Archive for September, 2008

Experiment boosts hopes for space solar power

Phoenix Mars Lander catches whirlwinds as they zip past camera

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A former NASA scientist has used radio waves to transmit solar power a distance of 92 miles (148 km) between two Hawaiian islands, an achievement that he says proves the technology exists to beam solar power from satellites back to Earth.

John C. Mankins demonstrated the solar power transmission for the Discovery Channel, which paid for the four month experiment and will broadcast the results Friday at 9 p.m. EDT. His vision is to transmit solar power collected by orbiting satellites as large as 1,102 pounds (500 kg) to lake-sized receiver stations on Earth.

Mankins, who worked at NASA for 25 years and managed the agency’s space-based solar program before it was disbanded, transmitted 20 watts of power between the two islands in may. The receivers, however, were so small that less than one one-thousandth of a percent of the power was received, Mankins said.

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The experiment cost about $1 million, and Mankins said larger arrays could be constructed with more money.

Each of the nine solar panels used was built to transmit about 20 watts of power, but the transmission was scaled back to two watts per panel in order to obtain U.S. Federal Aviation Administration approval for the test.

Despite the miniscule reception on the receiving end, Mankins said the ground-based test proved it is possible to transmit solar power through the atmosphere.

“The test was in no way fully successful,” he said. “I think it showed it is possible to transmit solar power quickly and affordably.”

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September 13th, 2008 at 11:29 am

Posted in Science news

Study finds current global warming unprecedented in 1,300 years (McClatchy Newspapers)

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WASHINGTON — A new scientific study adds evidence that temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere fluctuated a bit over time, but that the sharp increase during the past few decades is bigger than anything in at least 1,300 years.

The report was published Tuesday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences . Its conclusion is that temperature increased and decreased a little over the centuries, but the fluctuations were small enough that the line was roughly flat, like the shaft of a horizontal hockey stick. Then, from about 1980 to now, temperature increased sharply, more than any increase before — like the blade of the hockey stick.

For the past 10 years, climate-change skeptics have been calling the hockey stick bogus. Now the scientists who studied the climate record and produced the original hockey-stick graph have done a new study using more data from more sources — and they got the same pattern.

The new study "establishes further evidence that the recent warming isn't just part of a typical cycle," said climatologist Michael Mann , director of the Earth System Science Center at Pennsylvania State University .

"Of course, this alone doesn't establish the cause of that warming — that it must be due to human influences," Mann said. That's left to other scientific studies of the climate.

Forces of nature — changes in the output of the sun's energy and volcanic eruptions — and random variation explain the changes in climate before industrial times, Mann said. But only if human factors are taken into account — particularly the production of long-lasting, heat-trapping gases from burning fossil fuels — can scientists explain the unusually high recent temperature increase, he said.

Mann's group's study collected additional data for the centuries before the mid-19th century, when scientists began recording temperatures.

Their previous study depended on tree rings, and some critics said it was not a reliable way to reconstruct past climate over a long period. Mann said that while it's not always true that tree rings aren't reliable, his team decided to conduct a new study that didn't depend on them.

They took data from other natural sources of clues about past climate — corals, ice cores and lake and cave sediments.

"We found we got more or less the same answer," Mann said. The recent temperature increase is an anomaly over 1,300 years without using tree rings, and for 1,700 years if the tree-ring data are used, the study found.

Scientists have observed a warming of about 0.8 degrees Celsius during the past century. Mann said there was a burst of about 0.3 degrees from about 1900 to 1950. Then, in the 1950s to 1970s, temperatures were flat or showed a slight cooling, because heavy particle pollution, which has a cooling effect, masked the heating effect of greenhouse gases, Mann said.

Another, larger increase of temperature has been recorded in the past 30 years, he said, due largely to the increase of greenhouse gases. Particle pollution was reduced as a result of clean-air laws in the U.S. and other countries.

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Earth System Science Center at Penn State

Group: Global warming could cost Ohio its buckeyes (AP)

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It’s not the best-researched global-warming theory, but it could be the most horrifying to certain fans of college football: Environmentalists said Friday that climate change might push the growing range of Ohio’s iconic buckeye tree out of the state, leaving it for archrival Michigan.

Save The Buckeye, a coalition of environmental activists and outdoor enthusiasts, has a billboard in Columbus warning about the fate of the buckeye tree, and backers plan to hold rallies during football tailgating events. They’re hoping to channel Ohio pride into environmental awareness and action.

