Very nice multi-temporal images for Northern Australian floods. Watch out for the crocs, they are confused and angry!
-HLG
http://modis.gsfc.nasa.gov/gallery/individual.php?db_date=2009-02-27
Friday, February 27, 2009
Coleman Vs Gore VII
Weather Channel Founder Blasts Gore Over Global Warming Campaign
John Coleman, now a weatherman at San Diego's KUSI, writes on his station's Web site that Al Gore is ignoring the faulty research behind global warming.
founder of the Weather Channel is ridiculing Al Gore over his calls for action on global climate change, saying in a column that global warming is a "hoax" and "bad science."
John Coleman, now a weatherman at San Diego's KUSI, wrote on his station's Web site Wednesday that Gore refuses to acknowledge the faulty research on which the idea of global warming is based.
Coleman's lengthy scolding came as the former vice president and Nobel Peace Prize winner addressed the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and urged lawmakers to pass a bill that would put caps on heat-trapping gases and take the lead on a global climate treaty.
Coleman wrote that the Environmental Protection Agency is "on the verge" of naming CO2 (carbon dioxide) as a pollutant, and that seemingly all of Washington is on board with such CO2 silliness."
"I am totally convinced there is no scientific basis for any of it," Coleman wrote, describing the decades-old theory that increasing the amount of carbon dioxide in Earth's atmosphere leads to global warming.
"Global Warming. It is the hoax. It is bad science. It is a high jacking of public policy. It is no joke. It is the greatest scam in history," Coleman wrote. -AP
John Coleman, now a weatherman at San Diego's KUSI, writes on his station's Web site that Al Gore is ignoring the faulty research behind global warming.
founder of the Weather Channel is ridiculing Al Gore over his calls for action on global climate change, saying in a column that global warming is a "hoax" and "bad science."
John Coleman, now a weatherman at San Diego's KUSI, wrote on his station's Web site Wednesday that Gore refuses to acknowledge the faulty research on which the idea of global warming is based.
Coleman's lengthy scolding came as the former vice president and Nobel Peace Prize winner addressed the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and urged lawmakers to pass a bill that would put caps on heat-trapping gases and take the lead on a global climate treaty.
Coleman wrote that the Environmental Protection Agency is "on the verge" of naming CO2 (carbon dioxide) as a pollutant, and that seemingly all of Washington is on board with such CO2 silliness."
"I am totally convinced there is no scientific basis for any of it," Coleman wrote, describing the decades-old theory that increasing the amount of carbon dioxide in Earth's atmosphere leads to global warming.
"Global Warming. It is the hoax. It is bad science. It is a high jacking of public policy. It is no joke. It is the greatest scam in history," Coleman wrote. -AP
SO - WHO WAS RIGHT?
The Farmers' Almanac predicted below-average temperatures for the2009 winter for most of the United States. It predicted that at least two-thirds of the U.S. could expect colder than average temperatures and that only the Far West and Southeast should expect near-normal temperatures. The almanac predicted above-average snowfall for the Great Lakes and Midwest regions -- especially during the months of January and February. Above-normal precipitation for the Southwest in December and for the Southeast in January and February. The Northeast and Mid-Atlantic regions should expect an unusually high amount of rain or snow during February.
Their winter forecast disagreed with a prominent national weather service group (ahem...) who predicted warmer than normal temperatures over most of the U.S., including Alaska.
By the way, Joe the Meteorologist "Joe's Weather Works" blog - is hinting at snow in northern Alabama and Mississippi.
BB- GWA
Their winter forecast disagreed with a prominent national weather service group (ahem...) who predicted warmer than normal temperatures over most of the U.S., including Alaska.
By the way, Joe the Meteorologist "Joe's Weather Works" blog - is hinting at snow in northern Alabama and Mississippi.
BB- GWA
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Just for Larestar!
The Jan Mayen Cloud Squiggles (JMCS).
Ahhhh Memories, Like the Dawning of the Day ...
- HLG
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Orbital Carbon Observatory Fails
To be orbital, that is. :( No luck on getting some real carbon-cycle data on a global scale with this one. Did Al Gore cause this mission to fail? - HLG
NASA Climate Change Satellite Has Troubled Launch
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
VANDENBERG AIR FORCE BASE, California — A NASA satellite launched on a mission to track carbon dioxide emissions worldwide had technical problems shortly after its pre-dawn takeoff Tuesday that put in jeopardy its mission to better understand greenhouse gas and climate change.
The Taurus XL rocket carrying the Orbiting Carbon Observatory blasted off at 1:55 a.m. PST from Vandenberg Air Force Base on California's Central Coast, but launch managers shifted to a contingency plan minutes later because the payload fairing failed to separate properly from the spacecraft after it left the atmosphere, NASA commentator George Diller said.
"We have not had a successful launch tonight and will not be able to have a successful OCO mission," Diller said.
The fairing shelters the payload as the launch vehicle flies through the atmosphere.
The carbon observatory is NASA's first satellite dedicated to monitoring carbon dioxide on a global scale. Measurements collected from the $280 million mission were expected to improve climate models and help researchers determine where the greenhouse gas is coming from and how much is being absorbed by forests and oceans.
NASA Climate Change Satellite Has Troubled Launch
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
VANDENBERG AIR FORCE BASE, California — A NASA satellite launched on a mission to track carbon dioxide emissions worldwide had technical problems shortly after its pre-dawn takeoff Tuesday that put in jeopardy its mission to better understand greenhouse gas and climate change.
The Taurus XL rocket carrying the Orbiting Carbon Observatory blasted off at 1:55 a.m. PST from Vandenberg Air Force Base on California's Central Coast, but launch managers shifted to a contingency plan minutes later because the payload fairing failed to separate properly from the spacecraft after it left the atmosphere, NASA commentator George Diller said.
"We have not had a successful launch tonight and will not be able to have a successful OCO mission," Diller said.
The fairing shelters the payload as the launch vehicle flies through the atmosphere.
