WEEKLY WATER NEWS

8-12 December 2008

Water in the News:

Eye on the tropics -- The only tropical cyclone activity last week was in the North Indian Ocean basin, where Tropical Storm 7B developed east of India late last week. By Sunday (local time) this system was approaching Sri Lanka, spreading rain across the same region of southeastern India that was recovering from Tropical Cyclone Nisha, which made landfall during the previous week. For more information and satellite imagery, see the NASA Hurricane Page.
New hurricane research tool put online -- NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center Earth Sciences Data and Information Services Center has developed the NASA Goddard Hurricane Data Portal for the Internet that allows scientists, students, and other users access to hurricane-related visualizations and data sets from satellites and numerical models. [NASA GSFC]
Aircraft support tropical cyclone studies over western Pacific -- The Naval Research Laboratory has been providing support including the use of its P-3 aircraft in the multi-national Tropical Cyclone Struture-2008 project designed to observe, understand and predict the potential impacts of tropical cyclones in the western North Pacific basin. [EurekAlert!]
Gaining more information from future satellites -- During this upcoming week, various users of NOAA satellite information, including weather and climate forecasters and emergency managers from more than 20 Western Hemisphere countries, will meet with high-level NOAA officials in Miami, FL to learn about the new equipment and software needed to retrieve data from the next generation of polar orbiting and geosynchronous environmental satellites that NOAA will operate in the next seven to eight years. [NOAA News]
Monitoring Antarctic ice shelf cracks -- An image generated in late November from data collected by the Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar on the European Space Agency’s Envisat satellite shows more cracks on Antarctica's Wilkins Ice Sheet, which could signal a collage of the fragile ice bridge connecting several islands off the western side of the Antarctic Peninsula. [NASA Earth Observatory]
New laboratory facilities for fragile marine ecosystem research -- US Department of Commerce recently announced that it will provide $12 million to Scripps Institution of Oceanography/University of California San Diego for the construction of a new state-of-the-art ocean science research building. [Scripps Institution of Oceanography]
Clams used to record human impact upon coastal waters -- A researcher at the Alabama's Dauphin Island Sea Lab and her colleagues report that stable isotope analysis techniques of the shells of certain species of clams can be used to identify and trace wastewater entering estuaries and coastal food webs. [EurekAlert!]
Climate change hampers acidified river recovery -- Researchers at the United Kingdom's Cardiff University warn that changes in climate, especially associated with increased precipitation, appear to be hampering the long-term recovery of the ecosystems of rivers from the effects of acid precipitation. [EurekAlert!]
Rivers found to process carbon compounds -- An ecologist from the University of Vienna and colleagues report that microorganisms in river systems serve to make rivers carbon processors and not merely inert pipelines of materials. [EurekAlert!]
Drought may have spelled decline of ancient empires -- A team of geologists from the University of Wisconsin-Madison reconstructed a high-resolution climate record based upon on geochemical analysis of a stalagmite from a cave near Jerusalem, Israel and have shown that increased incidence of dry weather from 100 CE to 700 CE coincided with the fall of both Roman and Byzantine rule in the region. [EurekAlert!]
Martian rocks reveal ancient climate cycles -- Researchers at the California Institute of Technology and their colleagues who studied layered rock outcrops within four Martian craters from data collected by the high-resolution sensor on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter claim that they have found evidence of ancient climate change on Mars caused by regular 100,000-year variations in the planet's obliquity or axial tilt. [EurekAlert!]
European satellites focus on Arctic basin's environment -- Satellite data collected by the European Space Agency over a 17-year span from its ERS and Envisat satellites is now being used to study the rapid changes in the Arctic basin associated with changes in climate, pollution and human activity. [ESA]
Studying the planet with a tandem satellite mission -- The European Space Agency has recently positioned its ERS-2 and Envisat satellites into a tandem configuration that permitted the Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) instruments on both satellites to obtain high resolution images of the Earth's surface in a process called SAR interferometry, thereby helping researchers monitor glaciers and surface deformation. [ESA]
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, drought, floods, marine weather, tsunamis, rip currents, Harmful Algal Blooms (HABs) and coral bleaching. [NOAAWatch]
Global and US Hazards/Climate Extremes -- A review and analysis of the global impacts of various weather-related events, to include 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:

8 December 2002...Super-typhoon Pongsona hit Guam with sustained winds of 144 mph and gusts to 173 mph, along with a storm surge to 20 feet. The 40-mile wide diameter eye was over Anderson AFB for 2 hours. One indirect death and 193 injuries were attributed to the typhoon. Some bridge pavement was "scrapped off" by wind and wave action. Damage was estimated at $700 million. (Accord Weather Guide Calendar)
9 December 1786...A second great snowstorm in just five days brought another 15 inches of snow to Morristown, NJ, on top of the eight inches that fell on the 7^th and 8^th, and the 18 inches which fell on the 4th and 5th. The total snowfall for the week was thus 41 inches. New Haven, CT received 17 inches of new snow in the storm. Up to four feet of snow covered the ground in eastern Massachusetts following the storms. (9th-10th) (David Ludlum) (The Weather Channel)
9 December 1917...A severe winter storm struck the Ohio Valley and the Great Lakes Region. It produced 25 inches of snow and wind gusts to 78 mph at Buffalo, NY. The storm produced 26 inches of snow at Vevay, IN, with drifts fourteen feet high. By the 16th of the month, people could walk across the frozen Ohio River from Vevay into Kentucky. (8^th-9^th) (David Ludlum) (The Weather Channel)
9 December 1987...The fifth storm in nine days kept the northwestern U.S. wet and windy. Winds along the coast of Washington gusted to 75 mph at Oceans Shores and at Hoquiam, and the northern and central coastal mountains of Oregon were drenched with three inches of rain in ten hours, flooding some rivers. Snowfall totals in the Cascade Mountains of Washington State ranged up to 36 inches in the Methow Valley. High winds in Oregon blew a tree onto a moving automobile killing three persons and injuring two others at Mill City. (The National Weather Summary) (Storm Data)
9 December 1988...A winter storm blanketed the Southern and Central Appalachians with up to ten inches of snow. Arctic air invaded the north central U.S. bringing subzero cold to Minnesota and North Dakota. (The National Weather Summary) (Storm Data)
9 December 2003…A subtropical storm became Tropical Storm Peter approximately 700 miles west-northwest of the Cape Verde Islands. With Tropical Storm Odette having formed in the Caribbean on the 4th, the development of Peter marked the first time since 1887 that two tropical storms formed in the Atlantic Basin in December. (Accord Weather Guide Calendar)
10 December 1699...A severe ice storm hit Boston MA causing much damage to orchards. (The Weather Channel)
10 December 1988...Squalls produced heavy snow in the Lower Great Lakes Region. Totals in northeastern Ohio ranged up to 14 inches at Harpersfield, and totals in western New York State ranged up to 14 inches at Sodus. In the snowbelt of Upper Michigan, the Ontonagon area reported two feet of snow in two days. (Storm Data) (The National Weather Summary)
10 December 1989...Heavy snow fell across the northern and central mountains of Colorado, with 24 inches reported at Steamboat Springs. Six to twelve inches of snow fell in the Denver and Boulder area delaying plane flights and snarling traffic. Heavy snow also spread across the Central Plains into the Mississippi Valley. Winner SD received 11 inches of snow, and more than ten inches of snow was reported north of Sioux City IA. (The National Weather Summary) (Storm Data)
12 December 1882...Portland OR was drenched with 7.66 inches of rain, a record 24-hour total for that location. (12th-13th) (The Weather Channel)
12 December 1960...The first of three Middle Atlantic snowstorms produced a foot of snow at Baltimore MD. A pre-winter blizzard struck the northeastern U.S. producing wind gusts as high as 51 mph, along with 16 inches of snow at Nantucket MA, and 20 inches at Newark NJ. (David Ludlum)
13 December 1915...A heavy snowstorm kicked off the snowiest winter in modern records for western New England. (The Weather Channel)
13 December 1916...Avalanche killed 10,000 Austrian and Italian troops in 24 hours in Tyrol.
13 December 1987...A major winter storm produced high winds and heavy snow in the Southern Rockies and the Southern High Plains. Snowfall totals in New Mexico ranged up to 25 inches at Cedar Crest, with up to three feet of snow reported in the higher elevations. Winds of 75 mph, with gusts to 124 mph, were reported northeast of Albuquerque NM. El Paso TX was buried under 22.4 inches of snow, including a single storm record of 16.8 inches in 24 hours. The snowfall total surpassed their previous record for an entire winter season of 18.4 inches. Record cold was experienced the next three nights as readings dipped into the single numbers. High winds ushering unseasonably cold air into the southwestern U.S. gusted to 100 mph at Grapevine CA. (The National Weather Summary) (Storm Data)
13 December 1988...Low pressure off the Atlantic coast produced up to a foot of snow in eastern Nassau County and western Suffolk County of southeastern New York State. Mild weather prevailed across the western half of the country. Nine cities reported record high temperatures for the date, including Goodland KS with a reading of 74 degrees. (The National Weather Summary) (Storm Data)
13 December 1989...Strong northwesterly winds, ushering bitterly cold arctic air into the central U.S., produced squalls with heavy snow in the Great Lakes Region. Snowfall totals in Upper Michigan ranged up to 24 inches at Manistique. Nine cities in Arkansas and Texas reported record low temperatures for the date, including Calico Rock AR with a reading of 4 degrees above zero. (Storm Data) (The National Weather Summary)

Prepared by AMS WES Central Staff and Edward J. Hopkins, Ph.D., email hopkins@meteor.wisc.edu
ã Copyright, 2008, The American Meteorological Society.