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Severe Storms (severe + storm)
Selected AbstractsHydrological importance of an unusual hazard in a mountainous basin: flood and landslideHYDROLOGICAL PROCESSES, Issue 14 2006Umesh K. Haritashya Abstract The Bhagirathi River, a proglacial melt water stream of the Gangotri Glacier, is the principal source of the Ganges river system. The upper part of the basin lies in the high altitude region of the Garhwal Himalayas and is extensively covered by glaciers. We provide hydro-meteorological insight into a severe storm that produced unusual high rains in June 2000 in the uppermost part of the Bhagirathi River. This storm was concentrated upstream of Gangotri town and triggered landslides/rockslides at several locations between the glacier snout and Gangotri town. One of the major rockslides blocked the Bhagirathi River at Bhujbas, about 3 km downstream of the Gangotri Glacier snout, creating an artificial lake at this location. High stream flow in the river, generated by rapid runoff response from mountain slopes along with melt runoff from the glacier, quickly increased the level of water stored in the artificial lake. Daily rainfall in this region rarely exceeds 10 mm, while total rainfall during this 6-day storm was 131·5 mm. This unusual rain event occurred during the tourist season in June, consequently trapping a large number of tourists and vendors in this area. Sudden release of stored water generated floods that created havoc downstream of the artificially created lake. This paper presents the hydrological and meteorological information related to such an unusual and devastating event observed in the high altitude region of the Himalayas. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Hydrodynamic sorting in a coastal marine skeletal assemblageINTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF OSTEOARCHAEOLOGY, Issue 4 2002*Article first published online: 9 AUG 200, Christopher M. Stojanowski Abstract In this paper I evaluate the effects of wave and tidal erosion on element-specific measures of phenotypic variability. Previous research has found a high correlation between skeletal weight, shape, and density and the transport potential of an element exposed to hydrodynamic forces. However, no previous studies have attempted to address the issue of within-element sorting based on selective removal of only the smallest members of a given element class. I evaluate this hypothesis using a human skeletal sample from Bird Island (8DI52) located in Dixie County, Florida. This sample comprises two components, an eroded sample that was exposed during severe storm and tidal activity, and an uneroded sample excavated from primary context. The measurement-specific means for the subcomponents were compared using Student's t and Wilcoxon tests and variability differences were evaluated based on standard deviations, coefficients of variation, and maximum/minimum indices. The data included maxillary and mandibular tooth dimensions and postcranial metrics. No evidence for selective winnowing based on within-element size was found in this data set. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Nutritional consequences of a change in diet from native to agricultural fruits for the Samoan fruit batECOGRAPHY, Issue 4 2000Suzanne L. Nelson The Samoan fruit bat Pteropus samoensis Peak, an endemic flying fox that inhabits the Samoan archipelago, prefers to forage on native fruit species. This species has recently been subjected to extreme population threats including hunting and severe storms, as well as large-scale habitat degradation. If habitat destruction continues at its present rate, P. samoensis may be forced to forage more within an agricultural matrix. In this study, we analyzed sixteen species of native fruits and four species of agricultural fruits for five organic components and eight minerals to test whether native fruits provided a higher quality diet or more varied diet than agricultural fruits. Within native fruits, we also focused on four species of figs, because these fruits are often considered an important food item for tropical frugivores. Overall, native fruits provided more variation and had higher average values for several nutrients than agricultural fruits. Native fruits were especially high in biologically important minerals (calcium, iron, and sodium), and provided up to 5 times more calcium, 10.5 times more iron, and 8 times more sodium than agricultural fruits. Figs were found to be an especially rich source of many nutrients, particularly for calcium. Thus. P. samoensis. a sequential specialist, may be better able to adjust its diet to obtain higher levels of minerals when consuming a variety of native fruits than when restricted to the consumption of only agricultural fruits. These findings suggest a need to preserve native habitat and to create parks to sustain the long term health and viability of P. samoensis. [source] GROWTH OF CULTURED ABALONE, HALIOTIS FULGENS, USING NATURAL ALGAL DIETSJOURNAL OF PHYCOLOGY, Issue 2001Article first published online: 24 SEP 200 Pérez-Estrada, C. J.1,2, Serviere-Zaragoza, E.1, Mazariegos-Villareal, A.1, Reynoso-Granados, T.1 & Monsalvo-Spencer, P.1 1Centro de Investigaciones Biológicas del Noroeste (CIBNOR). P.O. Box 128, La Paz, Baja California Sur. 23000. México; 2Universidad Autónoma de Baja California Sur. Carretera al Sur km. 5.5 o 23080 o La Paz, B. C. S. Algal diets have been evaluated and used extensively for the aquaculture of abalone, especially in Japan. In other areas little is known about the nutritional value of the algae that the local abalone consume. In Mexico, regional hatcheries use Macrocystis pyrifera as a main source of natural food. Kelp availability, year round, has not generally been a problem for abalone aquaculturists. Most difficulties occur during severe storms, which may prevent access to kelp beds. El Niño also caused widespread destruction of M. pyrifera. In this study, growth rates of juvenile green abalone Haliotis fulgens, 31.7 " 1.5 mm shell length