World Pandemic: Coronavirus
In the US the total number of people infected will hit 6 million today, however, their graph is steadily falling from the peak number of daily cases on the 16th of July when almost 80,000 became infected down to 46,000 two days ago. The number of cases dropped to 37,000 of the 24th of August, the lowest number in a day since the 24th of June. The number of people dead from the virus is "reportedly," 183,000 in the US.
In many ways, the 1960s was a precursor to what is happening to the world in the early stages of the 2020s. The term "the Sixties" is used by historians, journalists, and other academics in scholarship and popular culture to denote the complex of inter-related cultural and political trends around the globe during this era, we are of course addressing the same issues today BLM, Antifa, MAGA, White Supremecy to name just a few.
Some use the term to describe the decade's counterculture and revolution in social norms about clothing, music, drugs, dress, sexuality, just look at the LGBT movement of today and the sexualising of schoolchildren and the #MeToo movement. Still, others used it to denounce the decade as one of irresponsible excess, flamboyance, and decay of social order, we have had enough social order decay in 2020 to last us a lifetime.
Volcanoes
The Sinabung volcano on Indonesia's Sumatra Island erupted Saturday spewing ash and smoke 2,000 meters (6,600 feet) above its crater. A worrying statistic which is never mentioned by the mainstream media is Mount Sinabung itself sits just 20 miles north of Lake Toba which is a massive supervolcano and is capable of plunging the Earth into a year without summer.
The Sinabung volcano on Indonesia's Sumatra Island erupted Saturday spewing ash and smoke 2,000 meters (6,600 feet) above its crater. The Center for Volcanology and Geological Hazar Mitigation (PVMBG) warned residents should not have any activity near the volcano, with official Muhammed Nurul Assori de Naman urging those in the Teran, Berastagi, Simpang and Merdeka regions are being warned to wear masks to shield against ash rain. The volcano reactivated for the first time in four centuries in 2010. A total of 23 people were killed in 2014 and 2016 from eruptions.
Major quakes
Chile is rockin'-and-a-rollin' with 5 major quakes this week, (mag 6 or higher) and some very large aftershocks: 3 major quakes this morning with a magnitude 6.6 Mid-Atlantic Ridge being the strongest: First six days of September has delivered 6 major quakes. The total for the year is 90
We have had an incredibly seismic few hours with three major quakes, (mag 6+) happening across the globe and a rather busy beginning to September as well. A magnitude 6.6 rocked the Mid-Atlantic Ridge with a powerful, shallow quake just 10 km deep.
Earlier, a magnitude 6.2 struck NW of Port Villa, Vanuatu with another powerful and very shallow quake at just 8 km deep. Another powerful and shallow quake measuring 6.3 on the Richter scale hit NW of Ovalle Chile. A mag 6.8 rocked the same area earlier in the week along with a 6.5 and two 6.3's.
The National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) on Saturday updated data of human and financial losses caused by the rains and floods during the recent monsoon season, raising the death toll to more than 300, including over 100 children.
The NDMA said the countrywide death toll stood at 310 – 135 men, 107 children and 70 women. The report said that Sindh was worst affected province with 136 fatalities, followed by 116 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 16 in Punjab, 21 in Balochistan, 12 in Azad Kashmir and 11 in Gilgit-Baltistan.
Hurricanes and cyclones
Spaceweather
September 15, 2020 - The solar minimum between Solar Cycle 24 and 25 - the period when the sun is least active - happened in December 2019, when the 13-month smoothed sunspot number fell to 1.8, according to the Solar Cycle 25 Prediction Panel, co-chaired by NOAA and NASA. We are now in Solar Cycle 25 with peak sunspot activity expected in 2025, the panel said.
Solar Cycle 24 was average in length, at 11 years, and had the 4th-smallest intensity since regular record-keeping began with Solar Cycle 1 in 1755.
