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What You Need to Know About The Massive Cyclone Heading Towards India

by Zeniarwpzz Posted on October 12, 2013

Mother Jones

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Cyclone Phailin NOAA

By Saturday afternoon, a massive cyclone currently traveling across the Bay of Bengal is expected to hit the coast of India. The government has evacuated more than a quarter million people to prepare for the storm, named Cyclone Phailin (pronounced: phie-lin), which it expects to cause massive power outages, floods, and damage to homes in the region. Here are some facts on the storm, and what’s ahead:

How bad is this storm?

The India Meteorological Department describes Phailin as a “very severe” storm, and the National Center for Atmospheric research rates it as a Category 5. It’s expected to hit the coast with winds up to 137 miles per hour, 9.8 or more inches of rain, and storm surges up to 11.5 feet. For reference, the storm surge in the Battery in New York City during Superstorm Sandy peaked at 9.2 feet, and the surge in nearby Kings Point, NY was 12.7 feet according to the Weather Channel. The India Meteorological Department predicts “extensive damage” to houses made from hay and mud, which are common in the region, as well as flooding, power outages, traffic disruption, and “the flooding of escape routes” in areas affected by the cyclone.

Writing at Quartz, meteorologist Eric Holthaus thinks that Cyclone Phailin could be more damaging than current estimates (emphasis added):

At one point (2 am Friday, India time), one satellite-based measure of Phailin’s strength estimated the storm’s central pressure at 910.2 millibars, with sustained winds of 175 mph (280 kph). If those numbers were verified by official forecast agencies, they would place Phailin on par with 2005′s Hurricane Katrina, and break the record for the most intense cyclone in Indian Ocean recorded history.

To get a sense of the size of the storm, this satellite image from the University of Wisconsin shows the cyclone, which appears to be about half the size of India.

Where is it heading?

Cyclone Phailin will primarily hit two states on the eastern coast of India, Odisha and Andhra Pradesh, and is expected to cause heavy rainfalls in a third, West Bengal. Low-lying areas near the coast, which is dotted with small fishing towns, are expected to be damaged by the storm surge. Reuters reports that the Indian government has made an effort to evacuate people, though not all of them are willing to leave:

Some 260,000 people were moved to safer ground and more were expected to be evacuated by the end of the day, authorities in the two states said. Not everybody was willing to leave their homes and belongings, and some villagers on the palm-fringed Andhra Pradesh coast said they had not been told to evacuate.

“Of course I’m scared, but where will I move with my family?” asked Kuramayya, 38, a fisherman from the village of Bandharuvanipeta, close to where the hurricane is expected to make to landfall, while 3.5-metre (12-foot waves) crashed behind him. “We can’t leave our boats behind.”

What’s the difference between a cyclone and a hurricane?

There isn’t one. Hurricanes, cyclones, and typhoons are all the same weather phenomenon, but they have different names depending on where they occur. (This National Geographic article has a complete breakdown of storm names by region.)

Do cyclones hit India often?

Bangladesh and the eastern coast of India have a history of devastating cyclones. According to Weather Underground‘s history of cyclones in the region, “most of the deadliest tropical storms on earth have occurred in the Bay of Bengal when tremendous storm surges have swamped the low-lying coastal regions of Bangladesh, India, and Burma.” Of Weather Underground‘s list of the 35 deadliest storms on record, 26 of them occurred in the Bay of Bengal.

As cyclone Phailin heads towards land, the Hindu Times reports that many people are recalling the massive Cyclone 05B, often referred to as the Odisha cyclone, that hit the area in 1999 and killed nearly 10,000 people.

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What You Need to Know About The Massive Cyclone Heading Towards India

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Deadly Cyclone Hits India

by maciao85 Posted on October 12, 2013

Mother Jones

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Cyclone Phailin NOAA

UPDATE 10:45 a.m. PT, Sunday, October 13, 2013: According to CNN, in India’s Odisha state, which was battered this weekend by Cyclone Phailin, “at least 13 people were killed after trees fell and walls collapsed when the storm hit, Police Chief Prakash Mishra said. Another death was confirmed in Andhra Pradesh state, India’s disaster management authority said. Many had feared the death toll would be higher. Massive evacuation efforts helped limit the number of casualties, officials said.”

