h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I have just added some recent news on the floods in China and wildfires in Colorado. If you find any newsworthy item, post it here. I will continue to update the page with recent news items where possible.

Woodpigeon

Another worrying report from the BBC regarding the acceleration of Antartic melting. I have put it on the page. Let me know if you come across other newsworthy stories.

More up to date information added about the Colorado wildfires and Chinese floods...

You might want to talk to Dragonfly about that - it's only one county away from her house

Thanks Goshoogosh - I have asked her about it.

Further updates on Colorado, and I have an amazing story about a wildfire in Alaska, caused by scientists trying to scare moose with firecrackers!

I have added Dragonfly's account to the researcher's page (makes you feel like as if you were there!) Thanks again, Dragonfly!

Woodpigeon

I have added a new article about a large earthquake in Chile yesterday. Fortunately, the area affected was remote.

An asteroid the size of a football field narrowly missed hitting the planet a few days ago, and we knew nothing about it. I also add an article on a study which has uncovered a link between disease and climate change.

There was a big quake in Iran this morning, which has claimed over 500 lives, with well over 1300 people injured to date. The earthquake was felt in Tehran. I will continue to provide updates regarding this.

Also, I have added some new information regarding the US wildfires - now two fires in Arizona are converging.

Finally, bad flooding in southern Russia has resulted in thousands of people being made homeless.

I have posted the latest updated from Iran, Russia and Arizona.

Interesting news day today. We have more information on the wildfires in Arizona and Colorado; an avalanche killed some mountain climbers in Peru, a bird fossil millions of years older than expected has been revealed, and El Nino is developing in the Pacific. All these items are on the main LE page.

Man, I drove through Show Low 10 years ago when I was doing a grand tour of the desert southwest. It's a beautiful area, but I don't recall forests... I do remember leaving the southern end of The Painted Desert National Park, driving east for a few miles, pulling to the side of the road to have a bite to eat, and hearing... nothing. Absolute silence. No wind, no birds, no insects, no traffic, nothing

Not to make you paranoid or anything Gosho, but do you reckon it had something to do with you?

Oh har de har har

It was the only time I can remember hearing(?) absolute silence. I've been in very quiet rooms before, but when you're indoors you can hear things like your heartbeat, or the blooding pumping through the arteries in your head.

That area of Arizona, or rather, to the south of it, is quite mountainous. I figured it would only take me a few hours to drive from The Painted Desert to Tombstone. It actually took more than twice that because the map I was using didn't show contours and was fairly small scale, so it wasn't until I was up to about 10,000' and driving through a small town called Alpine that I realised I was going to get there much later than I anticipated - the drive back down was along a typical hairpin road like the ones you see in the Alps.

That is quite amazing. I thought the desert did have an abundance of wildlife, but not quite what we are used to. I read a book by Michael Crichton a few months ago that discussed life in the 13th Century, where they stated that the significant difference between life then and life now would be the complete lack of ambient noise, such as cars and airplanes.

I visited the Sinai a few years ago, but the scenery there is nothing like you describe. It's actually quite scary - the rocks are like giant jagged teeth everywhere. You would not live long there without provisions.

That part of Arizona, from what I recall, isn't true desert. You don't find that until you get further south and west. I seem to remember grasslands and dry gullies, leading to woodlands and forests. The Painted Desert itself is... very hard to describe. It's the kind of place they'd use if they wanted to shoot a Martian landscape for a film.

I think the area around Show Low is largely agricultural - livestock rather than crops.

Ok, lots of interesting items today - a new satellite is giving incredible views of the world's oceans to aid in global warming research; a pre-cambrian fossil over 500 million yrs old has been found, making it one of the oldest complex organisms found; the wildfires in the US are still raging; theres some new evidence that the world recovered quickly after the K-T event that snuffed out the dinosaurs 65 million years old; and there has been some very severe rainstorms in India. Anyone around East Coast US yesterday will sympathise with the last item!

More news on the US Wildfires - seems like it might have been caused by an unemployed firefighter looking for a bit of work .

Also a big landslide in China caused by the flooding that has been going on for the past few weeks.

There is a group of scientists stranded in Antartica at the moment (a rescue attempt is underway), but I found an article where they describe the weird environment they are living in.

There was a huge earthquake (Mag 7.3) a few days ago on the China / Korea border, but because it was very far underground, its effects were considerably muted.

I'm confused: What do I bookmark in order to keep up with the latest posting to the Living Earth forum?

Pattern-chaser

"Who cares, wins"

Hi PC,

Go into the Living Earth page, and scroll down right to the bottom until you see the message "Click here to be notified of new conversations about this entry". Click on it, and you should be all set.

Hope that helps,

Woodpigeon