Monday, July 7, 2014

Global Disaster Watch - daily natural disaster reports.

**Act as if it were impossible to fail.**
Dorothea Brande


LARGEST QUAKES so far today -
None 5.0 or larger.

Yesterday, 7/6/14 -
5.0 FIJI REGION
5.0 CENTRAL PERU

7/5/14 -
6.0 NORTHERN SUMATRA, INDONESIA
5.2 KERMADEC ISLANDS, NEW ZEALAND

7/4/14/ -
5.7 NEAR EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
5.2 AZORES ISLANDS REGION
6.6 NEW BRITAIN REGION, P.N.G.
5.5 BOUGAINVILLE REGION, P.N.G.
5.0 PAPUA, INDONESIA
5.0 SOUTHERN MID-ATLANTIC RIDGE

7/3/14 -
5.1 PAPUA, INDONESIA
5.0 NORTHWESTERN KASHMIR
6.3 KERMADEC ISLANDS REGION
5.7 RAT ISLANDS, ALEUTIAN ISLANDS
5.8 KOMANDORSKIYE OSTROVA REGION
5.6 SOUTH OF FIJI ISLANDS
5.0 FIJI REGION
5.2 RAT ISLANDS, ALEUTIAN ISLANDS
5.7 KOMANDORSKIYE OSTROVA REGION
5.0 SOUTH OF KERMADEC ISLANDS

7/2/14 -
5.1 SOUTH SANDWICH ISLANDS REGION
5.0 MINAHASA, SULAWESI, INDONESIA
6.1 BALLENY ISLANDS REGION

VOLCANOES -
Ambang volcano (North-Sulawesi, Indonesia) - seismic unrest, alert level raised. A swarm of volcanic earthquakes that started under the volcano prompted VSI to raise the alert status from normal to waspada (2 on a scale of 1-4). During 3 July, 62 volcanic quakes were detected, compared to an average of 1-2 per day during the previous weeks. A light steam plume could be observed from the volcano's summit. The remote volcano had its last eruption in 2005, when phreatic explosions occurred.

TROPICAL STORMS -
Current tropical storms - maps and details.

* In the Western Pacific Ocean -
- Super typhoon Neoguri is located approximately 367 nm south of Kadena Air Base, Okinawa, Japan.
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Dangerous Category 4 Typhoon Neoguri Headed Towards Japan. In the Western Pacific, Typhoon Neoguri has strengthened into a dangerous Category 4 storm with 140 mph winds this Sunday morning, and is headed west-northwest at 12 mph towards a Tuesday brush with Okinawa in Japan's Ryukyu island chain.
Satellite images show a huge and well-organized system, with a prominent eye, and very intense eyewall thunderstorms with cold cloud tops. WInd shear is light, 5 - 10 knots, sea surface temperatures are a very warm 30 - 31°C, and very warm waters extend to great depth along the storm's path, giving the typhoon plenty of heat energy to power potential intensification into a Category 5 Super Typhoon.
The Sunday runs of two top track models, the GFS and European models, showed Neoguri passing about 50 - 100 miles south of Okinawa near 00 UTC Tuesday. Okinawa will be in the right front quadrant of Neoguri, but if the present track forecast holds, the top winds on the south end of the island will be barely hurricane force, 70 - 75 mph.
The ocean is very deep offshore of Okinawa, which will allow huge waves to crash against the coast. Shortly after passing Okinawa, Neoguri will get caught by a trough of low pressure and begin curving to the north, and likely hit the Japanese island of Kyushu, where the city of Nagasaki lies, between 12 - 22 UTC on Wednesday.
Although ocean temperatures will cool and wind shear will rise as Neoguri approaches Japan, weakening the storm, the typhoon is so large and powerful that it will likely make landfall at Category 2 or 3 strength, causing major damage in Japan.
Neoguri is the 7th named storm and 3rd typhoon of the 2014 Western Pacific typhoon season. The other two typhoons of 2014 -- Typhoon Faxai and Typhoon Tapah - were both Category 1 storms.

Post-tropical Storm Arthur batters Canada's Maritime provinces - Post-tropical storm Arthur, weakened from a hurricane, has battered south-east Canada leaving more than 200,000 homes and businesses without power.
Nova Scotia and New Brunswick bore the brunt of the storm's torrential rain and strong winds. Forecasters said Arthur would move north-east through the Gulf of St Lawrence towards Newfoundland on Sunday. On Friday, Arthur hit North Carolina with hurricane-force winds and later skirted New England.
Late on Saturday, the Canadian Hurricane Centre said Arthur was centred near Moncton in New Brunswick after making a second landfall in Canada. Trees were blown down and power was cut to more than 141,000 customers in Nova Scotia and 110,000 in New Brunswick. The largest number of outages was reported in Fredericton where winds of more than 62mph (100km/h) had brought down a number of large trees.
Police in Saint John, New Brunswick, said some roads were closed by flooding. The storm also caused flight cancellations and delays at the region's largest airport in Halifax, Nova Scotia. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police in Prince Edward Island said electricity poles had been knocked down and roads were blocked by fallen trees.
New England was largely spared major damage although about 19,000 people in Maine and 1,600 in Vermont were left without power. Arthur has now lost its tropical characteristics and has become "more a wintertime-type low". Arthur was the first hurricane to hit the US since Superstorm Sandy devastated New York and New Jersey in October 2012.

Hurricane Arthur is THE EARLIEST HURRICANE TO MAKE LANDFALL IN NORTH CAROLINA SINCE RECORDS BEGAN in the mid-19th century.

Hurricane Arthur brings rain, flooding to Massachusetts - Hurricane Arthur skirted the coast on Friday, creating a soggy July Fourth for many in Massachusetts who endured heavy rains and flooding,
Hurricane Arthur dumps more than month's supply of rain on SouthCoast Friday, raising water and fear to the point that the National Weather Service issued a rare Flash Flood Emergency for New Bedford and Fairhaven.
The NWS said it expected high rainfall amounts of eight to 10 inches in New Bedford, while the rest of SouthCoast could see anywhere from four to eight inches. Basements were flooded and roads across the region were closed by the flash flooding, which peaked in the late afternoon. At one point, the NWS described the situation as "serious and life-threatening" and was advising people in the area not to travel unless they were moving to higher ground.
But area officials said they were aware of no life-threatening situations. Cars had been stuck in water on Route 18. Notorious low-lying areas throughout the city were flooded in the late afternoon. State Police said Interstate 195 ramps from both the eastbound and westbound lanes were closed coming onto Route 18, which police said was covered by about three feet of water.
"SUVs and pickup trucks were making it, but cars just weren't. It's between your knee and thigh if you're standing in it. A teenager was riding a bike through it and it went right up to the seat of his bike. It's up to the hood on a regular car." Some neighborhoods in Fairhaven and New Bedford had already received more than five inches of rain by Friday afternoon, which is more than they typically get in the average month.
While the rain from Arthur was heavy, the area was hardly affected by winds and not at all by any storm surge. Officials were monitoring the situation at the hurricane barrier, but had not closed it through Friday evening. The strongest winds associated with the hurricane were expected east of Nantucket. "There are building seas offshore and as the water returns to shore" rip currents can arise.

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