The carbon observatory is NASA's first satellite dedicated to monitoring carbon dioxide on a global scale. Measurements collected from the $280 million mission were expected to improve climate models and help researchers determine where the greenhouse gas is coming from and how much is being absorbed by forests and oceans.
Atlantis Found?
Not really. Just some bad data the from old navy surveys! This made the popular news, but I found a nice explanation on Google's Lat/Long Blog, which is all-thing Googley Earth - HLG
Atlantis? No, it Atlant-isn't.
Monday, February 23, 2009 at 2:55 PM
[Note: Last week we saw some interesting speculation that Atlantis had been found in Google Earth. As much as we'd love for that to be the case, there is a scientific explanation for the odd markings found on the seafloor. We've invited two of the scientists who gathered the data that appears in Google Earth to answer some questions that came up. - Ed.]
Since the launch of Ocean in Google Earth, millions of people have started to explore the ocean, and many have been surprised by their discoveries.
Near Hawaii you can see a new volcanic island in the making called the Loihi Seamount.
You can also clearly see the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, an underwater mountain range in the Atlantic Ocean where two tectonic plates are moving away from one another. If you look closely, you can see this ridge connects with others around the globe, forming a nearly continuous mountain range that is over 60,000 kilometers long.
But so far nothing has sparked quite as much interest as this funny looking pattern off the west coast of Africa:
Patterns like this can actually be seen over much of the ocean floor in Google Earth. What is it? Is it real? Why does it look like this?
Some have speculated that these are the plow marks of seafloor farming by aliens. If there really are little green men hiding somewhere, the ocean's not a bad place to do it. Mars, Venus, the moon, and even some asteroids are mapped at far higher resolution than our own oceans (the global map of Mars is about 250 times as accurate as the global map of our own ocean).
One theory that's gained more traction is that these marks might be the ruins of the lost city of Atlantis. If that were the case, some of the city blocks would have to be over eight miles long - that's about fifty times the size of a city block in New York City (if you zoom in and use the measurement tool in Google Earth, you can do this comparison yourself).
So what is it? The scientific explanation is a bit less exotic, but we think it's still pretty interesting: these marks are what we call "ship tracks." You see, it's actually quite hard to measure the depth of the ocean. Sunlight, lasers, and other electromagnetic radiation can travel less than 100 feet below the surface, yet the typical depth in the ocean is more than two and a half miles. Sound waves are more effective. By measuring the time it takes for sound to travel from a ship to the sea floor and back, you can get an idea of how far away the sea floor is. Since this process — known as echosounding — only maps a strip of the sea floor under the ship, the maps it produces often show the path the ship took, hence the "ship tracks." In this case, the soundings produced by a ship are also about 1% deeper than the data we have in surrounding areas — likely an error — making the tracks stand out more. You can see all of the soundings that produced this particular pattern with this KMZ file.
Echosounding with sonar is currently the best method for collecting this kind of data, but it's not perfect. One challenge is that it's quite slow. It has to be done from ships or underwater vehicles, and they can't go very fast or they'll spoil the measurement. As a result, not much of the ocean has been mapped this way, and huge gaps remain all over the ocean. In fact, the typical hole between tracks is about 20,000 square kilometers, or about the size of the state of New Jersey.
Now you're probably wondering where the rest of the depth data comes from if there are such big gaps from echosounding. We do our best to predict what the sea floor looks like based on what we can measure much more easily: the water surface. Above large underwater mountains (seamounts), the surface of the ocean is actually higher than in surrounding areas. These seamounts actually increase gravity in the area, which attracts more water and causes sea level to be slightly higher. The changes in water height are measurable using radar on satellites. This allows us to make a best guess as to what the rest of the sea floor looks like, but still at relatively low resolutions (the model predicts the ocean depth about once every 4000 meters). What you see in Google Earth is a combination of both this satellite-based model and real ship tracks from many research cruises (we first published this technique back in 1997). If you zoom in and take a look around the ocean for yourself, you can see higher resolution patches where ships have studied the sea floor and all the places we've still yet to explore. Here's a good example just north of Hawaii:
So, what if we really wanted to find Atlantis? We probably couldn't do it with satellites — man-made structures simply aren't big enough to be measured that way. But we could map the whole ocean using ships. A published U.S. Navy study found that it would take about 200 ship-years, meaning we'd need one ship for 200 years, or 10 ships for 20 years, or 100 ships for two years. It costs about $25,000 per day to operate a ship with the right mapping capability, so 200 ship-years would cost nearly two billion dollars. That may seem like a lot of money, but it's not that far off from the price tag of, say, a new sports stadium.
For now, keep exploring the ocean in Google Earth, and continue to share what you discover. It's great to have so many sets of eyes looking at the data currently in Google Earth and asking questions about what it represents. We and our fellow oceanographers are constantly improving the resolution of our seafloor maps, so we promise to work with Google to keep the virtual explorers out there busy.
Posted by Walter Smith, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and David Sandwell, Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego
Permalink Links to this post
Atlantis? No, it Atlant-isn't.
Monday, February 23, 2009 at 2:55 PM
[Note: Last week we saw some interesting speculation that Atlantis had been found in Google Earth. As much as we'd love for that to be the case, there is a scientific explanation for the odd markings found on the seafloor. We've invited two of the scientists who gathered the data that appears in Google Earth to answer some questions that came up. - Ed.]
Since the launch of Ocean in Google Earth, millions of people have started to explore the ocean, and many have been surprised by their discoveries.
Near Hawaii you can see a new volcanic island in the making called the Loihi Seamount.
You can also clearly see the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, an underwater mountain range in the Atlantic Ocean where two tectonic plates are moving away from one another. If you look closely, you can see this ridge connects with others around the globe, forming a nearly continuous mountain range that is over 60,000 kilometers long.
But so far nothing has sparked quite as much interest as this funny looking pattern off the west coast of Africa:
Patterns like this can actually be seen over much of the ocean floor in Google Earth. What is it? Is it real? Why does it look like this?
Some have speculated that these are the plow marks of seafloor farming by aliens. If there really are little green men hiding somewhere, the ocean's not a bad place to do it. Mars, Venus, the moon, and even some asteroids are mapped at far higher resolution than our own oceans (the global map of Mars is about 250 times as accurate as the global map of our own ocean).
