November 2013 Weather News!
On November 7th, reportedly the strongest storm to ever hit landfall on this planet bore down on the Philippines. Super Typhoon Haiyan had sustained winds of 195mph with some gusts reported at 235mph! This storm equaled a Category 5 hurricane producing waves fifty feet high. At one point the storm was five hundred miles wide.
Your fine staff at Blue Duck Weather don’t usually report the aftermath of a storm, the cleanup or rebuilding efforts. It sometimes takes years. But in this sobering issue of Blue Duck Weather you will read, despite the best international intentions, food and relief can be delivered but getting it where it is needed is quite another challenge. Lawlessness becomes law. Disease becomes rampant as all systems break down and fresh water more valuable than gold, as valuable as life itself. The damage of this massive storm and the aftermath shows how a society can break down in a matter of days.
Features in this amazing issue of Blue Duck Weather are rubber ducks inducted into the National Toy Hall of Fame!, one hundred dead elk on a ranch and what happened?, a boy found with a chicken on his neck, a fire fact for this year that may surprise you, the difference in Thanksgiving turkey weights twenty four years ago and now!,
The average temperature on the Land for November was 60.95 degrees. The average for Talking Trees and Antelope Hill was 42.02 degrees.
An amazing rain month in just a few days brought the yearly total to 7.51”, putting us on target for an average annual rainfall. Read it about it more in this issue of Blue Duck Weather.
11-1- A lightning strike may have caused a pipeline to rupture that spilled 20,000 barrels of oil in a North Dakota wheat field.
Ninety two African migrants die of thirst after their trucks broke down in the middle of the Sahara Desert before reaching Nigeria.
11-3- A Swedish man climbing and skiing on New Zealand’s tallest mountain has fallen two thousand feet to his death.
11-4- Tropical Storm Sonia moving quickly toward the southern tip of Baja. “Life threatening flash floods feared.”
40mph winds topple trees on top of cars at a dealership in Peoria, Arizona.
An Indiana man hunting deer fell sixteen feet from a tree stand last Saturday and is paralyzed from the chest down. Doctors feared he would never be able to breathe on his own again. Family wanted the man to be brought out of sedation and told of his condition. They wanted him to be able to decide for himself if he wanted to live or die. The (brave) man decided to die with his family and friends beside him once the breathing tube had been removed.
11-7- Super Typhoon Haiyan headed straight for the Philippines with 195 mph sustained winds “gusting” to 230mph. The storm is five hundred miles wide producing waves fifty feet high.
11-8 Haiyan is said to be the most powerful storm on the planet ever to hit land. Twelve million people are in its path. This monster is big enough to cover most of the United States!
11-9- Twelve hundred feared dead in the Philippines and all systems are down- water, power,travel and communciations.
And this just in from the Lovely Mrs. Blue Duck: Hunters find one hundred dead elk on a 75,000 acre ranch north of Las Vegas, New Mexico. Officials are puzzled as natural causes including poison are ruled out. Further testing found “pond scum” or a neurotoxin produced by algae in warm, standing water. When animals dring they can be dead in minutes to hours from respiratory arrest. (If I saw this in the wilds hunting I would just hang my head and cry.)
Bighorn sheep will be reintroduced to the Catalina Mountains north of Tucson, Arizona. About thirty from the Kofa Mountains north east of Yuma will be captured and relocated. The last heard that lived in the Catalinas died out in the 90s. Suspected causes of the demise were urban development, predation by mountain lions, disease and human impact from higing and bringing dogs into the area. (just shoot the dogs!)
RUBBER DUCKS INDUCTED INTO THE NATIONAL TOY HALL OF FAME. ONLY 53 TOYS SHARE THIS HONOR!
11-10- Front Page Headlines: 10,000 Feared Dead…..horror, devastation in Philippines. “Storm surges high as trees.” Deaths mostly dy drowning and collapsed buildings. The city of Tacloban the hardest hit and all structures are damaged or destroyed. The airport there is a “muddy wasteland of debris with crumpled tin roofs and upturned cars.” The airport’s tower windows are shattered and helicopters flying in and out at the start of relief operations. The city’s two largest malls, grocery stores and gas stations are destroyed or looted. The winds were like a “747 flying just above my roof.” One reporter said the storm surge was like the Tsunami in Japan. A half million people are displaced.
11-11- “The World is Responding”- the Philippines is in a “National State of Calamity.”
11-12- Water born disease and the lack of fresh drinking water now the big concern in the Philippines. The death toll has now been downgraded.
Season’s first snow in the Midwest and Northeast.
A long time employee of an animal sanctuary killed by multiple bites from a cougar. The 36 year old died of “devastating injuries to back and neck.” She was inside the mountain lion enclosure when she was attacked.
11-13- “Desparate”- 73 nations ready to bring relief to the Philippines. Cebu City is foodless, waterless and lawless.
11-14- Mobs overrun a rice warehouse in Tacloban. A wall collapsed and eight are dead as crowd forced its way past armed guards and took off with sacks of grain. Grocery stores and gas stations will not be re-stocked because of fear of looting. Massive amounts of food and water on nearby islands but it can’t be moved in large amounts because there is no fuel for trucks or roads cleared. The UN reports the death toll is 4500 and will rise. (Hunger makes good people do desparate things, especially for their families. I’m sure killing for food is not out of the question as the days drag on .)
11-15-“Brutally hot and humid” One week later 3600 dead and 1200 missing. Two million are displaced. There is no clean drinking water for thousands.
11-16- Tornadoes slam central Illinois today in the community of East Peoria. 53 million in ten states are at significant risk of thunderstorms and tornadoes. 50 homes destroyed in Brockport, Illinois leaving four dead. 89 unconfirmed tornadoes reported today.
In the Philippines two million are homeless, 3800 dead, 1250 hurt and one thousand missing from Super Cyclone Hayian. There is a mass exodus from Talcoban. Now the grave concern is Measles, Typhoid and Polio outbreaks.
11-18- Hardest hit from tornaodes yesterday Washington, Illinois with eight folks killed. Two EF4 tornadoes confirmed in Illinois never seen before. These types of storms usually happen in the spring and summer. “The whole neighborhood is gone” said one resident of Washington. These fast moving storms affected twelve states in one day.
Philippine president says he will camp in Talcoban until he sees more aid coming in. (Good man, get out there in the human misery!)
And this one is from the Lovely Mrs. BlueDuck: Some forty days into Obamacare and 269 people have signed up in New Hampshire. During the same time period in that state 281 moose permits were issued.
“A social service supervisor and a nurse face child abuse charges after an 11 year old North Carolina boy was found handcuffed to a porch, shivering in frigid temperatures, with a dead chicken around his neck! (?).
11-20- Flooding rains kill 16 in Sardinia, Italy. 17.3 inches of rain in twenty four hours, half the amount normally received in a year. The mayor says the ferocity is a “water bomb” with bridges down and water ten feet deep.
Flooding in Vietnam kills 41, 80,000 forced from homes and 400,000 homes affected.
11-21- From his secluded location in Colorado RyDuck reports a high of 60 degrees yesterday with 14 degrees this morning!
And in The Valley of The Sun there is a one hundred percent chance of rain for tomorrow.
11-22- 1.65 inches of rain on The Land. 1.3 inches of rain recorded at Sky Harbor International Airport in Phoenix, shattering a forty year old record of .05 inches of rain in 1973. The White Mountains received seven inches of snow and the Snowbowl above Flagstaff received 10-16 inches.
11-23- 2.44 inches of rain on The Land in just over forty eight hours, a qaurter of our annual rainfall!
Mount Charleston in Nevada receives fifteen inches of snow with more water content in this storm than all of last year for the mountain!
The death toll in the Philippines is 4919 poor souls and 1611 still missing.
11-24- Four feet of snow in the Four Corners region!
The U.S. government for the first time has enforced environmental laws protecting wildlife from wind energy facilities. They have won a million dollar settlement from a power company that pleaded guilty to killing 14 eagles and 149 other birds at wind farms in Wyoming.
11-26- The number of wildfires this year hit a thirty year low in the United States despite the most tragedies in eighty years. 43,000 fires reported across the country so far this year, well below the average 68,000 fires. One contributing factor was a very active monsoon pattern in the Southwest that brought moderate to heavy rainfall. The July through September period was the wettest in the Four Corners region in 119 years.
11-27- An EF2 tornado has been confirmed from last night’s storms in North Carolina. Three people injured and condo damage in Atlantic Beach, North Carolina.
Heavy snow in New York and Michigan. 34mph winds expected in New York City tomorrow. It may affect the Macy Day Parade floats and balloons.
The average weight of a Thanksgiving turkey in 1989 was 19 pounds. Now it is 30 pounds. (What does that say about us?, just look around you.) (Mrs. Duck adds....google why and you might start raising your own birds. As for 30 pounds...uh, never seen one.)
The state of Arizona is cracking down on poaching of rare reptiles. Gila monsters get can get 1500 dollars on the black market. Poachers come from as far away as Australia and Germany. The monsoon season is a favorite time for poachers. “All of that water hitting the ground get the animals moving. People drive at night and using headlights and flashlights to spot reptiles on the move.” There are also 13 species of rattlesnakes indigenous to Arizona.
11-28- A reward is offered for the killing of a spike elk out of season along Highway 87 in the Coconino National Forest in Arizona. The carcass was found intact and was left to waste. (Especially at a time when the meat could have been donated to a food bank if legally taken.)
11-29- An animal handler is recovering in a Sydney, Australia hospital after being attacked by a Bengal tiger at a zoo owned by the family of late wildlife expert Steve Irwin. The tiger dragged the handler into a pool and bit his shoulders and neck during a show two days ago. The man was wearing a poncho and the tiger may have mistaken him for its “favorite chew toy.”
11-30- A six month old Pit bull is found in an apartment rubble nine days after the tornado in Washington, Illinois. The pooch is hungry and scratched but will be fine.
Well, my faithful readers, that wraps up another mind blowing edition of Blue Duck Weather; a relatively inactive month of weather reporting limited to a few pages instead of the novels I usually write. The Lovely Mrs. Blue Duck will be happy, and I am sure you will be too!
This month’s weather song is “Tornado” by Little Big Town.
Until next month when the wind howls out your name remember Pioneers took bullets. Settlers took land.
The Distinquished, honorable Professor MR Blue Duck.
November 2013 Weather News!
On November 7th, reportedly the strongest storm to ever hit landfall on this planet bore down on the Philippines. Super Typhoon Haiyan had sustained winds of 195mph with some gusts reported at 235mph! This storm equaled a Category 5 hurricane producing waves fifty feet high. At one point the storm was five hundred miles wide.
Your fine staff at Blue Duck Weather don’t usually report the aftermath of a storm, the cleanup or rebuilding efforts. It sometimes takes years. But in this sobering issue of Blue Duck Weather you will read, despite the best international intentions, food and relief can be delivered but getting it where it is needed is quite another challenge. Lawlessness becomes law. Disease becomes rampant as all systems break down and fresh water more valuable than gold, as valuable as life itself. The damage of this massive storm and the aftermath shows how a society can break down in a matter of days.
Features in this amazing issue of Blue Duck Weather are rubber ducks inducted into the National Toy Hall of Fame!, one hundred dead elk on a ranch and what happened?, a boy found with a chicken on his neck, a fire fact for this year that may surprise you, the difference in Thanksgiving turkey weights twenty four years ago and now!,
The average temperature on the Land for November was 60.95 degrees. The average for Talking Trees and Antelope Hill was 42.02 degrees.
An amazing rain month in just a few days brought the yearly total to 7.51”, putting us on target for an average annual rainfall. Read it about it more in this issue of Blue Duck Weather.
11-1- A lightning strike may have caused a pipeline to rupture that spilled 20,000 barrels of oil in a North Dakota wheat field.
Ninety two African migrants die of thirst after their trucks broke down in the middle of the Sahara Desert before reaching Nigeria.
11-3- A Swedish man climbing and skiing on New Zealand’s tallest mountain has fallen two thousand feet to his death.
11-4- Tropical Storm Sonia moving quickly toward the southern tip of Baja. “Life threatening flash floods feared.”
40mph winds topple trees on top of cars at a dealership in Peoria, Arizona.