“People had thought of global warming as something far away, affecting polar bears,” said Tom Bullock, an advocate for the Pew Environment Group in Ohio. “If we don’t get started now we will reduce the opportunity to reduce global warming and curb its worst effects.”

The billboard next to the Buckeye Hall of Fame and Cafe and along a highway near Ohio Stadium says: “Michigan Buckeye? Global Warming is Sending Ohio’s Buckeye North.”

Although found in other parts of the Midwest, the buckeye tree is the official state tree of Ohio, and the buckeye nut provided the name for sports teams at Ohio State University, whose football rival is the University of Michigan. The brown nut’s lighter circular “eye,” resembling the eye of a buck deer, gave the tree its name.

The coalition doesn’t have any evidence that the buckeye’s range has been pushed north but says global warming threatens to make that happen.

David Lytle, chief of the Division of Forestry in the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, said the campaign has merit because it calls attention to important ecological issues.

“I think it’s a lighthearted way of addressing a serious subject,” he said.

Lytle said healthy adult buckeye trees can tolerate a wide climate range, although seedlings are more sensitive. Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan could eventually give buckeye trees a more comfortable habitat, he said.

Football fans may not want to hear this, but Michigan already has some buckeye trees.

Donald R. Zak, an ecology professor at the University of Michigan, said it’s not unusual to find a buckeye tree in southern Michigan, where the climate and soil is like that in northern Ohio.

The Great Lakes region has experienced climate change often, including when glaciers shaped the landscape and then pulled back. But global warming presents a real concern now, Zak said.

“Humans are the cause of this warming, and that’s no longer a debate among scientists,” he said.

___

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September 13th, 2008 at 11:26 am

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Why Ike’s Storm Surge Could Devastate Galveston (LiveScience.com)

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As Hurricane Ike races toward Texas, it is pushing a mound of water in front of it that could inundate parts of the Gulf coast with up to 25 feet of water. The surge involves some incredible feats of physics, and in many hurricanes it's the leading cause of death.

Galveston Island, Texas, destroyed at least once before by a major hurricane in 1900, began to see the Ike-related water creeping up along its beaches Thursday and by Friday, parts of the city of Galveston were flooded by the surge coming in from Galveston Bay.

And, "it's only going to get worse," said Lance Wood, the Science and Operations Officer for the Houston/Galveston National Weather Service (NWS) office.

How it works

As a hurricane travels over the ocean, its strong winds push against the water's surface, causing it to pile up higher than the sea's ordinary level. As the storm approaches land, this pile of water, called storm surge, is pushed ashore.

The growth of a surge depends on wind strength, plus how long the wind blows in one direction. As has been the case with Ike, the surge can build for hours and hours while a storm is still hundreds of miles away.

Surges build gradually as a storm approaches, but when a hurricane makes landfall, the surge can suddenly grow into a towering monster. Storm surge is the main cause of the death and destruction associated with hurricanes; the raging waters can swiftly move in and flood roads and houses and wash away cars, trees and other debris.

Surge along the beach fronts in the Houston/Galveston area had already mounted to 8 feet high early Friday afternoon, Wood said. Projections right now have that surge hitting up to 14 to 16 feet on the Gulf side of the island and 15 to 20 feet on the Bay side.

"There's going to be a lot of water coming at them," Wood said.

Strength and size

Ike is piling up so much ocean water partly because of its strength - it is on the upper end of Category 2 storms (on the Saffir-Simpson scale, which rates hurricanes by their wind speeds) and could become a Category 3 storm sometimes before it makes landfall late Friday or early Saturday morning.

As far as storm surge is concerned though, Ike is effectively a Category 3, NWS storm surge specialist Will Schaffer told LiveScience. To estimate storm surge, forecasters look at the difference in pressure between the outside of the storm and the low at the storm's core; the greater the difference, the higher the surge.

Also a factor in Ike's substantial surge is its massive size. When a hurricane reaches Ike's size, its energy is spread out over a larger area, which in turn spreads the ravaging winds.

A hurricane rotates counterclockwise, and so ever since Ike entered the Gulf of Mexico, the winds to the north and east of the storm have been blowing toward the Gulf Coast states.

Ike's hurricane-force winds currently extend out 120 miles (195 kilometers), and its tropical storm-force winds are reaching out to 275 miles (445 km), which means that the surge associated with those winds can extend along the same range.

