Man slips to his death from muddy path as ‘Monsoon May’ rain continues to soak Britain

• Tourist, 52, slipped in wet conditions in front of wife and two children
• Snow in Scotland as Met issues early weather warnings for next week
• Flood warnings continue with more persistent and heavy rain expected

By Mail On Sunday Reporter

PUBLISHED: 20:29 EST, 5 May 2012 | UPDATED: 17:29 EST, 6 May 2012

A holidaymaker plunged 50 metres to his death in a horrific cliff fall in front of his wife and two children.

The 52-year-old man was walking on a cliff path in West Cornwall when he is thought to have slipped on ground left muddy by recent heavy rain.

A sea and air rescue was launched after his family raised the alarm but he was declared dead after his body was recovered from rocks at the base of the cliff.

Tragedy: The 52-year-old holiday maker fell 160ft, whilst walking with his wife. and two children on a clifftop path near Mullion in West Cornwall

The tragedy comes as Britain faces a Bank Holiday washout with yet more severe conditions and wet weather expected later in the week.

The Met office issued early weather warnings for next week with persistent heavy rain expected to spread across the country during Wednesday evening and the early hours of Thursday.

The lowest temperature recorded overnight on Friday was in south-west Scotland, where it plummeted to -6C (21.2F).

Yesterday, Scotland experienced snow, while the skies over southern England were grey with patchy rain. Further north, sunny intervals were interspersed with showers.

Snow in May: A car travels through appalling weather along the Inverness-Ullapool Road in Scotland

Forecast: The dismal weather follows weeks of heavy rain which has caused flooding in many areas.

Temperatures in north-east England peaked at about 6C (42.8F), while in Cornwall, the mercury struggled to climb above 11C (51.8F).

‘It’s been pretty cold,’ said forecaster Nick Prebble of MeteoGroup yesterday.

‘We’ve seen flurries of snow over the Grampians and north-west Highlands, and there’s been sleet there, too. There have also been a few light sleet showers in northern England.’

More snow flurries are forecast today over high ground in Scotland.

The unsettled weather is due to continue tomorrow, with a band of heavy rain edging north-east across most parts of the country.

‘It’s looking like most places will see a wet and breezy day,’ Mr Prebble.

The tragedy in Cornwall happened early on Friday morning as the visitor from Basingstoke, Hampshire, was walking at the Cornish beauty spot.

A police spokesman said: ‘A 52 year old male from the Basingstoke area was airlifted from the bottom of cliffs at Mullion around 7.45pm on Friday 4 May.

Snow in spring: The lowest temperature recorded overnight on Friday was in Scotland, where it plummeted to -6C

A hillwalker strolls though the snow-covered heather at Braemore near Inverness today

‘The male was pronounced deceased at hospital. It is believed that the male had been walking with his wife and two young children along the cliff path prior to being found.

Police are treating the man’s death as accidental. The coroner has been informed.

Falmouth Coastguards have warned other visitors to be very careful on muddy paths near unprotected cliffs.

A spokesman said: ‘People who walk along paths should be aware that we have had a lot of wet weather and the ground may be slippery.’

The dismal weather follows weeks of heavy rain which has caused flooding in many areas.

Downpour: A woman walks in the rain past colourful Azalea flowers in Exbury Gardens in the New Forest

Purple haze: A stunning bloom of British bluebells at Enys Garden in Cornwall

Four flood warnings remain in place and the Environment Agency said that while water levels were receding, officials were continuing to monitor the situation.

Yesterday, roads remained fairly clear, with many people opting to stay at home.

The Highways Agency said: ‘The roads haven’t been overly congested, performing well despite the weather.’

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2140240/First-floods–snows-May–just-time-Bank-Holiday.html#ixzz1uGcBtQeH

Europe tries to shield homeless from deep freeze

MSNBC
Fri, 03 Feb 2012 13:45 CST

© Fr LW Gonzales

Russia and Ukraine took extra precautions on Friday to protect homeless people during a brutal cold snap, ordering new facilities and medical care after scores of people have frozen to death on the streets of Europe.

