east toward the Guatemalan coast, making landfall on Saturday near the Guatemalan-Mexican border, before being downgraded to a tropical depression by late afternoon. [USA Today] An image obtained from sensors onboard NOAA's GOES-12 satellite shows the clouds associated with Tropical Storm Barbara last Thursday. [NOAA OSEI]
  • Tropical Storm Alvin, the season's first named tropical system in the eastern North Pacific had formed near the end of the previous week and moved as a minimal tropical storm westward away from the Mexican coast before dissipating at the end of this past week more than 1000 miles southwest of Cabo San Lucas at the southern tip of Mexico's Baja California. An image obtained last week from NOAA's GOES-11 satellite shows the clouds accompanying Tropical Storm Alvin. [NOAA OSEI]
  • Tropical Cyclone Gonu formed in the Arabian Sea (the northern Indian Ocean west of India) over this past weekend and moved to the northwest, increasing in strength to become a Category 2 system on the Saffir-Simpson Scale with maximum sustained surface winds of 105 mph late Sunday evening.
• Hot towers help intensify hurricanes -- Scientists at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center who have been using analyzing data from Hurricane Bonnie obtained from the Precipitation Radar and the Visible and Infrared Sensor on the TRMM (Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission) satellite indicate that the hurricanes intensify by feeding on the towering thunderstorm clouds that develop in the eyewall that surrounds the central eye of the hurricane. [NASA Earth Observatory]
• Lake level reaches record low -- Officials with the South Florida Water Management District announced that at the end of last week the level of Florida's Lake Okeechobee, the Southeast's largest freshwater lake, had dropped to 8.94 feet, a level that represents the lowest level since records commenced in 1931 and is the result of the current severe drought that these officials consider to be a "1-in-100-year drought" across the region. This lake represents a reserve for the water supply to over five million residents of South Florida. With heavy rain from Tropical Storm Barry, the lake level should rise. [South Florida Water Management District]
• Tropical cyclones found to have a climate-control role -- Researchers at Purdue University report that they found evidence that tropical cyclones, such as hurricanes, serve as a thermostat by cooling the tropics, resulting in modulating the North Atlantic ocean circulation patterns that transport heat and affect the climate of North America and Europe. [Purdue University]
• Monsoon history linked to changes in global climate -- Researchers at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and at Germany's Kiel University report that their reconstruction of a 155,000 year-long continuous monsoon history in equatorial West Africa from a sediment core obtained from the Gulf of Guinea indicates that the strength of this monsoon regime can be tied to the Northern Hemisphere’s climate shifts due to the expansion and contraction of the European and North American continental ice sheets and the amount of local solar radiation incident upon equatorial Africa. [EurekAlert!]
• Health of Greenland's ice sheet and glaciers assessed --
  • A research team from NASA Wallops Flight Facility recently returned from Greenland after taking part in the annual three-week Arctic Ice Mapping Project that measures critical areas of the ice sheet and glaciers on this island using laser and radar instruments mounted on an aircraft. [NASA Earth Observatory]
  • A NASA scientist from the Goddard Space Flight Center also reported that his analysis of satellite observations indicates that Greenland experienced melting snow on more days and at higher altitudes in 2006 than the average over the last 18 years. [NASA Earth Observatory]
  • Images obtained over the last several years from NASA Landsat satellites of the melting sections of the Greenland ice sheet have revealed an island that had been discovered by early 20th century European explorers who had assumed that it may have been a peninsula. [NASA Earth Observatory]
• Antarctic ice refreezes -- Last month, a research team from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the University of Colorado used QuikSCAT scatterometer data from a NASA satellite to find some of the ice that had melted in relatively mild weather during January 2005 has frozen again. [NASA Earth Observatory]
• International Polar Year exploration and research receives funding -- Thirty-three scientific investigations that will involve exploration and interdisciplinary research in the polar regions as part of the current International Polar Year are to be funded by NASA. [NASA Earth Observatory]
• Reduced water use may be due to public awareness -- Tucson (AZ) Water officials and a University of Arizona water researcher suggest that the seven percent reduction in water use over the last year in the Tucson metropolitan area despite a population increase appears to be due to increased public awareness of the ongoing drought experienced across the Southwest. [US Water News Online]