Reports already show surge flooding in Louisiana and as far away as Mississippi.

Potential devastation

Forecasters expect the Houston/Galveston area and adjacent portions of the Texas coast to bear the brunt of the storm surge threat. Of particular concern is the side of Galveston Island facing Galveston Bay, which does not have the sea wall that protects the Gulf-facing portion of the island. With the amount of flooding that could overtake the unprotected areas, "it's going to be devastating," Wood said.

Even with the protective sea wall on the other side of the island, "it's going to be close to the top of the sea wall," Wood said.

Those storm surge estimates were made with the current predicted track of Ike. If the storm shifts so that Galveston is hit by the northwest quadrant of the storm, the island could be washed over by the highest storm surge levels predicted.

"We could overtop that sea wall by several feet," Schaffer said.

However, if the storm jogs and hits north of Galveston, the storms winds will be coming of the land and storm surge likely won't be as bad.

The level of surge has slowly and steadily climbed since yesterday, Wood said, but "it's not the abrupt rise that we're going to get eventually" as Ike makes landfall.

As the storm's eyewall comes closer and closer to land and the winds intensify, the surge levels will rise rapidly.

Galveston Island began a mandatory evacuation yesterday to get residents out of harms way, but the houses and other historic structures are staring down a threat that they haven't seen since the 1900 hurricane that completely destroyed the town.

Natural Disasters: Top 10 U.S. Threats
Images: Hurricane Destruction
2008 Hurricane Guide

Original Story: Why Ike's Storm Surge Could Devastate Galveston

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September 13th, 2008 at 11:25 am

Posted in Science news

Hurricane Ike makes economic landfall (AP)

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HOUSTON - Even before Hurricane Ike smashed into the U.S. Gulf Coast, it had already made an economic landfall, sending wholesale gasoline prices soaring Friday and straining the nation’s fuel supply chain.

Wholesale gasoline prices on the Gulf Coast moved even further into uncharted territory to around $4.85 a gallon on fears of vast fuel shortages as the hurricane honed in on the mass of refineries that line the upper Texas coast. The region accounts for about one-fifth of the nation’s petroleum refining capacity.

At least eight refineries had shut down or were powering down as Ike prepared to strike.

Gas supply disruptions were being felt outside Texas, where Ike is expected to make landfall in the next 24 hours. Arkansas Gov. Mike Beebe declared a state of emergency and said he expected temporary increases in gas prices over the next few days as pipelines into the state are shut down.

Gulf Coast wholesale gasoline jumped substantially from Tuesday, when a gallon cost just $3, said Ben Brockwell, director of data, pricing and information services for the Oil Price Information Service in Wall, N.J.

“The path of the storm has put the entire supply chain under stress from the refinery level all the way to the retail station level,” Brockwell said. “Hopefully it’s a temporary phenomenon, but we won’t know until next week.”

The spike will almost certainly lead to higher pump prices for consumers across broad swaths of the country, as the gasoline makes it way from the wholesale market to retailers.

For now, pump prices are holding fairly steady. The average U.S. retail price for gasoline edged up less than a penny overnight to $3.675 a gallon, according to auto club AAA, the Oil Price Information Service and Wright Express. Meanwhile, October gasoline futures climbed 6.52 cents to $2.8140 a gallon on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Royal Dutch Shell said Friday evening it has delivered more than 6 million gallons of fuel to Shell-branded stations in Houston, Victoria, Pasadena, Galveston, Beaumont and Port Arthur in the past 36 hours. The deliveries amounted to more than double the daily averages in some areas, Shell said.

The Texas Attorney General’s Office said Friday it had received about two dozen complaints of price gouging at gasoline stations, but nothing excessive as yet.

“We haven’t seen anything egregious, but we’re watching,” said spokesman Tom Kelley.

On Friday, major refineries shuttered operations in preparation for a storm surge.

Valero Energy Corp., North America’s largest refiner, said it had shut down three of its six facilities on the Texas coast — those in Port Arthur, Texas City and Houston. But the company said the other three, including two in Corpus Christi, were operating at planned rates.

Spokesman Bill Day said 64 of Valero’s 193 company-owned stores in the region were closed because of evacuations. Those that remain open were being supplied with gasoline from refineries in other areas, particularly Corpus Christi. That will continue after Ike passes, Day said.

“As soon as it’s safe, we’ll get supplies into that area as soon as possible,” he said.

Still, there was concern the refinery shut-ins may last for days.

