Natural Events (Worldwide)

[Zetetic]

Thought it might be quite interesting to discuss upcoming natural events from around the world (plus what anyone is doing to prepare or not...)

Shall we start with Abigail in the UK?

www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/storm-abigail-severe-weather-warning-6812298

About 60 schools are planning to close, and ferries have been suspended

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-34794583

Made it through the night with winds a steady 65mph or so. Power went off between 3 and. 7 but is back now.

Bit that schools are shut because it was this bad earlier in the week - almost as though they've got caught up in the whole Abigail thing rather than BAU in Highlands and Islands!

Miserable weather doesn't stop us here, haircut and croft tending this morning - with kids in tow. Joy.

Not too bad in the end then. This man wasn't prepared!

Man attempts 'certain death' Nevis climb- A walker's attempt to scale Ben Nevis during Storm Abigail has been described as "certain death" by his rescuers.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-scotland-34806406

Glad you were OK - a steady blow (even when strong) seems to be far less damaging than gusts. There appear to have been power cuts over much of the North where there were surface power lines although I would guess that they don't need manual resetting these days quite as much as they once used to require.

I'm not surprised that the schools were shut. Authorities are becoming ever more risk-averse these days and shutting down things in the middle of the day if needed can, in any case, be a very bothersome task. (And Friday is such a convenient day for closure isn't it - sort of gives a 'long weekend' with everything (buses etc) in the right place ready to go for Monday morning? )

Madness, Zetetic - but then climbers and all.......?

I recall one of Scotland's greatest climbers going up Nevis one night in T shirt and wellies because he'd heard some Hoorays in the pub talking about going up the next morning and wanted to be there to say Hi at the summit.

(The fact that he was blind drunk a tad mellow is no excuse and is even a further demerit mark. Nevis is actually a serious pile of rock once you get beyond the lower stretches and hit the bad zones weather-wise.)

That would of course be 'greatest technical climbers* - I hold no brief for his attitude.

I wondered whether anyone might like to get the earthquake notifications round the world? It is interesting to see the patterns. A 6.5 in Japan just now. (Appreciate UK only has teeny ones)

sslearthquake.usgs.gov/ens/

earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/?source=sitenav

This shows the recent Japanese earthquakes.

earthquaketrack.com/p/japan/recent

It's still blowing up here and not looking to calm down until about 9pm tonight... all getting a bit tedious now although the waves are impressive and the seals were almost touchable from the car windows yesterday!

It must be raining very hard up there.

uk.news.yahoo.com/severe-flood-warnings-northern-england-163527352.html#uGO3iVD

And it is B for Storm Barney now. It will be hitting my area this time so I have got out my emergency lamps just in case.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-34834799

Can we talk about further away in time ones? Hopefully

Like the Cascadia fault... www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/07/20/the-really-big-one

And the supervolcano. volcanoes.usgs.gov/volcanoes/yellowstone/faqs_supervolcanoes.html which is less likely.

There is an event level at which prepping is useless. Ditto a proximity to the event.

I hope everyone near the storms is OK.

I'm blaming you for having me completely hooked on the Cascadia fault. Now onto the second book and it is unbelievable what could happen. Please correct me if this is wrong...

Major 9.0 earthquake in 1700 off the Canadian / USA coast (Cascadia Fault) stretching from Vancouver down through Washington State, Oregon and Northern Califonia. Major cities such as Seattle affected. It ruptures every 300 - 400 years so the next one could happen anytime and if it does it could be on the scale of the 2001 Boxing Day earthquake and tsunami or the Japanese one in 2011. And a lot of people in the region are not prepared! Schools are still sited in the inundation zone. Tower blocks could pancake.

Even if it only partly ruptures it will still be massive.

You do what you can, MrsTerry. If one of the big natural ones lets rip - Cascadia, Yellowstone, Cumbre Vieja, spontaneous viral mutation etc etc etc then we're all as little stick figures running around waving stick arms in the air. Likewise - almost certainly - the 'non-natural' ones.

You do what you can.

That the one Zenetic. It really will be enormous and could be much bigger that those earthquakes. People in my city are at least helped by the ridiculous NIMBYism about building tall buildings.

DH reassures himself that our house is on rock and we will be fine unless the whole island slips into the sea. The First Nations here have some interesting stories. "Used to be a band of people here" type stories. DH has also promised that at the first twitch, he's off and running uphill. His work is too near the water for my liking.

then we're all as little stick figures running around waving stick arms in the air So true.

I've been reading some of those First Nation stories about longhouses collapsing and dogs barking a warning. Fascinating that it shows up in Japenese written records of the time and that is how they tracked the date of the last one down (despite First Nation people only having an oral story tradition).

According to the books I'm reading you have 15 minutes from when the dogs start barking and the earthquake hits before the tsunami reaches you. Apparently you should plan your route and run at the first sign.

No wonder you have a bug out bag. I'm so glad you are on rock too.

DH has actually been in an earthquake. He was in the basement of a library and everyone else did that 'duck under the desks' thing. He ran out. They were all asking why and he said, "you are in a basement with tons of books above your head, I don't think a desk will save you". He's a good partner for the SHTF.

He also reckons from what he's read that there is likely to be a little wobble seconds/minutes before the big one. He has a pretty good 10K time so I'm hopeful. I don't feel the little ones we get here a lot but he does.

What are the books? Linky?

Here they are - (glad your DH can run & he sounds like he will react quickly which will make quite a difference)

www.amazon.co.uk/Full-Rip-9-0-Earthquake-Pacific-Northwest/dp/1570619425/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1447777522&sr=8-1&keywords=Full-Rip+9.0+Sandi+Doughton

www.amazon.co.uk/Cascadias-Fault-Earthquake-Tsunami-Devastate/dp/1582438242/ref=sr_1_6?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1447777625&sr=1-6&keywords=Cascadia

What freaks me out about this fault is that some authorities are sticking their heads in the sand - a bit like the film Jaws because it might hurt tourism.

Your area seems to be a bit more on the ball but Washington State has only just started (according to one of the books). Tsunami sirens are useless because it would arrive before anyone had a chance to do anything. So all those people are unprepared! And some of the ground in the city basins may actually liquify.

You are way ahead of the curve by making plans.

Totally. There are houseboats and ocean front hotels and houses. All very pretty but toast if we get a big one. Which we will. There's no doubt about that , it's just when. The hospitals, fire stations and so on are all uphill here so that's good. However, I happen to know, through a slightly circuitous route, that one of the biggest fire stations is not very seismically prepared.

I suspect that, in practice and unofficially, they've all 'taken a view on it'.

And it isn't always obvious which buildings are safer than others. You would think for example that the Space Needle in Seattle would be a terrible place to be stuck in an earthquake and a lower building might be better.

However the Space Needle was massively over engineered with multiple fail safe measures built in so it will probably even be fine in the 'Big One' (although will sway backwards and forwards like you are on a rollercoaster completely unable to stand up - just imagine!) whereas brick buildings will just collapse.

I'm feeling a bit alarmed for tourists as well.

Seem to be a lot of earthquakes at the moment. Greece last week (story in the newspapers today).

Just got e mail from USGS of a M6.8 in the SOLOMON ISLANDS.

welp, I've just been reading some of the Cascadia links!

If anyone's ever interested, they sometimes have some cracking earthquake documentaries on NHK world (deep in the dark and newsy recesses of digital tv). Really good and in depth.