Temperature
Extremes
High
temperature extreme:
Boa Vista, Brazil 104 degrees.
Low temperature extreme:
Verhoyansk, Siberia -73 degrees.
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Ongoing
Eruptions
Two
of Ecuador’s active volcanoes, Tungurahua and Guagua Pichincha,
resumed threatening activity, causing officials to suspend school
for more than 400,000 students in the capital of Quito.
Tungurahua roared back to life and spewed rocks and ash for more
than an hour in the south of the country. Witnesses reported that
incandescent boulders the size of automobiles were thrown out of
the mountain and broke apart when they hit the ground. Vulcanologists
in Quito said that Guagua Pichincha, located 7 miles from the capital,
had gathered a higher level of blocked energy than it had during
the Oct. 7 eruption. Communities located close to the mountain continue
to be evacuated. Experts said that Guagua Pichincha is in the process
of a prolonged eruption that could last for months or even years.
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Tropical
Cyclones
Tropical
storm Frankie lashed the central Philippines, forcing the evacuation
of at least 300 families marooned by floods in low-lying districts
of the city of Calbayog. The storm later lost force over the South
China Sea.
The official death toll from cyclone 05B, which battered India’s
coastal state of Orissa on Oct. 29, rose to an estimated 8,000.
Red Cross disaster workers predicted that it would climb past 10,000
with more bodies being recovered as the flood waters receded.
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Vietnamese
Flood Disaster
At
least 527 people in central Vietnam have been killed or left
missing after six days of incessant rains triggered the worst flooding
in the country for a century.
Seven provinces that stretch from the ancient city of Hue to China
Beach, and are home to seven million people, were devastated by
the floods. Many of the survivors have been subsisting on little
more than rainwater. Officials said that 500,000 homes were flooded
and 5,723 schools destroyed.
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Earthquakes
Late
reports from northern China say that at least 20,500 people
were left homeless by a magnitude 5.6 earthquake that shook the
hilly farming areas of Shanxi and Hebei provinces on Nov. 1.
A
magnitude 6.5 earthquake destroyed numerous homes and awakened sleeping
residents of northeastern Colombia’s Santander Province.
Earth
movements were also felt in southern Mexico, the western
Mediterranean, northwestern Turkey, eastern Romania,
northeastern Iran, Afghanistan’s Hindukush mountain
range and various points in Japan.
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Peruvian
Landslide
At
least 46 people were buried alive in Peru when an avalanche
of mud and rock engulfed parts of the Andean community of Tacabamba,
500 miles north of the capital city of Lima.
Residents in the area reported that they heard an explosion and
saw a large cloud of smoke with a sulfur-like smell moments before
the mudslide. The slides were apparently caused by recent heavy
rains seeping through the soil and coming into contact with superheated,
sulfurous underground thermal springs.
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Hawaii Deer
Crisis
The
exploding population of deer on Hawaii’s island of Molokai
is rapidly creating an ecological disaster, according to island
residents.
Ongoing dry weather has depleted the deer’s food source and forced
the animals to forage in residential gardens or anywhere they can
find food. The deer squeeze through fences and eat whatever grass
and plants they come across. Staff at the Kalaupapa National Historical
Park tried hunting the deer, but there was public protest about
the noise as well as safety concerns. The population of deer around
the community of Kalaupapa has burgeoned to several hundred and
to several thousand on the Kalawao Peninsula and in Waikolu Valley.
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Lonesome
George
A
650-pound giant tortoise in the Galapagos Islands, nicknamed
“Lonesome George,” has routinely been rejecting all offers of a
mate, and scientists now think they know why.
The Darwin Research Station had lined up numerous partners from
nearby islands for the lonely tortoise, but he turned up his nose
at all of them. A team from Yale University gathered DNA from stuffed
turtles captured in 1906 from Pinta Island where Lonesome George
lives. The results of the tests showed that the tortoise was much
more closely related to a species from the distant islands of San
Cristobal and Espanola. The scientists concluded that the huge turtle
needs a mate from the faraway islands with closer genetic affinities.
They plan to soon import a suitable bride that will hopefully be
more to George’s liking.