A North Carolina-based convenience store chain asked customers in most of its 11-state territory to limit gasoline purchases to 10 gallons Friday.

Pete Sodini, CEO of the Sanford-based Pantry convenience store chain, said his company dropped the 10-gallon request in Florida and other areas where stations were supplied by ship. He said supplies inland where stations are supplied from two major pipelines could be a problem as the storm wears on so the request stands in those areas.

Sodini emphasized the request is just that, similar to one the 11-state chain made during Hurricanes Katrina and Rita to try to slow down panic buying.

“We are not going to try to take the keys away from them,” he said. “It really comes down to what’s the inventory status by supplier, state by state.”

There was a run on gasoline in Tennessee fueled by speculation about Ike’s impact, according to AAA East Tennessee spokesman Don Lindsey.

Some stations in East Tennessee were overrun with customers and ran out of the cheapest unleaded gas, Lindsey said.

In Arkansas, Beebe said he made the emergency declaration to help the attorney general’s office pursue anyone who participates in price-gouging.

“We’ve dealt with emergencies before when severe weather has impacted fuel prices in Arkansas and throughout the region,” Beebe said. “This situation is unique with the interruption of pipeline service, and we want to do everything we can to make sure that any price gouging that results can be dealt with swiftly and strongly by the Attorney General.”

In Houston, gas prices rose 4.1 cents from Thursday to $3.496 a gallon on Friday, according to auto club AAA.

Statewide, the price of gas on Friday was $3.546, according to AAA.

Despite rising gasoline prices, the price for a barrel of crude dropped below $100, albeit briefly, for the first time since April, suggesting investors believe a global economic slowdown will tamp down supply for some time.

___

AP Business Writer Madlen Read in New York, AP writer Andrew DeMillo in Little Rock, Ark., and AP Business Writer Mark Williams in Houston, contributed to this report.

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September 13th, 2008 at 11:22 am

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Hundreds of homes flood as Ike passes Louisiana (AP)

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LAKE CHARLES, La. - Storm surge driven by Hurricane Ike breached levees in coastal Louisiana Friday and flooded hundreds of homes in areas along the Gulf of Mexico still recovering from Gustav.

About 1,800 homes and business flooded in coastal Cameron Parish as the storm churned toward expected landfall in Texas, said Gov. Bobby Jindal, and he expected water to eventually inundate all 2,900 homes in the area. Flooded homes were reported in other parishes, though numbers were sketchy at nightfall.

Flooding was reported in areas from Plaquemines Parish in southeast Louisiana to Cameron Parish on the Texas line.

“It’s going to be devastating for people,” said Cameron Parish emergency preparedness director Clifton Hebert. “We don’t have the wind that Rita brought, but we have at least the same storm surge, if not a little more.”

In nearby Terrebonne Parish, crews worked to plug at least four breaches. Officials said areas in which Rita inundated 10,000 homes in 2005 were vulnerable again.

More than 160 people were rescued from flooding Friday, Jindal said.

About 130 people remained in the fishing community on the barrier island of Grand Isle after storm surge cut off the only road to the mainland, said Gov. Bobby Jindal.

Jindal said search and rescue teams would head to the island as soon as wind abated and water receded.

He told residents they could break into a state wildlife and fisheries lab that was deemed a safe structure. He called it “the most unusual piece of advice I might give.”

More than 100,000 customers were without electricity Friday night, a number that also included some customers who lost power in Gustav, the Louisiana Public Service Commission said.

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September 13th, 2008 at 11:21 am

Posted in Science news

Hurricane Ike makes landfall in Texas (AFP)

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GALVESTON, Texas, (afp) - Hurricane Ike made landfall early Saturday on Galveston Island, Texas, driving a huge ocean surge over coastal areas where tens of thousands of people remained holed up, the US National Hurricane Center announced.

"Radar data and surface observations indicate that the center of Ike made landfall at Galveston, Texas, at about 2:10 am CDT (0710 GMT)," the center said in a statement.

Ike, a powerful category two hurricane with winds raging at 175 kilometers (110 miles) per hour, was headed for a direct hit on Houston, the fourth largest US city and a major oil hub 70 kilometers (45 miles) inland from Galveston.

More than a million people fled inland in the hours before the Texas-size storm was due to make landfall.

But officials said more than 100,000 residents of low-lying neighborhoods decided to ride out the storm despite warnings from the national weather service that a wall of water up to 25 feet (7.5 meters) high could mean "certain death" to those who stayed behind.

