Jennifer Marohasy

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Super Typhoon Haiyan Strongest in Recorded History?

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THE US Navy’s Joint Typhoon Warning Center, using satellite analysis to estimate wind speeds, has claimed that Typhoon Haiyan, that hit the east coast of Samar in the Phillipines on November 8, 2013 is one of the strongest storms in recorded history.

According to the New York Times [1]:

Before the typhoon made landfall, some international forecasters were estimating wind speeds at 195 m.p.h., which would have meant the storm would hit with winds among the strongest recorded. But local forecasters later disputed those estimates. “Some of the reports of wind speeds were exaggerated,” Mr. Paciente said.

The Philippine weather agency measured winds on the eastern edge of the country at about 150 m.p.h., he said, with some tracking stations recording speeds as low as 100 m.p.h.

The United States Navy’s Joint Typhoon Warning Center used satellite analysis to estimate sustained winds at 195 m.p.h., with gusts up to 235 m.p.h., but that measured the center of the storm when it was over the ocean.

“As far as satellite imagery was concerned, it indicated that this was one of the strongest storms on record,” said Roger Edson, the science and operations officer at the United States National Weather Service in Guam.

He said 195 m.p.h. winds would put the storm “off the charts,” but he acknowledged that satellite estimates require further study on the ground to determine if they were accurate.

I can’t find information on the sea level pressure recorded for Typhoon Haiyan.

Guiuan, Samar

Typhoon Tip had been considered the largest and most intense tropical storm ever recorded with a worldwide record-low sea level pressure of 870 mbar and peak winds of 190 mph (305 km/h) on October 12, 1979. It was also the largest storm ever recorded with a wind diameter of 2,220 km (1,380 miles) [2]. US Air Force aircraft flew 60 weather reconnaissance missions into this typhoon.

The deadliest storm in recorded history is known as Great Boha hitting Bangladesh on November 12, 1970. This cyclone sustained a record high 40-foot storm surge and killed 300,000 to 500,000 people [3].

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1. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/09/world/asia/powerful-typhoon-causes-mass-disruption-in-philippines.html?smid=tw-share&_r=0
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typhoon_Tip
3. http://www.wunderground.com/blog/weatherhistorian/comment.html?entrynum=204

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Postgraduate Research Opportunity

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INFLUENTIAL, but seriously flawed research suggesting agricultural pesticides killed mature stands of mangroves at Mackay in Queensland was based on experiments with mangrove seedlings that were dosed with concentrations of Diuron orders of magnitude higher than anything found in waterways.

Seedling were used because it was claimed that it was impossible to grow mature mangrove plants under controlled conditions, and because of the urgency of proving a causal connection between agriculture and damage to the Great Barrier Reef high concentrations were applied.

In April 2011, with funding from the B. Macfie Family Foundation, and a permit from the Department of Fisheries, John Abbot and I oversaw the excavation (with a 10 tonne excavator) of 10 mature mangrove plants from the Koorana Crocodile Park on the Capricorn Coast. Eight of the 10 plants survived. In fact the eight have thrived under our cultivation system that includes an irrigation system that simulates diurnal tidal inundation of the large containers with the mangroves.

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Against Collective Integration: Carl Jung

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In his review of the book ‘The Undiscovered Self’ by the psychiatrist and philosopher Carl JungCarl Jung, Maxwell Cynn suggests that:

“Dr. Jung noted that whenever individuals are pressed into a group an averaging effect occurs and part of the individual Self is sacrificed in order to fit-in to the norm of the group. We stop thinking in terms of Self and the group becomes our personae. The larger the group the more the individual suffers. He pointed to the Iron Curtain as a physical manifestation and symbol of a psychic schism within mankind.

He also warned that the freedom-loving West was not immune to the psychic infection of the communist Eastern Block, but rather more susceptible because of our free and open-minded societies. The fall of the Iron Curtain in modern times did not symbolize an end to the schism Jung described, but more ominously the acceptance in the West of collective ideals.

