Sea level rise contributions from ice melt in different areas, including Greenland (a), West Antarctica (b), East Antarctica (c) and median of global glaciers (d). Values are ratios of regional sea level change to global mean sea level change. Adapted from Kopp et al. 2015.
axios.com - by Andrew Freedman - June 14, 2018
News of Antarctica's accelerating ice melt garnered worldwide headlines yesterday, as scientists revealed that 3 trillion tons of ice has been lost to the sea since 1992 — mostly from the thawing West Antarctic Ice Sheet and Antarctic Peninsula.
Why it matters: The location of the ice melt is important for determining the future of coastal communities, according to climate scientists. And, due to West Antarctica melting, it turns out that the U.S. coastline will be hit extra hard . . .
With the 2018 hurricane season already underway, FEMA is scrambling to hire more people who are willing to depart at a moment’s notice for assignments that can last months at a stretch.
Internal documents obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request show the agency's disaster-response force is understaffed by 26 percent. And as last year revealed, many of those who sign up don't always respond when needed.
The extraordinary string of domestic disasters in 2017 continues to weigh on the U.S. agency. With thousands of workers still out in the field, official figures show that 33 percent of FEMA’s disaster-response workforce is available for deployment, down from 56 percent at this time last year.
Some specialties are stretched especially thin: Only 13 percent of the workers who direct federal aid to pay for rebuilding costs after a disaster hits are currently available.
Scientists warns time is running out to save the Antarctic and its unique ecosystem, with potentially dire consequences for the world. Photograph: Daniel Beltrá/Greenpeace
washingtonpost.com - by Chris Mooney - June 13, 2018
Antarctica’s ice sheet is melting at a rapidly increasing rate, now pouring more than 200 billion tons of ice into the ocean annually and raising sea levels a half-millimeter every year, a team of 80 scientists reported Wednesday.
Hurricane Harvey over the Gulf of Mexico in August 2017. The storm stalled over Texas and dropped nearly 50 inches of rain in some places. Credit NOAA/NASA GOES Project
A new study shows that storms are staying in one place longer, much like Hurricane Harvey did last year.
nytimes.com - by Kendra Pierre-Louis - June 6, 2018
. . . A study published Wednesday in the journal Nature focuses on what is known as translation speed, which measures how quickly a storm is moving over an area, say, from Miami to the Florida Panhandle. Between 1949 and 2016, tropical cyclone translation speeds declined 10 percent worldwide, the study says. The storms, in effect, are sticking around places for a longer period of time.
miaminewtimes.com - by Jerry Iannelli - May 2, 2018
In the long, hot, powerless days after Hurricane Irma, Miamians grew all sorts of irate at Florida Power & Light, South Florida's largest electricity company. After sweltering for more than a week without power, a group of sweaty Miami-area residents sued FPL last year over the widespread outages after the storm.
Despite the fact that FPL says it spent more than $3 billion hardening its power grid after Hurricane Wilma hit in 2005, 4.4 million of the company's 4.9 million customers (about 90 percent) lost power during last year's hurricane despite the fact that Miami ended up avoiding sustained hurricane-force winds. In their class-action lawsuit against FPL, filed in county court September 26, the residents alleged the company misspent those storm-hardening funds.
Summary: Maintaining five healthy habits -- eating a healthy diet, exercising regularly, keeping a healthy body weight, not drinking too much alcohol, and not smoking -- during adulthood may add more than a decade to life expectancy, according to a new study.
No person or place is immune from disasters or disaster-related losses, and recent events have proven that even prepared communities can be overwhelmed in a state of emergency. Our reports provide guidelines and targeted resources for all stakeholders in a disaster response, including state and local governments, emergency medical services and health care centers. Read these online for free. CLICK HERE - Related Books
User-Friendly Guide Reveals Safe Levels Set by Scientists, Not Regulators