Gargantuan waves smashed over a 17-foot (five meter) seawall built to protect this island city as the center of Ike was about 35 kilometers (20 miles) southeast of Galveston , moving at about 20 kilometers (12 miles) an hour, the Miami-based National Hurricane Center reported.

Ike was pushing ashore waves measuring as high as a two-story house, swamping Galveston while blistering winds raked Houston, home to a major US port and key refineries.

As Ike bore down on Texas, companies abandoned 13 refineries representing a combined capacity of 3.7 million barrels of crude oil per day — a fifth of US refinery capacity.

In Galveston, the power went out across the island just before 0100 GMT Saturday, plunging the storm-stricken city into darkness.

Galveston Mayor Lyda Ann Thomas ordered a dusk-to-dawn curfew starting Friday and ending Monday morning. Chocolate-colored seawater flooded the streets as the storm surge intensified throughout the day, spoiling the city's potable water system.

Two blazes broke out in the afternoon. Flames shot out of an unattended Galveston home near the oceanfront, while thick smoke from a ship repair warehouse darkened the sky over the city.

Firefighters, restricted by the high water, had to let the structures burn.

All neighborhoods and possibly entire coastal communities along Galveston Bay, which reaches 25 miles (40 kilometers) inland from its namesake barrier island to the heart of Houston, "will be inundated during the period of peak storm tide," the National Hurricane Center said.

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff described Ike's arrival as "potentially catastrophic."

"This is a monster storm in terms of the flooding potential," added Chertoff. The storm surge "is going to inundate large parts of the Texas coast."

Texas Governor Rick Perry described Ike on CNN as "a monster of a storm."

Referring to the holdouts that refused to flee the coastal area, he said on Fox News: "Individuals who think they are tougher, stronger than Mother Nature — God be with them."

Perry said some 1.2 million people had evacuated coastal Texas ahead of the storm.

Houston, whose metropolitan area population tops five million people, is just a few miles from the bay, and destruction there and along the coast in the hurricane zone is expected to be massive.

Jack Colley, from the Texas Department of Emergency Management, said officials estimated the storm's economic impact would be "somewhere in between the 80-billion dollar and 100-billion-dollar range."

Texas Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison also warned of the storm's economic consequences.

"The economic impact is going to be huge. People are much more concerned about this one than I have seen in a long, long time," she said on Fox News.

Oil and gas production in the Gulf was largely shut off, though the US Department of Energy said Ike appeared likely to spare most rigs and platforms there.

President George W. Bush, a former Texas governor, said he was "deeply concerned" about the threat the storm posed to the region.

Galveston has faced calamity before. The deadliest hurricane in US history, the "Great Storm" of 1900, killed at least 8,000 people when it smashed into Galveston and Houston.

Ike has left more than 100 dead across the Caribbean and sparked hurricane and tropical storm warnings from Louisiana to Mexico.

Separately, US Coast Guard rescuers called off an attempt to rescue 22 sailors stranded aboard a Cyprus-flagged freighter that lost power in the Gulf of Mexico as it tried to steam out of Ike's way, but added they would seek to remain in radio contact with the crew.

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September 13th, 2008 at 11:20 am

Posted in Science news

Banks orders were end for travel group

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Until August this year, the single most important event in the history of the UK’s third-largest tour operator was a meeting in Iceland in October 2006.

Then, an Icelandic investment group called Avion – now known as Eimskip – decided to sell a clutch of companies in its charter and leisure portfolio.

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September 13th, 2008 at 11:20 am

Posted in Industry news

Devastating Ike slams Texas as a Category 2 storm (AP)

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GALVESTON, Texas - A massive Hurricane Ike ravaged southeast Texas early Saturday, battering the coast with driving rain and ferocious wind gusts as residents who decided too late they should have heeded calls to evacuate made futile calls for rescue.

Though it would be daybreak before the storm’s toll was clear, already, the damage was extensive. Thousands of homes and government buildings had flooded, roads were washed out and several fires burned unabated as crews could not reach them. But the biggest fear was that tens of thousands of people had defied orders to flee and would need to be rescued from submerged homes and neighborhoods.

“The unfortunate truth is we’re going to have to go in … and put our people in the tough situation to save people who did not choose wisely. We’ll probably do the largest search and rescue operation that’s ever been conducted in the state of Texas,” said Andrew Barlow, spokesman for Gov. Rick Perry.