UPDATE 7:30 p.m. PT, Saturday, October 12, 2013: Cyclone Phailin made landfall on Saturday night around 9 pm local time, according to the Times of India. “Broken glass pieces, wood shreds and asbestos sheets flew like killer projectiles in the adjoining cities of Gopalpur and Berhampur,” the Times reported. An estimated 12 million people were in the storm’s path by the time it made landfall, with wind speeds around the predicted 130 miles per hour. 18 fishermen were stuck at sea when the cyclone hit, according to the Times. As the sun rises in India Sunday morning, the country will begin assessing the damage.

By Saturday afternoon, a massive cyclone currently traveling across the Bay of Bengal is expected to hit the coast of India. The government has evacuated more than a quarter million people to prepare for the storm, named Cyclone Phailin (pronounced: phie-lin), which it expects to cause massive power outages, floods, and damage to homes in the region. Here are some facts on the storm, and what’s ahead:

How bad is this storm?

The India Meteorological Department describes Phailin as a “very severe” storm, and the National Center for Atmospheric research rates it as a Category 5. It’s expected to hit the coast with winds up to 137 miles per hour, 9.8 or more inches of rain, and storm surges up to 11.5 feet. For reference, the storm surge in the Battery in New York City during Superstorm Sandy peaked at 9.2 feet, and the surge in nearby Kings Point, NY was 12.7 feet according to the Weather Channel. The India Meteorological Department predicts “extensive damage” to houses made from hay and mud, which are common in the region, as well as flooding, power outages, traffic disruption, and “the flooding of escape routes” in areas affected by the cyclone.

Writing at Quartz, meteorologist Eric Holthaus thinks that Cyclone Phailin could be more damaging than current estimates (emphasis added):

At one point (2 am Friday, India time), one satellite-based measure of Phailin’s strength estimated the storm’s central pressure at 910.2 millibars, with sustained winds of 175 mph (280 kph). If those numbers were verified by official forecast agencies, they would place Phailin on par with 2005′s Hurricane Katrina, and break the record for the most intense cyclone in Indian Ocean recorded history.

To get a sense of the size of the storm, this satellite image from the University of Wisconsin shows the cyclone, which appears to be about half the size of India.

Where is it heading?

Cyclone Phailin will primarily hit two states on the eastern coast of India, Odisha and Andhra Pradesh, and is expected to cause heavy rainfalls in a third, West Bengal. Low-lying areas near the coast, which is dotted with small fishing towns, are expected to be damaged by the storm surge. Reuters reports that the Indian government has made an effort to evacuate people, though not all of them are willing to leave:

Some 260,000 people were moved to safer ground and more were expected to be evacuated by the end of the day, authorities in the two states said. Not everybody was willing to leave their homes and belongings, and some villagers on the palm-fringed Andhra Pradesh coast said they had not been told to evacuate.

“Of course I’m scared, but where will I move with my family?” asked Kuramayya, 38, a fisherman from the village of Bandharuvanipeta, close to where the hurricane is expected to make to landfall, while 3.5-metre (12-foot waves) crashed behind him. “We can’t leave our boats behind.”

What’s the difference between a cyclone and a hurricane?

There isn’t one. Hurricanes, cyclones, and typhoons are all the same weather phenomenon, but they have different names depending on where they occur. (This National Geographic article has a complete breakdown of storm names by region.)

Do cyclones hit India often?

Bangladesh and the eastern coast of India have a history of devastating cyclones. According to Weather Underground‘s history of cyclones in the region, “most of the deadliest tropical storms on earth have occurred in the Bay of Bengal when tremendous storm surges have swamped the low-lying coastal regions of Bangladesh, India, and Burma.” Of Weather Underground‘s list of the 35 deadliest storms on record, 26 of them occurred in the Bay of Bengal.