One theory that's gained more traction is that these marks might be the ruins of the lost city of Atlantis. If that were the case, some of the city blocks would have to be over eight miles long - that's about fifty times the size of a city block in New York City (if you zoom in and use the measurement tool in Google Earth, you can do this comparison yourself).
So what is it? The scientific explanation is a bit less exotic, but we think it's still pretty interesting: these marks are what we call "ship tracks." You see, it's actually quite hard to measure the depth of the ocean. Sunlight, lasers, and other electromagnetic radiation can travel less than 100 feet below the surface, yet the typical depth in the ocean is more than two and a half miles. Sound waves are more effective. By measuring the time it takes for sound to travel from a ship to the sea floor and back, you can get an idea of how far away the sea floor is. Since this process — known as echosounding — only maps a strip of the sea floor under the ship, the maps it produces often show the path the ship took, hence the "ship tracks." In this case, the soundings produced by a ship are also about 1% deeper than the data we have in surrounding areas — likely an error — making the tracks stand out more. You can see all of the soundings that produced this particular pattern with this KMZ file.
Echosounding with sonar is currently the best method for collecting this kind of data, but it's not perfect. One challenge is that it's quite slow. It has to be done from ships or underwater vehicles, and they can't go very fast or they'll spoil the measurement. As a result, not much of the ocean has been mapped this way, and huge gaps remain all over the ocean. In fact, the typical hole between tracks is about 20,000 square kilometers, or about the size of the state of New Jersey.
Now you're probably wondering where the rest of the depth data comes from if there are such big gaps from echosounding. We do our best to predict what the sea floor looks like based on what we can measure much more easily: the water surface. Above large underwater mountains (seamounts), the surface of the ocean is actually higher than in surrounding areas. These seamounts actually increase gravity in the area, which attracts more water and causes sea level to be slightly higher. The changes in water height are measurable using radar on satellites. This allows us to make a best guess as to what the rest of the sea floor looks like, but still at relatively low resolutions (the model predicts the ocean depth about once every 4000 meters). What you see in Google Earth is a combination of both this satellite-based model and real ship tracks from many research cruises (we first published this technique back in 1997). If you zoom in and take a look around the ocean for yourself, you can see higher resolution patches where ships have studied the sea floor and all the places we've still yet to explore. Here's a good example just north of Hawaii:
So, what if we really wanted to find Atlantis? We probably couldn't do it with satellites — man-made structures simply aren't big enough to be measured that way. But we could map the whole ocean using ships. A published U.S. Navy study found that it would take about 200 ship-years, meaning we'd need one ship for 200 years, or 10 ships for 20 years, or 100 ships for two years. It costs about $25,000 per day to operate a ship with the right mapping capability, so 200 ship-years would cost nearly two billion dollars. That may seem like a lot of money, but it's not that far off from the price tag of, say, a new sports stadium.
For now, keep exploring the ocean in Google Earth, and continue to share what you discover. It's great to have so many sets of eyes looking at the data currently in Google Earth and asking questions about what it represents. We and our fellow oceanographers are constantly improving the resolution of our seafloor maps, so we promise to work with Google to keep the virtual explorers out there busy.
Posted by Walter Smith, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and David Sandwell, Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego
Permalink Links to this post
Friday, February 20, 2009
Aster Image of Chilean Volcano
Very nice high-res image of the Chaiten Volcano in Chile continuing to blow smoke and ash.
-HLG
FAWN (No, not an exotic dancer)
Well I am sure Fawn is an exotic dancer somewhere, and if I meet her I will report back, but I am talking about the Florida Automated Weather Network. Very nice web tools they have for their network of recording stations AND archives.
http://fawn.ifas.ufl.edu/station.php?id=260
HLG
http://fawn.ifas.ufl.edu/station.php?id=260
HLG
ANOTHER THING TO FEAR
I've always believed that these are the types of events to wipe out civilizations. One of the reasons why SETI cannot find intelligent life outside our planet.
BB
BB
Huge gamma-ray blast spotted 12.2 bln light-years from earth
The spectacular blast, which occurred in September in the Carina constellation, produced energies ranging from 3,000 to more than five billion times that of visible light, astrophysicists said.
Thursday, February 12, 2009
Dark Comets Could Strike Earth at Any Time!
But have a nice day! - HLG
'Dark' Comets Could Hit Earth Without Warning
Thursday, February 12, 2009
Comet Hale-Bopp over Mount Fuji in 1998.
Hazardous comets and asteroids are tracked by various space agencies, but British-based astronomers say there are many dangerous ones still going undetected, New Scientist magazine reported.
Previous research suggests comets nudge in the Earth's direction when the solar system periodically passes through the galactic plane.
These comets appear to coincide with the dates of ancient impact craters found on Earth — suggesting they were caused by comets and not asteroids.
"There is a case to be made that dark, dormant comets are a significant but largely unseen hazard," said Bill Napier at Cardiff University.
Napier and David Asher, at Armagh Observatory, say dark comets may still be in the solar system, and could come near Earth.
Dark comets happen when a comet's reflective water ice evaporates away, and leaves behind an organic crust.
Since the water's gone, they don't reflect light, making it hard for astronomers to see them until they're right on top of us
'Dark' Comets Could Hit Earth Without Warning
Thursday, February 12, 2009
Comet Hale-Bopp over Mount Fuji in 1998.
Hazardous comets and asteroids are tracked by various space agencies, but British-based astronomers say there are many dangerous ones still going undetected, New Scientist magazine reported.
Previous research suggests comets nudge in the Earth's direction when the solar system periodically passes through the galactic plane.
These comets appear to coincide with the dates of ancient impact craters found on Earth — suggesting they were caused by comets and not asteroids.
"There is a case to be made that dark, dormant comets are a significant but largely unseen hazard," said Bill Napier at Cardiff University.
Napier and David Asher, at Armagh Observatory, say dark comets may still be in the solar system, and could come near Earth.