and 2.5 " 0.2 g body weight were evaluated during 136 days. Juveniles were fed with some of the algae used in regional hatcheries, Macrocystis pyrifera, Egregia menziesii, Eisenia arborea, Porphyra sp. and Ulva sp. Shell length growth rates varied between 2 mm day-1 for Ulva sp. and 18 mm day-1 for M. pyrifera. Body weight rates ranged from no growth for Ulva sp. to 14 mg day-1for E. menziesii. The percent of survival was between 46 and 75 %. Ulva sp. showed the lowest protein content followed by E. menziesii, E. arborea, M. pyrifera and Porphyra sp. [source] Storm prediction over Europe using the ECMWF Ensemble Prediction SystemMETEOROLOGICAL APPLICATIONS, Issue 3 2002Roberto Buizza Three severe storms caused great damage in Europe in December 1999. The first storm hit Denmark and Germany on 3 and 4 December, and the other two storms crossed France and Germany on 26 and 28 December. In this study, the performance of the Ensemble Prediction System (EPS) at the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecast (ECMWF) in predicting these intense storms is investigated. Results indicate that the EPS gave early indications of possible severe storm occurrence, and was especially useful when the deterministic TL319L60 forecasts issued on successive days were highly inconsistent. These results indicate that the EPS is a valuable tool for assessing quantitatively the risk of severe weather and issuing early warnings of possible disruptions. The impact of an increase of the ensemble system horizontal resolution (TL255 integration from a TL511 analysis instead of the operational TL159 integration from a TL319 analysis) on the system performance is also investigated. Results show that the resolution increase enhances the ensemble performance in predicting the position and the intensity of intense storms. Copyright © 2002 Royal Meteorological Society. [source] Environmental energetics of an exceptional high-latitude stormATMOSPHERIC SCIENCE LETTERS, Issue 1 2010Alexandre Bernardes Pezza Abstract This study presents the Lorenz energetics of an exceptional baroclinic storm propagating to Nome (Alaska) in October 1992, where it caused severe flooding. The storm track was greatly influenced by the interaction with a blocking high a week before the cyclone was formed. The energetics gives new insights into this dramatic storm, suggesting that the large-scale environment was responsible for its long trajectory and intensification. The blocking high also provided the dynamic steering that facilitated the wave propagation and baroclinic growth. Our results show that the environmental energy transfers can be used as an informative metric for severe storms. Copyright © 2010 Royal Meteorological Society [source] Radiative cooling effect of Hurricane Florence in 2006 and precipitation of Typhoon Matsa in 2005ATMOSPHERIC SCIENCE LETTERS, Issue 2 2009Quanhua Liu Abstract The increasing strength of tropical cyclones may be a response of the Earth's interaction between natural variability and human activities. Negative effects of the severe storms, such as flooding, landslides, damage to properties, and even a number of human casualties, have been reported many times. This study reported other aspects on Hurricanes and Typhoons, which may be beneficial to the world. We found that Hurricane Florence in 2006 decreased radiation energy by , 0.5 × 1020 J to the Earth-atmospheric system, about 10% of the annual global energy consumption. If the amount of energy uniformly distributes over the whole Earth surface and over 1-year time, it corresponds to a power of , 0.003 W m,2 The total forcing power on climate change is 0.24 W m,2, if we only take account for the stored fluxes in water, atmosphere, continents, and heat required to melt glaciers and sea ice. Thus, the shielding effect of solar radiation by tropical storms could contribute to ease global warming. In addition, hurricane and typhoon can ease drought sometimes. This study found that the total rainwater carried by Typhoon Matsa in August 2005 into China's inland amounts to about 135 billion tons. The rainfall over the northern China eased severe drought in summer 2005. Copyright © 2009 Royal Meteorological Society [source] Relationship Between Aboveground Biomass and Multiple Measures of Biodiversity in Subtropical Forest of Puerto RicoBIOTROPICA, Issue 3 2010Heather D. Vance-Chalcraft ABSTRACT Anthropogenic activities have accelerated the rate of global loss of biodiversity, making it more important than ever to understand the structure of biodiversity hotspots. One current focus is the relationship between species richness and aboveground biomass (AGB) in a variety of ecosystems. Nonetheless, species diversity, evenness, rarity, or dominance represent other critical attributes of biodiversity and may have associations with AGB that are markedly different than that of species richness. Using data from large trees in four environmentally similar sites in the Luquillo Experimental Forest of Puerto Rico, we determined the shape and strength of relationships between each of five measures of biodiversity (i.e., species richness, Simpson's diversity, Simpson's evenness, rarity, and dominance) and AGB. We quantified these measures of biodiversity using either proportional biomass or proportional abundance as weighting factors. Three of the four sites had a unimodal relationship between species richness and AGB, with only the most mature site evincing a positive, linear relationship. The differences between the mature site and the other sites, as well as the differences between our richness,AGB relationships and those found at other forest sites, highlight the crucial role that prior land use and severe storms have on this forest community. Although the shape and strength of relationships differed greatly among measures of biodiversity and among sites, the strongest relationships within each site were always those involving richness or evenness. Abstract in Spanish is available at http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/loi/btp [source] | |||||||||||||