As cyclone Phailin heads towards land, the Hindu Times reports that many people are recalling the massive Cyclone 05B, often referred to as the Odisha cyclone, that hit the area in 1999 and killed nearly 10,000 people.

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Deadly Cyclone Hits India

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Blizzard Catastrophe Kills Tens of Thousands of Cows; Shutdown Leaves Ranchers on Ice

by DeenaBumg Posted on October 10, 2013

Mother Jones

Last Wednesday, the weather was sunny and warm at Bob Fortune’s cattle ranch in Belvidere, S.D. On Thursday, it started raining. By Friday night, the rain had turned to snow. By the weekend, the snow turned to a blizzard with 60 mile an hour winds. By the weekend, Fortune says, “the cattle just couldn’t stand the cold anymore, and they just started dying.”

Only a year after sweeping drought left ranchers across South Dakota desperate for feed, this week they’re just beginning to reckon with a freak early snowstorm, dubbed Winter Storm Atlas, that wiped out an estimated 10 percent of the cattle in the state’s western region, up to 100,000 animals. In the coming weeks they will dig through the mess to try to tally the damage to an industry worth $5.2 billion statewide, that also killed an unknown number of horses, sheep, and wildlife. Fortune, president of the South Dakota Stockgrowers Association, says losses like this would be enough to cripple many ranchers even in the best of times, especially with the loss of future calves next spring whose would-be mothers were killed. But with the federal Department of Agriculture still shut down, ranchers are cut off from the livestock insurance that would normally keep them afloat following a disaster like this.

“We have no idea if there’ll be federal aid for these ranchers,” Fortune says.

After catastrophes, livestock producers typically turn to the federal Farm Service Agency’s livestock indemnity program, which offers compensation for lost cattle, pigs, sheep, chickens, and other livestock. As long as the government stays shut, FSA offices nationwide will be shut too, leaving ranchers without support. A spokesperson for the state’s Department of Agriculture said the most their office can do is offer advice on how to document and carry out a cleanup effort. Even before the shutdown, the insurance program was already threatened by delayed passage of a new federal farm bill, which allots money for a range of food and ag-related programs from food stamps to incentives to go organic. While the shutdown debate rages, the Senate and House are still hashing out the farm bill, leaving the livestock indemnity program in midair.

The weekend blizzard, which dumped up to five feet of snow in some places, was “very historic,” according to meteorologist Darren Clabo at the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology’s Institute of Atmospheric Sciences. Rapid City, the largest city in the state’s western half, received the most snowfall ever recorded in October, and the third-highest one-day snowfall for any time of year. While South Dakota residents and ranchers are accustomed to brutal winters, Clabo said, “we don’t get these kinds of storms in the first week of October.” That means that cattle were still covered in thin summer coats, and left out in exposed summer pastures.

A snow-covered steer in South Dakota after a blizzard in 1966. Ranchers are still reeling from this weekend’s blizzard. NOAA

The storm, Clabo said, was the result of a strong high-altitude storm that pushed in quickly from the Pacific, gathered energy over the Rockies, and peaked just over Rapid City. While it’s too early to say what role climate change might have played in this particular storm, higher levels of heat trapped in the atmosphere can result in more frequent and severe storms. Last month’s IPCC report found it “very likely” that extreme precipitation events like blizzards will increase over this century.

For now, the South Dakota state Department of Agriculture is picking up the slack as best it can, urging ranchers to fully document their losses so they can get aid if and when it reappears, said spokesperson Jamie Crew. Meanwhile, Fortune and his peers will continue to dispose of dead livestock, which state law requires be cleaned up within 36 hours for public health reasons.

“The more snow melts,” he says, “the more dead cattle they’re finding.”

