Ex-fire boss pleads guilty in 4 deaths
Ellreese Daniels, 47, of Lake Wenatchee, Chelan County, pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge Fred Van Sickle to two misdemeanor counts of making false statements to investigators.
In exchange, the government dropped four felony counts of involuntary manslaughter and seven felony counts of making false statements.
Sentencing was set for July 23 in what is believed to be the first criminal case against a wildland firefighter for the death of comrades on the line. …
Daniels, who now works for the U.S. Forest Service in a supply capacity, faced as much as six years in prison for each manslaughter count. Instead, he faces up to a year in prison and a $100,000 fine for each misdemeanor. Hunt plans to ask for no prison time. … [more]
Harsh winter, hunting, annual cull cut Yellowstone bison population in half
GARDINER, Montana (CNN) — More than half of Yellowstone National Park’s bison herd has died since last fall, forcing the government to suspend its annual slaughter program.
Between harsh weather, hunting and an annual cull, fully half of Yellowstone National Park’s bison have died.
1 of 3 More than 700 of the iconic animals starved or otherwise died on the mountainsides during an unusually harsh winter, and more than 1,600 were shot by hunters or sent to slaughterhouses in a disease-control effort, according to National Park Service figures.
As a result, the park estimates its bison herd has dropped from 4,700 in November to about 2,300 today, prompting the government to halt the culling program early. … [more]
Sacred Mountain Controversy
By Diane Fowler, Cibola County Beacon-News [here]
GRANTS - Tsoodzil, Kaweshtima, Turquoise Mountain and Mount Taylor are names that have been given over the years to the dormant volcano on the horizon. The mountain represents sacred sites and the home of gods to some Native American neighbors and a place for recreation, ranching, Land Grant communities and appreciation of nature for others. Currently there has been a growing interest in resuming uranium mining on Mount Taylor, coinciding with some designations of protection by both the U.S. Forest Service and the New Mexico Cultural Properties Review Committee.
These state and federal designations have produced debate in Grants and led to allegations about how the measures would limit public activity on the mountain.
Some government leaders and the mining interests have reacted with hostility and many uninformed citizens have made dramatic, if incorrect, public statements on the situation.
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La Nina and Pacific Decadal Oscillation Cool the Pacific
NASA Earth Observatory [here]
A cool-water anomaly known as La Nina occupied the tropical Pacific Ocean throughout 2007 and early 2008. In April 2008, scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory announced that while the La Nina was weakening, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation-a larger-scale, slower-cycling ocean pattern-had shifted to its cool phase.
This image shows the sea surface temperature anomaly in the Pacific Ocean from April 14–21, 2008. The anomaly compares the recent temperatures measured by the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer for EOS (AMSR-E) on NASA’s Aqua satellite with an average of data collected by the NOAA Pathfinder satellites from 1985–1997. Places where the Pacific was cooler than normal are blue, places where temperatures were average are white, and places where the ocean was warmer than normal are red.
The cool water anomaly in the center of the image shows the lingering effect of the year-old La Nina. However, the much broader area of cooler-than-average water off the coast of North America from Alaska (top center) to the equator is a classic feature of the cool phase of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO). The cool waters wrap in a horseshoe shape around a core of warmer-than-average water. (In the warm phase, the pattern is reversed).
Unlike El Nino and La Nina, which may occur every 3 to 7 years and last from 6 to 18 months, the PDO can remain in the same phase for 20 to 30 years. The shift in the PDO can have significant implications for global climate, affecting Pacific and Atlantic hurricane activity, droughts and flooding around the Pacific basin, the productivity of marine ecosystems, and global land temperature patterns. “This multi-year Pacific Decadal Oscillation ‘cool? trend can intensify La Nina or diminish El Nino impacts around the Pacific basin,” said Bill Patzert, an oceanographer and climatologist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. “The persistence of this large-scale pattern [in 2008] tells us there is much more than an isolated La Nina occurring in the Pacific Ocean.”
Icecap Note [here]: We have been noting this shift in the Pacific as has Bill for a while. As he says it favors more of these cool La Ninas, more tornadoes, hurricanes, winter snow, spring flooding and summer heat waves and drought - and importantly a cooling of the global temperatures, which will be augmented if cycle 24 proves to be quiet and when the AMO cycles back into its cool mode.