The eye of the storm powered ashore at 3:10 a.m. EDT at Galveston with 110 mph winds, just shy of a Category 3 storm. Because Ike was so huge — nearly as big as Texas itself — hurricane winds pounded the coast for hours before landfall and would continue through much of the morning, forecasters said.

More than 1.3 million customers — or 2.9 million people — had lost power, and suppliers warned it could be weeks before all the service was restored. There also was fear winds could shatter the windows of Houston’s sparkling skyscrapers that define the skyline of America’s fourth-largest city. Forecasters said the worst winds and rain would come after the center came ashore.

Though 1 million people fled coastal communities near where the storm made landfall, authorities in four counties alone said roughly 140,000 ignored mandatory evacuation orders and stayed behind. Other counties were unable to provide numbers but officials said they were concerned that many decided to brave deadly conditions rather than flee.

As the front of the storm moved into Galveston, fire crews rescued nearly 300 people who changed their minds and fled at the last minute, wading through floodwaters carrying clothes and other possessions.

“We don’t know what we are going to find. We hope we will find the people who are left here alive and well,” Galveston Mayor Lyda Ann Thomas said. “We are keeping our fingers crossed all the people who stayed on Galveston Island managed to survive this.”

Some 60 miles inland, storm surge was pushing into a neighborhood near Johnson space Center where Houston Mayor Bill White had made rounds earlier with a bullhorn trying to compel people to leave. Nearby, the popular Kemah Boardwalk at the mouth of Galveston Bay, ringed by million-dollar homes, was submerged, state officials said.

Thousands of homes could be damaged, a spokesman for the mayor said, but it was too dangerous to go out and canvass the neighborhood at the height of the storm.

A landmark restaurant, Brennan’s of Houston, was destroyed by flames when firefighters were thwarted by high winds. The restaurant had been a downtown institution for more then four decades. Across Houston’s downtown, car alarms screeched and light poles swayed like small trees.

On the far east side of Houston, 34-year-old Claudia Macias was awake with her newborn and was trying unsuccessfully not to think about the trees swaying outside her doors, or the wind vibrating through her windows. She had been through other storms, but this time was different because she was a new mother.

“I don’t know who’s going to sleep here tonight, maybe the baby,” Macias said.

Before it came ashore, the storm was 600 miles across. Because of the hurricane’s size, the state’s shallow coastal waters and its largely unprotected coastline, forecasters said the biggest threat would be flooding and storm surge, with Ike expected to hurl a wall of water two stories high — 20 to 25 feet — at the coast. The strongest winds and highest storm surge were expected near or just after the eye made landfall.

Firefighters left three buildings to burn Galveston because water was too high for fire trucks to reach them. Six feet of water had collected in the Galveston County Courthouse on the island’s downtown, and the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston was flooded, according to local storm reports on the National Weather Service’s Web site.

But there was some good news: a stranded freighter with 22 men aboard made it through the brunt of the storm safely, and a tugboat was on the way to save them. And an evacuee from Calhoun County gave birth to a baby girl in the restroom of a shelter with the aid of an expert in geriatric psychiatry who delivered his first baby in two decades.

“It’s kind of like riding a bike,” Dr. Mark Burns told the New Braunfels Herald-Zeitung after he helped Ku Paw welcome her fourth child.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency said more than 5.5 million prepackaged meals were being sent to the region, along with more than 230 generators and 5.6 million liters of water. At least 3,500 FEMA officials were stationed in Texas and Louisiana.

If Ike is as bad as feared, the storm could travel up Galveston Bay and send a surge up the Houston Ship Channel and into the port of Houston. The port is the nation’s second-busiest, and is an economically vital complex of docks, pipelines, depots and warehouses that receives automobiles, consumer products, industrial equipment and other cargo from around the world and ships out vast amounts of petrochemicals and agricultural products.

The storm also could force water up the seven bayous that thread through Houston, swamping neighborhoods so flood-prone that they get inundated during ordinary rainstorms.

The oil and gas industry was closely watching Ike because it was headed straight for the nation’s biggest complex of refineries and petrochemical plants. Wholesale gasoline prices jumped to around $4.85 a gallon for fear of shortages.

Ike is the first major hurricane to hit a U.S. metropolitan area since Katrina devastated New Orleans three years ago. For Houston, it would be the first major hurricane since Alicia in August 1983 came ashore on Galveston Island, killing 21 people and causing $2 billion in damage. Houston has since then seen a population explosion, so many of the residents now in the storm’s path have never experienced the full wrath of a hurricane.

