NASA sees Typhoon Lekima stretching out and closing its eye

PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

25-Oct-2013

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Contact: Rob Gutro
robert.j.gutro@nasa.gov
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center

NASA's TRMM satellite observed Typhoon Lekima's shrinking eye on Oct. 24, and by the Oct. 25, the eye had shrunk to just 4 nautical miles. TRMM also observed very heavy rainfall occurring around the eyewall of the storm.

NASA's TRMM satellite flew above the center of Super-typhoon Lekima in the western North Pacific Ocean early on Oct. 24 and data was used to create a 3-D image of the storm's structure. TRMM's first orbit provided a look at Super-typhoon Lekima at 0745 UTC/3:45 a.m. EDT. Lekima was somewhat close to Tropical Storm Francisco. Lekima was located southeast of Tropical Storm Francisco over the open waters of the Pacific.

At NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. the data TRMM gathered was used to create imagery of the storm. Precipitation data from TRMM's Microwave Imager (TMI) and Precipitation Radar (PR) instruments were overlaid on infrared images from TRMM's Visible and InfraRed Scanner (VIRS).

TRMM's PR data revealed that Lekima had a small well defined eye at the center of the super typhoon with another concentric outer replacement eye wall. Rain was falling at a rate of over 130mm/~5.2 inches per hour in the powerful storms in Lekima's outer eyewall. Lekima was the fourth super typhoon in the western Pacific this year with wind speeds estimated to be over 130 knots/~150 mph.

Radar reflectivity data from TRMM's PR instrument were used to create 3-D images that showed differences between super typhoon Lekima and tropical storm Francisco. TRMM is managed by both NASA and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency.

On Oct. 25, increasing wind shear is taking a toll on Typhoon Lekima, stretching it out and weakening convection in the storm. Enhanced infrared satellite imagery showed that Lekima's eye shrunk to a small pinhole, just 4 nautical miles/4.6 miles/7.4 km wide.

At 1500 UTC/11 a.m. on Oct. 25, Lekima's maximum sustained winds were near 100 knots/115 mph/185 kph. The eye of the storm was located near 30.7 north and 146.0 east, about 444 nautical miles southeast of Yokosuka, Japan. Lekima was moving speedily at 24 knots/27.6 mph/44.4 kph to the north-northeast and is expect to turn toward the east-northeast over the next couple of days, remaining far to the east of the big island of Japan.

###

Rob Gutro

NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center

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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.

PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

25-Oct-2013

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| E-mail

]


Share

Contact: Rob Gutro
robert.j.gutro@nasa.gov
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center

NASA's TRMM satellite observed Typhoon Lekima's shrinking eye on Oct. 24, and by the Oct. 25, the eye had shrunk to just 4 nautical miles. TRMM also observed very heavy rainfall occurring around the eyewall of the storm.

NASA's TRMM satellite flew above the center of Super-typhoon Lekima in the western North Pacific Ocean early on Oct. 24 and data was used to create a 3-D image of the storm's structure. TRMM's first orbit provided a look at Super-typhoon Lekima at 0745 UTC/3:45 a.m. EDT. Lekima was somewhat close to Tropical Storm Francisco. Lekima was located southeast of Tropical Storm Francisco over the open waters of the Pacific.

At NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. the data TRMM gathered was used to create imagery of the storm. Precipitation data from TRMM's Microwave Imager (TMI) and Precipitation Radar (PR) instruments were overlaid on infrared images from TRMM's Visible and InfraRed Scanner (VIRS).

TRMM's PR data revealed that Lekima had a small well defined eye at the center of the super typhoon with another concentric outer replacement eye wall. Rain was falling at a rate of over 130mm/~5.2 inches per hour in the powerful storms in Lekima's outer eyewall. Lekima was the fourth super typhoon in the western Pacific this year with wind speeds estimated to be over 130 knots/~150 mph.

Radar reflectivity data from TRMM's PR instrument were used to create 3-D images that showed differences between super typhoon Lekima and tropical storm Francisco. TRMM is managed by both NASA and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency.

On Oct. 25, increasing wind shear is taking a toll on Typhoon Lekima, stretching it out and weakening convection in the storm. Enhanced infrared satellite imagery showed that Lekima's eye shrunk to a small pinhole, just 4 nautical miles/4.6 miles/7.4 km wide.

