New articles on natural disasters; which, however, have also economic and social sides.
On the earthquake in the Indian ocean, which destroyed many coastal areas of Asia last year: Clinton paints false picture of “progress” for Sri Lanka’s tsunami victims.
Update 25 December 2006: here.
Update 30 December 2006: here.
Sri Lanka labour struggle in the 1930s: here.
Update on India: here
On deathly and destructive hurricane Katrina and its survivors of the southern USA: 50,000 Katrina evacuees without permanent housing. FEMA to stop paying hotel bills.
For the track of Katrina: see here.
And on, maybe, the future: One earthquake could leave two-thirds of Californians without drinking water.
Yeppers, the 2006 hurricane season started June 1 2006. This season
is expected to be as active as last year, but according to the
National Hurricane Center in USA, only one major hurricane will hit
the USA coastline…but hopefully their prediction is wrong and it
will miss!!!
I am now an official hurricane/storm reporter for
http://stormcarib.com/ and I will post updates pertaining to my area
on this blog as well, so stay tuned!!
Exact data with links to local references, such as government, local
news media and storm watch agencies, will be posted when the data
needs to be posted in regards to my direct area of reporting: ABC
islands Aruba, Bonaire, and Curacao. I reside on the latter, which
is in the middle of this 3-island chain.
Three years in a row we were lucky. The hurricanes passed us by as
the very last moment thanks to the Andes Mountain Ridge in
Venezuela/Colombia which causes most storm systems to bounce off and
head up due north west.
Aruba wasn’t so lucky in 2004 with hurricane Ivan. This hurricane
was a cat 5 when it headed 4 days straight for us. At the very last
moment it went due northwest, we experienced nothing, no wind, no
rain, nada. But Aruba was hit by the tail and suffered extensive
water damage due to rain, and extensive beach erosion due to the
Southwest wave action. Normal wave action comes in from the
Southeast on all 3 islands.
The worst recent storm activity in Curacao were 100 ft (30meters)
waves in 1999 caused by the storm surge of Lenny when it passed us
from the West going East. Curacao had never experienced an eastward
heading hurricane before, so this was definitely a learning
experience for all storm watcher hobbyists in the ABC islands. Even
the visiting Queen of Holland was almost swept away near the
coastline by the sudden storm surge with arrived without warning and
lasted for 15 minutes.
The ABC islands are located 500 miles below the hurricane belt, so
should never be hit by a hurricane. But the last 3 years have raised
a growing concern that this safety area does not
exist anymore, and should be re-assessed by local or international
scientists.
See this link about past storms that hit or passed by Curacao:
http://stormcarib.com/climatology/TNCC_all_isl.htm
So keeping my fingers crossed an I am hoping that the storm that
hits us every 100 years (it is overdue now) will pass us by this
year as well causing no rain or storm surge damage at all!!!!
If I see the country flag moving around the daily prediction is:
windy. If it is wet, it is raining, and if it is gone…run for
cover!!! heh…
June 03, 2006 Tropical Storm Alberto?
Normally it is usually quiet this early in the hurricane season but
it looks like the first tropical storm is developing south of
Jamaica. There is allot of windshear 200 miles due north of
Jamaica…if this windshear persists for the 6 to 8 hours the high
convection area will be torn apart and nothing will be able to
develop….so let’s sleep on it and see what has developed 10 hours
from now when I wake up…
www.weather.com is not reporting anything yet, but you can obtain
scientific weather data yourself from
http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/PS/TROP/trop-atl.html
A large version of the weather photo is at:
http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/goes/east/watl/vis-l.jpg
Comment by Administrator — June 3, 2006 @ 9:47 am