At least 500 hundred drinking water wells that serve up to 9 million Californians have potentially dangerous levels of a highly toxic family of chemicals and some of the worst are right here in the Bay Area. Surrounded by lush green fields, Pleasanton often makes the top ten list of desirable places to live. But a new list just out is nothing to boast about. "I was just floored," said Pleasanton resident Jill Buck when she found out her town made the top ten for dangerous drinking water
Pleasanton relies heavily on groundwater for tap water but stopped using one of its wells last fall after state-mandated testing found it contained potentially unsafe levels of two chemicals that are part of a family called per and polyfluorinated chemicals or PFAS.
Climate Change
If you thought climate change would be a slow phenomenon well, think again. Climate change arrived like a thief in the night and by 2020 had reached "WHAM-BAM-THANK-YOU-MAM" proportions: Joking aside, 2020 has been the year when even the most stoic optimist would have begun to see the glass half empty.
If you thought climate change would be a slow phenomenon well, think again. Climate change arrived like a thief in the night in the late 50s and early 60s and by 2020 had reached "WHAM-BAM-THANK-YOU-MAM" proportions to put it lightly. However, joking aside, 2020 has been the year when even the most stoic optimist would have begun to see the glass half empty.
The whole year so far reads of the devastation of record-breaking weather events across the entire globe, costing governments billions. Every continent on our planet has suffered record weather devastation in 2020. Unfortunately, most of the weather news this year didn't make it to your TV screens because of other huge events happening around the world, Covid-19 for instance with 13 million people infected and almost 1 million deaths.
Disease
A frightening new outbreak of viral pneumonia much deadlier than Covid-19 is causing concern for citizens of Kazakhstan. The situation is described as very grim: Meanwhile, an unknown disease has killed 130,000 Saiga antelope.
Between Covid-19 and the pneumonia outbreak, the diplomats described the health situation in Kazakhstan as “very grim.”
While the Chinese embassy described the illness as “unknown pneumonia”, Kazakhstani officials and media have only said it is pneumonia. It was not clear why the Chinese embassy had described the illness as “unknown” or what information it had about pneumonia. The embassy’s website, citing local media reports, said the provinces of Atyrau and Aktobe and the city of Shymkent have reported significant spikes in pneumonia cases since the middle of June.
Animal Die-Offs
351 sea turtles found dead on the same coastline where 137 sea lions mysteriously died earlier this month: In 2019, 331 loggerhead turtles were found dead in the area, and in 2018 the figure stood at 459.
Environment
The 3,500-mile-long, (5,600 km) cloud, dubbed the “Godzilla dust cloud,” travelled 5,000 miles (8,047 km) and has now arrived in the southern US where COVID-19 cases have recently spiked causing concern among doctors.
'The Godzilla dust cloud' which left the Shara earlier in the month has arrived over the U.S. Southeast, raising health concerns. Forecasters are expecting a thick brown haze raising more health concerns in states where the coronavirus crisis is worsening.
California wildfires kill 25 people
Religion
These two witnesses are to be given special powers by God to witness Him for 1,260 days (3 and a half years) when they will be killed by the antichrist and left in the street for all to see for three and a half days before being called up to Jehovah. These two witnesses will breathe fire out of their mouths consuming people who are against the Lord and will have special powers to control the weather and bring plagues and pestilence.And I will give power unto my two witnesses, and they shall prophesy a thousand two hundred and threescore days, clothed in sackcloth.
Photo of the day
A letter from Holland: Unusual skies this week in the Amsterdam region as the world enters lockdown: Libertine, tolerant and free Amsterdam is at this moment just like the rest of the world, empty as the Covid-19 threat takes hold
As I walk my dog every day I come across only occasional other dog walkers or runners who are only too ready to distance themselves from me, eying me with caution. Empty busses pass me by as do the occasional automobile, however, Holland wouldn't be Holland without bicycles and scooters and, this is the mode of transport at the moment, especially for the kids.