At 1500 UTC/11 a.m. on Oct. 25, Lekima's maximum sustained winds were near 100 knots/115 mph/185 kph. The eye of the storm was located near 30.7 north and 146.0 east, about 444 nautical miles southeast of Yokosuka, Japan. Lekima was moving speedily at 24 knots/27.6 mph/44.4 kph to the north-northeast and is expect to turn toward the east-northeast over the next couple of days, remaining far to the east of the big island of Japan.

###

Rob Gutro

NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center

---

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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.

Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-10/nsfc-nst102513.php
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2 Miss. Museums To Take On Its Turbulent History

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Mississippi breaks ground Thursday on side-by-side museums that are expected to break ground of their own in how they depict the Southern state once rocked by racial turmoil, one promising a frank focus on civil rights and the other a sweep of history from pre-European settlements to Elvis Presley and more.

The Mississippi Civil Rights Museum and the Museum of Mississippi History — two museums under the same roof— are scheduled to open in Jackson in 2017, the state's bicentennial.

Hank Holmes, director of the state Department of Archives and History, said the exhibits won't minimize the parts of the past that some might consider embarrassing or uncomfortable.

"There is no sugar coating," he said.

The two museums will have more than 200,000 square feet combined and are to be built not far from the Capitol in Jackson. The state has committed $40 million, and Holmes said officials are trying to raise $14 million in private donations.

The civil rights museum, focusing on 1945-70, will display the rifle that a white supremacist used in 1963 to kill Medgar Evers, the Mississippi NAACP leader whose slaying helped propel the struggle for equality to national attention. The rifle has been on temporary display the past few months at the state archives building, next door to the future museums' site, as part of an exhibit commemorating Evers' legacy and the 50th anniversary of his death.

The civil rights museum will have a display about the 1955 slaying of Emmett Till, a 14-year-old African-American from Chicago who was said to have whistled at a white woman in a rural Mississippi grocery store. Till was kidnapped, badly beaten and shot in the head, and his body dumped in the Tallahatchie River. Till's mother allowed photos of his brutalized body to be published, galvanizing the fledgling civil rights movement.

The same museum will focus on the "Mississippi Burning" killings of civil rights workers Michael Schwerner, James Chaney and Andrew Goodman in Neshoba County in June 1964. And it will include exhibits devoted to people like Fannie Lou Hamer, who pushed for voting rights for all citizens in the 1960s and '70s.

Democratic state Sen. Hillman Frazier of Jackson was among the Legislative Black Caucus members who worked for years to bring a civil rights museum to fruition. He said the museums are a project that politicians, black and white, would have been reluctant to push a generation ago.

"For so many years, we were so ashamed of our history," Frazier said, speaking about Mississippians of all races.

The Mississippi Civil Rights Museum joins other facilities across the nation in addressing America's complex history of race relations. The National Civil Rights Museum opened in 1991 in Memphis, Tenn., at the Lorraine Motel, where the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in 1968. In Alabama, the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute opened in 1992. And the National Museum of African American History and Culture is scheduled to open in 2015 in the nation's capital.

Like many Deep South states, Mississippi had segregated schools and public facilities until the 1960s and 1970s — facilities that people in power once falsely labeled "separate but equal." Holmes said African-Americans' stories will be integrated into both museums, not simply segregated into the civil rights segment.

The Museum of Mississippi History will include information on the Choctaw and Chickasaw Indian civilizations, which were thriving before European settlers arrived. It will recognize the diverse groups that shaped the state, including Chinese who settled in the Delta's agricultural flatlands. It also is to include exhibits on slavery, the Civil War and the Jim Crow era when laws imposed racial segregation in many public places in the U.S.

"We're very much trying to get away from the 'great white man's story,' which is how American history has been told," Holmes said.

The general history museum will even chronicle natural disasters, including the Mississippi River flood of 1927, Hurricane Camille in 1969 and Hurricane Katrina in 2005. It also will feature prominent Mississippians, including B.B. King, Elvis Presley and William Faulkner.

Holmes said the museums will tell history "with many stories."

The state used to have a small history museum inside a former state Capitol building in downtown Jackson. Then, officials at the Department of Archives and History officials began talking in 1998 about developing a larger and more detailed comprehensive museum.