As the death toll from the past week rose to at least 175 on Friday, Russian Emergencies Minister Sergei Shoigu ordered the creation of facilities nationwide to feed and provide medical assistance to the homeless.

The week-long freeze – Eastern Europe’s worst in decades – is causing power outages, frozen water pipes and widespread closure of schools, nurseries, airports and bus routes.

Other parts of Europe experienced frigid temperatures unseen in years. A roundup:

Ukraine

In the hardest-hit country, health officials have told hospitals to stop discharging the hundreds of homeless patients after they are treated for hypothermia and frostbite. The goal is to prevent them from dying once they are released into temperatures as low as minus 32 Celsius (minus 26 Fahrenheit).

Authorities also have set up nearly 3,000 heating and food shelters.

Thirty-eight more fatalities were reported from frostbite and hypothermia in Ukraine on Friday, raising the nation’s death toll to 101. Emergency officials have said many of the victims were homeless.

Bosnia

Bosnia reported its first deaths. Five people died Friday in Sarajevo, most of them while shoveling snow, Dr. Tigran Elezovic said, and one person died in the southern city of Mostar, where ambulances could not reach the victim because of snow.

Rome

Thick snowflakes fell on Rome on Friday, forcing the closure of the Colosseum over fears tourists would slip on the icy ruins, and leaving buses struggling to climb the city’s slushy hills.

The snowfall prompted authorities to stop visitors from entering the Colosseum, the adjacent Roman Forum and the Palatine Hill, the former home of Rome’s ancient emperors.

Authorities appealed to Italians to stay off highways, as the cold snap was predicted to continue well into the next week.

Northern Italy also has been gripped by snow and ice that is disrupting train travel.

Netherlands

Police in the eastern city of Wageningen reported that a homeless man found dead Thursday in a shed died of hypothermia, making him the first confirmed Dutch victim of the cold.

Traffic around the Netherlands was thrown into chaos Friday by snow. Trains ran with long delays and several flights in and out of Schiphol were delayed or canceled.

Poland

The Interior Ministry recorded eight more deaths on Friday and said two other people died of asphyxiation from carbon monoxide-spewing charcoal heaters.

Croatia and Montenegro

In Croatia, some highways were closed and waters of the Adriatic Sea froze in some areas. Buses that travel from Zagreb, the capital, toward the coast have been canceled. In Montenegro, the airport in the capital, Podgorica, was closed due to heavy snow.

This article includes reporting from Reuters and The Associated Press.

http://www.sott.net/articles/show/241076-Europe-tries-to-shield-homeless-from-deep-freeze

NibiruMagick 2012′s Climate Change Update: Gulf Dead Zone Much Larger Than thought, San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station CA. (2 February 2012)

Uploaded by NibiruMagick2012 on Feb 1, 2012

The leak occurred in equipment that was installed in the plant in the fall of 2010. The leak occurred in one of thousands of tubes that carry radioactive water from the Unit 3 reactor.
However, the company has found damage to other tubes, Dricks said.
“The damage that they have found to many other tubes is unusual, and they are attempting to identify the reason,”
http://enenews.com/ap-radiation-could-have-escaped-nuke-plant-on-san-diego-co…

US: Researchers Discover Gulf Dead Zone Much Larger Than Previously Thought
http://www.sott.net/signs/list_by_category/4-The-Living-Planet?page=1

Powerful energy release emanating from the Earth’s core recorded?
http://theextinctionprotocol.wordpress.com/

Tropical Cyclone Iggy weakens before making landfall
http://thewatchers.adorraeli.com/

http://hisz.rsoe.hu/alertmap/index2.php

Report: ‘Empty’ Reactor No. 4 was actually filled with nuclear fuel — Only a matter of time before melt-out
http://enenews.com/

DON”T forget Zippcast (Uploaded fast tonight)
http://www.zippcast.com/user/NibiruMagick2012

Newly Discovered Icelandic Current Could Lead To Climate Cooling

Mark Dunphy
Irish Weather Online
Mon, 22 Aug 2011 12:13 CDT

© WHOI
The research vessel Knorr navigates the Iceland Sea while taking measurements of the Jet.