Dark comets happen when a comet's reflective water ice evaporates away, and leaves behind an organic crust.
Since the water's gone, they don't reflect light, making it hard for astronomers to see them until they're right on top of us
EGM (Ehanced Global Mixing) Strikes Again! - HLG (Father of Enhanced Global Mixing Theory)
Winds whip into area again
Tens of thousands lose electricity as poles and lines topple
By Emily Udell • eudell@courier-journal.com • February 12, 2009
A front that followed a line of thunderstorms and generated winds of up to 60 mph blew through the Louisville area late yesterday afternoon, knocking out power to about 37,000 Louisville Gas & Electric customers.
Utility officials in Southern Indiana were reporting less than 2,400 customers without power about 5:15 this morning in Clark, Floyd and Harrison counties.
Shortly after the storm moved through the area early in the afternoon, LG&E was reporting 2,100 outages, most of them in the southern part of Jefferson County.
"We kind of thought we were out of the woods there," said Chip Keeling, a spokesman for the utility.
But then the winds arrived, and LG&E saw a spike of outages.
Drew Case got a familiar feeling of dread when he thought the power at his Tyler Park home might go out about 6 last night.
"It flickered and we had our fingers crossed," said Case, who lost power during the September wind storm caused by Hurricane Ike and last month’s ice storm.
Keeling said customers without power were spread across the metro area, and crews were working to repair lines. The outages came just days after LG&E restored power to more than 200,000 customers who lost it when the ice storm of Jan. 27 and 28 brought down trees, limbs and power lines. Across the state, almost 700,000 people lost power in that storm, and around 30,000 are still without electricity, state officials said.
Kentucky Public Service Commission spokesman Andrew Melnykovych said last Wednesday night that yesterday’s storms had resulted in at least 120,000 new power outages across the state, a figure that doesn’t include Tennessee Valley Authority cooperatives or municipalities.
Some areas that escaped the ice storm were hit by yesterday’s weather, Melnykovych said, but others were left in the dark for a second time.
"I’m sure people’s patience is running about as thin as it can get and understandably so," he said. While 35 deaths in Kentucky were linked to the ice storm, no fatalities have been reported from yesterday’s storms and wind.
There were reports of possible injuries in Trimble, Johnson, Hopkins and Whitley counties and of possible tornadoes in Breathitt, Garrard, Knox and Whitley counties, said Buddy Rogers, spokesman for the Kentucky Division of Emergency Management.
Knox and Whitley counties declared states of emergency, Rogers said.
In Floyds Knobs, Ind., Lisa Easton thought, "those famous words — here we go again" when she lost power about 4:30 yesterday.
Easton was among those who experienced outages during both the September wind storm and the ice storm. She said she and her two children played battery-powered video games to pass the time until the power came back on about 11 p.m.
"We’ve done this so many times, it’s like old hat to us," she said
Tens of thousands lose electricity as poles and lines topple
By Emily Udell • eudell@courier-journal.com • February 12, 2009
A front that followed a line of thunderstorms and generated winds of up to 60 mph blew through the Louisville area late yesterday afternoon, knocking out power to about 37,000 Louisville Gas & Electric customers.
Utility officials in Southern Indiana were reporting less than 2,400 customers without power about 5:15 this morning in Clark, Floyd and Harrison counties.
Shortly after the storm moved through the area early in the afternoon, LG&E was reporting 2,100 outages, most of them in the southern part of Jefferson County.
"We kind of thought we were out of the woods there," said Chip Keeling, a spokesman for the utility.
But then the winds arrived, and LG&E saw a spike of outages.
Drew Case got a familiar feeling of dread when he thought the power at his Tyler Park home might go out about 6 last night.
"It flickered and we had our fingers crossed," said Case, who lost power during the September wind storm caused by Hurricane Ike and last month’s ice storm.
Keeling said customers without power were spread across the metro area, and crews were working to repair lines. The outages came just days after LG&E restored power to more than 200,000 customers who lost it when the ice storm of Jan. 27 and 28 brought down trees, limbs and power lines. Across the state, almost 700,000 people lost power in that storm, and around 30,000 are still without electricity, state officials said.
Kentucky Public Service Commission spokesman Andrew Melnykovych said last Wednesday night that yesterday’s storms had resulted in at least 120,000 new power outages across the state, a figure that doesn’t include Tennessee Valley Authority cooperatives or municipalities.
Some areas that escaped the ice storm were hit by yesterday’s weather, Melnykovych said, but others were left in the dark for a second time.
"I’m sure people’s patience is running about as thin as it can get and understandably so," he said. While 35 deaths in Kentucky were linked to the ice storm, no fatalities have been reported from yesterday’s storms and wind.
There were reports of possible injuries in Trimble, Johnson, Hopkins and Whitley counties and of possible tornadoes in Breathitt, Garrard, Knox and Whitley counties, said Buddy Rogers, spokesman for the Kentucky Division of Emergency Management.
Knox and Whitley counties declared states of emergency, Rogers said.
In Floyds Knobs, Ind., Lisa Easton thought, "those famous words — here we go again" when she lost power about 4:30 yesterday.
Easton was among those who experienced outages during both the September wind storm and the ice storm. She said she and her two children played battery-powered video games to pass the time until the power came back on about 11 p.m.
"We’ve done this so many times, it’s like old hat to us," she said
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Avian Aviation Hazard Map from Radar
Very cool application of current avian hazard to aviation by radar detection. -HLG
Monday, February 9, 2009
More Aussie Fires
The attached image is a 4 km composite of two MODIS scenes. The shear scale of the smoke-plume from the fires, reaching well past New Zealand was just amazing to me. I don't think I have ever seen one that stretched this far.
-HLG
Australia Fires
This MODIS (250 m resolution)image shows the active burns, and the burn-scars from the wildfires which have killed a couple of hundred people in Australia the past few days. - HLG
Google Mars
This is definitely in the "sortof weather" category, but it is VERY GEEKY! If you haven't downloaded the new Google Earth 5.0, you just gotta get it. The new flight simulator is much improved, but I just can't seem to turn off Google Mars! Too much fun. Supposedly Google Moon will be in the 3D model soon.