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Blizzard Catastrophe Kills Tens of Thousands of Cows; Shutdown Leaves Ranchers on Ice

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The Scary Truth About Antibiotic Overprescription

by bfys19 Posted on October 4, 2013

Mother Jones

When a patient complains of a sore throat or bronchitis, doctors prescribe antibiotics much more often than is medically necessary. That’s the main takeaway of a new study published in the peer-reviewed journal JAMA Internal Medicine. Findings from the National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey and National Hospital Ambulatory Medical Care Survey reveal that doctors prescribed antibiotics to 60 percent of sore throat patients—despite the fact that the drugs are only thought to be necessary in about 10 percent of cases. For acute bronchitis, antibiotics are not recommended at all, yet the researchers—a team from Harvard—found that doctors prescribed antibiotics to an astonishing 73 percent of patients diagnosed with the condition.

The number of doctor visits for acute bronchitis tripled between 1996 to 2010, from about 1.1 million visits to 3.4 million visits. The number of sore throat visits actually declined from 7.5 percent of all visits in 1997 to 4.3 percent in 2010—and yet the rate of antibiotic prescription remained consistent.

Another interesting finding: the growing popularity of expensive, broad-spectrum antibiotics such as azithromycin over tried-and-true strep-targeting drugs like penicillin. Last year, the New York Times noted that azithromycin “may increase the likelihood of sudden death” in adults who have or are at risk for heart disease. In that piece, Dr. John G. Bartlett, a professor of medicine at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, told the Times that he believed that overprescription of azithromycin could also contribute to antibiotc resistance. “We use azithromycin for an awful lot of things, and we abuse it terribly,” he said. “It’s very convenient. Patients love it. ‘Give me the Z-Pak.’ For most of where we use it, probably the best option is not to give an antibiotic, quite frankly.”

If the looming threat of antibiotic resistance isn’t reason enough for concern about doctors’ free hand with antibiotics, there’s also the considerable cost to our healthcare system—an estimated $500 million for antibiotics prescribed unnecessarily for sore throat alone between 1997 and 2010. If you include the cost of treating the side effects of unnecessary antibiotics such as diarrhea and yeast infections, the study’s authors estimate that the cost would increase forty-fold.

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The Scary Truth About Antibiotic Overprescription

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Open-Access Champion Michael Eisen "Sets Free" NASA’s Paywalled Mars Rover Research

by Teofilnpc Posted on September 30, 2013

Mother Jones

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Wait, did science publishing maverick Michael Eisen just borrow a tactic from the late internet whiz kid Aaron Swartz?

Why yes, he did.

The headline for my new profile of Eisen wasn’t meant to be taken literally. As I explain in “Steal This Research Paper! (You Already Paid for It.),” Swartz was indicted by the federal government for trying to do just that: He’d gained access to MIT networks to “liberate” millions of copyrighted scientific papers, most of them bankrolled by taxpayers through the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and other federal agencies. Swartz and others in the open-access movement believed that the public should be able to view publicly-funded research without forking over stiff access fees to science publishers. Seems like a no-brainer, huh?

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Open-Access Champion Michael Eisen "Sets Free" NASA’s Paywalled Mars Rover Research

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Watch: Rush Limbaugh On Why Climate Change Is Like Affirmative Action

by NWRWalkerjhrkw Posted on September 28, 2013

Mother Jones

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Friday morning in Stockholm, the the United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released a key section of its Fifth Assessment Report on global warming, which found that climate change is “unequivocal,” that humans are “extremely likely” to be the cause, and that the recent slowdown in the rate that surface temperatures are rising doesn’t contradict any of this. (Read a summary of the report or our live blog from Sweden.)

Awesome graphic: The Rush Limbaugh show

Rush Limbaugh would beg to differ. On his show on Friday, Limbaugh launched into a sprawling, 15-minute tirade against the IPCC, Al Gore, and affirmative action—all at the same time. Limbaugh argued that climate scientists and activists are perpetuating the global warming “hoax” because “the longer this goes, the richer they get.” At one point, Limbaugh likened this to Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson, who, he said, “would be out of business” if racism ended in the United States. (Full transcript here.)