An international team of researchers has confirmed the presence of a deep-reaching ocean circulation system off Iceland that could have “important ramifications” for ocean circulation’s impact on climate in the Northern Hemisphere.

The current, called the North Icelandic Jet (NIJ), contributes to a key component of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), also known as the “great ocean conveyor belt,” which is critically important for regulating Earth’s climate.

Climate specialists have been concerned that the conveyor belt is slowing down due to a rise in global temperatures. They suggest that increasing amounts of fresh water from melting ice and other warming-related phenomena are making their way into the northern North Atlantic, where it could freeze, which would prevent the water from sinking and decrease the need for the loop to deliver as much warm water as it does now. Eventually, this could lead to a colder climate in the northern hemisphere.

The team, which includes physical oceanographers from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), announced their findings in a paper published in the August 21 online issue of the journal Nature Geoscience.

As part of the planet’s reciprocal relationship between ocean circulation and climate, the “great ocean conveyor belt” transports warm surface water to high latitudes where the water warms the air, then cools, sinks, and returns towards the equator as a deep flow. Crucial to this warm-to-cold oceanographic choreography is the Denmark Strait Overflow Water (DSOW), the largest of the deep, overflow plumes that feed the lower limb of the conveyor belt and return the dense water south through gaps in the Greenland-Scotland Ridge.

For years it has been thought that the primary source of the Denmark Overflow is a current adjacent to Greenland known as the East Greenland Current. However, this view was recently called into question by two oceanographers from Iceland who discovered a deep current flowing southward along the continental slope of Iceland. They named the current the North Icelandic Jet and hypothesized that it formed a significant part of the overflow water.

Now, the team of researchers – including the two Icelanders who discovered it – has confirmed that the Icelandic Jet is not only a major contributor to the DSOW but “is the primary source of the densest overflow water.”

© WHOI
The North Icelandic Jet in cross-section, adjacent to the continental slope of Iceland.

“These results implicate water mass transformation and exchange near Iceland as central contributors to the deep limb of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, and raise new questions about how global ocean circulation will respond to future climate change,” said Eric Itsweire, program director in the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF)’s Division of Ocean Sciences, which funded the research.

“In our paper we present the first comprehensive measurements of the NIJ,” said Robert S. Pickart of WHOI, one of the authors of the study. “Our data demonstrate that the NIJ indeed carries overflow water into Denmark Strait and is distinct from the East Greenland Current. We show that the NIJ constitutes approximately half of the total overflow transport and nearly all of the densest component.

The researchers used a numerical model to hypothesize where and how the NIJ is formed. “We’ve identified a new paradigm,” he said. “We’re hypothesizing a new, overturning loop” of warm water to cold.

While a subsequent cooling of scenario is far from certain, it is critical that researchers understand the overturning process, he said, to be able to make accurate predictions about the future of climate and circulation interaction. “If a large fraction of the overflow water comes from the NIJ, then we need to re-think how quickly the warm-to-cold conversion of the AMOC occurs, as well as how this process might be altered under a warming climate,” Pickart said.

Pickart and a team of scientists from the U.S., Iceland, Norway, and the Netherlands are scheduled to embark on Monday on a cruise aboard the WHOI-operated R/V Knorr to collect new information on the overturning in the Iceland Sea.