Climate Change and the Human Condition
by Sherwood, Keith, and Craig Idso
CO2 Science, Volume 11, Number 17 [here]
In the introduction to their illuminating paper, the authors say they previously studied “a long span of Chinese history and found that the number of war outbreaks and population collapses in China is significantly correlated with Northern Hemisphere temperature variations and that all of the periods of nationwide unrest, population collapse, and drastic change occurred in the cold phases of this period.” In their current study, they write that they “extend the earlier study to the global and continental levels between AD 1400 and AD 1900.” This they do by using high-resolution paleoclimate data to explore “at a macroscale” the effects of climate change on the outbreak of war and population decline in the pre-industrial era as discerned by analyses of historical socioeconomic and demographic data.
In describing their findings, the five scientists say their newest analyses, like their earlier ones, show that “cooling impeded agricultural production, which brought about a series of serious social problems, including price inflation, then successively war outbreak, famine, and population decline.” And they suggest, as they put it, that “worldwide and synchronistic war-peace, population, and price cycles in recent centuries have been driven mainly by long-term climate change,” wherein warm periods were supportive of good times and cooling led to bad times, some of which (in our opinion) could arguably be described as a descent into hell. … [more]
Kimbell: We are a nation at war
By JUDITH KOHLER, AP [here]
DENVER — Wildfires in Arizona and New Mexico and last week’s fires in eastern Colorado mean another busy firefighting season is likely in store, said U.S. Forest Service Chief Gail Kimbell, whose agency is grappling with bigger, more expensive fires while budgets stay flat.
Kimbell, in an interview with The Associated Press Thursday, said she hopes the above-average snowpack in the Rockies and Northwest will stick around to help cut the fire danger that has plagued the region in recent years.
But the wetter winter hasn’t stopped blazes from erupting this spring.
“These fires in New Mexico and Arizona and Colorado - in April - would indicate that we’ll be very busy this summer,” said Kimbell, in Denver to present a grant to a Denver school for an outdoors program.
A 4,600-acre fire was burning Thursday in New Mexico’s Manzano Mountains. A fire scorched roughly 5,000 acres along the Arizona-Mexico border earlier this week.
Last week in Colorado, where the mountain snowpack is deeper than it’s been in more than a decade, three fires burned a total of nearly 29 square miles. One of the wildfires was in the mountains.
A pilot was killed when his plane crashed while attacking a fire on the Fort Carson Army base south of Colorado Springs. Two volunteer fighters rushing to a quick-moving fire on the eastern plains died when a damaged bridge collapsed under their vehicle.
Even before the West dries out for the summer, the Forest Service has already spent $400 million on fires, including ones driven by drought in the Southeast and Southern California.
Adding to the costs is expansion of homes into forested areas because protecting structures can be expensive, said Rick Cables, Rocky Mountain regional forester for the Forest Service.
Nearly half the agency’s roughly $4 billion budget is spent on fires, including suppression and decreasing wildfire risk by reducing vegetation.
“Our budgets have been relatively flat over the last six, seven, eight years and larger percentages of that total are being spent on fire and fire suppression,” Kimbell said.
The Forest Service’s financial struggles have to be placed in context, the chief added.
“We are a nation at war and we’re a nation with a huge budget deficit,” Kimbell said, “so these budget issues are really challenging.”
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Weyerhaeuser loses finished alder case; vows appeal
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — A Portland jury on Monday ordered Weyerhaeuser to pay almost $28 million for unlawfully monopolizing the market for finished alder lumber [here].
The award will be tripled under federal antitrust laws.
“We are very disappointed with the verdict,” said Sandy D. McDade, Weyerhaeuser senior vice president and general counsel. “We are confident it will be reversed on appeal because last year the U.S. Supreme Court decided in our favor a case presenting virtually identical issues. We fully expect that the Court of Appeals will apply that precedent.
“Our business conduct has been and remains within the spirit and letter of the law, and we will continue to vigorously defend this case.”
Morelock Enterprises Inc. of Bend filed the suit four years ago and it was later granted class-action status. The plaintiffs could not be reached for comment late Monday.
The U.S. Supreme Court last year tossed out a $79 million judgment against Weyerhaeuser. In that suit, a Vancouver, Wash., company convinced an Oregon jury that Weyerhaeuser paid too much for alder logs it didn’t need, with the goal of driving competitors out of business.
This class-action lawsuit was filed while that case was under appeal.
Morelock alleged that by controlling the logs, Weyerhaeuser was able to monopolize the market for finished alder, the Northwest’s leading hardwood lumber that is used in furniture and specialty products such as guitars.
Weyerhaeuser, based in Federal Way, Wash., is one of the world’s largest forest products companies. Sales last year were $16.3 billion.
Rey in Missoula to address Plum Creek talks
U.S. Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey will be in Missoula on Monday to answer questions about controversial closed door talks between the U.S. Forest Service and the Plum Creek Timber Company.