Jung’s words ring soundly today in our modern electronic society of larger groups, stronger connections, greater integration, and socio-political correctness. Our nationalism has turned to internationalism and our group has become global. Individualism is under greater assault today than at any point in history–Jung’s words live on in an almost prophetic sense. The Self continues to drown in a sea of collectivism.”

Ive been reading ‘The Undiscovered Self’ on my iPhone via Questia.com.

Hazard Reduction, Only Proven Bushfire Management Tool

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The Volunteer Firefighters Association (VFFA), the body representing the Voice of Volunteer Rural Firefighters in New South Wales, refutes the claim by green alarmists that climate change is the cause of the recent bushfires in New South Wales.VFFA Truck

“It’s ridiculous to blame climate change when we know there has been far worse bushfires stretching back to the earliest days of European settlement in Australia including the Black Saturday Victoria 2009, NSW Bushfires 1994, Ash Wednesday Victoria 1983, Blue Mountains NSW 1968, Black Tuesday Hobart 1967 and Black Friday Victoria 1939,” said Peter Cannon, President of the VFFA.

The VFFA is angered by comments from the green lobby groups that tackling climate change was more important than prescribed burning of forest fuels to reduce bushfire risk. The real blame rests with the greens and their ideology as they continue to oppose and undermine our efforts to conduct hazard reduction in the cooler months and to prevent private landowners from clearing their lands to reduce bushfire risk.

Hazard reduction is the only proven management tool rural firefighters have to reduce the intensity and spread of bushfires and this has been recognised in numerous bushfire enquires since the Stretton enquiry into the 1939 Victorian bushfires.

“The amount of ‘green tape’ we have to go through to get a burn approved is beyond frustrating,” says Peter Cannon.

The VFFA is calling on the NSW State Government to reduce the amount of green tape involved in planning and conducting hazard reductions, so that our Volunteer Firefighters can get on with the job of conducting fire prevention works in the cooler months to prevent the inevitable summer bushfire disasters that are now becoming a more regular feature.

The NSW State Government must also provide sufficient funding for bushfire hazard reduction works on a planned and sustained basis, including the creation of asset protection zones and upgrades of all fire trails in high bushfire risk areas.

“Remember that it’s far more cost effective, say around 66 to 100 times more cost efficient, to prevent wild fires through hazard reduction than it is to have reactionary fire response, which is what we have at the moment. With the great number of lost homes and decreasing property values through these wild fires, what then will the total fiscal amount be… when it could have all been prevented by effective Hazard reduction.”

Mr Cannon says, “The area treated by prescribed burning on bushfire prone lands needs to be increased from the current level of less than 1% per annum to a minimum of 5% per annum, as recommended by the Victorian Royal Commission and many leading bushfire experts.”

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This is a media release from the VFFA made on October, 30, 2013.

Bushfire Management in Australian Forests: A Note from Roger Underwood

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THERE is an old saying that one of the greatest of human failings is the inability to learn from the mistakes of others. One example is that of my 2-year old grandson who, despite being warned, could not resist testing the heat of the stove, and got his fingers burned. I have noted an identical situation in the attempts at bushfire management by Australia’s new generation of forest managers.

Yet while the new managers have suffered a lot of burned fingers over the last ten years, strangely they do not seem to be learning from it. There are three simple lessons which could be learned: First, the current approach to bushfire management is not working. Second, the current approach has been tried before and it didn’t work then either. And third, there are still a lot of people around who know all this, from whose first-hand experience much could be learned. [Read more…] about Bushfire Management in Australian Forests: A Note from Roger Underwood

The Nature of Inclusive Climate Science

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Not so long ago, the United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC, released a report about how it is now hotter, and that there is a 95% chance this has been caused by human activity.

This key finding was from just part 1 of a 3-part report. Part 2, is probably more relevant to those on the land as it will discuss “impacts” including how changes in temperature are likely to affect rainfall. Part 2 is not due for release until March 2014. Red gums flooding

But it is possible to get a sneak peek by reading some of the peer-reviewed papers that will contribute to the second report. According to one of these by a team from the Centre for Australian Weather and Climate Research, CAWCR, which is a partnership between the Bureau of Meteorology and CSIRO, there may be an overall 1.8% decline in rainfall in the Murray Darling Basin [1].

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