• Oklahoma businessmen help supply needed water -- A nonprofit group of Oklahoma businessmen called Solar Streams of Water have financed installation of solar-powered water pumps that bring water to villagers in China, Zambia and the Philippines. [US Water News Online]
• Climate change impact considerations not needed by Army engineers -- The US Senate recently voted on an amendment to a water projects bill that would not require the US Army Corps of Engineers to consider the impact of climate change when it designs water resources projects. [US Water News Online]
• Tracking huge storm-generated waves -- French scientists recently tracked the progression of huge waves that were generated by a storm in the Indian Ocean from data collected by the European Space Agency's Envisat satellite. They detected waves with heights of up to 11 meters that had been generated by a storm off Cape Town, South Africa strike Reunion Island and then Indonesia some 10,000 km distant after a span of nine days. [ESA]
• Active Nicaraguan volcano monitored -- A recent photograph taken by an astronaut on the International Space Station shows a plume of steam and ash emanating from Concepción Volcano, one of Nicaragua’s tallest and most active volcanoes. Muddy flow, called a lahar, moved down the slopes of this volcano when Hurricane Mitch passed across the region resulting in much damage. [NASA Earth Observatory]
• Spring floods on a Siberian river -- A series of images taken over a two-week span by the MODIS sensor on NASA's Terra satellite shows the return of spring to Siberia with snow covering the ground and the Lena River still frozen as of mid-May, but a lack of snow cover and a meltwater-swollen river by the end of the month. [NASA Earth Observatory]
• Start of rainy season captured over the southern Amazon -- Three images made last August and early September by the MODIS instrument on NASA's Aqua satellite shows the onset of the rainy season over the Amazon rainforest south of the equator. Recent research indicates that an increase in leaf area in the forest could help trigger a seasonal reversal in the winds that could result in a change from dry to wet season. [NASA Earth Observatory]
• Satellites ready for seasonal increase in distress calls-- NOAA officials recently reported that the fleet of polar and geosynchronous satellites operated by NOAA is ready for the potential increase in distress calls from emergency locator beacons that are carried on boats and aircraft as well as hand-held personal devices. These satellites, along with Russia's Cospas spacecraft, represent a part of the international Search and Rescue Satellite-Aided Tracking System, called COSPAS-SARSAT. [NOAA News]
• A survey marker dedicated to "inner space science" -- NASA recently presented NOAA with a survey marker that was placed near the NOAA Aquarius underwater research laboratory off the coast of Key Largo, FL, to be used as a reference for coral surveys conducted by NOAA and by NASA astronauts in training. It also commemorates the joint effort by these two federal science agencies at exploring "inner space." .[NOAA News]
• A climate signal detected in Indian Ocean -- Oceanographers at Australia's Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) report that their examination of a 40-year time series of Indiana Ocean temperatures near Australia reveals a signature of climatic change associated with increased surface temperatures, but a sub-surface cooling in the tropics. [CSIRO]
• 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.

Historical Events:

• 4 June 1825...A hurricane struck Long Island, NY leveling trees and causing damage to ships. The early season hurricane, which originated near Cuba, caused major damage along the Atlantic coast from Charleston, SC to New York City. Many were lost at sea. (David Ludlum)
• 4 June 1976...Forty-foot waves from a tropical cyclone smashed Gogha (port), India. Excellent warnings limited the death toll to approximately 70. Dredging of the harbor at Bhavnnagar ceased for several years as storm runoff from the Kansa River washed away accumulated sand and silt. (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)
• 4 June 1982...A four-day storm began over New England which produced up to 14 inches of rain in southern Connecticut breaching twenty-three dams and breaking two others. Damage was estimated at more than $276 million. (David Ludlum)
• 4 June 1991...Up to six feet of water raced through parts of Howells, NE as the result of nearly five inches of rain. An elderly man who ignored evacuation orders drowned when the water collapsed his basement wall after he had taken shelter because of a tornado warning. (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)
• 5 June 1908...Helena, MT was deluged with 3.67 inches of rain to establish their all-time 24-hour rainfall record. (4th-5th) (The Weather Channel)
• 5 June 1993...A strong, late season spring storm moved into California. The 0.76 inches of rain at Los Angeles set a new daily rainfall record for June. Lake Gregory was deluged with 3.24 inches of rain in 24 hours and a foot of snow fell at the Mammoth Mountain ski area. (Intellicast)