-HLG
Friday, February 6, 2009
DANGEROUS Tropical Cyclone "GAEL"
This one intensified very rapidly as it approached Madagascar. I hope they aren't currently filming Madagascar 3 there, but if they don't have a story, maybe it should be "All the Cartoon Animals Die in a Cylcone!" (Rated PG-13) - HLG
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Try, Try, Again
NOAA-N Prime Launch Scrubbed
Feb 5, 2009
By Michael Mecham (Aviation Week)
NASA scrubbed the launch of the Lockheed Martin NOAA-N Prime weather satellite at 2 a.m. PST Feb. 4 when a pressurization system on the Boeing Delta II rocket failed.
An immediate repair of the gaseous nitrogen pressurization system was undertaken on the launch pad at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., and a second attempted launch was set for 2:22 a.m. PST Feb. 5. But NASA later announced that the launch had been postponed for an additional 24 hours and is now set to take off on Feb. 6 at 2:22 a.m. PST.
The system maintains pressurization and purges of various components on the rocket.
The satellite is the 16th in a series of polar-orbiting weather satellites that NASA has launched for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration over the past 31 years.
Feb 5, 2009
By Michael Mecham (Aviation Week)
NASA scrubbed the launch of the Lockheed Martin NOAA-N Prime weather satellite at 2 a.m. PST Feb. 4 when a pressurization system on the Boeing Delta II rocket failed.
An immediate repair of the gaseous nitrogen pressurization system was undertaken on the launch pad at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., and a second attempted launch was set for 2:22 a.m. PST Feb. 5. But NASA later announced that the launch had been postponed for an additional 24 hours and is now set to take off on Feb. 6 at 2:22 a.m. PST.
The system maintains pressurization and purges of various components on the rocket.
The satellite is the 16th in a series of polar-orbiting weather satellites that NASA has launched for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration over the past 31 years.
Google Oceans Bug
I don't think they have fully debugged Google Oceans. The atached image here happens when you switch to Google Sky with the SST layer turned on. Interesting effect, but not highly informative. - HLG
Congrats to NAVO/CNMOC on Google Oceans
I want to congratulate all of the people who worked for many years to make NAVO the world-wide Center of Expertise on MCSSTs! I think it was a very big day to become a part of Google Earth. There has been tremendous world-wide press on the release of this product, and when you click on Daily SSTs it takes you straight to Stennis Space Center, Mississippi! Good job! - HLG
Real-Time Weather for GIS Users
Realtime Weather for GISTM
March 30, 2009 8:30-12:00 $125
Learn how to integrate realtime weather information into your GIS! Color weather radar, lightning strike locations, watches and warnings and many more weather layers can be viewed as overlays within ArcGIS and Google Earth. This class teaches how to integrate realtime weather data into HAZMAT plume modeling applications such as ALOHA and then display the results in GIS, so that resources-at-risk can be identified and an effective response can be planned and executed. The class is designed for both beginning and experienced GIS users, so there is something for everyone!
Since 1994, Waypoint Mapping has offered training for emerging geospatial technologies.
Students have included Federal, State and Local government agencies, U.S. and World Military organizations and Fortune 500 companies in the Oil & Gas, Pipeline, Utilities and Energy Industries.
Whether your organization is large or small, we can provide you with the skills that you need in order to put geospatial visual intelligence to work right away!
Monitoring Hurricane Ike in ArcGIS
About the Instructor:
Devon Humphrey is a geographer and has worked in the geospatial industry since 1991. While working within Local and State government, he served on the Texas GIS Standards Committee, which developed Standards and Guidelines for GIS for the State of Texas. He has also served on the Texas GPS Committee and is an award-winning GIS Instructor and Presenter. He was recognized as “Best Speaker” two years in a row by the Geospatial Information Technology Association (GITA) 2005-2006.
Mr. Humphrey has also worked in the private sector for ESRI’s San Antonio Regional Office and was founder and CEO of his own one-stop geospatial products and services company called Geowarehouse from 1995-2001. Since 1994, he has been providing GIS and GPS training at Texas A&M University’s National Spill Control School in Corpus Christi, Texas. He is currently President of Waypoint Mapping, providing specialized geospatial training and consulting to a wide variety of organizations world-wide
March 30, 2009 8:30-12:00 $125
Learn how to integrate realtime weather information into your GIS! Color weather radar, lightning strike locations, watches and warnings and many more weather layers can be viewed as overlays within ArcGIS and Google Earth. This class teaches how to integrate realtime weather data into HAZMAT plume modeling applications such as ALOHA and then display the results in GIS, so that resources-at-risk can be identified and an effective response can be planned and executed. The class is designed for both beginning and experienced GIS users, so there is something for everyone!
Since 1994, Waypoint Mapping has offered training for emerging geospatial technologies.
Students have included Federal, State and Local government agencies, U.S. and World Military organizations and Fortune 500 companies in the Oil & Gas, Pipeline, Utilities and Energy Industries.
Whether your organization is large or small, we can provide you with the skills that you need in order to put geospatial visual intelligence to work right away!
Monitoring Hurricane Ike in ArcGIS
About the Instructor:
Devon Humphrey is a geographer and has worked in the geospatial industry since 1991. While working within Local and State government, he served on the Texas GIS Standards Committee, which developed Standards and Guidelines for GIS for the State of Texas. He has also served on the Texas GPS Committee and is an award-winning GIS Instructor and Presenter. He was recognized as “Best Speaker” two years in a row by the Geospatial Information Technology Association (GITA) 2005-2006.
Mr. Humphrey has also worked in the private sector for ESRI’s San Antonio Regional Office and was founder and CEO of his own one-stop geospatial products and services company called Geowarehouse from 1995-2001. Since 1994, he has been providing GIS and GPS training at Texas A&M University’s National Spill Control School in Corpus Christi, Texas. He is currently President of Waypoint Mapping, providing specialized geospatial training and consulting to a wide variety of organizations world-wide
What's the problem with a few little ole' gravity waves!