On its way through the Gulf toward Texas, Ike spawned thunderstorms, shut down schools and knocked out power throughout southern Louisiana on Friday. An estimated 1,200 people were in state shelters in Monroe and Shreveport, and another 220 in medical needs shelters.

In southeastern Louisiana near Houma, Ike breached levees, and flooded more than 1,800 homes. More than 160 people had to be rescued from sites of severe flooding, and Gov. Bobby Jindal said he expected those numbers to grow. In some extreme instances, residents of low-lying communities where waters continued to rise continued to refuse National Guard assistance to flee their homes, authorities said.

No deaths had been officially reported, but crews expected to resume searching at daybreak near Corpus Christi for a man believed swept out to sea as Ike closed in.

___

Juan A. Lozano reported from Galveston. Chris Duncan reported from Houston. Associated Press writers Jim Vertuno and Jay Root in Austin, Eileen Sullivan in Washington, Schuyler Dixon and Paul Weber in Dallas, John Porretto, Monica Rhor and Pauline Arrillaga in Houston, Michael Kunzelman in Lake Charles, La., Brian Skoloff in West Palm Beach, Fla., Andre Coe in College Station, and Allen G. Breed and video journalist Rich Matthews in Surfside Beach also contributed.

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September 13th, 2008 at 11:19 am

Posted in Science news

Hurricane Ike slams into populous Texas coast (Reuters)

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HOUSTON, Sept 13 - (Reuters) - Hurricane Ike barreled into the densely populated Texas coast near Houston early on Saturday, bringing with it a wall of water and ferocious winds and rain that could cause catastrophic flooding along the Gulf of Mexico and cripple the fourth-largest U.S. city.

Ike, which has idled more than a fifth of U.S. oil production, came ashore at the barrier island city of Galveston as a strong Category 2 storm at 2:10 a.m. CDT (3:10 a.m. EDT) with 110 mph (175 kph) winds, the National Hurricane Center said.

Ike surprised Texans with its fury and size, roughly the size of Texas itself. It is the biggest storm to hit a U.S. city since Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans in 2005.

The hurricane drove a wall of water 20 feet high over Galveston and submerged a 17-foot (5-metre) sea wall built to protect the city after a 1900 hurricane killed at least 8,000 people. Most people had fled and scattered fires were reported on the island, where emergency operations were suspended through the storm.

About 50 miles inland, Ike lashed downtown Houston's glass-covered skyscrapers, blowing out windows and sending debris flying through city streets.

The hurricane has shut down 17 oil refineries on the Gulf of Mexico, the heart of the U.S. oil sector where 22 percent of fuel supplies are processed. Energy experts said it would take at least a week for the refineries to get back to normal.

More than 1.3 million customers were without electricity, according to local reports. That number was likely to increase and utilities warned it could take up to two weeks to restore power.

Ike was expected to remain a hurricane through Saturday afternoon and could dump up to 10 inches of rain over eastern Texas and southwestern Louisiana.

"Even though Ike has made landfall, it remains a very large and dangerous hurricane with effects felt at long distances from the center," the hurricane center said.

EVACUATION ORDERS

More than a million Texans heeded evacuation orders and headed inland, but officials worried that many had remained.

"It's not a time to play chicken with the storm," U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said on Friday.

As the storm surge swelled onto Galveston Island, some people who had ignored a mandatory evacuation order called to be rescued. They got no response because emergency workers were ordered off the streets through the worst of the storm, officials told the Houston Chronicle.

"We don't know what we're going to find tomorrow," Mayor Lyda Ann Thomas told the newspaper. "We hope we'll find that the people who didn't leave here are alive and well."

There were no immediate confirmed reports of storm-related fatalities or injuries.

Some who thought they would stick it out made a last-minute exit from Galveston.

"When I woke up, my bed was floating in the house," said handyman David Daubuisson. "I just took what I could and got out."

The Coast Guard had to rescue 65 people from rising waters on the Bolivar Peninsula, east of Galveston.

Forecasters warned Ike would send water surging up the Houston Ship Canal, the second-busiest U.S. port, a complex of docks, pipelines, depots and warehouses that receives automobiles, consumer products, industrial equipment and other cargo from around the world.

A dawn-to-dusk curfew was imposed to prevent looting in Houston, where airports were closed and hotels jammed.