Later, Limbaugh said that the global warming “narrative” is “never gonna end,” adding, “Just like affirmative action will never end” (emphasis added):

If I’m in a global warming movement, and it hasn’t warmed up in the last 15 years, I’d claim credit for it. I say it’s all the hybrids. It’s the reduction in coal! I claim that everything I’ve been advocating is the reason, and then I’d say,”We need to do more of this.” I mean, if their objective is to downsize this country and downsize our lifestyle and downsize our progress, we had a golden opportunity.

Fifteen years of no warming! They could have claimed credit and probably had a pretty good chance of being supported by the media in advocating further lifestyle change. But they didn’t, did they? Because they don’t want the issue changing in any way. They don’t want the premise changed. The premise is it’s getting warmer and we’re causing it, and nothing is gonna change that narrative. Nothing. Even if they can claim success in it.

The narrative, the template is, “It’s getting warmer, we’re causing it, we have to pay a price,” and it’s never gonna end. Just like affirmative action will never end. There will never be a day where somebody says, “You know what? Okay, we’ve had enough reverse racism now that we’ve evened the score, and we’re gonna get rid of it and we’re now in a level playing field.” They (sic) will never happen. The price will never be paid.

Limbaugh wasn’t the only one railing against the IPCC’s climate change report, of course. Rassmusen Reports ran a commentary by conservative pundit Michael Barone that compared global warming believers to a religious sect run amok:

Religion has ritual. Global warming alarmism has recycling and Earth Day celebrations.

Some religions persecute heretics. Some global warming alarmists identify “denialists” and liken them to Holocaust deniers.

Religions build grand places of worship. Global warming alarmists promote the construction of windmills and solar farms that produce uneconomic and intermittent electricity.

Global warming alarmism even has indulgences like the ones Martin Luther protested. You can buy carbon offsets to gain forgiveness for travel on carbon-emitting private jet aircraft.

Limbaugh and Barone’s comments are extreme, but they do highlight a persisting ideological divide between parties on climate change. According to Gallup, as of March 2013, 85 percent of Democrats think there is strong evidence that global warming exists, but only 48 percent of Republicans and 65 percent of independent voters agree.

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Watch: Rush Limbaugh On Why Climate Change Is Like Affirmative Action

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WATCH: The Real Story of the Global Warming "Hiatus"

by maciek123 Posted on September 27, 2013

Mother Jones

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The talk of the town at the IPCC conference today in Stockholm was all about the so-called global warming “hiatus.” In the last 15 years, global surface temperatures have risen more slowly, which some skeptics took as a sign that climate change was kaput. So I asked a few scientists to explain…turns out, while the exact cause of the slowdown is still being worked out, it’s definitely not curtains for climate change. For more information, check out Climate Desk’s explanation of the possible causes of the slowdown.

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WATCH: The Real Story of the Global Warming "Hiatus"

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WATCH: Why Is Arctic Sea Ice Disappearing?

by AllanThurston Posted on September 27, 2013

Mother Jones

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The Arctic is warming nearly three times faster than the rest of the planet, which means ice in the Arctic Circle could be nearly gone in summertime before mid-century. Josefino Comiso, a NASA earth scientist and an author of the report’s chapter on the “cryosphere” (that is, the Earth’s frozen parts) explains why only the hardiest ice will likely survive year-round.

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WATCH: Why Is Arctic Sea Ice Disappearing?

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WATCH: Why Carbon Pollution Is Destroying the Ocean

by Lovell Mao Posted on September 27, 2013

Mother Jones

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One of the major themes in today’s report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is the significance of oceans, which absorb 30 percent of the carbon dioxide we emit. This turns the water increasingly acidic, which threatens to dissolve many marine critters’ hard shells. I sat down with Monika Rhein, an oceanographer at Germany’s University of Bremen and a lead author of the IPCC report’s chapter on oceans, to talk about the state of the science on ocean acidification.