As the Aeroflot representative told the irate (irational!) passengers. "Don't vorry, deese planes today practically fly demselves!"
-HLG
NOT A GOOD TIME TO FLY
Another outstanding satellite loop from our friends at CIMSS. This shows atmospheric gravity waves which can be a major source of disruption for people trying to drink coffee on planes. Add in a few drunk pilots and you have a fun flight from Omaha to Portland.
BB
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Australian Heat Wave
The attached image shows temperature anomalies for Australia last month. The title of the article it was attached to was "Exceptional Heat Wave". The reds are 0-10 C positive temps, and the blue are 0 to - 10 negative anomalies. You be the judge. Is this an "Australian" heat-wave, or just a heat-wave where the people, and not just kangaroos & wombats live?
-HLG
Astronaut Photography Site
If you like pictures from space, check out this cool NASA website.
The two images here are an anoymous CB over the Amazon, and Tokyo at night.
http://eol.jsc.nasa.gov/scripts/sseop/photo.pl?mission=ISS016&roll=E&frame=27586
-HLG
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Oh Yea?! Well SLOSH still runs ...
on a Windows 98 PIII box! So there! (SLOSH is the nations operational storm surge forecasting tool!) - HLG
IBM to build massive supercomputer for U.S. government
Remember Roadrunner's 1 petaflop? The new system will reach 20 petaflops
By Patrick Thibodeau
February 3, 2009 (Computerworld) The U.S. government has hired IBM to build a supercomputer with more power than all the supercomputers on the Top500 supercomputer list combined.
It's an ambitious claim by IBM in a business where jumbo-size claims are the norm. The planned Sequoia system, capable of 20 petaflops, will be used by the U.S. Department of Energy in its nuclear stockpile research. The fastest systems today can only reach 1 petaflop, a remarkable achievement in its own right that was met only last year.
It "is the biggest leap of computing capability ever delivered to the lab," said Mark Seager, assistant department head for advanced technology at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, Calif., where the system will be housed. It's expected to be up and running in 2012.
IBM is actually building two supercomputers under this contract. The first one, to be delivered by midyear, is called Dawn and will operate at around 500 teraflops. Researchers will use Dawn to help prepare for the larger system.
Sequoia will use approximately 1.6 million processing cores, all IBM Power chips, running Linux, which dominates high-performance computing at this scale. IBM is still developing a 45-nanometer chip for the system and may produce something with eight or 16 cores -- or more -- for it. Although the final chip configuration has yet to be determined, the system will have 1.6TB of memory and be housed in 96 "refrigerator-size" racks.
The cost of the system wasn't disclosed.
The supercomputer is also helping to drive a massive power upgrade at Lawrence Livermore, which is increasing the amount of electricity available for all its computing systems from 12.5 megawatts to 30 megawatts. To achieve the upgrade, it will run more power lines to its facility. Sequoia alone is expected to use about 6 megawatts, according to Seager.
The world's first computer to break the teraflop barrier was built at Sandia National Laboratories in 1996. A teraflop equals a trillion floating points a second; a petaflop is 1,000 trillion (one quadrillion) sustained floating-point operations per second.
It takes government funding to build systems of this scale and size, but that also means that the U.S. is paying for much of the problem-solving it takes to scale across more than a million cores. "This is what's so good about it," said Herb Schultz, manager of deep computing at IBM. "They [the national lab] end up proving that you can get codes to scale that high."
In effect, by solving those problems, the national lab's work will pave the way for broader adoption of massive systems that could improve weather research, forecasts, tornado tracking, and work on a variety of other research problems. Large systems such as Sequoia help researchers reduce uncertainty and improve precision in simulations that can, for instance, predict tornado paths. The more compute power available, the more fine tuned and accurate the simulation.
The major problem in running a system of this scale is "the applications -- porting the applications and scaling them up is a critical problem we are facing," said Seager.
There are two petaflop systems in the U.S., IBM's Roadrunner at Los Alamos National Laboratory, which passed the petaflop barrier last May, and Cray Inc.'s XT Jaguar at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
IBM plans to build Sequoia at its Rochester, Minn., plant
IBM to build massive supercomputer for U.S. government
Remember Roadrunner's 1 petaflop? The new system will reach 20 petaflops
By Patrick Thibodeau
February 3, 2009 (Computerworld) The U.S. government has hired IBM to build a supercomputer with more power than all the supercomputers on the Top500 supercomputer list combined.
It's an ambitious claim by IBM in a business where jumbo-size claims are the norm. The planned Sequoia system, capable of 20 petaflops, will be used by the U.S. Department of Energy in its nuclear stockpile research. The fastest systems today can only reach 1 petaflop, a remarkable achievement in its own right that was met only last year.
It "is the biggest leap of computing capability ever delivered to the lab," said Mark Seager, assistant department head for advanced technology at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, Calif., where the system will be housed. It's expected to be up and running in 2012.
IBM is actually building two supercomputers under this contract. The first one, to be delivered by midyear, is called Dawn and will operate at around 500 teraflops. Researchers will use Dawn to help prepare for the larger system.
Sequoia will use approximately 1.6 million processing cores, all IBM Power chips, running Linux, which dominates high-performance computing at this scale. IBM is still developing a 45-nanometer chip for the system and may produce something with eight or 16 cores -- or more -- for it. Although the final chip configuration has yet to be determined, the system will have 1.6TB of memory and be housed in 96 "refrigerator-size" racks.
The cost of the system wasn't disclosed.
The supercomputer is also helping to drive a massive power upgrade at Lawrence Livermore, which is increasing the amount of electricity available for all its computing systems from 12.5 megawatts to 30 megawatts. To achieve the upgrade, it will run more power lines to its facility. Sequoia alone is expected to use about 6 megawatts, according to Seager.
The world's first computer to break the teraflop barrier was built at Sandia National Laboratories in 1996. A teraflop equals a trillion floating points a second; a petaflop is 1,000 trillion (one quadrillion) sustained floating-point operations per second.