“During our upcoming cruise on the Knorr we will, for the first time, deploy an array of year-long moorings across the entire Denmark Strait to quantify the NIJ and distinguish it from the East Greenland Current,” Pickart said. “Then we will collect shipboard measurements in the Iceland Sea to the north of the mooring line to determine more precisely where and how the NIJ originates.”

© WHOI
Buoyant spheres will hold moorings upright in the Jet during the upcoming expedition.

June snow falls in Wales as Britain struggles through a drought

Posted on June 11, 2011 by The Extinction Protocol

June 11, 2011- WALES – Tourists in Wales were left frozen and shocked when snow started to fall, despite it being mid-June. The blizzard-like conditions had holidaymakers running for shelter in Snowdonia – just as it was being announced that large parts of Wales and England are officially suffering a drought. Jonathan Tyler, manager of Snowdon Mountain Railway’s visitor centre at the summit of the mountain, told Wales Online: ‘It snowed for about an hour… people were arriving at the summit looking quite bemused. It was summer at the bottom of the mountain and winter at the top.’ Mary Pearce, 62, who was visiting the mountain railway, told the BBC: ‘It is the middle of June, days before the start of Wimbledon and just over a week before the summer solstice. But there we were, standing with the snow blowing all around us.’ Meanwhile in Bristol, another area affected by drought concerns, a hailstorm broke out, forcing shoppers and tourists to run for cover. While the snow and hail may not be welcomed by summer holidaymakers, many are hoping that it will help bring some relief to the dry conditions around the country. After one of the driest springs on record in many parts of Britain, a state of drought has been officially declared in parts of eastern England. The drought affects Cambridgeshire, Northamptonshire and Lincolnshire and more areas could follow. Parts of the South West, South East, Midlands and Wales are experiencing near-drought conditions, the Environment Agency said. –AOL travel

contribution Suzie B.

Climate chaos: Rare June snow falls in desert region of Namibia

Posted on June 10, 2011 by The Extinction Protocol

June 10, 2011 – NAMIBIA – Reports and photographs of the snowfall circulated rapidly and widely across the Internet and inboxes bulged with rare images depicting snow in areas usually associated with heat and dust, not biting cold and white blankets of snow. John Rabie from Namibgrens Guest Farm close to the Spreetshoogte Pass where the majority of snow and rain fell, described the scenes of low clouds, mist and snow on Tuesday. It was ice cold, especially as the wind was blowing,” he said. The snow fell during the day, from around eleven in the morning until the afternoon. He said the minimum temperature on Tuesday was minus two degrees Celsius, while the day’s maximum temperature did not go above five degrees. Although the temperatures had not improved by yesterday, the absence of wind took away the worst bite of the cold, he said. “We lost one lamb,” he said. He attributed the low number of stock losses to the fact that the wind had died down from Tuesday to Wednesday. According to the Namibia Weather Network website, Tuesday’s cold was one for the record books. The website reported that Windhoek had its lowest average day temperature in at least ten years on Tuesday. –Namibian

“Parts of the south-west Africa nation of Namibia usually associated with heat and dust have been blanketed in snow.” –Irish Weather O

 

Fresno CA, Snow in Shaver Lake changes some Memorial Day plans3

FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) — Memorial Day weekend was anything but ordinary for many families as rain and snow disrupted their holiday plans.

Three inches of snow fell in the Shaver Lake area overnight and continued throughout the morning.

The unofficial start of summer looked more like winter up near Shaver. So much so, that many families ended their holiday weekend early.

People heading toward Shaver Lake Sunday experienced snow falling on their windshields and an empty lake, which is usually full of watercrafts this time of year.

“It’s weird. It’s crazy. It’s normally not like this ever,” Jeremy Fairchild said.

Jeremy Fairchild and his family traveled from Coarsegold to go fishing.

They didn’t expect this kind of weather but chose to stick with their plans anyway.

“Catch em or not, it’s always a good day to fish.”

To read more and see video go here:

http://abclocal.go.com/kfsn/story?section=news/local&id=8159251