"Businesses in Napa reach out to tourists after quake" by Ellen Knickmeyer | Associated Press August 26, 2014
NAPA, Calif. — A day after an earthquake caused at least $1 billion in damage to about 150 homes and businesses in California’s wine capital, workers Monday were cleaning up the debris, mopping up thousands of dollars in high-end vintages, and struggling to reopen in advance of the summer’s last holiday weekend.
Bill Dodd, Napa County supervisor, said if people ‘‘think Napa is devastated, it’s anything but devastated. We’re only 24 hours out from an earthquake, and we’re on our way back.’’
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Must be why print coverage was dropped.
"CLEARING A PATH -- A broken mirror reflected a sanitation worker shifting damaged household items left for disposal Tuesday at a school in Napa, Calif., where several aftershocks from Monday's 6.0 earthquake were recorded. At least 200 people were injured in the initial quake, officials said, and the damage toll is expected to top $1 billion (Boston Globe August 27 2014)."
Related: After missteps, Dunkin’ Donuts set for California expansion
A different path.
"Expert calls for nuclear plant closure" Associated Press August 26, 2014
LOS ANGELES — A senior federal nuclear expert is urging regulators to shut down California’s last operating nuclear plant until they can determine whether the facility’s twin reactors can withstand powerful shaking from any one of several nearby earthquake faults.
Michael Peck, who for five years was Diablo Canyon’s lead on-site inspector, says in a 42-page, confidential report that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is not applying the safety rules it set out for the plant’s operation.
The document, which was obtained and verified by the Associated Press, does not assert that the plant itself is unsafe.
Instead, according to Peck’s analysis, no one knows whether the facility’s key equipment can withstand strong shaking from those faults — the potential for which was realized decades after the facility was built.
Maybe we should have thought through nuclear power a bit more back when, huh?
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"Suspect held in deadly California shooting spree | Associated Press August 26, 2014
LOS ANGELES — A man who was detained as a person of interest in a series of apparently random shootings that killed three people in suburban Los Angeles was booked on animal-cruelty charges Monday as detectives worked to link him to the three homicides, a police spokesman said.
Alexander Hernandez, 34, of Sylmar, was being held in lieu of $1 million bail on the animal-cruelty case, but he has not been charged with the shootings that killed two women and one man on Sunday and injured four others, Los Angeles police spokesman Bruce Borihanh said.
The dogs were killed Saturday, and the person who shot them drove a vehicle similar to the one witnesses described at two of the three crime scenes on Sunday, a tan or gold-colored SUV with tinted windows. The weapon used, a shotgun, was also the same, police said.
Police have not released the victims’ names because relatives are still being notified.
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Related: Globe Confirms Cool Weather
And yet two days later I see this?
"Emissions Swamp Efforts on Warming, U.N. Draft Report Says" by Justin Gillis | New York Times August 27, 2014
NEW YORK — The world may already be nearing a temperature at which the loss of the vast ice sheet covering Greenland would become inevitable, the report said. The actual melting would then take centuries, but it would be unstoppable....
I won't be here to tell them what liars they are.]
Related:
Greenland's surface gained 300 billion tons of ice over the past year
Satellite data shows that Arctic sea ice is getting thicker
Global Warmers Tied Up in Knots
Forgot that, did you?
Remember when they said the glaciers would be gone by now?
The report was drafted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a body of scientists and other specialists appointed by the United Nations that periodically reviews and summarizes climate research. It is not final and could change substantially before release.
Is there anyone on planet Earth that still believes the IPCC?
The report, intended to summarize and restate a string of earlier reports about climate change released over the past year, is set to be unveiled in early November, after an intensive editing session in Copenhagen. A late draft was sent to the world’s governments for review this week, and a copy of that version was obtained by The New York Times.
In other words, the report is nothing but reheated bullshit -- and the New York Times featured it! OMG!
Using blunter, more forceful language than the reports that underpin it, the new draft highlights an urgency that is likely to intensify as emissions of heat-trapping gases, primarily carbon dioxide released by the burning of such fossil fuels as coal, oil, and natural gas, continue.
Then STOP the WARS!!!!
Related: Fart-Misting Fudge-Packers
Does the truth need to be manipulated in such a stinky way?
The report found that companies and governments had identified reserves of these fuels at least four times larger than could safely be burned if global warming is to be kept to a tolerable level.
That means if society wants to limit the risks to future generations, it must find the discipline to leave the vast majority of these valuable fuels in the ground, the report said.
With fracking the savior of AmeriKa's energy future? Good luck with that one!
It cited political efforts around the world on climate change, including efforts to limit emissions as well as to adapt to changes that have become inevitable. But the report found that these efforts were being overwhelmed by construction of such facilities as coal-burning power plants that will lock in high emissions for decades.
The draft report did find that efforts to counter climate change are gathering force at the regional and local level in many countries. This is especially clear in the United States, where Congress is paralyzed and the national government has effectively ceded leadership on climate to states, particularly California, New York, and Massachusetts.
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The result of global warming:
"Monster waves pummel Calif. coast" Associated Press August 29, 2014
LOS ANGELES — High surf generated by a storm in the eastern Pacific rolled onto Southern California beaches again Thursday, showing signs of diminishing but still bringing warnings of possible property damage and dangerous rip currents.
Big breakers chewed away at beaches and provided thrills for surfers, body-boarders, and shoreline crowds.
However, meteorologists said the conditions had peaked and would gradually subside through Friday, with high surf advisories expected to expire that evening.
Tropical Storm Marie, downgraded from hurricane status, was spinning more than 800 miles west of Punta Eugenia, Mexico, and was expected to be further downgraded to post-tropical cyclone status Thursday night, according to the US National Hurricane Center.
The storm was moving toward the northwest at about 15 miles per hour, with maximum sustained winds dropping to 45 miles per hour.
Surging surf arrived on the Southern California coast late Tuesday and was wildest on Wednesday. Blocks of oceanfront homes flooded in low-lying Seal Beach south of Los Angeles, pilings were knocked off the Malibu Pier, and a boatyard on Santa Catalina Island was battered.
Warnings or advisories were posted for hundreds of miles of coastline. The National Weather Service called it the region’s most significant southerly swell event since July of 1996.
Lifeguards worked to keep all but the most experienced surfers and swimmers out of the water but still made hundreds of rescues.
Beaches were left with deep gouges and abrupt drop-offs more typical of the aftermath of winter storms than summer.
At scenic Sycamore Cove below the rugged Santa Monica Mountains, waves on Thursday gradually stole remnants of an old lifeguard building known as the Cove House, which had collapsed into the surf overnight.
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NEXT DAY UPDATES:
"Two years after Sandy, Jersey shore on the rise" by Wayne Parry | Associated Press August 30, 2014
BELMAR, N.J. — Good weather and greater awareness that the Jersey shore has made huge strides in recovering from Hurricane Sandy helped make the second summer after the storm better than the first one, many merchants and elected officials say.
Some business owners report profits up 20 to 30 percent this summer compared with last year, when the shore was in the early stages of recovering from the 2012 storm.
‘‘This summer was great,’’ said Matt Riccelli, who manages Gee Gee’s restaurants on the Manasquan beachfront.
Riccelli said his business was up 20 percent this summer from last, when it was still rebuilding and the beach was much narrower before a replenishment project. Weekend weather was mostly sunny. But he and others said the biggest factor was getting past images of Sandy’s destruction.
‘‘Sandy is a memory at this point,’’ Riccelli said....
Let Gelman(!) cook you up something.
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Also see: Researchers find harmful ozone in Colorado mountains
Uh-oh, smug alert.