It takes government funding to build systems of this scale and size, but that also means that the U.S. is paying for much of the problem-solving it takes to scale across more than a million cores. "This is what's so good about it," said Herb Schultz, manager of deep computing at IBM. "They [the national lab] end up proving that you can get codes to scale that high."
In effect, by solving those problems, the national lab's work will pave the way for broader adoption of massive systems that could improve weather research, forecasts, tornado tracking, and work on a variety of other research problems. Large systems such as Sequoia help researchers reduce uncertainty and improve precision in simulations that can, for instance, predict tornado paths. The more compute power available, the more fine tuned and accurate the simulation.
The major problem in running a system of this scale is "the applications -- porting the applications and scaling them up is a critical problem we are facing," said Seager.
There are two petaflop systems in the U.S., IBM's Roadrunner at Los Alamos National Laboratory, which passed the petaflop barrier last May, and Cray Inc.'s XT Jaguar at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
IBM plans to build Sequoia at its Rochester, Minn., plant
Al Gore Approves New "Google Oceans"
Can't get cooler that that kids! - HLG
Google Earth Goes Underwater
February 03, 2009 | by Christopher Nickson (Digitaltrends)
As a major addition to Google Earth, Google Ocean will map the ocean floor, letting users explore the terrain in 3D.
Google pushed out the boat at an event in San Francisco to launch a major upgrade to Google Earth. The software will now map the ocean floor with Google Ocean – and 70% of the earth is made up of water – letting users enjoy exploring in 3D, and taking the company a good swim closer to having the entire globe mapped out.
Attendee Al Gore said:
"You can not only zoom into whatever part of our planet's surface you wish to examine in closer detail, you can now dive into the world's ocean that covers almost three-quarters of the planet and discover new wonders that had not been accessible in previous versions."
The software will include videos on surf spots, shipwrecks and marine life, among other things. Google has worked with a number of partners, including the BBC and the National Geographic Society, on the venture.
Among other updates to Google Earth are virtual time travel, GPS, and even updates to Mars 3D.
Google Earth Goes Underwater
February 03, 2009 | by Christopher Nickson (Digitaltrends)
As a major addition to Google Earth, Google Ocean will map the ocean floor, letting users explore the terrain in 3D.
Google pushed out the boat at an event in San Francisco to launch a major upgrade to Google Earth. The software will now map the ocean floor with Google Ocean – and 70% of the earth is made up of water – letting users enjoy exploring in 3D, and taking the company a good swim closer to having the entire globe mapped out.
Attendee Al Gore said:
"You can not only zoom into whatever part of our planet's surface you wish to examine in closer detail, you can now dive into the world's ocean that covers almost three-quarters of the planet and discover new wonders that had not been accessible in previous versions."
The software will include videos on surf spots, shipwrecks and marine life, among other things. Google has worked with a number of partners, including the BBC and the National Geographic Society, on the venture.
Among other updates to Google Earth are virtual time travel, GPS, and even updates to Mars 3D.
Monday, February 2, 2009
The "Great Blue Hole"
Fascinating image of a naturally existing, nearly perfectly circular, 30 meter wide "hole" in the reef off of Belize. It is eithe proof of Global Warming, or aliens, take your pick. - HLG
Global Warming Causes Worst Disaster in Kentucky's History!
LOUISVILLE, Kentucky (CNN) -- National Guard troops were going door to door Sunday in Kentucky, checking on families in the worst-hit areas of what Gov. Steve Beshear called "the biggest natural disaster that this state has ever experienced in modern history."
John Randolph moves fallen branches at his home in the Louisville, Kentucky, area Sunday.
1 of 3 more photos » The devastating ice storm has been blamed for at least seven deaths in Kentucky, Beshear said. In total, 21 deaths have been reported in the state since the storm hit on Tuesday, but authorities could not immediately confirm whether all were directly storm-related.
The "unprecedented" call-up of the National Guard includes 4,600 troops in various roles.
Of 120 counties in the state, 92 had declared emergencies, the governor's office said. More than 400,000 customers were without power. See images of the ice storm's aftermath »
Temperatures were higher Sunday -- in the 40s -- which meant some relief, but also new problems. Melting ice and snowcan make it more difficult for utility trucks to reach certain areas.
And the National Weather Service warned of another potential problem: winds that could knock down loose trees.
"Although not particularly strong, winds between 10 and 15 mph can be expected later this morning and through the early evening over areas affected by the recent ice storm last week," the NWS said.
Louisville resident John Randolph showed CNN tree branches that fell onto his two-story suburban home.
"Just the power and the ... crunch and the crash and ... just the overall power of the branches falling was actually pretty frightening" when the ice storm was setting in, he said. iReport.com: Share photos of icy, snowy weather in your town
He added, "The baby slept through the night and didn't wake up once. My wife and I, once we heard the first branches falling, we didn't go back to sleep the whole night. We didn't know what to do. ... Ultimately, we sort of just stayed in our bedrooms and I just kind of went outside periodically and assessed the situation."
Randolph's home -- which escaped serious damage -- is among those without power.
"The troops have been instructed to attach green tape to the homes in which residents have sufficient food, power, water or communications. Red tape will be used to indicate homes where shortfalls exist," according to a Kentucky Air National Guard news release.
"Houses marked with red tape will be reported to local emergency operations centers and will be placed on a list to be resurveyed for on-going support based on county capabilities."
Arthur Byrn, mayor of Mayfield -- one of the cities hit hard by the storm -- told CNN Radio that authorities were conducting a "door-to-door welfare check of the entire Graves County area, which is 38,000 people."
He said it could take "as much as two months" for the county to have 100 percent of its power back.
"It's quite disconcerting to go out at 7 o'clock at night and not see a light anywhere other than [a headlight] coming down the street," Byrn said.
He added, "Devastation is sometimes an overused word, but I would say that's what we had."
Jamie Gunnels, who was staying in a Louisville shelter with her 18-month-old son, said it was "entirely too cold" to stay in her house without power.
"We were sitting there being thankful that we still had power," she said. "A few minutes after we said we were thankful we had power, it went out." Watch how people are helping one another »
Louisville Mayor Jerry Abramson said four people had died in his city. Two elderly people and their special-needs adult child died because of an "improperly vented" generator, and another person died after using a charcoal grill as a heater for the house.