An Indiana man hunting deer fell sixteen feet from a tree stand last Saturday and is paralyzed from the chest down. Doctors feared he would never be able to breathe on his own again. Family wanted the man to be brought out of sedation and told of his condition. They wanted him to be able to decide for himself if he wanted to live or die. The (brave) man decided to die with his family and friends beside him once the breathing tube had been removed.
11-7- Super Typhoon Haiyan headed straight for the Philippines with 195 mph sustained winds “gusting” to 230mph. The storm is five hundred miles wide producing waves fifty feet high.
11-8 Haiyan is said to be the most powerful storm on the planet ever to hit land. Twelve million people are in its path. This monster is big enough to cover most of the United States!
11-9- Twelve hundred feared dead in the Philippines and all systems are down- water, power,travel and communciations.
And this just in from the Lovely Mrs. Blue Duck: Hunters find one hundred dead elk on a 75,000 acre ranch north of Las Vegas, New Mexico. Officials are puzzled as natural causes including poison are ruled out. Further testing found “pond scum” or a neurotoxin produced by algae in warm, standing water. When animals dring they can be dead in minutes to hours from respiratory arrest. (If I saw this in the wilds hunting I would just hang my head and cry.)
Bighorn sheep will be reintroduced to the Catalina Mountains north of Tucson, Arizona. About thirty from the Kofa Mountains north east of Yuma will be captured and relocated. The last heard that lived in the Catalinas died out in the 90s. Suspected causes of the demise were urban development, predation by mountain lions, disease and human impact from higing and bringing dogs into the area. (just shoot the dogs!)
RUBBER DUCKS INDUCTED INTO THE NATIONAL TOY HALL OF FAME. ONLY 53 TOYS SHARE THIS HONOR!
11-10- Front Page Headlines: 10,000 Feared Dead…..horror, devastation in Philippines. “Storm surges high as trees.” Deaths mostly dy drowning and collapsed buildings. The city of Tacloban the hardest hit and all structures are damaged or destroyed. The airport there is a “muddy wasteland of debris with crumpled tin roofs and upturned cars.” The airport’s tower windows are shattered and helicopters flying in and out at the start of relief operations. The city’s two largest malls, grocery stores and gas stations are destroyed or looted. The winds were like a “747 flying just above my roof.” One reporter said the storm surge was like the Tsunami in Japan. A half million people are displaced.
11-11- “The World is Responding”- the Philippines is in a “National State of Calamity.”
11-12- Water born disease and the lack of fresh drinking water now the big concern in the Philippines. The death toll has now been downgraded.
Season’s first snow in the Midwest and Northeast.
A long time employee of an animal sanctuary killed by multiple bites from a cougar. The 36 year old died of “devastating injuries to back and neck.” She was inside the mountain lion enclosure when she was attacked.
11-13- “Desparate”- 73 nations ready to bring relief to the Philippines. Cebu City is foodless, waterless and lawless.
11-14- Mobs overrun a rice warehouse in Tacloban. A wall collapsed and eight are dead as crowd forced its way past armed guards and took off with sacks of grain. Grocery stores and gas stations will not be re-stocked because of fear of looting. Massive amounts of food and water on nearby islands but it can’t be moved in large amounts because there is no fuel for trucks or roads cleared. The UN reports the death toll is 4500 and will rise. (Hunger makes good people do desparate things, especially for their families. I’m sure killing for food is not out of the question as the days drag on .)
11-15-“Brutally hot and humid” One week later 3600 dead and 1200 missing. Two million are displaced. There is no clean drinking water for thousands.
11-16- Tornadoes slam central Illinois today in the community of East Peoria. 53 million in ten states are at significant risk of thunderstorms and tornadoes. 50 homes destroyed in Brockport, Illinois leaving four dead. 89 unconfirmed tornadoes reported today.
In the Philippines two million are homeless, 3800 dead, 1250 hurt and one thousand missing from Super Cyclone Hayian. There is a mass exodus from Talcoban. Now the grave concern is Measles, Typhoid and Polio outbreaks.
11-18- Hardest hit from tornaodes yesterday Washington, Illinois with eight folks killed. Two EF4 tornadoes confirmed in Illinois never seen before. These types of storms usually happen in the spring and summer. “The whole neighborhood is gone” said one resident of Washington. These fast moving storms affected twelve states in one day.
Philippine president says he will camp in Talcoban until he sees more aid coming in. (Good man, get out there in the human misery!)
And this one is from the Lovely Mrs. BlueDuck: Some forty days into Obamacare and 269 people have signed up in New Hampshire. During the same time period in that state 281 moose permits were issued.
“A social service supervisor and a nurse face child abuse charges after an 11 year old North Carolina boy was found handcuffed to a porch, shivering in frigid temperatures, with a dead chicken around his neck! (?).
11-20- Flooding rains kill 16 in Sardinia, Italy. 17.3 inches of rain in twenty four hours, half the amount normally received in a year. The mayor says the ferocity is a “water bomb” with bridges down and water ten feet deep.
Flooding in Vietnam kills 41, 80,000 forced from homes and 400,000 homes affected.
11-21- From his secluded location in Colorado RyDuck reports a high of 60 degrees yesterday with 14 degrees this morning!
And in The Valley of The Sun there is a one hundred percent chance of rain for tomorrow.
11-22- 1.65 inches of rain on The Land. 1.3 inches of rain recorded at Sky Harbor International Airport in Phoenix, shattering a forty year old record of .05 inches of rain in 1973. The White Mountains received seven inches of snow and the Snowbowl above Flagstaff received 10-16 inches.
11-23- 2.44 inches of rain on The Land in just over forty eight hours, a qaurter of our annual rainfall!
Mount Charleston in Nevada receives fifteen inches of snow with more water content in this storm than all of last year for the mountain!
The death toll in the Philippines is 4919 poor souls and 1611 still missing.
11-24- Four feet of snow in the Four Corners region!
The U.S. government for the first time has enforced environmental laws protecting wildlife from wind energy facilities. They have won a million dollar settlement from a power company that pleaded guilty to killing 14 eagles and 149 other birds at wind farms in Wyoming.
11-26- The number of wildfires this year hit a thirty year low in the United States despite the most tragedies in eighty years. 43,000 fires reported across the country so far this year, well below the average 68,000 fires. One contributing factor was a very active monsoon pattern in the Southwest that brought moderate to heavy rainfall. The July through September period was the wettest in the Four Corners region in 119 years.
11-27- An EF2 tornado has been confirmed from last night’s storms in North Carolina. Three people injured and condo damage in Atlantic Beach, North Carolina.
Heavy snow in New York and Michigan. 34mph winds expected in New York City tomorrow. It may affect the Macy Day Parade floats and balloons.
The average weight of a Thanksgiving turkey in 1989 was 19 pounds. Now it is 30 pounds. (What does that say about us?, just look around you.)
The state of Arizona is cracking down on poaching of rare reptiles. Gila monsters get can get 1500 dollars on the black market. Poachers come from as far away as Australia and Germany. The monsoon season is a favorite time for poachers. “All of that water hitting the ground get the animals moving. People drive at night and using headlights and flashlights to spot reptiles on the move.” There are also 13 species of rattlesnakes indigenous to Arizona.
11-28- A reward is offered for the killing of a spike elk out of season along Highway 87 in the Coconino National Forest in Arizona. The carcass was found intact and was left to waste. (Especially at a time when the meat could have been donated to a food bank if legally taken.)
11-29- An animal handler is recovering in a Sydney, Australia hospital after being attacked by a Bengal tiger at a zoo owned by the family of late wildlife expert Steve Irwin. The tiger dragged the handler into a pool and bit his shoulders and neck during a show two days ago. The man was wearing a poncho and the tiger may have mistaken him for its “favorite chew toy.”
11-30- A six month old Pit bull is found in an apartment rubble nine days after the tornado in Washington, Illinois. The pooch is hungry and scratched but will be fine.
Well, my faithful readers, that wraps up another mind blowing edition of Blue Duck Weather; a relatively inactive month of weather reporting limited to a few pages instead of the novels I usually write. The Lovely Mrs. Blue Duck will be happy, and I am sure you will be too!
This month’s weather song is “Tornado” by Little Big Town.
Until next month when the wind howls out your name remember Pioneers took bullets. Settlers took land.
The Distinquished, honorable Professor MR Blue Duck.
Sunday, December 8, 2013
Sunday, November 3, 2013
October 2013 Blue Duck Weather News
October 2013 Weather News!
This is the thirty year anniversary of the historic Great Maricopa flood that made national headlines and cut off your truly and his little family from the cities for a week.
It was not the amount of rain that fell in Maricopa that late September and early October in 1983 that flooded the tiny town and surrounding areas. In the southern and eastern portion of the state it rained for days. Safford, Arizona recorded twelve inches of rain in ten days as a result of remnants from Tropical Storm Octave. The subsequent runoffs funneled from the high ground to the east and to the south toward rural Pinal County with Maricopa in the crosshairs. There were even grave concerns that Coolidge Dam to the east would not be able to take the pressure of the flooding and that it may fail.
When all was said and done 14 people were killed in the state, thousands injured and the damage to homes and property was estimated at one billion dollars.
On October 3rd, 1983 the flood roared into town, at that time a population of 250 residents. (Hard to believe looking at Maricopa now.) No one believed floods would breach the Santa Rosa Wash but they did. Water engulfed the only school in town, the restaurant and everything south of the railroad tracks. When the water arrived “it changed everything.”
Some reported a wall of water seven feet high. Folks scrambled to turn off electricity and warn neighbors. Soon, families climbed onto the roofs of their homes awaiting rescue. It wasn’t just the water that was dangerous. There were snakes, rats and floating debris in the water.
The Arizona National Guard sent soldiers to help move in supplies and Pinal County Sheriffs moved deputies into the area to help with search and rescue operations.
Cleanup of the K-12 school took six weeks. Homes had two feet of mud in them. One man said he will never forget looking back to the east from town and seeing a “solid sheet of wet, glistening mud for as far as I could see.”
On that October day before the floods roared through every wash north and south of town the Lovely young Mrs. Blueduck had been tipped that the water was coming. She drove sixteen miles to the nearest pay phone (we had no home phone then as there was no phone service available yet on The Land), and called my boss in Phoenix. He radioed me that I better get home (there were not cell phones than and office to truck communication was by radio.). Heading home as fast as I dared I could see engineers on the tiny bridges spanning washes north of Maricopa. Maricopa Road was a dangerous two lane road full of dips, potholes and occasional wild horses wandering into traffic. The engineers were ready to close the road as I made it southbound.
Fortunately our little nest was sixteen miles south of Maricopa so no flood waters came this far south. But what cut us off from work, Phoenix and Casa Grande were closed interstate bridges. I-8 was closed to the south. I-10 was closed to the east over the Gila River. There was no Maricopa Road at its juncture with the Gila as it was completely washed out.
The one store to get supplies was a tiny little commissary on the Reservation north of us. They were rationing eggs, milk, gas and bread. Looking back we did just fine, our little family of four riding the flood out.
But what about the next time? Maricopa now has a population of sixty thousand people thirty years later. The Army Corps of Engineers took to the sky in the days after the flood, observing how the water spread out and making plans to improve the area washes and bridges to prevent wider flooding in the future.
The Santa Rosa Wash was widened after the flood, which helped diminish the damage from another “hundred year flood” ten years later in 1993. But one long time Maricopa resident said recently “You can’t predict anything.” All I know is this many people later in Maricopa and another flood like 1983 would be a national disaster.
It seems javelinas made a lot of news in the early part of the month in Arizona, none of it any good being the victims of man or vehicle. Also read about a freak, tragic accident on a Colorado hiking trail, ‘’Super smog”, “A Super Typhoon”, where road kill is now legal to take for food, and so much more in this jam packed exciting issue of Blue Duck Weather!
But first it is necessary to get weather statistics out of the way. It was nineteen degrees cooler on The Land at the end of the month than the beginning with an average temperature of 68.79 degrees due to a cold front that passed through.
Talking Trees and Antelope Hill had and average temperature of 46.08 degrees, also nineteen degrees cooler at the end of the month due to the same cold front that affected Arizona temperature.
Not a fucking drop of rain fell in the month of October on The Land or for most of the state.
And that brings us to the shrinking, although steady, lake levels. Mead is 46% full, Powell 45% full, Pleasant 52% and Roosevelt 45% full.
10-2- Tons of jellyfish force one of the world’s largest nuclear reactors to shut down in Sweden.