• 6-10 June 1816...Late season snow fell across New England and eastern Canada. The editor of the Bangor (ME) Register observed that individual snowflakes that fell on Bangor during the afternoon of the 6^th covered areas up to two inches in diameter. Snow fell near Quebec City, Quebec over a 5-day period accumulating to 12 inches with "drifts reaching the axel trees of carriages" during this infamous Year Without a Summer. The Montreal Gazette reported that this "Extraordinary Season" gave snow squalls to the city on the 6^th and 8^th. On the 7^th, a famous June snow fell in the northeastern U.S. Danville, VT reported drifts of snow and sleet twenty inches deep. The Highlands were white all day, and snow flurries were observed as far south as Boston MA. Waltham, MA reported a low temperature of 33 degrees and New Haven, CT had a low of 35 degrees (David Ludlum) (Intellicast) (The Weather Doctor) (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)
• 6 June 1894...One of the greatest floods in U.S. history occurred as the Williamette River overflowed to inundate half of the business district of Portland, OR. (David Ludlum)
• 7 June 1972...Richmond, VA experienced its worst flood of record as rains from Hurricane Agnes pushed the water level at the city locks to a height of 36.5 feet, easily topping the previous record of thirty feet set in 1771. (The Weather Channel)
• 7-11 June 2001...Tropical Storm Allison made landfall along the Texas Gulf Coast near Galveston early on the 6^th and drifted northward before becoming stationary as a depression later in the day near Lufkin. Later, it began to drift back southward, moving offshore over the Gulf late on the 9^th at nearly the same place as it had made landfall. On the 11th, Allison became extratropical as it moved from near Morgan City, LA across southern Mississippi. Allison caused disastrous flooding across the Upper Texas Gulf Coast, especially in the Houston area where a storm total of 36.99 inches fell at Port Houston. Twenty-three people lost their lives in Texas. Damage in the region amounted to $5 billion, which included 45,000 homes, 70,000 vehicles, and 2000 businesses. (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)
• 8 June 1960...Hail the size of chicken eggs fell for 45 minutes on Hooker, OK. Nearly four inches of rain also accompanied this storm. Much property and crop damage was reported. (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)
• 8-9 June 1991...Two days of rain at Bombay, India topped 30 inches, the heaviest in four decades for this western India city. (The Weather Doctor)
• 8-10 June 2002…Heavy snow fell across Montana's Rocky Mountain Front, with 5 to 7 feet falling at elevations above 5000 feet and 2 to 4 feet falling on the adjoining plains. Three to four feet were common in Glacier National Park. Blizzard conditions prevailed at times. Many avalanches were reported. (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)
• 9 June 1966...Hurricane Alma made landfall over the eastern Florida Panhandle near Alligator Point during the evening-- the earliest land-falling hurricane on the U.S. mainland on record. Peak sustained winds were near 90 mph. Highest winds reached 125 mph and lowest pressure 970.2 millibars (28.65 inches) were reported at the Dry Tortugas on the 8^th. (Intellicast) (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)
• 9 June 1972...A cloudburst along the eastern slopes of the Black Hills of South Dakota produced as much as 14 inches of rain resulting in the Rapid City flash flood disaster. The rains, which fell in about four hours, caused the Canyon Lake Dam to collapse. A wall of water swept through the city drowning 238 people, injuring 2932, and causing more than $100 million in property damage. (David Ludlum)
• 9 June 1989...Severe weather abated for a day; however, showers and thunderstorms continued to drench the eastern U.S. with torrential rains. Milton, FL was deluged with 15.47 inches in 24 hours. Record heat and prolonged drought in south central Texas left salt deposits on power lines and insulators near the coast, and when nighttime dew caused arcing, the city of Brownsville was plunged into darkness. (The National Weather Summary)
• 9 June 1990...San Diego, CA set a new record rainfall amount on this date, as 0.38 in. of rain fell breaking the old record of 0.13 in. established in 1892. Moisture from the remains of Hurricane Boris was responsible for this rare rain event. (Intellicast)
• 10 June 1752...This day is believed to when Benjamin Franklin narrowly missed electrocution while flying a kite during a thunderstorm to determine if lightning is related to electricity. (David Ludlum)
• 10 June 1967...Fergus, Ontario received 3.4 in. of rain in one hour. (The Weather Doctor)
• 10 June 1990...Rains of between 0.75 to more than 1.5 in. in less than one hour caused flash flooding in Las Vegas, NV. Every underpass and most city streets were flooded. Two people died because of the floods, with one woman in a vehicle swept one mile down a concrete wash. A four-foot wall of water swept a bus with 15 people to within 40 feet of Flamingo Wash. (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)

Return to DataStreme WES Website

Prepared by AMS WES Central Staff and Edward J. Hopkins, Ph.D., email hopkins@meteor.wisc.edu
ã Copyright, 2007, The American Meteorological Society.