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WATCH: Why Carbon Pollution Is Destroying the Ocean

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America’s Nuke Plants Are in Trouble

by gt67dx1 Posted on September 25, 2013

Mother Jones

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America’s fleet of nuclear power plants might be on the cusp of an industry crisis, according to an investigation by Inside Climate News and a recent report from Vermont Law School’s Institute for Energy and the Environment. The industry has been plagued by a streak of plant closures, which come as regulations, expensive upgrades, and newly cheap natural gas have made nuclear increasingly uncompetitive in the energy market. Plants in Vermont, Wisconsin, California, and Florida—the first plants to close in 15 years—have announced this year that they’re shutting down. And more are on the chopping block. According to the report, the industry might shrink in the coming decades, sinking hopes of America being at the start of “nuclear renaissance.”

Six years ago, amidst tax credits and nuclear-friendly regulation, a flood of proposed nuclear projects appeared to be the end of the drought that followed the 1979 accident at Pennsylvania’s Three Mile Island plant, when a partial meltdown stoked fears of a nuclear disaster and halted all new uranium power plant construction. But today, plans for more than half of the 28 new reactors that were proposed have been put on hold or canceled, and those that have gone ahead have suffered from delays and heaping budget overruns. Sixty-two percent of US plants have been operating for more than 30 years—and 20 percent for more than 40 years (the limit of their projected lifespan when they were built). And utility companies are becoming more reticent to pay for their expensive upgrades now that the natural gas boom has created a glut of cheap power.

The newly announced closures are just part of the grim picture the nuclear industry is facing. A 2012 court ruling blocked new permits from being issued until the Nuclear Regulatory Commission can assess the risks of storing spent fuel at plant sites, and at least five projects that would boosted the output of existing plants have already been canceled this year. The projects that are continuing in Georgia, South Carolina, and Tennessee are beleaguered by delays and cost overruns.

The report from Vermont Law School’s Mark Cooper, a senior fellow at the school’s Institute for Energy and Environment, paints an even more dire picture. “With little chance that the cost of new reactors will become competitive with low carbon alternatives in the time frame relevant for old reactor retirement decisions,” the report intones, “attention will shift to the economics of keeping old reactors online, increasing their capacity and/or extending their lives.” Of the 99 operating nuclear plants, the report says, “in terms of basic economics, there are three dozen reactors that are on the razor’s edge.”

The culprit for nuclear’s shrinking margins is the glut of cheap natural gas. When the nuclear renaissance was being prophesied in the mid 2000s, natural gas prices were more than four times what they are today. In this more competitive climate, David Lochbaum, director of the nuclear safety project at the Union of Concerned Scientists, told Inside Climate News, “you’re basically one surprise away—one component problem away—from not having the economics favor you.” Another major burden facing the industry, the question of what to do with reactor waste, and how to pay for it, is being argued by the Department of Energy Wednesday morning, defending a fee it imposed for a future nuclear waste repository.

According to Inside Climate News, “the U.S. industry has weathered tough times before. A similar combination of economic stresses led to the closure of ten reactors in the mid-to-late 1990s, prompting the Department of Energy to predict that 50 reactors would be mothballed between 1995 and 2015.” Despite the dire forecast, only 15 reactors were decommissioned since 1995.

There is light on the horizon, however, for a new generation of nuclear plants that could run on the spent fuel from the current fleet (which surely beats sprinkling it from airplanes). According to a story in Wednesday’s New York Times, Bill Gates has made this new breed of nuclear reactors a pet project. Terra Power, which is led by Gates and former Microsoft Chief Technology Officer Nathan Myhrvold, is shooting to build “a new kind of nuclear reactor that would be fueled by today’s nuclear waste, supply all the electricity in the United States for the next 800 years and, possibly, cut the risk of nuclear weapons proliferation around the world,” according to the Times. It’s courting China as a lead partner for the $5 billion prototype project.

Read the whole Inside Climate News story here.

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America’s Nuke Plants Are in Trouble

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