A man and his wife from the lowest lying nation on earth is trying to convince judges in New Zealand that he is a refugee from climate change. They left six years ago for higher ground due to rising seas.
10-3- The first named winter storm of the season (you read it first in Blue Duck Weather last year. The National Weather Service believe if they name threatening storms, like hurricanes, people will pay more attention to the potential harm they cause.) Atlas will bring snow to parts of the northern Rockies.
Wandering javelinas keep a school locked down near 51st Street and Thomas in Phoenix until Arizona Game & Fish relocate them.
And in a separate incident 10 javelinas found dead at an intersection in north east Scottsdale struck by cars. Two babies a few weeks old found on top of dead mamas trying to nestle.
A father and four family members killed on a hiking trail in Colorado by rolling, massive boulders. A 13 year old girl survived and said Dad shielded her. The boulders weighing as much as one hundred tons left a slide gash the size of a football sleeve on the mountain.
10-4- Tropical Storm Karen threatening the Gulf Coast and mandatory evacuations in Louisiana due to storm surges three to five feet high.
A tornado destroys homes in north east Nebraska near Wayne.
A blizzard warning is issued in six states including Wyoming and South Dakota with 70mph winds.
A high today of 89 degrees in Phoenix, cooler than Washington, DC.
10-5- Record breaking four feet of snow in portions of South Dakota. Rapid City received 19’’, the most on this day since 1919.
80mph Santa Anna Winds blow into Southern California.
10-6- “Without warning”. Flash flooding in Kentucky prompts 80 emergency rescues and 75 roads closed. Seven inches of rain in 36 hours ties old record.
The tornado that hit Wayne, Nebraska has been confirmed as an EF4 with 170mph winds.
10-8- Typhoon Fitow slams eastern China with a staggering 574,000 evacuations and 35,800 sea vessels called to shore. One man died when he was blown off a hill while trying to help rescue a stranded fisherman.
And blame it on the fucking federal government shutdown: Colorado River runner permit holders denied scheduled launch dates will receive refunds. They will be allowed to schedule with choice of dates until 2016 and they have ninety days to apply.
10-9- Snow Advisory in northern Arizona above 6500’. Dust Storm Warning for the valley until 7:00pm. (Yours truly got caught in this mess heading south on Maricopa Road. It was one of the few times I had to pull completely off the road, turn off the lights and take my foot off the brake so someone wouldn’t plow into the back of me. The visibility was zero and when I finally got back on the road I could see several cars piled up on the opposite side of the road. I couldn’t see or hear the crash but there was debris all over the highway.)
Typhoon Fitow closes 60 parks and a zoo in Beijing. The single day total of rain was 6’’, the most since 1961.
10-10- Twenty degrees below normal around Arizona with a high of only 71 degrees on The Land. Flagstaff received 3.5’’ of snow breaking a record of 1’’ for this date.
Montana Fish and Wildlife approve regulations to allow people to go on line for permits to salvage road kill for food. The animals they hit with a vehicle “accidentally” will be fare game for the table if they apply within 24 hours of the kill. ( Some rednecks I know would just consider this another form of “hunting.”)
10-11- Super Cyclone Phailin is forming into a Category 5 hurricane and is the biggest weather system on earth today. (That is saying a lot!.)
A 56 year old Tucson man is crushed to death when the side of a wash caved in while he and a friend were looking for rocks and minerals. His friend walked for miles to reach authorities. It took them two hours to arrive to the site and two hours to dig him out of two to three feet of rock and sand.
A zookeeper who worked there for 30 years was killed by an elephant in south east Missouri. It is not believed the elephant attacked the man but merely “brushed” against him
10-12- Super Cyclone Phailin is said to be a humanitarian disaster. It is as broad as Hurricane Katrina was and has a foot print the size of France. As it strikes India twelve million people will be affected. One hundred and fifty mile per hour winds with twenty to thirty foot storm surges 800,000 evacuated.
A reward up to five thousand dollars is being offered by Arizona Game & Fish for information leading to the arrest of anyone who killed ten javelinas found near Saguaro National Park in Tucson. It is not clear if the pigs weres shot as all the meat was taken.
A 27 year old man has fallen to his death off Midgley Bridge in Oak Creek Canyon, Arizona. He fell two hundred feet to the canyon floor and investigators think it was suicide. His vehicle was found stopped on the bridge with the driver’s side door open. Sheriffs found a bedroom slipper near the car.
10-13- Phailin claims 13 souls in India. Early evacuations are credited for more lives not being lost. Damage to crops estimated to be in the hundreds of millions of dollars.
A seventy two year old deer hunter, lost for 19 days in the rugged mountains of northern California is rescued by other hunters and carried out on a make shift stretcher. It was not unusual for him to separate from his hunting partner for a few hours but somehow he managed to stumble and was unconscious he believes for an entire day. He survived by shooting small game with his rifle and packing leaves and dry grass on himself to stay warm. He also stayed close to water.
10-14- Arapahoe Basin Ski Resort in Colorado is the first to open in the nation this season.
10-15- Up to four feet of snow fell in parts of Black Hills, North Dakota last week killing ten to twenty thousand head of cattle. The vast majority of ranchers do not have insurance. One rancher lost over a thousand head of cattle and had to to bury them in a massive grave.
You read it here first several months ago about moose dying off in Michigan but now it seems it is spreading. From British Columbia to New Hampshire moose are dying and the speculation is stress from warmer temperatures, parasites and ticks. Up to one hundred thousand ticks can hide in the thick hair of a single moose.
10-16- Chinese rescuers evacuate 86 ‘tourists” from Mount Everest after they were stranded by heavy snow. They were about to return after “sightseeing” at the mountain’s North Base Camp. (Call me naïve or having a fixed image of the hardships climbers have endured on this mighty mountain but is hard to relate to recreational “tours” on this mighty mountain.)
10-17- Typhoon Wipha grounds hundreds of Tokyo flights. On one island thirty inches of rain fell in 24 hours. There are seventeen missing, fifty dead and three hundred and fifty homes destroyed.
10-18- Major wildfires burning in New South Wales in Australia; one thousand evacuated and two hundred homes burned.
10-19- Nearly thirty separate wildfires, twenty two out of control burning in the Blue Mountains of Australia. 193 homes have been destroyed and 109 damaged.
10-20- State of Emergency declared and fires in Australia have consumed 200 homes and has burned 180 square miles.
Tropical Storm Raymond has formed and moving toward Mexico’s southern Pacific coast. This area is still in bad shape after Manuel last month. Ten thousand people are still evacuated from flooded homes and landslide risks.
80 percent of Colorado’s roads have been repaired since the historic flooding last month. There were worries that roads would not be repaired before winter snow started to arrive. But Glen Haven, Colorado is still a “ghost town” and inaccessible.
10-21- The fires in Australia are now the size of Los Anegels.
Raymond is now a Category 3 hurricane.
10-22- The fires burning in Australia now reach one thousand miles. The initial fire began during a military training exercise.
Raymond stalls and is downgraded but still producing heavy rain on the Mexican coast.
“Super smog” blankets Harbin, China and visibility is down to half of a football field. Small particle pollution is 40 times higher than international safety standards. One resident said “I couldn’t see anything out of my apartment window and thought it was snowing.”
10-23- At ninety five degrees today Phoenix the hottest city in the nation. (What a lovely honor to have!)
10-24- A huge landslide covers part of a road in Denali National Park, Alaska. A two hundred foot stretch of the road is covered with 30,000 yards of rock and soil from five hundred feet above the road.
Arctic temperatures the warmest in the last century than in the last 40,000 years. (I don’t care whether you believe in global warming or not, this is alarming!)
A 169 pound catfish is caught on the Ebro River in Spain. The man that caught the lug, or maybe the fish caught him, was fishing from an inner tube and was drug for a mile. He said several times his tiny inner tube was about to be pulled underwater.
10-26- Days of torrential rains in India have left 39 dead with 70,000 evacuated!
A fully intact 76 pound deer found inside of a 16 foot Burmes python in the Florida Everglades.
10-27- Millions in England and Wales are told to prepare for heavy rains and hurricane force winds from a storm unofficially named St. Jude.
10-28- Thirteen dead, mostly from fallen trees and 270,000 without power. 90 mph winds pound the Isle of Wight.
60mph winds in Show Low Arizona and the snow level expected to drop to 7500 feet.
10-29- The most deadly stretch of an Arizona highway when the dirt blows; A short but very dense dust storm on I-10 near Pichacho Peak causes a nineteen vehicle pile up that kills three and twelve injured. The freeway was closed in both directions for six hours.
Rain and snow in Flagstaff, Arizona. A Freeze Warning is issued for Mohave County.
10-30- One hundred acre Whiting Fire burning east of Show Low near the New Mexico border. The cause is unknown.
10-31- Heavy rain and flooding cancels Halloween in portions of Texas. High wind warnings issued in 16 states. The barometric pressure will drop to a Category 2 hurricane level. Twelve to fourteen foot seas on Lake Erie.
There you have it my fine readers, another staggering edition of Blue Duck Weather! But wait, this is a bonus month and we shall leave you with two quotes for the month:
“Listening I could hear
Within myself the snow
That was coming, the sound
Of a loud, cold trumpet-
John Haines, Poem for a Cold Journey 1966.
And a viwpoint on Glen Canyon Dam on the Colorado River: “It made a hell of a lot better river than it does a Reservoir.” River guide and long time rafter, Richard Quest.
Until next month, and hopefully you won’t find yourself inside a sixteen foot Burmese Python, remember Pioneers took bullets. Settlers took land.
The Distinguished Professor MR Blue Duck.
This is the thirty year anniversary of the historic Great Maricopa flood that made national headlines and cut off your truly and his little family from the cities for a week.
It was not the amount of rain that fell in Maricopa that late September and early October in 1983 that flooded the tiny town and surrounding areas. In the southern and eastern portion of the state it rained for days. Safford, Arizona recorded twelve inches of rain in ten days as a result of remnants from Tropical Storm Octave. The subsequent runoffs funneled from the high ground to the east and to the south toward rural Pinal County with Maricopa in the crosshairs. There were even grave concerns that Coolidge Dam to the east would not be able to take the pressure of the flooding and that it may fail.
When all was said and done 14 people were killed in the state, thousands injured and the damage to homes and property was estimated at one billion dollars.
On October 3rd, 1983 the flood roared into town, at that time a population of 250 residents. (Hard to believe looking at Maricopa now.) No one believed floods would breach the Santa Rosa Wash but they did. Water engulfed the only school in town, the restaurant and everything south of the railroad tracks. When the water arrived “it changed everything.”
Some reported a wall of water seven feet high. Folks scrambled to turn off electricity and warn neighbors. Soon, families climbed onto the roofs of their homes awaiting rescue. It wasn’t just the water that was dangerous. There were snakes, rats and floating debris in the water.
The Arizona National Guard sent soldiers to help move in supplies and Pinal County Sheriffs moved deputies into the area to help with search and rescue operations.
Cleanup of the K-12 school took six weeks. Homes had two feet of mud in them. One man said he will never forget looking back to the east from town and seeing a “solid sheet of wet, glistening mud for as far as I could see.”
On that October day before the floods roared through every wash north and south of town the Lovely young Mrs. Blueduck had been tipped that the water was coming. She drove sixteen miles to the nearest pay phone (we had no home phone then as there was no phone service available yet on The Land), and called my boss in Phoenix. He radioed me that I better get home (there were not cell phones than and office to truck communication was by radio.). Heading home as fast as I dared I could see engineers on the tiny bridges spanning washes north of Maricopa. Maricopa Road was a dangerous two lane road full of dips, potholes and occasional wild horses wandering into traffic. The engineers were ready to close the road as I made it southbound.
Fortunately our little nest was sixteen miles south of Maricopa so no flood waters came this far south. But what cut us off from work, Phoenix and Casa Grande were closed interstate bridges. I-8 was closed to the south. I-10 was closed to the east over the Gila River. There was no Maricopa Road at its juncture with the Gila as it was completely washed out.
The one store to get supplies was a tiny little commissary on the Reservation north of us. They were rationing eggs, milk, gas and bread. Looking back we did just fine, our little family of four riding the flood out.
But what about the next time? Maricopa now has a population of sixty thousand people thirty years later. The Army Corps of Engineers took to the sky in the days after the flood, observing how the water spread out and making plans to improve the area washes and bridges to prevent wider flooding in the future.
