The Petermann Glacier..[ 1619 ]

Ice Island calves off Petermann Glacier

Posted August 10, 2010

download large image (2 MB, JPEG) acquired August 5, 2010

download large image (2 MB, JPEG) acquired July 28, 2010

download Google Earth file (95 KB, KML) acquired July 28, 2010 - August 5, 2010

On August 5, 2010, an enormous chunk of ice, roughly 97 square miles (251 square kilometers) in size, broke off the Petermann Glacier along the northwestern coast of Greenland. The Canadian Ice Service detected the remote event within hours in near-real-time data from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite. 

The Petermann Glacier lost about one-quarter of its 70-kilometer- (40-mile-) long floating ice shelf, said researchers who analyzed the satellite data at the University of Delaware.

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite captured these natural-color images of Petermann Glacier 18:05 UTC on August 5, 2010 (top), and 17:15 UTC on July 28, 2010 (bottom). The August 5 image was acquired almost 10 hours after the Aqua observation that first recorded the event. By the time Terra took this image, skies were less cloudy than they had been earlier in the day, and the oblong iceberg had broken free of the glacier and moved a short distance down the fjord.

Icebergs calving off the Petermann Glacier are not unusual. Petermann Glacier’s floating ice tongue is the Northern Hemisphere’s largest, and it has occasionally calved large icebergs. The recently calved iceberg is the largest to form in the Arctic since 1962, said the University of Delaware.

The large iceberg breaking from the Petermann Glacier serves as a reminder that ice sheets are dynamic, says Robert Bindschadler, Senior Research Scientist at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. A glacier is like a relatively slow-moving river of ice. 

When a glacier flows into the ocean, as the Petermann Glacier does, ice breaks or calves from the end, creating new icebergs. “Calving is a natural process,” Bindschadler explains. How frequently icebergs calve from a glacier depends on how fast the glacier grows because of new snow, how fast it flows into the ocean, and how fast it melts.

“Changes in calving will happen as climate changes because the environment changes,” says Bindschadler. Ice breaking from the Petermann Glacier doesn’t necessarily herald big changes on the Greenland ice sheet, he adds, but it does provide one more piece of data to help scientists understand how the ice sheet is changing as a whole.

The event is also a reminder of the usefulness of satellites in monitoring our planet’s health. “We know what the ice sheets are doing because the satellites provide us with the data,” Bindschadler observes.

1. 
   

   References

2. Scott, M. (2008, September 12). Crack in the Peterman Glacier. NASA’s Earth Observatory. Accessed August 9, 2010.
3. University of Delaware. (2010, August 6). Greenland glacier calved island 4 times the size of Manhattan, UD scientist reports. Accessed August 9, 2010.

NASA Earth Observatory image created by Jesse Allen and Robert Simmon, using data obtained from the Goddard Level 1 and Atmospheric Archive and Distribution System (LAADS). Caption by Holli Riebeek and Michon Scott.

Instrument: Terra - MODIS

Himalayan flash floods..[ 1618 ]

European citizens among those dead in Himalayan flash floods

Three French citizens as well as two more Europeans are reported to have died in flash floods on Friday in north India, officials said on Tuesday. In total, at least 177 people are confirmed dead and authorities expect to find more casualties.

By News Wires (text)

AFP -(France 24) Latest update: 10/08/2010 

 Five European tourists, including three French nationals, were among 177 people killed in huge floods in the Himalayan region of Ladakh, an Indian official said Tuesday.
  
Hundreds of people are also missing after sudden rains caused flash floods Friday that swept away roads, houses, bridges and power cables.
  
"I can confirm to you that five foreign (European) tourists are among the dead," Aamir Ali, a government disaster management official, told AFP, adding the other two European victims were Spanish and Italian.
  
They are the first known European deaths in the disaster in the remote region popular as an adventure sports destination.
  
Other foreigners among the dead were 16 Nepali labourers and one Tibetan refugee.
  
Nearby Indian Kashmir is in the grip of a Muslim insurgency but Buddhist-dominated Ladakh with its mountains, rivers and monasteries has not been touched by unrest and is popular with tourists.
  
The announcement of the latest deaths came as soldiers and emergency relief teams sifted through flattened homes in the search for bodies in Leh, the region's main town.
  
"Some 150 bodies have been identified and their cremation and burials are on," a police officer in Leh said, asking not to be named. "We are taking photographs of 15 bodies which have not been identified to keep a record."
  
The police officer said rescuers feared hundreds more people may have died after being swept away or buried by waves of rock and mud.
  
An army statement said work has focused on the swamped village of Choglamsar on the outskirts of Leh, but progress in recovering bodies has been slow.
  
Among those feared dead are 26 Indian soldiers stationed at a small army post on the de facto border with Pakistan.
  
The Indian air force has been flying in aid, doctors and engineers to Ladakh.
  
Officials in Srinagar, the summer capital of Indian Kashmir, said most of Leh's electricity supply should be restored by the end of Tuesday as the area struggles to get back to normality.
  
Roads are blocked due to landslides and officials said it would take at least one more week to restore the Srinagar-Leh route as army engineers repair bridges and damaged stretches of road.
  
Ladakh is a highly militarised area because of border disputes with both Pakistan and China.
  
Leh, situated in an arid mountain desert at an altitude of 3,505 metres (11,500 feet), receives virtually no rainfall all year and has no planned drainage system.
  
The floods came as neighbouring Pakistan suffered the worst flooding in its history with 14 million people affected and at least 1,600 people killed.