Legislators later began working on a parallel plan to develop a museum that would focus on Mississippi's civil rights era — and that proposal got a boost when it was embraced in recent years by then-Gov. Haley Barbour, a Republican who at the time was considering a presidential run.

A study committee recommended putting the civil rights museum at Tougaloo College, a private and historically black school in Jackson that was a hub of activity in the civil rights era. Critics acknowledged Tougaloo's significance, but argued it would be difficult for tourists to find. They also opposed spending public money for a museum at a private institution.

In early 2011, when Barbour was laying the groundwork for a possible 2012 White House run, he used his state of the state speech to set the location in downtown Jackson.

"The civil rights struggle is an important part of our history, and millions of people are interested in learning more about it," Barbour said in the speech. "People from around the world would flock to see the museum and learn about the movement. ... I urge you to move this museum forward as an appropriate way to do justice to the civil rights movement and to stand as a monument of remembrance and reconciliation."

Starting in early 2012, Archives and History officials traveled Mississippi for months. In a series of public meetings, they solicited opinions about how the state's story should be told, focusing particularly on trying to find information from people who had lived through civil-rights struggles.

"Everywhere we went, people said, 'Tell the truth,'" Holmes said.

Evers' widow, Myrlie Evers-Williams, co-wrote an article this month with U.S. Sen. Thad Cochran, R-Miss., supporting the two museums.

"Stories help connect us. They are how history has been shared and handed down for centuries," Evers-Williams and Cochran wrote. "They inspire us, teach us, and, sometimes, embarrass us. Mississippi, in many ways, provides America with a clear look into the mirror."

___

Online: http://www.2mississippimuseums.com/

___

Follow Emily Wagster Pettus on Twitter: http://twitter.com/EWagsterPettus

Source: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=240254586&ft=1&f=
Category: elizabeth smart   Prisoners   eminem   danity kane   Call Of Duty Ghosts  

10 Things to Know for Thursday

Your daily look at late-breaking news, upcoming events and the stories that will be talked about Thursday:

1. WHY ANGELA MERKEL CALLED OBAMA TO COMPLAIN

Germany says it received information that the U.S. may have targeted the chancellor's cellphone.

2. DEMOCRATS FRUSTRATED WITH HEALTH CARE WEBSITE WOES

"I think the president needs to man up, find out who was responsible and fire them," Rep. Richard Nolan, D-Minn., says.

3. WHAT DEFENSE THE BOSTON MARATHON SUSPECT MAY USE

Tsarnaev's lawyers may try to save him from the death penalty by arguing he fell under the influence of his older brother, experts say.

4. TESTS SUGGEST BABY BORN WITH HIV IN REMISSION

A report says the Mississippi girl, now 3, shows no active infection after she was treated aggressively 30 hours after birth.

5. HOW NORWAY TRIED TO STOP THE KENYA MALL SUSPECT

The country's domestic intelligence service attempted to prevent one of the suspected gunmen from joining Somali militants more than three years ago.

6. KENNEDY COUSIN SKAKEL WINS NEW TRIAL IN 1975 DEATH

A Connecticut judge rules his attorney failed to adequately represent him when he was convicted in 2002.

7. SOFT-SPOKEN MASS. TEEN ACCUSED OF KILLING TEACHER

Officials recovered the remains of the 24-year-old victim in the woods behind the school.

8. WHO HASN'T PAID MILLIONS IN BACK TAXES

Nearly 700 employees of Internal Revenue Service contractors owe $5.4 million, a report says.

9. WHAT'S SECRET ABOUT MITT ROMNEY'S NEW HOUSE IN UTAH

The home's study has a bookcase that swivels open and leads into a hidden room, according to plans obtained by The Salt Lake Tribune.

10. STUDY RECOMMENDS HIGH-DOSE FLU SHOTS FOR ELDERLY

Experts say regular flu shots tend to be only about 30 to 40 percent effective in people 65 and older.

• Politics & Government
• Richard Nolan
• ANGELA MERKEL

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/10-things-know-thursday-104756375.html
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Nigerian Rebels Reportedly Contact Pirates Who Seized U.S. Crew

A 2008 photo of the offshore supply ship C-Retriever.