The Santa Rosa Wash was widened after the flood, which helped diminish the damage from another “hundred year flood” ten years later in 1993. But one long time Maricopa resident said recently “You can’t predict anything.” All I know is this many people later in Maricopa and another flood like 1983 would be a national disaster.
It seems javelinas made a lot of news in the early part of the month in Arizona, none of it any good being the victims of man or vehicle. Also read about a freak, tragic accident on a Colorado hiking trail, ‘’Super smog”, “A Super Typhoon”, where road kill is now legal to take for food, and so much more in this jam packed exciting issue of Blue Duck Weather!
But first it is necessary to get weather statistics out of the way. It was nineteen degrees cooler on The Land at the end of the month than the beginning with an average temperature of 68.79 degrees due to a cold front that passed through.
Talking Trees and Antelope Hill had and average temperature of 46.08 degrees, also nineteen degrees cooler at the end of the month due to the same cold front that affected Arizona temperature.
Not a fucking drop of rain fell in the month of October on The Land or for most of the state.
And that brings us to the shrinking, although steady, lake levels. Mead is 46% full, Powell 45% full, Pleasant 52% and Roosevelt 45% full.
10-2- Tons of jellyfish force one of the world’s largest nuclear reactors to shut down in Sweden.
A man and his wife from the lowest lying nation on earth is trying to convince judges in New Zealand that he is a refugee from climate change. They left six years ago for higher ground due to rising seas.
10-3- The first named winter storm of the season (you read it first in Blue Duck Weather last year. The National Weather Service believe if they name threatening storms, like hurricanes, people will pay more attention to the potential harm they cause.) Atlas will bring snow to parts of the northern Rockies.
Wandering javelinas keep a school locked down near 51st Street and Thomas in Phoenix until Arizona Game & Fish relocate them.
And in a separate incident 10 javelinas found dead at an intersection in north east Scottsdale struck by cars. Two babies a few weeks old found on top of dead mamas trying to nestle.
A father and four family members killed on a hiking trail in Colorado by rolling, massive boulders. A 13 year old girl survived and said Dad shielded her. The boulders weighing as much as one hundred tons left a slide gash the size of a football sleeve on the mountain.
10-4- Tropical Storm Karen threatening the Gulf Coast and mandatory evacuations in Louisiana due to storm surges three to five feet high.
A tornado destroys homes in north east Nebraska near Wayne.
A blizzard warning is issued in six states including Wyoming and South Dakota with 70mph winds.
A high today of 89 degrees in Phoenix, cooler than Washington, DC.
10-5- Record breaking four feet of snow in portions of South Dakota. Rapid City received 19’’, the most on this day since 1919.
80mph Santa Anna Winds blow into Southern California.
10-6- “Without warning”. Flash flooding in Kentucky prompts 80 emergency rescues and 75 roads closed. Seven inches of rain in 36 hours ties old record.
The tornado that hit Wayne, Nebraska has been confirmed as an EF4 with 170mph winds.
10-8- Typhoon Fitow slams eastern China with a staggering 574,000 evacuations and 35,800 sea vessels called to shore. One man died when he was blown off a hill while trying to help rescue a stranded fisherman.
And blame it on the fucking federal government shutdown: Colorado River runner permit holders denied scheduled launch dates will receive refunds. They will be allowed to schedule with choice of dates until 2016 and they have ninety days to apply.
10-9- Snow Advisory in northern Arizona above 6500’. Dust Storm Warning for the valley until 7:00pm. (Yours truly got caught in this mess heading south on Maricopa Road. It was one of the few times I had to pull completely off the road, turn off the lights and take my foot off the brake so someone wouldn’t plow into the back of me. The visibility was zero and when I finally got back on the road I could see several cars piled up on the opposite side of the road. I couldn’t see or hear the crash but there was debris all over the highway.)
Typhoon Fitow closes 60 parks and a zoo in Beijing. The single day total of rain was 6’’, the most since 1961.
10-10- Twenty degrees below normal around Arizona with a high of only 71 degrees on The Land. Flagstaff received 3.5’’ of snow breaking a record of 1’’ for this date.
Montana Fish and Wildlife approve regulations to allow people to go on line for permits to salvage road kill for food. The animals they hit with a vehicle “accidentally” will be fare game for the table if they apply within 24 hours of the kill. ( Some rednecks I know would just consider this another form of “hunting.”)
10-11- Super Cyclone Phailin is forming into a Category 5 hurricane and is the biggest weather system on earth today. (That is saying a lot!.)
A 56 year old Tucson man is crushed to death when the side of a wash caved in while he and a friend were looking for rocks and minerals. His friend walked for miles to reach authorities. It took them two hours to arrive to the site and two hours to dig him out of two to three feet of rock and sand.
A zookeeper who worked there for 30 years was killed by an elephant in south east Missouri. It is not believed the elephant attacked the man but merely “brushed” against him
10-12- Super Cyclone Phailin is said to be a humanitarian disaster. It is as broad as Hurricane Katrina was and has a foot print the size of France. As it strikes India twelve million people will be affected. One hundred and fifty mile per hour winds with twenty to thirty foot storm surges 800,000 evacuated.
A reward up to five thousand dollars is being offered by Arizona Game & Fish for information leading to the arrest of anyone who killed ten javelinas found near Saguaro National Park in Tucson. It is not clear if the pigs weres shot as all the meat was taken.
A 27 year old man has fallen to his death off Midgley Bridge in Oak Creek Canyon, Arizona. He fell two hundred feet to the canyon floor and investigators think it was suicide. His vehicle was found stopped on the bridge with the driver’s side door open. Sheriffs found a bedroom slipper near the car.
10-13- Phailin claims 13 souls in India. Early evacuations are credited for more lives not being lost. Damage to crops estimated to be in the hundreds of millions of dollars.
A seventy two year old deer hunter, lost for 19 days in the rugged mountains of northern California is rescued by other hunters and carried out on a make shift stretcher. It was not unusual for him to separate from his hunting partner for a few hours but somehow he managed to stumble and was unconscious he believes for an entire day. He survived by shooting small game with his rifle and packing leaves and dry grass on himself to stay warm. He also stayed close to water.
10-14- Arapahoe Basin Ski Resort in Colorado is the first to open in the nation this season.
10-15- Up to four feet of snow fell in parts of Black Hills, North Dakota last week killing ten to twenty thousand head of cattle. The vast majority of ranchers do not have insurance. One rancher lost over a thousand head of cattle and had to to bury them in a massive grave.
You read it here first several months ago about moose dying off in Michigan but now it seems it is spreading. From British Columbia to New Hampshire moose are dying and the speculation is stress from warmer temperatures, parasites and ticks. Up to one hundred thousand ticks can hide in the thick hair of a single moose.
10-16- Chinese rescuers evacuate 86 ‘tourists” from Mount Everest after they were stranded by heavy snow. They were about to return after “sightseeing” at the mountain’s North Base Camp. (Call me naïve or having a fixed image of the hardships climbers have endured on this mighty mountain but is hard to relate to recreational “tours” on this mighty mountain.)
10-17- Typhoon Wipha grounds hundreds of Tokyo flights. On one island thirty inches of rain fell in 24 hours. There are seventeen missing, fifty dead and three hundred and fifty homes destroyed.
10-18- Major wildfires burning in New South Wales in Australia; one thousand evacuated and two hundred homes burned.
10-19- Nearly thirty separate wildfires, twenty two out of control burning in the Blue Mountains of Australia. 193 homes have been destroyed and 109 damaged.
10-20- State of Emergency declared and fires in Australia have consumed 200 homes and has burned 180 square miles.
Tropical Storm Raymond has formed and moving toward Mexico’s southern Pacific coast. This area is still in bad shape after Manuel last month. Ten thousand people are still evacuated from flooded homes and landslide risks.
80 percent of Colorado’s roads have been repaired since the historic flooding last month. There were worries that roads would not be repaired before winter snow started to arrive. But Glen Haven, Colorado is still a “ghost town” and inaccessible.
10-21- The fires in Australia are now the size of Los Anegels.
Raymond is now a Category 3 hurricane.
10-22- The fires burning in Australia now reach one thousand miles. The initial fire began during a military training exercise.
Raymond stalls and is downgraded but still producing heavy rain on the Mexican coast.
“Super smog” blankets Harbin, China and visibility is down to half of a football field. Small particle pollution is 40 times higher than international safety standards. One resident said “I couldn’t see anything out of my apartment window and thought it was snowing.”
10-23- At ninety five degrees today Phoenix the hottest city in the nation. (What a lovely honor to have!)
10-24- A huge landslide covers part of a road in Denali National Park, Alaska. A two hundred foot stretch of the road is covered with 30,000 yards of rock and soil from five hundred feet above the road.
Arctic temperatures the warmest in the last century than in the last 40,000 years. (I don’t care whether you believe in global warming or not, this is alarming!)
A 169 pound catfish is caught on the Ebro River in Spain. The man that caught the lug, or maybe the fish caught him, was fishing from an inner tube and was drug for a mile. He said several times his tiny inner tube was about to be pulled underwater.
10-26- Days of torrential rains in India have left 39 dead with 70,000 evacuated!
A fully intact 76 pound deer found inside of a 16 foot Burmes python in the Florida Everglades.
10-27- Millions in England and Wales are told to prepare for heavy rains and hurricane force winds from a storm unofficially named St. Jude.
10-28- Thirteen dead, mostly from fallen trees and 270,000 without power. 90 mph winds pound the Isle of Wight.
60mph winds in Show Low Arizona and the snow level expected to drop to 7500 feet.
10-29- The most deadly stretch of an Arizona highway when the dirt blows; A short but very dense dust storm on I-10 near Pichacho Peak causes a nineteen vehicle pile up that kills three and twelve injured. The freeway was closed in both directions for six hours.
Rain and snow in Flagstaff, Arizona. A Freeze Warning is issued for Mohave County.
10-30- One hundred acre Whiting Fire burning east of Show Low near the New Mexico border. The cause is unknown.
10-31- Heavy rain and flooding cancels Halloween in portions of Texas. High wind warnings issued in 16 states. The barometric pressure will drop to a Category 2 hurricane level. Twelve to fourteen foot seas on Lake Erie.
There you have it my fine readers, another staggering edition of Blue Duck Weather! But wait, this is a bonus month and we shall leave you with two quotes for the month:
“Listening I could hear
Within myself the snow
That was coming, the sound
Of a loud, cold trumpet-
John Haines, Poem for a Cold Journey 1966.
And a viwpoint on Glen Canyon Dam on the Colorado River: “It made a hell of a lot better river than it does a Reservoir.” River guide and long time rafter, Richard Quest.
Until next month, and hopefully you won’t find yourself inside a sixteen foot Burmese Python, remember Pioneers took bullets. Settlers took land.
The Distinguished Professor MR Blue Duck.
Wednesday, October 9, 2013
September Blue Duck Weather News 2013
September 2013 Weather News!
The Labor Day Flood of 1970 in Arizona has been described as the “the greatest natural disaster in the history of the state.” It happened on September 5th when more rain fell in one day than any other in the state’s recorded weather history.
By the time it was over 23 lives were lost. Most of the fatalities occurred about fifteen miles east of Payson when a wall of water four to five feet high swept cars down stream and drowning five campers that were trying to escape.
The tragedy unfolded when warm, moist air from Tropical Storm Norma collided with a cold front coming from the Northwest. The resulting weather slammed into the Payson area before midnight, September 4th. By the next day washes and creeks were overflowing and floods were sweeping cabins in the Christopher Creek area off their foundations.
The storm set a twenty four hour record with 11.4’’ of rain, crushing the old record by more than five inches. Mount Lemmon near Tucson recorded 8.74’’ and Crown King received 7.01”. (Mind you, Phoenix average annual rainfall is about eight inches.)
Some descriptions of the flood’s power are hard to believe. Bark had been stripped off of Ponderosa Pines twenty four feet above the ground. Rock fragments were imbedded in pine logs as if they had been shot out of a gigantic gun. Water rolled a boulder, approximately 9 feet by 7 feet by four feet up on top of a log jam. That boulder was sixteen feet above the bottom of a wash!
In 1976 the Big Thompson River in Colorado caused the deadliest flash flood in Colorado history when a foot of rain fell in four hours! A 144 people were killed. And now 37 years later the flooding you will read about in the latest edition of Blue Duck Weather is being called the worst since 1976 of “Biblical” proportions causing the most helicopter rescues since Hurricane Katrina! Read why later why this storm system qualified as a one in one thousand year flood.