Monte Carlo flat..[ 1617 ]

Polemics over Monte Carlo flat rumble on

 

(ANSA) 10 August, 2010., 18:40

(ANSA) - Rome, August 10 - Polemics over a judicial probe on the sale of an apartment in Monte Carlo willed to the right-wing party which House 

Speaker Gianfranco Fini merged into premier Silvio Berlusconi's People of Freedom (PdL) party flared on Tuesday after a newspaper began collecting a petition for his resignation.

Il Giornale, a daily owned by Berlusconi's brother Paolo, urged readers to send in "waves of signatures and send Fini home".

Rome prosecutors began their probe last week after two ex members of Fini's old National Alliance (AN), now with a rival rightist formation, filed a formal complaint on suspected fraud charges.

According to Il Giornale, the flat, in a swank area of Monte Carlo, was allegedly sold at a knockdown price to an offshore company which then sold it to another offshore company and then to a third which now rents it to the brother of Fini's partner Elisabetta Tulliani.

Fini has sued the paper for libel, saying the allegations are false and defamatory.

On Sunday he offered a detailed eight-point explanation of the deal, rejecting accusations of wrongdoing launched by political rivals, including former AN aides and PdL MPs.

Fini, once widely expected to become Berlusconi's political heir, distanced himself from the premier on a number of issues shortly after their PdL party swept into power in the 2008 general elections.

After months of acrimonious exchanges, Berlusconi threw Fini out of the party two weeks ago.

The Speaker immediately formed a breakaway parliamentary group - Future and Freedom for Italy (FLI) - depriving the government of a majority in the House and raising the spectre of early elections.

In his written statement, Fini stressed that in nearly 30 years of parliamentary activity he had never had problems with the judiciary, a direct jab to Berlusconi who has been beset with court cases since his entry into politics in 1994.

"I have absolutely nothing to hide or to fear over this Monte Carlo story," Fini said.

The Speaker said the flat was in dire need of renovation and had been sold by AN for 300,000 euros in 2008 after Giancarlo Tulliani - the brother of Fini's partner Elisabetta Tulliani - told him that he knew a company willing to buy it.

Fini said he was surprised and disappointed when he later learned from his partner that her brother Giancarlo was renting the flat.

The speaker said he felt obliged to present his side of the story because the pro-Berlusconi papers have been waging an "obsessive campaign" against him.

On Tuesday, Il Giornale said its newsrooms were being swamped with e-mails, faxes, letters and cell phone text messages urging Fini to go.

In a front-page editorial, the paper's editor-in-chief Vittorio Feltri, also said early elections were inevitable because Fini's FLI group will break with the Berlusconi government once parliament reconvenes in September.

Other dailies, including Italy's leading Corriere della Sera, have been devoting front-page attention to the story since the judicial probe began last week.

Critics, including the leader of the opposition Italy of Values party, former graft-busting magistrate Antonio Di Pietro, say Fini's explanations have come too late and are not sufficient.

But FLI MPs are sticking to Speaker's side and urging critics to wait for the end of the judicial probe.

photo: Monte Carlo condo.

Andes,,Bolivians protest for two weeks.....[ 1616 ]

Bolivian protesters cut off town from world for two weeks

Protesters' blockade of the Bolivian town of Potosi drew an angry reaction Monday from standed bus passengers.

By the CNN Wire Staff

August 10, 2010 -- Updated 1852 GMT (0252 HKT)

(CNN) -- Bolivia's president wants a peaceful solution to a two-week-old protest by residents of a remote Andean city who have cut off all roads, train and air traffic with the rest of the world, a government spokesman said Tuesday.

About 6,000 of the 16,000 residents in Potosi, in southwestern Bolivia, have mounted the blockade. They say President Evo Morales has abandoned them after they supported his presidential bid four years ago. The protesters have blocked all the roads into town, as well as the rail line to neighboring Chile. On Saturday, the villagers also closed down the airport.

Some protesters also launched a hunger strike, which has been joined by Potosi Province Governor Felix Gonzalez and other officials as well as union leaders.

Presidential spokesman Ivan Canelas said Tuesday the government has no intention of mounting a military operation to end the blockade and urged protesters to come to the negotiating table.

The protesters "should put aside their intransigence, end their pressure tactics and partake in dialog as the best path to solve the region's demands," Canelas said at a news conference. "Thousands of children are harmed because schools are closed, as are the health centers and the food markets."

More than 100 foreign tourists are believed trapped in the area, news reports said.

The leftist Morales, who is indigenous, relied on a broad base of support among indigenous people and the poor -- nearly always one and the same in Bolivia -- for his election victory.

Whites in Bolivia account for only 15 percent of the population, according to the CIA World Factbook. About 30 percent of the population is Quechua and another 25 percent are Aymara, both indigenous groups. Meztizos, who are of mixed white and indigenous ancestry, account for 30 percent of the population.

Chaves and Santos to meet..[ 1615 ]

Venezuelan and Colombian presidents to meet

 

Juan Manuel Santos was heavily criticised by Hugo Chavez when he was Colombia's defence minister

BBC 10 August 2010 Last updated at 16:49 GMT

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is to meet his new Colombian counterpart, Juan Manuel Santos, to discuss re-establishing diplomatic relations.

Mr Chavez will travel to the Colombian city of Santa Marta for the talks.

He broke off relations last month after the Colombian government said it had evidence that 1,500 left-wing rebels were operating inside Venezuela.

But after Mr Santos' inauguration on Saturday, the Venezuelan leader said he would like to meet him "face-to-face".

Click for more :  Chavez and Santos to hold talks