Christian Serrano/Courtesy of ShipSpotting.com

A 2008 photo of the offshore supply ship C-Retriever.

Christian Serrano/Courtesy of ShipSpotting.com

Rebels in Nigeria are reportedly in contact with pirates holding two U.S. crewmen seized earlier this week from the offshore supply vessel C-Retriever, The Associated Press reports.

According to the AP, an email reportedly from the rebel group Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta says the men were captured off the coast of the Nigerian town of Brass, but there were no details of demands or a ransom.

Officials have said the captain and an engineer from the U.S.-flagged vessel were seized during an attack in the Gulf of Guinea on Wednesday.

The Nigerian navy, which reports freeing at least two other hostages this year and killing several pirates, says it's searching for the kidnapped men.

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said Thursday, "We are seeking additional information so that we can contribute to the safe resolution of the situation."

He added: "More broadly, we are concerned by the disturbing increase in the incidence of maritime crime, including incidents of piracy off the coast of West Africa, specifically in the Gulf of Guinea."

The West African coast is a hotspot for piracy that is second only to the Somali coast and the Indian Ocean.

The New York Times reports:

"An official of the private security firm, AKE Group, of Hereford, England, said the attack on the vessel, identified as the C-Retriever, took place near the Nigerian city of Brass, where the oil-rich Niger Delta empties into the Gulf of Guinea, in West Africa. The official, based in AKE Group's office in Lagos, Nigeria, spoke on the condition of anonymity.

" 'All we know is this attack happened, and these were the people who were kidnapped,' the official said by telephone. He said he did not know the identities of the two hostages.

"A spokesman for the Nigerian Navy, Cmdr. Kabiru Aliyu, confirmed the piracy attack. 'The Nigerian Navy has directed its operational command to search for and rescue the vessel and the crew members," he said. "Right now, the search is going on, and we are tracking down the culprits. We don't know how it was carried out.' "

Source: http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2013/10/25/240719039/nigerian-rebels-reportedly-contact-pirates-who-seized-u-s-crew?ft=1&f=1004
Related Topics: Reign   julio jones   cbs sports  

Alexander Gustafsson vs. Antonio Rogerio Nogueira booked for UFC's return to London

Alexander Gustafsson's road back to a light heavyweight title shot will go through Antonio Rogerio Nogueira.

Gustafsson vs. Rogerio Nogueira will headline the UFC's return to London, England on March 8, UFC president Dana White announced at the UFC Fight Night 30 post-fight press conference.

White said that should Gustafsson beat Nogueira, he'll fight the winner of Jon Jones vs. Glover Teixeira for the UFC light heavyweight title in the future. White didn't state which arena will host the event and where the card will air in the United States.

No date has been set for Jones vs. Teixeira.

"I'm super excited to fight in London," Gustafsson said. "I've fought there before.

"We were supposed to fight way back, but we didn't, but now I have the chance to fight him again. He's a really good stand-up striker and a great opponent."

Indeed Gustafsson and Nogueira were scheduled to fight in April 2012, however, Nogueira pulled out of the fight due to a knee injury and was replaced by Thiago Silva.

Gustafsson (15-2) most recently lost to Jones last month via unanimous decision at UFC 165 in what many consider to be the 2013 Fight of the Year. Nogueira (21-5) hasn't fought since his February decision win over Rashad Evans at UFC 156. He was scheduled to fight Mauricio "Shogun" Rua at UFC 161 but pulled out due to a back injury.

The UFC's event in London will mark the first of six trips to Europe in 2013. Ross Pearson vs. Melvin Guillard 2 will serve as the co-main event.

The promotion is planning on holding an event in Malmo, Sweden next year despite Gustafsson not being on the card.

Source: http://www.mmafighting.com/2013/10/26/5032530/alexander-gustafsson-vs-antonio-rogerio-nogueira-booked-for-ufcs
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Study: Strokes affecting more younger people

LONDON (AP) — Strokes are increasingly hitting younger people and the incidence of the crippling condition worldwide could double by 2030, warns the first global analysis of the problem.

Though the chances of a stroke jump dramatically with age, the growing number of younger people with worrying risk factors such as bulging waistlines, diabetes and high blood pressure means they are becoming increasingly susceptible.