Welcome to another amazing edition of Blue Duck Weather! I have lived here all of my life and was completely aware of my surroundings in 1970, although at times I may have been incoherent. I do not remember the historic flood of that summer and maybe it is best I didn’t. But this is the kind of amazing information you will get from no other place but Blue Duck weather, combined with all of the other fascinating tidbits we search high and low for!
In this edition you read startling news of the Moose decline in the North East, the cause of the Rim Fire near Yosemite, the fate of a New Mexico firefighter missing for a week, the safest metro city from Natural disasters, a fraternity that gets fined for turkey abuse, resourceful goat thieves and the city that had the hottest summer on record.
The average temperature on The Land this month (finally “cooling down”) was 83.05 degrees. The average temperature at Talking Trees and Antelope Hill was 59 degrees.
The Land received .59” of rain for the month making the yearly total 5.05”. We need about three inches more rain before the end of the year to bring us up to normal yearly averages.
Lake Mead is 47% full, Pleasant in 45%, Pleasant 45% and Roosevelt 41%.
9-2- Although the Rim Fire near Yosemite is “still growing’’ it is 49% contained. 111 structures and 11 homes lost.
Tornado Warnings issued in the Chicago area.
Heavy snowstorms in Peru kills six and 30,000 domestic animals! Twelve thousand people stranded with three feet of snow.
The largest Alligator ever caught in Alabama has been shot. Thirteen feet long and weighing 727 pounds!
Moose in Minnesota experiencing a dramatic decline. They are gone from the northwest part of the state. The populations are down 35% from last year and 55% since 2010. Some are extremely malnourished. Warmer weather and parasites are suspected of being part of the cause for the decline.
9-3- Three men in Miami hid under a tractor to get out of a lightning storm. Lightning struck the tractor with enough energy all three were electrified and one died.
9-5- Tropical Storm Lorena in the Gulf of Mexico may affect Arizona weather later this week.
The cause of the Rim Fire near Yosemite has been determined an illegal camp fire by a archery hunter. All camp fires had been banned a week before his apparently got out of hand.
The NFL season opener between the Baltimore Ravens and the Denver Broncos delayed because of lightning. ( Interesting. They don’t let the players on the field but what about the eighty thousand “spark plugs” in their seats?
9-6- Severe Weather Alert issued late this afternoon in Phoenix. Planes diverted because of potential wind sheer. A Flood Advisory has been issued until 7:00 p.m. 111 degrees in Phoenix today ties the record set in 1986.
Tropical Storm Gabrielle kicks Puerto Rico in the ass with heavy rain. The capitol of San Juan already has two feet of rain above normal for the year!
A New Mexico firefighter missing for a week is found dead in rugged mountains on top of a mesa after he apparently crashed his SUV. He apparently went out to check on smoke that he had spotted.
Golf ball size hail in Oregon and Idaho. Two funnel clouds reported in Idaho also.
9-7- Syracuse, New York has been named the metro area that is the safest from natural disasters. This includes wildfires, floods, tornadoes, earthquakes and hurricanes.
Three stranded on an Alaska volcano after their helicopter iced over. They have been rescued.
The Rim Fire is 80% contained at 400 square miles!
9-8- 81 degree high at the Land with .36’’ of rain; beautiful. Flash Flood Watch issued for Phoenix until nine p.m.
And while it was 81 degrees at The Land it was 100 degrees in Kansas City!
Frost Advisories issued in New England for the first time this season.
9-9- Seventy nine beautiful degrees for the high on The Land and .26” of rain. Flooding in Phoenix closes the I-17 and Greenway underpass. Tempe received 2.5’’ of rain and 2’’ in Cave Creek.
9-10- A brand new fire near Redding, California (just what they need.) Dozens of homes threatened.
A 69 year old woman fell a hundred feet in Box Canyon near Tucson and was not discovered until the next day. She was injured but alive before a man spotted her a rescue helicopter lifted her out. The man had returned to the area the second day and notice a parked car there from the day before. Later the man heard calls for help and called authorities. (One lucky woman and one observant man.)
9-11- WE SHALL NEVER FORGET THAT FATEFUL DAY IN 2001!.
So far (knock on plastic since there is no wood around), the quietest hurricane season on record so far. But it is not over until November.
9-12- It is being called a “Five hundred year flood.” Eight inches of rain north of Boulder, Colorado has fallen and three have drowned. It is the same weather system that passed through Arizona three days ago. One firefighter rescued after being trapped in a tree in Left Hand Canyon. He was part of a crew working their way up the canyon to assess the situation when a wall of water came down. The University of Colorado is closed due to flooding and homes have been swept off their foundations.
The body of a man found in a burnt out motor home destroyed by fire near Redding, California. The Clover fire has destroyed thirty homes and forced evacuations of 300 folks. With winds the fire is burning 500 acres per hour. Some residents literally just given minutes to grab their belongings and get the hell out!
9-13- A State of Emergency has been called for central Colorado. Up to ten inches have fallen, six inches in Boulder County in twelve hours. Seven inches in Boulder, shattering a 95 year old record.
Flooding from Boulder Creek has damaged 40 buildings at the University of Colorado. The National Guard is deployed to help with rescues. Hundreds airlifted out today along with 85 fifth graders on a school trip.
The Clover Fire near Redding has destroyed 68 homes.
9-14- 2500 people evacuated from the isolated Colorado mountain community of Lyson by heavy trucks and helicopters.
National Guard troops have airlifted 295 residents from the town of Jamestown, cut off without power or water.
90 miles of I-95 closed from Denver to Cheyenne. Colorado’s heavily populated Front Range has received more than 15’’ of rain this week.
Rocky Mountain National Park is closed.
The Big Thompson River is four feet above flood stage.
The south Platte River is ten times wider than normal.
Although it is not getting much press, parts of New Mexico has had heavy flooding and ruptured dams. One man found dead after being washed into a ravine in his submerged vehicle. He was swept a mile off the road near Elephant Butte dam.
The Gila River near the Cliff Dwellings National Monument rose 15 feet.
Six inches of rain per hour fell in Los Alamos. Three of four bridges in Las Vegas, Nevada closed.
The governor issues a State of Emergency.
Tropical Storm Ingrid in Mexico’s Gulf Coast with 60mph and torrential rains and flooding.
9-15- Flash flooding in the tiny town of Clifton, Arizona causes the San Francisco River to rise 26 feet, closing an RV park.
The Boulder area is reeling after record rainfall with more than a half year’s worth of rain falling over the past three days.
During those three days, twenty four hour rainfalls of eight to ten inches were enough to qualify this storm as a 1 in 1,000 year event, meaning that is has a .01 chance of occurring in a given year.
The NWS director saidn “this is clearly going to be a historic event. The true magnitude is really just becoming obvious now.”
Five are dead, 1500 homes destroyed and 17,000 damaged! Seventeen hundred folks rescued.
Ingrid turns into a hurricane with twelve folks perished. This storm may impact Texas with heavy rain.
9-16- All time record for rain in some of the mountain towns in Colorado. Rescues continue, 3,000 since last week. 19,000 homes damaged and 800 roads washed out.
Tropical Storm Manuel and Hurricane Ingrid kill 34 on opposite sides of Mexico from flooding and landslides.
A University of Kansas fraternity agrees to pay a five thousand dollar fine and one thousand hours of community service for abusing a turkey. The turkey had been rented for a party. (How do you “rent” a fucking turkey?) Members broke the bird’s cage, chased and choked the poor bastard. Then they broke its wing and leg.
9-18- Eighty people dead from a two storm “punch in the gut” in Mexico. Acapulco is cut off from road transport from Tropical Storm Manuel. 10,000 tourists are trapped with no cash. Emergency rescue flights are being organized. The airport is submerged in flood water.
9-19- And from the “nothing better to do file”, Gilbert, Arizona officials are looking to hatch (wah, wah) a new chicken ordinance that will allow more residents to raise fowl while limiting the number of birds permitted on smaller lots in denser neighborhoods. One resident proclaimed the profound need for chickens. “With chickens there are no scorpions.”
A woman trapped for 16 days in an abandoned well in China said she shouted for help every day and began to lose hope, but she managed to survive on raw corn and rainwater. She was gathering herbs when she fell into the well. Her husband and children searched every day for her. She was found by a person passing by when she was screaming for help.
9-20- Evacuees from Lyons, Colorado have been allowed to return for two hours to check on their homes and then leave immediately. Under tight security and identification checks authorities are concerned about over crowding with heavy equipment operating to clear storm debris and restore electricity.
97 are dead from landslides in the northern state of Sinoloa, Mexico from Tropical Storm Manuel. 68 missing. People in one village reported the terrifying experience of hearing the low roar of tumbling rocks, mud and debris.
9-21- This was the hottest June, July and August since record keeping began in 1895 for Phoenix, Arizona. The average daily temperature was 95.1 degrees.
Colorado is rushing to fix mountain roads destroyed by flooding before the snows arrive. In some cases laying down one lane gravel roads just to reconnect isolated towns.
Typhoon Usagi hits Taiwan and the Philippines with sustained winds of 173mph. Twenty inches of rain in twenty hours! Two souls have drowned.
9-22- Governor Brewer signs a declaration to assist with flood recovery in Apache and Greenlee counties. Powerful storms and flooding struck the regions on September 13th and the 14th. Major flooding and debris flow in the San Francisco Rivers isolated residents.
First day of fall and 87 degrees on the Land.
One inch of snow in the Sierra Nevadas in California.
Typhoon Usagi downgraded but slams southern China today, shutting down flights and shipping and putting a nuclear power plant on alert. The storm is moving through the most densely populated area in the world.
Criticism is flowing out of Mexico City that the government had made worse natural disasters because of poor planning lack of prevention strategy and corruption. 101 folks dead from Ingrid and Manuel. 68 missing in La Pintada where soldiers continue digging after a landslide wiped out half of a town.
9-23- From his secluded location in Colorado RyDuck reports one and a half feet of snow in the high country.
The 8th victim is found dead after flooding in Colorado. A 79 year old woman whose house was washed away by the Big Thompson River was found dead on the river bank. Six folks are still unaccounted for.
9-24- Thieves use duct tape to keep 22 goats quiet when they stole them in Honolulu. These weren’t just any fucking goats mind you, they were pure breeds!
9-26- Severe Dust Storm alert this afternoon. Blowing dust closes fourteen miles of Maricopa Road from I-10 to Casa Blanca Road for three hours. Multiple collisions but fortunately no serious injuries.
Two javelina returned to the desert after a stroll through down town Casa Grande. They were roaming the streets for three hours. “They weren’t nosing into plants or anything. It was kind of like they were jogging.”
9-27- The body of an 81 year old Arizona man found eight miles downstream of his picup truck by hikers along the San Francisco River. The man was staying at an inn near the town of Reserve, New Mexico on September 14th when he was evacuated due to an impending flood. The flood sent a fifteen foot wall of water through town that swept away his truck.
E-coli found in Lyons, Colorado drinking water after the massive flood. It could be two to six months before the town is “livable.” Millions of gallons of sewage has been released around the state because of septic systems ad sewer lines torn out by flood water and flooded waste water treatment plants.
9-28- Rainbow Bridge National Monument reopened yesterday after flooding washed out 150’ of trail next to Lake Powell.
9-29- Forty two souls have drowned and two hundred missing from a ferry boat that broke up in stormy weather on the Niger River.
A nine month old pit bull who saved his family from an early morning fire is burned over 30% of his body but is expected to recover. At two in the morning he began barking so loudly that he awakened the family in time to get out of the upstairs bedrooms.
9-30- A confirmed rare tornado near Seattle this morning.
“Official” end to the monsoon season in Arizona today.
Eight to twelve inches of snow in some parts of Montana.
Before we conclude this month’s fantastic Blue Duck Weather we will leave you with the song of the month titled “Didn’t it Rain?” by the Kennedys.
Until next month remember Pioneers took bullets. Settlers took land.
Professor Mr Blue Duck
Monday, September 2, 2013
August 2013 Blue Duck Weather News
August 2013 Weather News! Sixth Anniversary Special Edition
Welcome my faithful readers. It is hard to believe this is already the sixth anniversary edition of Blue Duck Weather! Seventy two monthly installments of all the weather information worldwide and local that any serious weather geek needs. I especially want to thank the Lovely Mrs. Blueduck for placing my monthly scripts into a blog that has almost had 7,000 views from around the world. Every time I give her my computer to put all the nonsense together she lovingly rolls her eyes at me and gets the job done come rain, shine, hot or cold.
