Worldwide Disasters

What we know about H1N1 Influenza A “Swine Flu”

DisasterMan — Fri, 01 May 2009 11:47:24 +0000

Here’s a quick rundown of what we know about H1N1 Influenza A “Swine Flu” that’s currently sweeping the media, as opposed to the globe. The H1N1 virus appears to be a mild influenza, and is nowhere near as dangerous as N5N1. The H1N1 virus appears to bind to the receptors in the upper respiratory tract causing mild [...]

Italy quake kills 40

DisasterMan — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 12:47:08 +0000

A powerful earthquake tore through central Italy on Monday devastating historic mountain towns and killing at least 40 people, authorities said. Many remained unaccounted for as emergency services scrambled to find victims trapped under collapsed buildings in L’Aquila, which bore the brunt of the quake, and officials warned that the toll would rise. Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi [...]

Sea rise ‘to exceed projections’

DisasterMan — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 21:16:48 +0000

The global sea level looks set to rise far higher than forecast because of changes in the polar ice-sheets, a team of researchers has suggested. Scientists at a climate change summit in Copenhagen said earlier UN estimates were too low and that sea levels could rise by a metre or more by 2100. The projections did not [...]

Earthquake north of Indonesia triggers tsunami warning

DisasterMan — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 18:51:05 +0000

Indonesia has issued a tsunami warning after an earthquake measuring 7.5 on the Richter scale struck in the Indonesian Taulad Islands. The USGS put the depth of the quake at around 20 miles beneath the ocean floor and said it was centered 200 miles northeast of Manado, a town on Sulawesi island. There is no danger [...]

Asteroid bound for Earth! Warn your grandchildren

DisasterMan — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 11:36:18 +0000

Great, if not somewhat alarmist headline from the folks at New Scientist! AN ASTEROID that had initially been deemed harmless has turned out to have a slim chance of hitting Earth in 160 years. While that might seem a distant threat, there’s far less time available to deflect it off course. Asteroid 1999 RQ36 was discovered a [...]

Toddler treated for bird flu

DisasterMan — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 14:36:33 +0000

A girl aged two is critically ill with the H5N1 strain of bird flu in Shanxi, northern China, in the second case reported by China in as many weeks. The girl was discovered ill on 7 January in the central province of Hunan and taken to a hospital in her home province, Chinese state media say. [...]

The world has never seen such freezing heat

DisasterMan — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 17:49:38 +0000

A surreal scientific blunder last week raised a huge question mark about the temperature records that underpin the worldwide alarm over global warming. On Monday, Nasa’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), which is run by Al Gore’s chief scientific ally, Dr James Hansen, and is one of four bodies responsible for monitoring global temperatures, [...]

‘Certain death’ warning over Hurricane Ike

DisasterMan — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 17:24:50 +0000

Residents in one area of the Texas coastline have been warned they must evacuate before the arrival of Hurricane Ike or “face certain death”. The National Weather Service issued the grave warning to those living in low-lying areas around Galveston Bay. More than a million people in Texas have been advised to leave their homes before Ike [...]

CERN spins up atom smasher … and we get four magnitude 6+ earthquatkes within 24 hours!

DisasterMan — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 03:34:18 +0000

So, CERN spins up the world’s largest atom smasher over in Switzerland, and we get four magnitude 6+ earthquakes within 24 hours. Southern Iran - 1100 GMT, 10 Sept - Magnitude 6.1 (BBC News | USGS) Mid-Atlantic ridge - 1308 GMT, 10 Sept - Magnitude 6.6 (USGS) Indonesian Moluccas islands - 0002 GMT, 11 Sept - Magnitude 6.6 (BBC News | USGS) Hokkaido, Japan [...]

LHC doomsayers - nothing new …

DisasterMan — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 18:50:42 +0000

Unless you’ve been living in a cave on Mars with your fingers stuck in your ears you’ve no doubt read/heard/seen the doomsayers predicting the end of the world the moment the Large Hadron Collider is switched on. What’s interesting is that doomsayers are nothing new. The Times has compiled a list of 30 days when the [...]