Day: February 10, 2015

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Storms and Floods

Tropical Storms – Roundup of Tropical Storms:

Tropical Storm (TS) 02w (Higos), located approximately 424 nm north-northeast of Chuuk and is tracking northwestward at 07 knots.

NewsBytes:

Jakarta, Indonesia – Flooding in Jakarta after heavy rains has displaced close to 6,000 people in the nation’s capital city. Around 15,517 people were affected directly by the floods as their houses were inundated. Many parts of Jakarta were still submerged Tuesday, making traffic worse in a city already notorious for such problems. Rain started up Tuesday morning again after stopping Monday evening.‎ Many shops were closed as workers were unable to get to work. More rain was forecast.

Boston, USA – Boston is in the cross hairs again as the third major winter storm approaches, but winter storm warnings are in place across large portions of the Northeast, including Massachusetts, New York, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine. The National Weather Service forecasts 12 to 16 inches of snow by the time the storm ends Tuesday. For Upstate New York, the numbers are 8 to 14 inches. Schools in parts of the Northeast, including Boston, will be closed Monday and Tuesday. “These storms that we’re getting are unprecedented. We’ve never seen this type of snow in the city of Boston at any other time in the history of our city.” The storm was snarling air traffic again, but not as bad as in past weeks. FlightAware.com showed more than 1,500 flights into and out of the United States canceled for Monday, on top of the more than 700 flights scrubbed Sunday. Two other storms have hit the Northeast in the past two weeks, closing airports, cancelling classes and creating mountains of snow along cleared roadways. Boston has set a record for the snowiest seven-day period in history, with over 40 inches, the National Weather Service said last week. The city is way past its average annual snowfall of 47 inches.

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Volcanos

Roundup of Global Volcanic Activity

Sinabung (Sumatra, Indonesia): Another large pyroclastic flow occurred yesterday morning. The flow traveled 2-3 km to the base of the mountain and produced an impressive coignimbrite ash plume that rose to approx. 4 km altitude. The volcano’s eruption continues mostly quietly to effuse viscous lava, feeding a flow emplaced on the upper southeastern flank. At times, such as yesterday, it becomes too unstable and smaller or larger parts of it can collapse, generating dangerous pyroclastic flows.

Fuego (Guatemala): The recent, strong paroxysm ended Sunday. It had lasted 22 hours. CONRED reported that the volcano now returned to its typical intermittent strombolian activity with weak to moderate explosions. The lava flow towards the Trinidad and Ceniza canyon on its upper flank remains weakly active, although seems to be decreasing. Guatemala’s international airport has resumed operations.

Piton de la Fournaise (La Réunion): The eruption continues without major changes. The volcano observatory OVPF reports low, but stable tremor levels. Webcam imagery from last night (before clouds obscure views) show that the eruption is mainly effusive with only weak explosive activity (weak spattering) at the vents. Currently, a small lava flow is active that extends approx 500 m from the base of the Dolomieu cone, enlarging the new lava field of partially overlapping flows at its base. The middle section of the lava flow is through a lava tube, making it invisible to the webcams.