Those of you that have been reading this weather journal from the beginning know how it came about. It began as a simple exercise in accurately recording the daily average high and low temperatures month by month, year by year. Our intent was to supply accurate data for our little microscopic study on climate change. Eventually your fine staff at Blue Duck Weather began to add daily weather events locally, then nationally and then world wide. Ever changing to keep your interests peaked we decided to add animal articles and “human interest” stories as well. With enough said your fine staff has recorded the temperature data for the last six years and below you will find six years of average temperatures for The Land in the great south west desert and the Land in New Mexico at approximately 7400’ in elevation.
2008- 77.21 degrees and 48.33 degrees.
2009- 71.36 degrees and 49.65 degrees.
2010- 71.16 degrees and 48.25 degrees.
2011- 69.04 degrees and 50.43 degrees.
2012- 72.33 degrees and 51.35 degrees.
2013- 70.82 degrees and 49.18 degrees.
As you can see 2008 was by far the warmest on The Land. This year was actually the second coolest! Talking Trees and Antelope Hill was the third coolest.
Beginning with this anniversary edition the amount of rainfall on the Land in the last twelve months is included at no charge! 5.73’’ fell in the last twelve months. There is no doubt we are into about a fifteen year drought that some say may extend to one hundred years. I sincerely hope not as life will change drastically as we know it now.
And speaking of droughts. Some of you may have wondered why every month we include four of the most important lakes to the South West and Arizona for water needs and agriculture. It is important to be aware of the levels, especially in these prolonged years of drought. Following is piece of alarming news that was issued this month about one of the biggest lakes in the South West and the water needs of our future.
In the coming year releases from Lake Powell to Lake Mead will be cut 8.23 million acre feet to 7.48 million acre feet. An acre foot is 325,000 gallons, enough to supply two households for a year. Powell is at its lowest levels since the lake was filling in the 1960s.
Lake Mead will drop eight feet next year, reducing deliveries to farmers and “water banks.” One CAP official said “This is the worst 14 year drought period in the last 100 years.” Based on projections shortages could trigger a 20% decrease in Arizona deliveries to agriculture.
On that bleak note let’s get right to this special anniversary edition of Blue Duck Weather!
In this special anniversary edition of Blue Duck Weather find out about an
unlikely place to find a shark tooth, a tragic accident involving a python and two young boys, a place if you have a ten million dollar home you have private fire fighters and a fire engine on your insurance plan ( a definite case of the haves and have not’s), a dog in a Chinese zoo on display as a lion, more and more pot stoned dogs turning up in northern Arizona veterinary clinics, a woman in Tucson “attacked” by javelina, the massive Rim Fire burning near Yosemite, a man attacked by a crocodile never to be seen again and bear attacks on the rise again in the U.S.
The average temperature on The Land this month was 89.37 humid, sweltering degrees. Thankfully there were only ten days over 105 degrees and two days over 110 degrees. The average temperature at Talking Trees and Antelope Hill was 65.98 degrees.
The Land received 1.65 inches of rain for the month bringing the total to 4.46 inches for the year. Phoenix has had 4.74 inches, Glendale not so lucky with only 2.53 inches of rain.
Lake Mead is 47% full, Powell is 45% full, Pleasant 43% and Roosevelt 44%.
8-1- Havasupai water in the bottom of the Grand Canyon tested after flash flooding five days ago contaminated the water supply. St. Mary’s Food Bank has provided 30,000 bottles that had to be flown in by helicopter. The only other way to reach the village is on foot or by mule, an eight mile one way trek. Severe thunderstorms on the plateau caused Havasu Creek to rise fifteen feet above normal knocking out sewers. Dozens of tourists also stranded and the Red Cross has set up shelters.
One man killed and another injured helping to fight a forest fire in Oregon when a tree fell on them. They were private contractors known as tree fallers. They specialize in clearing trees to open paths for firefighters.
8-2- Flagstaff, Arizona ties a record set in 1919 for the wettest July with 7.58”!
An EF2 tornado has been confirmed in Jacksonville, Florida damaging 20 homes and tornadoes even reported in north east Colorado.
8-4- U.S 89 and 98 near Page, Arizona reopened after flash flooding two days ago.
Massive downpours of rain across Pakistan destroys 100 homes and caused a factory wall to collapse. 14 souls lost.
Millions of tiny fragments of plastic, some so small it takes a microscope to view them, found in the Great Lakes.
8-5- Flash flooding kills 58 in eastern provinces of Afghanistan with 30 missing.
8-6- A cool 80 degree high at The Land today with .18” of rain. (What a blissful and peaceful break from this oppressive summer.) The high in Phoenix was 92 degrees, and that was reported after midnight.
A young child trapped in a car that was swept away dies in flash floods near Waynesville, Missouri. Several water rescues and dozens of others forced out of their homes. Seven inches of rain from midnight to this morning!
A large wildfire burning near Athens, Greece with 49 others across the country. Some are cause by negligence such as open barbeques, industrial work or discarded cigarettes in hot, dry windy conditions.
A prehistoric shark tooth is found near the Village of Oak Creek in Arizona. The Devil Tooth shark tooth is 260 million years old and represents a time when a shallow ocean covered northern Arizona.
Dozens of Great Whites in Cape Cod feeding on seals. The seals are protected and thousands beach on the island. Fishermen say sharks aren’t the problem is all the fish the seals are eating. A recent sighting reported a 13,500 pound Great White!
8-7-State of Emergency in Missouri due to flooding. The Waynesville River crested at 21 feet, a new record. I-44 closed.
Torrential rain in Georgia this morning. Mudslides block traffic on Highway 5 in Gilmer County with 5’’ of rain.
New wildfire near Denning, California blows up to 2500 acres this afternoon.
Hurricane Henriette becomes the strongest storm of 2013 hurricane season with winds of 90mph. It is 1545 miles east of Hawaii.
A one hundred pound python strangles two young boys in Canada. It apparently escaped from its enclosure, crawled through a ventilation sytem and fell through the roof into the room the boys were sleeping in. The brothers were visiting a friend whose father ownes an exotic pet store on the floor below.
8-8- The Silver Fire near Banning California has blown up to 11,000 acres overnight. Four firefighters and one person burned severely. Fifteen homes have been damaged or destroyed. 2,000 evacuated and the fire is out of control.
The governor of Missouri calls on the National Guard for help with flooding. Fifteen inches of rain in two days! 25 rescues and 100 evacuations near Hollixer. Turkey Creek that runs through the center of town rose 15’.
In Nashville, 200 rescued by boat and eight inches of rain. South Kansas has received six inches of rain.
8-9- A “stalled front” from Oklahoma to West Virginia affects 17 states with days of saturating rain. 60 year old man swept away in Oklahoma City trying to rescue loved ones from a car. His body was found six blocks away. North Georgia, already saturated received 4-6” of rain last night.
The Silver Fire near Banning, California has burned 16,000 acres with 26 homes destroyed, 539 threatened. At times the wind driven fire speed has been 35mph. The fire is 25% contained. 100,000 acres have burned in California this year, doubled from this same time last year.
All time heat records in Austria and Hungary. 104 degrees in a heat wave that has lasted two weeks.
A quail observation from your fine editor at Blue Duck Weather News: Here it is in August and I have noticed many chicks scurrying about the desert. This seems odd as usually they are seen in late April and May. Is it the lack of rain and grass that has quail breeding so late in the season? I suspect so but I am glad to see them instead of nothing at all. The quail is a tough little bird and during hunting season even tougher to get a bead on.
8-10- “Without Warning.” Man’s body recovered from debris from a fast moving mudslide in Manitou Springs, Colorado. Crews searching for three others. Water rose 12’ above a creek bed.
Flood Advisory in Safford, Arizona with 1.5” of rain falling per hour.
The Silver Fire is 50% contained at 14,000 acres.
8-11- Flash Flood Warning issued for Tucson, Arizona. Some areas receiving two inches per hour.
A woman seen clinging to a tree on banks of a swollen creek is still unaccounted for from the flood in Manitou Springs, Colorado. One and a half inches of rain fell in 30 minutes. 40 vehicles have been towed out of mud and debris.
Utar, the most powerful Typhoon of 2013 strikes the Philippines with gusts up to 105mph. Nine fishermen are missing.
8-13- The Elk Complex Fire in Idaho has burned 125 square miles. It has been determined to have been caused by lightning.
A few miles south, residents of Pine have been evacuated. This fire has burned 190 square miles and is the Nation’s top priority fire.
A survivor of the Manitou Springs flood said a four foot wall of water swept through her house and pulled her to the bottom. After being swept out of her house with a broken foot and leg a block later she managed to grab a tree branch and pull herself up on an embankment.
Two inches or rain today and 65mph winds closes roads in Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
8-14- The Patch City Fire near the mountain resort of Park City, Utah has destroyed 10-15 structures. Sixteen square miles have burned.
8-15- Forty four wildfires are burning across 11 states. The Elk Complex Fire in Idaho has burned 111,977 acres.
The fifth named tropical storm of the season, Erin forms in the Atlantic.
8-16- 1600 homes are evacuated near the resort community of Pine Valley in Idaho. “Private insurers have dispatched their own crews to provide structural protection of homes valued in the tens of millions of dollars… there are private engines that companies have sent in.”
8-17- Excessive Heat Warning issued for the Phoenix area for the next three days. (Hell and bliss. Exactly the kind of heat to bring back the cooling monsoon rain hopefully.)
And all the South is getting is rain when they already have had enough. Wettest July on Record from New Orleans to Charlston, North Carolina. And now a “stalled front” is bringing more rain.
The Beaver Creek Fire near Todell County, Utah has burned 12,000 acres.
A twelve foot Arctic shark from Greenland has been caught in the warm Gulf waters. It is the first deep swimming shark to be caught in the Gulf. It was swimming at a depth of six thousand feet to try and stay cool. ( How the fuck do you “fish” in six thousand foot water? How would you feel a tug or even reel in six thousand feet of line? How would you even know where to fish? This makes my brain tired.)
8-17- 114 degree record in Phoenix today.
In central Idaho the Beaver Creek Fire has burned 100,000 acres, threatening the Sun Valley Ski Resort. It is only 6% contained.
8-18- The Skull Fire west of Prescott has burned 3,000 acres.
At 3:35 p.m. The Land received .35’’ of rain in twenty minutes! It may not seem like a big deal but that is a lot of rain quickly and the desert was flowing.
Thousands more in Idaho evacuated from the onslought of the Beaver Creek Fire. 150 square miles burned and 9% contained.
8-19- Major flooding in Manila and the Philippines and twelve million people have been placed on alert.
8-20- “West on Fire” reads the headlines. A Level 5 Decleration Alert is announced. It is the hightest level of preparedness.
Excessive Heat Warning issued for the Phoenix area until eight p.m. tomorrow.
Non stop rain cripples Manila. Half of the capital city is under water, 12,000 have been forced out of their homes and 94,000 affected.
8-21- Twenty one inches of rain fell in Manila in one day last Friday, a month’s worth of rain!
8-22- A fire has erupted fifteen miles from Yosemite National Park. The Rim Fire has burned 84 square miles, camp grounds evacuated and 2500 homes threatened. The fire thripled in size overnight and two homes have been destroyed.
Lightning kills two men in Kentucky trying to seek shelter in a barn.
Monsoon flooding in Pakistan kills 139 and one million others affected.
Flagstaff vet clinics are reporting stoned dogs from eating pot. They come in dazed and confuzed, shaking and falling asleep. They seem to be getting into their owner’s stash. It is becoming more and more common with two to three cases reported a month. Wild mushrooms are also a problem. ( I wonder if dogs hallucinate.)
8-23- 40 mph winds in Yuma, Arizona with hail and downed power lines.
Littleton, Colorado receives enough hail to break out the town’s snow plows.
The Rim Fire near Yosemite has blown up to 106,000 acres, growing four times overnight. Residents of Pine Mountain Lake are urged to evacuate. It is the top priority fire in the nation and Canada is sending in 5 Type 1 crews to help its neighbor.
8-24- A State of Emergency is declared in California as the Rim Fire threatens water and power supplies to San Francisco. It has grown to 125,000 acres and there is a smoky haze all the way to Reno, Nevada.