Abramson said authorities were trying to let people know it's dangerous to take generators and grills inside.
"It can kill, and it has, unfortunately," he said.
John Randolph moves fallen branches at his home in the Louisville, Kentucky, area Sunday.
1 of 3 more photos » The devastating ice storm has been blamed for at least seven deaths in Kentucky, Beshear said. In total, 21 deaths have been reported in the state since the storm hit on Tuesday, but authorities could not immediately confirm whether all were directly storm-related.
The "unprecedented" call-up of the National Guard includes 4,600 troops in various roles.
Of 120 counties in the state, 92 had declared emergencies, the governor's office said. More than 400,000 customers were without power. See images of the ice storm's aftermath »
Temperatures were higher Sunday -- in the 40s -- which meant some relief, but also new problems. Melting ice and snowcan make it more difficult for utility trucks to reach certain areas.
And the National Weather Service warned of another potential problem: winds that could knock down loose trees.
"Although not particularly strong, winds between 10 and 15 mph can be expected later this morning and through the early evening over areas affected by the recent ice storm last week," the NWS said.
Louisville resident John Randolph showed CNN tree branches that fell onto his two-story suburban home.
"Just the power and the ... crunch and the crash and ... just the overall power of the branches falling was actually pretty frightening" when the ice storm was setting in, he said. iReport.com: Share photos of icy, snowy weather in your town
He added, "The baby slept through the night and didn't wake up once. My wife and I, once we heard the first branches falling, we didn't go back to sleep the whole night. We didn't know what to do. ... Ultimately, we sort of just stayed in our bedrooms and I just kind of went outside periodically and assessed the situation."
Randolph's home -- which escaped serious damage -- is among those without power.
"The troops have been instructed to attach green tape to the homes in which residents have sufficient food, power, water or communications. Red tape will be used to indicate homes where shortfalls exist," according to a Kentucky Air National Guard news release.
"Houses marked with red tape will be reported to local emergency operations centers and will be placed on a list to be resurveyed for on-going support based on county capabilities."
Arthur Byrn, mayor of Mayfield -- one of the cities hit hard by the storm -- told CNN Radio that authorities were conducting a "door-to-door welfare check of the entire Graves County area, which is 38,000 people."
He said it could take "as much as two months" for the county to have 100 percent of its power back.
"It's quite disconcerting to go out at 7 o'clock at night and not see a light anywhere other than [a headlight] coming down the street," Byrn said.
He added, "Devastation is sometimes an overused word, but I would say that's what we had."
Jamie Gunnels, who was staying in a Louisville shelter with her 18-month-old son, said it was "entirely too cold" to stay in her house without power.
"We were sitting there being thankful that we still had power," she said. "A few minutes after we said we were thankful we had power, it went out." Watch how people are helping one another »
Louisville Mayor Jerry Abramson said four people had died in his city. Two elderly people and their special-needs adult child died because of an "improperly vented" generator, and another person died after using a charcoal grill as a heater for the house.
Abramson said authorities were trying to let people know it's dangerous to take generators and grills inside.
"It can kill, and it has, unfortunately," he said.
Global Warming Paralyzes Western Europe!
Is Al still testifying to Congress as he was during our ice storm last week? Possibly he took his 300 pound carbon footprint onto his private jet and bailed out!
-HLG
Western Europe hit by heavy snow - AP
Some roads in Spain were affected by the snow
Icy temperatures and snow are causing problems across Western Europe.
South-east England saw the worst snow for 18 years, with all London buses pulled from service. One of Heathrow Airport's runways remains closed.
In Paris, flights were delayed and snow caused several road accidents, although the state forecaster said the quantities of snow were not unusual.
Snowfalls also snarled traffic in several parts of Spain, including the Madrid area, on Sunday.
Up to 20cm of snow fell in parts of Switzerland overnight, while part of the road around the San Bernardino tunnel was closed.
Meanwhile, a storm disrupted ferry travel from the Spanish port city of Algeciras to Morocco, authorities said.
No injuries
France's road traffic agency urged motorists to cancel non-essential journeys, with roads difficult and in a small number of cases impassable around Paris and in the east near Strasbourg.
Heavy snow hits much of Britain
Flights were delayed by at least half an hour at Paris's Orly and Roissy-Charles de Gaulle airports. One of Orly's two runways was closed.
Air France cancelled a third of short and medium haul flights from Charles de Gaulle Airport during the morning but said long haul routes would not be troubled.
Despite a dozen road accidents in the Paris region there were no injuries, officials said.
In Italy, three people died and 500 people had to be evacuated from their homes amid adverse weather conditions on Sunday.
-HLG
Western Europe hit by heavy snow - AP
Some roads in Spain were affected by the snow
Icy temperatures and snow are causing problems across Western Europe.
South-east England saw the worst snow for 18 years, with all London buses pulled from service. One of Heathrow Airport's runways remains closed.
In Paris, flights were delayed and snow caused several road accidents, although the state forecaster said the quantities of snow were not unusual.
Snowfalls also snarled traffic in several parts of Spain, including the Madrid area, on Sunday.
Up to 20cm of snow fell in parts of Switzerland overnight, while part of the road around the San Bernardino tunnel was closed.
Meanwhile, a storm disrupted ferry travel from the Spanish port city of Algeciras to Morocco, authorities said.
No injuries
France's road traffic agency urged motorists to cancel non-essential journeys, with roads difficult and in a small number of cases impassable around Paris and in the east near Strasbourg.
Heavy snow hits much of Britain
Flights were delayed by at least half an hour at Paris's Orly and Roissy-Charles de Gaulle airports. One of Orly's two runways was closed.
Air France cancelled a third of short and medium haul flights from Charles de Gaulle Airport during the morning but said long haul routes would not be troubled.
Despite a dozen road accidents in the Paris region there were no injuries, officials said.
In Italy, three people died and 500 people had to be evacuated from their homes amid adverse weather conditions on Sunday.
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