U.S. crude oil futures rose 31 cents on Friday to $101.18 a barrel after dropping below $100 for the first time since early April as concerns over U.S. economic weakness outweighed storm disruption fears.

Ike could be the third most-destructive U.S. storm behind Hurricanes Katrina in 2005 and Andrew in 1992, experts said.

The costliest storm in U.S. history, Katrina, devastated New Orleans and other parts of the Gulf Coast, killing 1,500 people and causing at least $81 billion in damage.

(Additional reporting by Eileen O'Grady, Erwin Seba and Bruce Nichols; Writing by Mary Milliken; Editing by Doina Chiacu)

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September 13th, 2008 at 11:18 am

Posted in Science news

Obama tones it down as Hurricane Ike looms (AFP)

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MANCHESTER, New Hampshire (afp) - The White House campaign faced its second storm-forced disruption Saturday as Barack Obama offered to raise funds from his army of donors for victims of the monstrous Hurricane Ike.

With Ike coming ashore on Galveston Island in Texas and threatening Houston, a major oil processing center, the Democrat appeared likely to tone down a fearsome offensive against what he calls Republican John McCain's "lies."

Obama canceled a planned appearance on the cult comedy program "Saturday Night Live" as he anxiously followed the enormous storm's destructive path through the Gulf of Mexico, aides said.

In a telephone call to Houston Mayor Bill White, "Obama offered to do whatever he can to help, including using the Obama website to raise funds for relief efforts," campaign spokeswoman Linda Douglass said late Friday.

Obama had already appealed to his base of more than two million donors to contribute funds to help victims of Hurricane Gustav, which forced McCain to curtail the first day of the Republican convention on September 1.

The Democrat had been scheduled to hold a joint rally in Manchester, New Hampshire with his vice presidential running mate, Joseph Biden, on Saturday.

But aides said Biden was no longer coming, and it was probable that Obama would scale back his savage attacks on McCain of recent days to avoid a show of overt partisanship in Ike's potentially tragic trail.

There was no immediate word from the McCain campaign of any change of plan for the Republican ticket.

McCain himself had no events scheduled on Saturday but his running mate, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, was due to hold a morning rally in Anchorage and an afternoon event in Carson City, Nevada.

Before focussing on Ike, Obama Friday ripped into the 72-year-old McCain as an out-of-touch economic illiterate who had slept through the Internet revolution.

The Democrat, 47, vowed to wield the "truth" against his Republican adversary and seize the policy high ground, but McCain denied resorting to outright untruths in his escalating attacks on Obama.

Questioned by a man frustrated with Obama's response to a Republican "smear campaign," the Illinois senator said in Dover, New Hampshire that Democrats were right to be nervous because "they've seen this movie before."

But US voters would not be diverted from anxieties over the economy, healthcare, education and war, Obama said.

"I can guarantee that we are going to be hitting back hard … but we're hitting back on the issues that matter to families. I'm not going to start making up lies about John McCain," he said.

Later in Concord, the Democrat said the choice facing Americans in the November 4 election was stark as he mocked McCain's "maverick" credentials by noting his lock-step voting record with President George W. Bush.

"They will spend any amount of money and use any tactic out there in order to avoid talking about how we are going to move America into the future," he said of his Republican opponents.

The sharper rhetoric came after McCain eliminated Obama's lead in the polls following his shock pick two weeks ago of Palin as his running mate.

McCain defended an advertising onslaught that has accused Obama, controversially, of sexism against Palin, of planning to cripple the US economy with tax hikes and of wanting to teach sex education to kindergarten children.

"Actually, they are not lies," McCain, who had no campaign events Friday, said on ABC day-time program "The View."

"The point is I'm the same person with the same principles, whether spending, climate change, the conduct of the war in Iraq, torture of prisoners," the Arizona senator added.

"No matter what it is — I'm the same guy."

Palin appeared to stumble over key foreign policy questions in her first major network interview with ABC News Thursday. In the interview's second part broadcast Friday, she picked at the scars of the Democratic primary fight.

Obama must now be "regretting" that he did not name Hillary Clinton as his running mate, she said, lauding the former first lady's "determination and grit and even grace."

"Sarah Palin should spare us the phony sentiment and respect," Florida Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz said after video footage emerged of Palin, in March, attacking Clinton's "perceived whine" during the primary race.

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September 13th, 2008 at 11:17 am