Tropical Storm Ivo is causing Flash Flood Watches in all of wester Arizona.
Slowest start to the hurricane season on record.
And from the Lovely Mrs. Blueduck: Six people have been mauled by bears in five states in the past week. In Yellowstone there have been 64% more attacks this year than last. *Watch out Joan.
8-25- Cool, cloudy high of 85 degrees on The Land. Bullhead City receives 1.77” of rain, Sedona 1.19”.
Teams are assigned to protect the massive Sequoias as the Rim Fire grows to 133,000 acres and is 7% contained.
Record breaking heat in the Midwest and some schools are closed. Inadequate or no air conditioning make classrooms unbearable.
Tidal bore waves injure thirty onlookers on the banks of a river in eastern China. They were gathered to see high tide on the Qiantang River. Due to the influence of Typhoon Tranni waves came inland over 21’ high.
A twenty four year old man is missing and presumed dead after being attacked by a sixteen foot long crocodile in Australia. He ignored warnings and went swimming in a river infested with crocs.
8-26- Severe Thunderstorm Warning issued for Pinal County with 40mph winds and hail reported south of Florence. Blowing Dust Warning for Maricopa and 52mph winds in Casa Grande.
Moisture from Tropical Storm Ivo drenches part of north Las Vegas and dumps three inches of rain in Clark County. There were 18 water rescues in Las Vegas alone.
The Rim Fire is the size of Chicago and can be seen from the Space Station.
Massive storm hit’s the Phoenix area, worst hit Tempe and Buckeye with 70mph winds. 80% of trees lost at Avondale Park. 62mph winds reported in Chandler.
8-27- At four thirty in the afternoon it began raining hard at The Land preceded by a wall of dust. Then hail the size of dimes to quarters began pounding the west wall of the house and sounded like it was going to break the windows. Violent winds blew off part of the porch roof. A shelf on the front porch with at least two hundred pounds of weight on it blew over and smashed to pieces. In twenty minutes we received over a half inch of rain. It let up in about an hour with .75’’ or rain. Yours truly is an official weather spotter so I called in my severe weather report to NOA with my official identification number. The poor Mrs. BlueDuck did not make it in because of flooding until after eleven that night.
Four thousand firefighters are on the Rim Fire. It is only 20% contained and has burned 179,480 acres.
Officer in Connecticut kills a montor lizard when a homeowner reported her chickens were being attacked. She thought it was an alligator. This lizard can grow up to five feet in length.
8-28- A baby dies after being left in a hot car in Scottsdale. The dad said he went into his place of employment for about an hour and forgot about the child. Later information came out that the “dad” was smoking pot with another person outside the eatery and bar where the dad worked. The “dad” has been arrested and jailed.
Two women in two days have died while rafting on the Ocoee River in Tennessee.
8-29- Flooding closes the Loop 303 in the west valley near Peoria this morning.
Tropical Storm Juliette is producing heavy rain and winds in Baja, California.
8-30- One inch of rain this afternoon near Black Canyon City and five miles of Arizona 74 is closed due to flooding near Lake Pleasant. Inch and a half of rain in east Mesa and Apache Junction.
The Rim Fire has burned 311,000 acres and is 30% contained. Yosemite however is open for business this Labor Day weekend. (Makes me sick!)
A Tucson woman is teated at a local hospital after “being attacked” by javelina when she was on an early morning walk with her dog. Apparently she saw the pigs eating out of a tipped over garbage can and fell when she tried to get away. The woman said as many as three of the pigs charged her. She suffered some cuts from the the fall and lacerations from the piggies but managed to get back home.
Game & Fish officials say it may have been her dog that provoked the attack. “Javelinas act instinctively to a dog’s presence because they don’t distinguish it from a coyote.”
8-31- Eight inches of hail in twenty minutes near Hay Springs, Nebraska! The area appeared to be covered in snow.
Hofefully in the year (s) to come the fine staff at Blue Duck Weather will be able to continue to bring you weather news as it breaks and we shall continue to earn your readership.
The perfect weather song for the month is “Thunderstorms and Neon Lights” by Hank 111.
Until next month remember Pioneers took bullets. Settlers took Land.
The Distinguished Quack MR Blue Duck
Sunday, August 4, 2013
July 2013 Blue Duck Weather News
July 2013 Weather News!
The Wind! April is the wind month for Arizona. But I have noticed the afternoons have been windy for months. Ten, fifteen and twenty mph wind gusts in the afternoons straight out of the west. Not winds that have anything to do with storms or the monsoon that is upon us but just gradients between low and high pressure systems moving through. I wish in my weather recordings I kept a closer eye on this so there would be a baseline to compare to but I haven’t. And it wouldn’t have mattered. Wind just doesn’t seem that important until it advances storms or causes damage when it becomes to strong or mixes with fire to cause death and destruction.
On June 29th I walked out of the nest in the late afternoon. The temperature was 115 degrees and the wind was blowing at about 20mph. It was like walking into a blast furnace. I immediately went to the east side of our house to get out of the wind. Doing that did no good in making me any cooler but the wind was just oppressive! Walking out of the nest in February when it is forty degrees with a 20 mph wind is cold, but being bundled up, getting out of the wind is more comfortable if not comforting. When I compare the two I would rather be able to get out of a cold wind than a hot one, especially for prolonged periods of time. But given the right conditions and too much time in the elements both can kill you.
The Winds! The next day I am sure it was the winds, first the hot dry winds from the west and then unexpected outflow of monsoon winds from the north and east colliding, and a fire that blew up in a matter of minutes that killed nineteen of the finest battling the fire on Yarnell Hill. The last text photo of one of the firefighters to his wife that afternoon showed part of the team to be in a safe distance and location from the fire. What happened in the following hours must have been a fire tornado that no math, education, training, radio contact, weather reports or safety protocol could have prevented. The fire became a living breathing monster with its own uncontrollable intentions.
That day, June 30th disaster struck after 4:00 p.m. for the nineteen men battling the Yarnell Fire. Between 4:00p.m. and 5:00 p.m. the winds shifted 180 degrees and nearly doubled in strength to 40 mph. The fire’s huge mushroom cloud collapsed on itself, sending smoke and heat into the canyon.
At 4:47 p.m. the Granite Mountain Hotshots deployed their emergency fire shelters received from a calm two way radio communication to a fire commander. These shelters look like large sleeping bags. Simply put they are placed on the ground cleared of immediate fire or hot embers and are opened partially away from the flames and heat. There is an air intake for cooler air near the ground. The shelters are built to deflect the heat and can withstand temperatures of 300 degrees. At 500 degrees they begin to melt. They have been mandatory personal protective equipment since 1977. One veteran firefighter later said “When you deploy these you either make it or you don’t.”
Some firefighters believe that a fire is a living, breathing animal. One firefighter said after the fire had taken these men it got what it wanted and would probably lay down. All of the men and women battling urban, forest or desert firefighters are soldiers. They have a bond and a brotherhood that cannot be comprehended for those of us who simply don’t understand what they go through on a “routine” basis. One of the fallen in the Yarnell fire had posted a prayer that Sunday morning before he went into the field. He simply asked God to protect them as they went into battle.
The men lost that day are the most first responders lost at one time since 9-11. They fought a good fight and deserve to rest in peace. Sleep peacefully soldiers.
For this month your staff at Blue Duck Weather will place the usual boring weather stats at the end of this weather journal. Let’s get right to the weather as it unfolds for the month of July and hope it ends not nearly as sadly as June.
7-1- At times yesterday the Yarnell Hill Fire was moving 22’ per second. It has blown up from 400 acres to over 8,000 acres in twenty four hours. It has been classified as a Type 1 fire and now the federal government is involved with fighting the fire. There is no estimate yet on the amount of homes and structures damaged or lost.
The Dean Peak Fire near Kingman has burned 1000 acres.
Death Valley, California reaches 129 degrees, an all time record for this date.
7-2- The Yarnell Hill Fire is 0 percent contained and fifty homes have been damaged or destroyed.
The Dean Park Fire has grown to 2500 acres with no containment.
.02” of rain at The Land. It doesn’t sound like much but we haven’t had a drop since April!
7-3- Estimate of homes damaged or destroyed in the Yarnell Hill Fire is 127. Folks will not be allowed to return to their homes for at least a week. Heavy rains have helped the cause and the fire is at 49% containment.
Mandatory evacuations as the Dean Peak Fire near Kingman has burned 4400 acres. It grew 1000 acres overnight.
There are three new wildfires burning in Oregon started by lightning. One fire has burned 30,000 acres. Campers at the Owyhee Dam were evacuated when the fire jumped the river below the dam.
The NWS has confirmed a tornado hit New Jersey two days ago. Extensive damage in Berkeley Heights.
7-4- With average dew points 55 degrees or higher for the third day the monsoon season began at The Land on July 2nd.
The Yarnell Hill Fire may be 85% contained by tonight.
The Dean Park Fire has blown up to 5400 acres.
Nearly one foot of hail falls in Santa Rosa, New Mexico, enough to bring out snow plows.
Ripcurrents in Florida and Georgia are so strong beaches are closed.
Twelve to twenty inches of rain falls in the Florida Pan Handle.
The Statue of Liberty is reopened today after being closed for repairs from Hurricane Sandy last October.
7-5- The Yarnell Hill Fire is 80% contained.
7-6- The Yarnell Hill Fire is 90% contained.
The Dean Park Fire is Fire is 37% contained at 5500 acres and 550 homes under mandatory evacuations.
7-7- Hopefully some of the Yarnell Hill Fire evacuees will return home tomorrow.
Dean Park Fire evacuation order lifted and the fire is 65% contained.
Storm damage last night in San Tan Valley, Arizona and a microburst has been confirmed.
1300 treated for heat related problems at a country music relief concert at the University of Oklahoma Stadium in Norman. 60,000 attended and when the concert began it 93 degrees.
What is defined as a Heat Wave in the East? Three consecutive days with temperatures in the 90s or higher. The NWS issues a heat advisory of parts of New York and Massachusetts with the heat and humidity index causing temperatures as high as 105 degrees.
7-8- Record high low of 91 degrees in Phoenix this morning.
7-9- The Shipman Fire near Kearney, Arizona started yesterday with two structures burned and evacuations. It started by the San Pedro River and has burned 500 acres.
A new out of control wildfire is burning in Southern California and has burned 8 structures.
7-10- 100 mountain cabins destroyed and 120 homes in peril in San Diego County from a masive wildfire.
Wildfire update for Arizona: The Doce Fire, human caused started on June 18th is 96% contained at 6,732 acres. The Yarnell Hill Fire, started on June 28th has burned 8400 acres and 90% contained. The Dean Park Fire, lightning caused began on June 29th is 90% contained at 5200 acres.
A Mesa, Arizona woman is dead after being struck in the head by a tree branch in high winds. She was sitting near a camp table playing cards with friends at the bottom of Supai Canyon, Grand Canyon.
Two major fires are raging in Nevada. One north of Las Vegas is within a quarter mile of homes. In northern Nevada 25,700 acres have burned in the Pine Nut Mountains south west of Reno.
Tropical Storm Chantal threatens Puerto Rico.
3.5’’ of rain in Toronto, Canada in as many hours. 1500 stranded in a commuter train. A month’s worth of rain in a matter of a few hours and 300,000 without power!
Worst flooding in westerrn China in 50 years. Landslide buries 40 people. A bridge collapses sending five vehicles into floow waters with twelve missing.
The hottest temperature on the planet was recorded 100 years ago in Death Valley, California at 134 degrees.
7-11- Death Valley Park rangers tell tourists to quit trying to fry eggs on the pavement and sidewalks. They are leaving sticky gooey messes that are difficult to cleanup and stink. (Who the fuck would want to go to Death Valley in July, or anytime for that matter?)
The fire near Vegas (I haven’t heard a name yet) destroys six structures at a desert ranch. Crews are trying to protect homes in Rainbow, Echo and Old Town areas.
Two and a half inches of rain causes a huge mudslide today that swept a car away and stranded 21 vehicles west of Manitou Springs in Colorado. U.S. Highway 24 closed for three hours. Thankfully there were no injuries. Flooding and erosion a result of the Waldo Canyon Fire last year and the Black Forest Fire this year.
Flooding in western China has destroyed a memorial to the 2008 Sichuan province that left 90,000 dead or missing from an earthquake.