Rey says the talks have merely clarified old forest road use agreements, guaranteeing Plum Creek access across public land for all purposes, including real estate development.
But some say they’re worried that the easement negotiations could pave the way for extensive real estate sales in what is now working timberland.
Rey will meet with county commissioners from across western Montana, as well as with the public, from 1:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. on Monday at Missoula’s Holiday Inn Downtown at the Park.
Plum Creek is the country’s largest private landowner, with 8 million acres nationwide and 1.2 million acres in Montana.
Overall, the company says that some two million of those acres are targeted for sale in coming years across the U.S. … [more]
Hurricane forecaster’s dispute with school focuses on global warming debate
By ERIC BERGER, Houston Chronicle
By pioneering the science of seasonal hurricane forecasting and teaching 70 graduate students who now populate the National Hurricane Center and other research outposts, William Gray turned a city far from the stormy seas into a hurricane research mecca.
But now the institution in Fort Collins, Colo., where he has worked for nearly half a century, has told Gray it may end its support of his seasonal forecasting.
As he enters his 25th year of predicting hurricane season activity, Colorado State University officials say handling media inquiries related to Gray’s forecasting requires too much time and detracts from efforts to promote other professors’ work.
But Gray, a highly visible and sometimes acerbic skeptic of climate change, says that’s a “flimsy excuse” for the real motivation — a desire to push him aside because of his global warming criticism.
Among other comments, Gray has said global warming scientists are “brainwashing our children.”
Now an emeritus professor, Gray declined to comment on the university’s possible termination of promotional support. … [more]
Rabid bobcat attacks two hikers
By Gabrielle Fimbres, Tucson Citizen
TUCSON - The two University of Arizona scientists first spotted the eyes.
It was a bobcat, staring at Katrina Mangin and Rich Thompson as they hiked Saturday through one of their favorite spots in the Santa Rita Mountains, south of Gardner Canyon.
Thompson, 46, immediately knew he and his wife were in trouble.
“Rabid bobcat!” Thompson, a geologist, shouted to Mangin, a 54-year-old marine biologist. “Watch out!”
The next 10 minutes, the couple fought off the bobcat before Thompson pinned it to the ground with a stick and killed it with a hammer from his backpack.
Tests later determined the animal was rabid.
“It wasn’t hard to figure out that there was no choice but to fight it to the death because it was so persistent,” he said. “It’s very sad. This poor kitty cat was deranged by its disease-riddled brain. I love the native cats. It was terrible to have to kill it.” … [more]
Friends of the Earth Starve Millions of Africans to Death
Leftwing extremist group Friends of the Earth [here] have been blamed with starving to death millions of the poorest people in the world. The wealthy “environmental” international organization favors famine in Africa over humanitarian food aid.
By INVESTOR’S BUSINESS DAILY
Food: Today’s headlines are filled with Americans expressing their fears of food shortages and frustration with spiraling grocery prices. As part of the solution, it’s time to give genetically modified crops a try.
There’s much resistance to overcome, however. In the fall of 2006, Friends of the Earth publicly asked governments in the hungry African countries of Ghana and Sierra Leone to recall American food aid that contained genetically modified rice.
Four years earlier, when southern Africa was tormented by famine, the U.S. offered 540,000 tons of genetically modified grain.
Though the World Health Organization estimated that nearly 14 million Africans, including 2.3 million children under 5, were at risk of starvation, leaders in the region rejected the food. … [more]
Environmental, conservation groups sue over wolf delisting
BILLINGS, Mont. — Environmental and animal rights groups sued the federal government Monday to force it to restore endangered species status for gray wolves in the Northern Rockies.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service lifted federal protections for the estimated 1,500 wolves in March. It turned over management responsibilities to state officials in Idaho, Wyoming and Montana for the first time in more than three decades.
The lawsuit alleges those states lack adequate laws to ensure wolves are not again eradicated from the region. At least 37 were killed in the last month.
The groups are seeking an immediate court order to restore federal control over the species until the case is resolved.
“We’re very concerned that absent an injunction, hundreds of wolves could be killed under existing state management plans,” said attorney Jason Rylander with Defenders of Wildlife, one of 12 groups that filed the suit in U.S. District Court in Missoula.
Sharon Rose, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, said her agency had not yet received the lawsuit and could not comment on the allegations.
Rose did say the agency’s decision was based on science that will hold up in court.
