“Mother Nature Hates You”

Snowing 6 Points 7:30ish #ONStorm

That was thunder.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted in"Mother Nature Hates You"

America Is Losing the ‘Epic Battle’ Against Bird Flu

After losing eight million egg-laying hens to avian influenza in 2015, Versova Management Co. spent tens of millions of dollars on laser systems, sound cannons and on-site worker showers to shield flocks from the virus spread by wild birds.

Versova lost another two million or so hens in the latest outbreak, showing the limits of costly industry protections.

“We’re fighting an epic battle,” said J.T. Dean, president of Versova, one of the five largest U.S. egg producers. “We have to be perfect.”

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted in"Mother Nature Hates You"

US faces new threat from Canadian ‘super pig’

‘Incredibly intelligent, highly elusive’

For decades, wild pigs have been antagonizing flora and fauna in the US: gobbling up crops, spreading disease and even killing deer and elk.

Now, as fears over the potential of the pig impact in the US grow, North America is also facing a new swine-related threat, as a Canadian “super pig”, a giant, “incredibly intelligent, highly elusive” beast capable of surviving cold climates by tunneling under snow, is poised to infiltrate the north of the country.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted in"Mother Nature Hates You", Canada, USA, WTF?

The earthquake that will devastate Seattle

Seattle could do with an earthquake.

At around eleven in the morning on February 28, 2001, I was standing in front of a mirror in my home in suburban Seattle, adjusting what remained of my hair prior to driving downtown to meet a friend for lunch, when the ground began to shake beneath my feet. The movement lasted about twenty seconds and wasn’t entirely unpleasant, with just the slightest hint of the old days when I was a devotee of Bacchus. After a bit, I checked that the house was all right, looked in on my infant son peacefully asleep in his crib, said goodbye to my wife, started the car and went on my way into the city.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted in"Mother Nature Hates You"

Great Salt Lake’s retreat poses a major fear: poisonous dust clouds

To walk on to the Great Salt Lake, the largest salt lake in the western hemisphere which faces the astounding prospect of disappearing just five years from now, is to trudge across expanses of sand and mud, streaked with ice and desiccated aquatic life, where just a short time ago you would be wading in waist-deep water.

But the mounting sense of local dread over the lake’s rapid retreat doesn’t just come from its throttled water supply and record low levels, as bad as this is. The terror comes from toxins laced in the vast exposed lake bed, such as arsenic, mercury and lead, being picked up by the wind to form poisonous clouds of dust that would swamp the lungs of people in nearby Salt Lake City, where air pollution is often already worse than that of Los Angeles, potentially provoking a myriad of respiratory and cancer-related problems.

This would never have happened if Donny & Marie stayed together.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted in"Mother Nature Hates You"

Turkey’s shoddy builders sold a ‘piece of heaven’ that turned to hell

Arrest warrants issued for dozens of cost-cutting construction bosses

The slick advertisement describes the luxury apartment complex as a “piece of heaven”, taking viewers on a virtual-reality tour of manicured gardens, generous amenities and people sunbathing beside a swimming pool.

The Ronesans Residence, completed in 2013, was touted as the most desirable abode in Antakya, a city in southern Turkey. According to its promotional video, the development was a place of “flawless comfort” built to exacting safety standards.

That Allah fella, he has mysterious ways I’m told.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted in"Mother Nature Hates You"

Lt.-Gen. Michel Maisonneuve (ret’d): Once again, Canada fails on the world stage

The news out of Turkey and Syria is horrible. As of the time of writing, the death toll from the earthquakes there has reached more than 23,000 and no one thinks it has peaked.

The devastation is overwhelming. It is almost impossible to reconcile the piles of rubble with the apartment buildings, places of worship and historical treasures they once were, even with the graphic photos of before and after provided by those on the ground.

Why are western nations always expected to bail out Muslim states?

Quake Devastation Tied to Turkey’s Failure to Enforce Building Codes

ISTANBUL — Turkey has for years tempted fate by not enforcing modern construction codes while allowing — and in some cases, encouraging — a real estate boom in earthquake-prone areas, experts say.

The lax enforcement, which experts in geology and engineering have long warned about, is gaining renewed scrutiny in the aftermath of this week’s devastating earthquakes, which flattened thousands of buildings and killed more than 22,700 people across Turkey and Syria.

“This is a disaster caused by shoddy construction, not by an earthquake,” said a professor of emergency planning at University College London, David Alexander.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted in"Islamophobia", "Mother Nature Hates You", Turkey

Turkey earthquake: Why did so many buildings collapse?

The sight of newly constructed apartments collapsing in the earthquakes that hit Turkey has sparked anger. The BBC examined three new buildings, turned to rubble, to find out what they reveal about building safety.

Two major earthquakes – measuring 7.8 and 7.5 on the magnitude scale – flattened buildings of all kinds and killed thousands of people across southern Turkey and northern Syria.

But the fact that even some of the newest apartment blocks crumbled to dust has led to urgent questions about building safety standards.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted in"Mother Nature Hates You"

There is no such thing as a purely ‘natural’ disaster

The earthquake that struck Turkey and Syria at 4am on Monday is already among the deadliest of our young century. The death toll hit 7,700 on Wednesday morning and is expected to rise dramatically, as the time window for finding survivors in the rubble gets narrower by the minute. In southern Turkey alone, some 6,000 buildings have been levelled, leaving hundreds of thousands homeless. All in all, some 23million people across Turkey and Syria are said to have been impacted by the earthquake and its aftershocks. The humanitarian crisis that is unfolding is bleak beyond words. The obvious question it invites is, could things have been different?

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted in"Mother Nature Hates You"

Did animals in Turkey, Syria sense the quake early? Here’s the science.

Birds flew erratically above snow-capped buildings. Dogs howled loudly. Then, a devastating earthquake in Turkey and Syria leveled buildings and killed more than 5,000 people.

Social media users claimed that animals were behaving strangely just before the massive 7.8-magnitude earthquake and significant aftershocks. While The Washington Post could not immediately verify the footage, the idea that animals can detect powerful earthquakes before humans has been a theory around since at least ancient times.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted in"Mother Nature Hates You"

SECOND mega earthquake hits Turkey, hours after record 7.8-magnitude tremor kills 1,500 people

Turkey has been hit by a second massive earthquake, hours after an earlier catastrophic quake devastated the region, killing more than 1,500 people and injuring thousands more, while toppling thousands of buildings.

The second quake hit at 1:24 pm (1024 GMT), two-and-a-half miles south-southeast of the town of Ekinozu and around 60 miles north of the first quake that wrought devastation across Turkey and Syria, and as rescue workers continued their efforts.

The 7.5 magnitude trembler struck as hundreds were still believed to be trapped under rubble as a result of the first, and the toll was expected to rise as rescue workers searched mounds of wreckage in cities and towns across the area.

Twitter – Turkiye

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted in"Mother Nature Hates You", Turkey

The Last of Us: Could a fungal pandemic turn us all into zombies?

Caterpillar eaten by fungus

Let me introduce you to something truly horrifying – the fungus that turns its victims into zombies.

Its spores enter the body. The fungus then grows and begins to hijack the mind of its host until it loses control and is compelled to climb to higher ground.

The parasitic fungus devours its victim from the inside, extracting every last nutrient, as it prepares for its big finale.

Share
by Blazingcatfur••0•Posted in"Mother Nature Hates You"