An iceberg larger than Chicago broke free from Antarctica’s Pine Island Glacier two days ago and is now floating freely in the Amundsen Sea. It covers 278 square miles!
7-12- The wildfire near Vegas is the top priority fire in the United States as this is written.
THE YARNELL HILL FIRE IS 100 PERCENT CONTAINED!
A pregnant New Mexico woman and her husband watching fireworks on their front porch were struck by lightning in Albuquerque. She was just weeks from her due date. She was rushed to the hospital, an emergency Cesarian section was performed and mom, dad and baby are doing fine.
7-13- Charallete, North Carolina has had rain for twenty days in a row. (Why don’t you send some our way?)
There has been a rise in bear sightings that has closed Forest Road 171 just south of Arizona 260 in the Apache Sitgrieves National Forest. No road access allowed or “dispersed” camping until the area is cleared of bears. There have been no reports of bear attacks.
7-14- The 34th annual Calgary Folk Music Festival on July 25th-28th remains at its historical home, Prince’s Island Park after weeks of uncertainty due to significant damage from the great flood…..the island has been repaired and is ready.
7-15- Three inches of rain near Gila Bend, Arizona last night!
Pea sized hail near 30th St. and Chandler Blvd. Large trees are down, one inch of rain in a brief amount of time, new homes being built in the framing stage blown over with 45-55mph winds.
Just south of there, on the Gila Indian Reservation Rawhide will be shut down for repairs until August. Old wagons flipped over and the 150,000 square foot pavillion is blown apart.
Rare, high elevation tornado touched down near Pike’s Peak, Colorado at the 14,140’ summit. The highest elevation on record was photographed by a hiker in Sequoia National Park, California on July 7th, 2004 at 12,000’
7-16- A Heat Emergency is declared for 140 million people in the East. There are 90 degree sustained temperatures in 43 states. Low temps in some North East cities that won’t drop below 80 degrees. A huge heat dome is contributing to the misery and the heat/ humidity index will feel like 105 degrees in many places.
The NWS has confirmed winds that hit the Ahwautee area in Phoenix two nights ago exceeded 90mph.
Almost all of the buildings in the Yarnell Hill burn zone that had been adequately cleared with a “defensible space” survived the fire. Of 63, 60 were unscathed.
The Yarnell Hill Fire was more intense in speed than ever witnessed by Arizona firefighters. 22’ per second or 15 miles per hour.
14,200 monster of a fire in the San Jacinto Mountains of Southern California began two days ago. It blew up 50% overnight and is 10% contained. Six homes destroyed and mandatory evacuations for Camp Ronald McDonald, a camp for children with cancer. This fire is now a top priority blaze.
7-18- 6,000 forced to evacuate when the winds changed fire direction in Idyllwild, California. Residents, tourists, 22,000 homes and condos. The Mountain Fire has grown to 19,600 acres with almost 3,000 firefighters. Thirty miles of the Pacific Coast Trail that runs from Mexico to Canada destroyed. It is raining ash in Palm Springs. The cause of this fire is not known. (In 2006 five firefighters lost their lives fighting a blaze in Idyllwild.)
New heat records being set and emergency rooms are filling up in 24 states. One hundred degrees a new record in New York City. 50% of rescue calls in the Bronx are due to heat.
A man is found dead near Parker Canyon Lake in south eastern Arizona with two state protected rattlesnakes in his backpack. The two ridge nose rattlers were dead when the man was found. “It’s a very coveted rattlesnake on the Black Market. People are always trying to poach them out here. Autopsy reports are pending as to the cause of death. ( Yours truly has in the past had rattlesnakes in his backpack although they were not protected and I was not poaching. I was rabbit or bird hunting and had the “opportunity” to kill a few for skins. Even with the heads cut off it is a very uncomfortable feeling to have snakes squirming against my back.)
7-19- Three charged in heat death of migrant found in U-Haul truck with eight others at a gas station near Picacho Peak and Interstate 10 in Arizona. Charges include second degree murder in a human smuggling operation.
Flames from the Mountain Fire are within sight of Palm Springs, California. The air attack is going on twenty four hours a deay and the fire is 15% contained.
With the heat/humidity index it is 110 degrees in Washington, D.C.
7-20- Powerful thunderstorms beat up Los Vegas last night snapping trees and utility poles flooding part of the famous Strip. Peak wind gusts of 70mph and a new daily rainfall record of .22”. ( If this is a daily record one can certainly tell Vegas doesn’t get much rain. After all it is barren outside of the city, more like a bomb was dropped fifty years ago.)
Twenty three of New Jersey firefighters overcome with heat wave and heat exhaustion battling a huge structure fire. Heat is suspected in 13 deaths across the country.
The Heat Wave in the N.E. is in it’s 7th day from D.C. to Boston. 100,000 without power in Detroit to add to the misery. Thankfully the wind pattern is beginning to shift from east to west and cool air drops temps in Minnestota into the forties.
The Mountain Fire in California has gulped up 27,000 acres with 2,000 still evacuated in Idyllwild. The monster is 25% contained.
7-21- Drenching monsoon rain closes U.S. 60 in Tempe, Arizona in both directions at the Mill Avenue underpass. Water rescues for two men in Apache Junction and some areas report up to 2’’ of rain. And at The Land we received .48’’ of land with a tropical high of only 85 degrees.
The Carpenter Fire on Mount Charleston, Nevada ia 95% contained at 28,000 staggering acres.
7-22- Flash Flood Warning issued for Eloy, Arizona and they received 3’’ of rain! Yours truly was driving west of Eloy when rain came in from the west. It was raining so hard visibility dropped to a few feet, just as bad as dust or fog. I had to pull over when it was safe and wait about thirty minutes for the brunt of the storm to blow over. There was even a brief period of hail pounding the roof of my truck.
Idyllwild evacuations lifted as heavy rain helps fire conditions mercifully. Forty two fucking square miles have burned!
A farmer is suing the City of Chandler, Arizona claiming that an abundance of rabbits are eating his crops. He wants a fence built around a park. According to him four acres of his forty acres was damaged causing him about four thousand dollars. ( You know, air rifles don’t make any sound, I’m just saying.)
7-24- Baseball size hail in several counties in Kansas breaks out windshields.
7-25- And from the It’s your time file: A husband and his wife were killed by lightning at a highway scenic overlook along Arizona 89 A, eight miles south of Jacob’s Lake. A boy with them was struck but not killed.
A pregnant Maine woman and her friend got lost hiking in the woods and were rescued. But they died later that evening when they drove their car into the ocean in fog. They presumabley drowned when their car went down a boat ramp at the end of a dead end road.
A third hiker, this one from Arizona, dies at The Wave while exploring near the Arizona-Utah border. The three have died because of brutal heat in open arid country with no marked trails showing the way. Only twenty permits are issued per day. It seems to be okay until on the way out when people get lost and run out of water.
Tropical Storm Dorian gathering strenght in the Atlantic.
7-26- How hot is it? The Lovely Mrs. Blue Duck told me she had a bag of potatoes in her car. The potatoes in the sun were half baked when she took them out. (That beats the fucking frying an egg on the sidewalk worn out story all to hell.)
The incredibly massive wildfire still burning in the San Jacinto Mountains in California was sparked by failed electrical equipment on private property. According to the utility company it happened on the “customer’s side of the meter.” ( What this means is they take no responsibility at all.) The fire has burned 42 square miles and is 92% contained.
Tropical Storm Flossie may hit Hawaii.
7-27- Sate of Emergency declared in North Carolina after six to ten inches of rain has fallen.
Flood Alerts issued for Hawaii as Flossie is tracking to make a direct hit on the island.
7-28- 89mph winds and flash flooding in southern Utah.
5’’ of rain in Philadelphia. And the temps are coming down, get on your sweaters! Stanley, Iowa, 34 degrees. 41 degrees in Heron, South Dakota. It was warmer in Alaska yesterday than Chicago.
Flash Flood Warnings in northern Arizona. 7.15 inches of rain in Flagstaff this month. Six feet of rushing water in washes in Supai Village at the bottom of the Grand Canyon.
Tropical Storm Warning issued for Hawaii County and Maui County as Flossie gets ready for a greeting.
A swarm of about 30,000 bees attacks a Texas couple exercising their miniature horses. The woman was stung over 200 times ,the boyfriend 50 times, and the horses were stung so badly they died.
7-29- A tour bus on the way to Vegas yesterday swept by flooding as deep as eight feet and rolls on its side. The driver is credited for helping 33 passengers crawl out of windows with no injuries. The bus driver was suddenly hit by a wall of water crossing a paved wash, the bus stalled and floated three hundred yards before it rolled over. He may be a hero to the passengers but he may be charged with the “Stupid Motorist Law” for crossing a flooded wash.
An out of control wildfire is burning in Mallocra, Spain. It is a popular tourist destination. Seven hundred are evacuated.
Record all time daily rain of 8.26’’ in Philadelphia . Seven inches fell in four hours and all American Flights are cancelled.
7-30- Flossie is downgraded to a Tropical Depression but the Big Island is still expecting six inches of rain. This is the first Tropical Storm to make direct contact with Hawaii since 1958!
Tropical Storm Gil forms in the Mexican Baja.
Farms in the South East are receiving too much rain. In Fort Valley, Georgia crops are drowning. The largest peach crop in the nation has lost one thire of its peaches. The ground is too wet to cut wheat. Corn, tomatoes and peas are drowned.
An eleven year old boy hiking with his family fell down a 200’ sliding rock fall in Utah in Provo Canyon. He is recovering and will be released from a local hospital.
7-31- Anchorage broke a record for hitting highs above 70 degrees for the 14th straight day.
Before we give our final observation about the Tragedy on Yarnell Hill on June 30th that unfolded in details throughout the month of July please join me in my misery of a full blown summary of the monsoon moisture on the Land (and other boring stats.)
The average temperature on the Land for July was 91.60 degrees. (No wonder fucking electric bills are three hundred dollars a month!) The average humidity was 43.84 percent. The average dew point was 62.84 degrees, well into monsoon territory the entire month. The Land received some much needed rainfall to the tune of .74’’ bringing the total to 2.81’’ of rain for the year. There were four days it was over 110 degrees, eight days over 105, and eleven over 100.
Talking Trees and Antelope Hills in New Mexico usually runs about twenty degrees cooler than the Land but this month it was almost thirty degreees cooler with an average temperature of 64.48 degrees.
And what is Blue Duck weather without a mud puddle report for the lakes that effect Arizona and the “great” South West? Lake Mead is 47% full, Powell 47%, Pleasant 55% and Roosevelt 46%.
Almost every day this month there has been some kind of published report about the Yarnell Hill Fire, causes and speculations of the 19 brave young men that died. There was a beautiful and moving ceremonial and buriel for the crew. There have been relief concerts, donations and the kindness of Arizona and the world has shown through such a tragic time. The community of Yarnell has pulled together and will rebuild. The unity is incredible and even the most hard and untouched person has to have been touched.
Out of respect to the firefighters and the families, your fine staff at Blue Duck Weather did not give you day by day accounts of speculation by people or the media as to what happened or why. There are at least two major national and local investigations going on and the results will probably be posted in September. But does it matter for the boys, the families and the community? They will never get them back. I only hope the investigations help fire science, protcol and training to help future firefighters out of a terrible situation with no way out. The most basic conclusion is nature killed these men and no amount of science will ever tame her.
The most important long lasting tribute to these men was a proposal I read earlier this month. “The land where the firefighters died may be set aside for a permanent memorial. The State Land Comission has ordered 320 acres closed to public access. A fence has also been built around the site where the men died.” The only exception for access is for families of the fallen and other firefighters.
As I looked at photos of the American and Arizona flag on a pole at the site the ground is barren, the boulders surreal, the vegetation burnt away and I realized what would look like normally an easy hike became a boxed in inferno with no way out. But the thing that struck me the most profoundly, is it appears not to be that far off the road. Preserve that site for all to remember and feel for generations. It would be an honor to all soldiers of fire fighting.
I came across the following quote by total accident. It was unrelated to anything about the fire and tragedy I had read. But I thought how true and symbolic it was. “I can think of no more stirring symbol of man’s humanity to man than a fire engine.” Kurt Vonnegut.
As I conclude this month’s edition of Blue Duck Weather there are rain drops on my office window, there is no smell of wood smoke outside and there is no wind.
MR Blue Duck
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