“We believe we made the right decision — that the wolf had recovered and the regulatory mechanisms are there” to ensure its continued survival, Rose said. … [more]
Holocene Floods and Droughts in China Associated With Global Cooling
All six episodes of major flooding events of the Sushui River occurred during cool periods, not warm ones.
from World Climate Report, April 24, 2008 [here]
In nearly every presentation on global warming, we hear that floods and droughts will be more severe as the temperature rises. Believe it or not, and who would not believe it given thousands of websites on the issue, there are many scientists who believe the opposite. We have covered these topics in many previous essays, and a recent article in Quaternary Science Reviews reinforces our skeptical viewpoint. …
The research was conducted by Chun Chang Huang and five associates from China’s Shaanxi Normal University. Their goal was to reconstruct major flooding events of the Sushui River (Figure 1) during the Holocene period (the Holocene began approximately 12,000 years ago when the last great glacial period ended).
… Basically, they found a geomorphic sequence that beautifully preserves datable information about major floods over the past 12,000 years. They write “Thus, these loess–soil sequences provide unique information for investigation of Holocene climatic change, flood hydrology, geomorphic and pedogenic changes, and human impact in semiarid zones. This stratigraphic data can provide valuable hydrologic information to those working in engineering hydrology, flood hazard prevention and mitigation, geomorphology, Quaternary sciences and global change.”
The authors… conducted a surprisingly complex set of analyses, and they found six periods over the past 12,000 years when large floods were frequent. Huang et al. state “During the Holocene, there are six episodes of overbank flooding recorded over the alluvial plain. The first occurred at 11,500–11,000 a BP, i.e. the onset of the Holocene. The second took place at 9500–8500 a BP, immediately before the mid-Holocene Climatic Optimum. After an extended geomorphic stability and soil formation, the third overbank flooding episode came at about 3620–3520 a BP, i.e. the late stage of the mid-Holocene Climatic Optimum, and the floodwater inundated and devastated a Bronze-age town of the Xia Culture built on the alluvial plain, and therefore the town was abandoned for a period of ca 100 years. During the late Holocene, the alluvial plain experienced three episodes of overbank flooding at 2420–2170, 1860–1700 and 680–100 a BP, respectively.”
OK – so what, right? As it turns out, all six episodes occurred during cool periods, not warm ones.
Pine beetles may affect climate change
By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor, The Star Online [here]
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Mountain pine beetles that are destroying forests along much of the Rocky Mountain range are doing so much damage that they may affect climate change, Canadian researchers reported on Wednesday.
The damage is nearly equivalent to the polluting effects of forest fires, they report in the journal Nature.
“In the worst year, the impacts resulting from the beetle outbreak in British Columbia were equivalent to 75 percent of the average annual direct forest fire emissions from all of Canada during 1959-1999,” Werner Kurz of the Canadian Forest Service in Victoria, British Columbia and colleagues wrote.
Usually, a forest is a carbon “sink,” soaking up carbon dioxide that would otherwise affect the atmosphere and help hold in heat.
The beetle, Dendroctonus ponderosae, changed that. Dead trees release carbon as they rot, and of course fail to use carbon dioxide as they would if alive.
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Sorry to ruin the fun, but an ice age cometh
by Phil Chapman, The Australian, April 23, 2008 [here]
THE scariest photo I have seen on the internet is www.spaceweather.com, where you will find a real-time image of the sun from the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, located in deep space at the equilibrium point between solar and terrestrial gravity.
What is scary about the picture is that there is only one tiny sunspot.
Disconcerting as it may be to true believers in global warming, the average temperature on Earth has remained steady or slowly declined during the past decade, despite the continued increase in the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide, and now the global temperature is falling precipitously.
All four agencies that track Earth’s temperature (the Hadley Climate Research Unit in Britain, the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, the Christy group at the University of Alabama, and Remote Sensing Systems Inc in California) report that it cooled by about 0.7C in 2007. This is the fastest temperature change in the instrumental record and it puts us back where we were in 1930. If the temperature does not soon recover, we will have to conclude that global warming is over.
There is also plenty of anecdotal evidence that 2007 was exceptionally cold. It snowed in Baghdad for the first time in centuries, the winter in China was simply terrible and the extent of Antarctic sea ice in the austral winter was the greatest on record since James Cook discovered the place in 1770.
It is generally not possible to draw conclusions about climatic trends from events in a single year, so I would normally dismiss this cold snap as transient, pending what happens in the next few years.
This is where SOHO comes in. The sunspot number follows a cycle of somewhat variable length, averaging 11 years. The most recent minimum was in March last year. The new cycle, No.24, was supposed to start soon after that, with a gradual build-up in sunspot numbers.
It didn’t happen. The first sunspot appeared in January this year and lasted only two days. A tiny spot appeared last Monday but vanished within 24 hours. Another little spot appeared this Monday. Pray that there will be many more, and soon.
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