Worldwide, stroke is the second-leading cause of death after heart disease and is also a big contributor to disability.

Most strokes occur when a clot blocks the blood supply to the brain. Patients often experience symptoms including a droopy face, the inability to lift their arms and garbled speech. If not treated quickly, patients can be left with long-term side effects, including speech and memory problems, paralysis and the loss of some vision.

Scientists combed through more than 100 studies from 1990 to 2010 studying stroke patients across the world and also used modeling techniques when there wasn't enough data. They found the incidence of stroke has jumped by a quarter in people aged 20 to 64 and that those patients make up almost one-third of the total number of strokes.

Researchers said most strokes still occur in the elderly and that the numbers of people suffering strokes are still increasing as the world's population ages.

"Some of the increase we will see in strokes is unavoidable because it has to do with people aging, but that doesn't mean we should give up," said Majid Ezzati of Imperial College London, one of the study's authors. Ezzati said countries should focus on reducing smoking rates further, aggressively controlling blood pressure and improving eating habits.

Ezzati said developing countries such as Iran and South Africa that have set up national systems to monitor maternal and child health are a good model for similar initiatives that could help keep stroke risk factors, such as high blood pressure, in check.

Ezzati and colleagues found the death rate from strokes dropped 37 percent in developed countries and 20 percent in developing countries, largely because of better diagnosis and treatment.

Stroke prevalence was highest in East Asia, North America, Europe and Australia. It was lowest in Africa and the Middle East —though researchers said people in those regions may be dying of other ailments before they get old enough to have a stroke.

In the U.S., doctors have already noted an alarming increase in strokes among young and middle-aged Americans, while the number has been dropping in older people.

The research was paid for by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and published online Thursday in the journal Lancet.

"Young people think stroke is only a problem of the elderly, but we need to educate them," said Dr. Yannick Bejot of the University Hospital of Dijon in France, who co-wrote an accompanying commentary. He added that using illegal drugs such as marijuana and cocaine also boosts the chance of a stroke.

"If young people understood how debilitating a stroke is, maybe they would change their behavior," he said.

___

Online:

www.lancet.com

Associated PressSource: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/bbd825583c8542898e6fa7d440b9febc/Article_2013-10-23-EU-MED-Global-Strokes/id-10ca429dbc6f4901b18a81c3b3975f8d
Tags: parenthood   Emmy Winners 2013  

Headlines From Around The World

A woman walks past a newsstand in Beijing.

Alexander F. Yuan/AP

A woman walks past a newsstand in Beijing.

Alexander F. Yuan/AP

We begin with more revelations about the National Security Agency's spying program – this time from France.

Le Monde reported that the NSA monitored 70.3 million French phone records during a 30-day period. The article was co-authored by Glenn Greenwald. He's the American journalist who's broken many of the stories on the agency's spying programs around the world – stories made possible by the leak of documents by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.

The French Foreign Ministry has summoned the U.S. ambassador to protest the reported spying.

It's the latest revelations about the NSA's spying program that has strained relations with allies such as Brazil. But Monday's story comes at a particularly embarrassing time for the U.S. as it coincides with Secretary of State John Kerry's arrival in Paris.

Meanwhile in Egypt, political and religious figures are condemning the attack outside a Coptic Christian church that killed four people, including two girls, ages 8 and 12.

Al-Ahram reports that a man randomly fired 15 rounds at a wedding ceremony outside the church in Cairo's Warraq neighborhood on Sunday.

Interim Prime Minister Hazem El-Beblawi called the attack a "cowardly criminal act." The attack was also condemned by the grand imam of the influential Al-Azhar mosque and the Salafist Nour Party.

But Al-Ahram reported that a Christian rights group blamed the government for the attack, saying it hadn't done enough to protect the community, which makes up about 10 percent of Egypt's population. Attacks against Christians have risen following the July coup that ousted Islamist President Mohammed Morsi.

Now to Zimbabwe, where the government-owned Herald reports that Western sanctions, which it calls illegal, are hurting the country's industry.

The Industrial Development Corp. has had more than $20 million frozen in the U.S. Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control, the newspaper reported. Here's more:

"The Zimbabwe Fertiliser Company, one of the IDC subsidiaries, still has US$5 million frozen to date as the US applies its Zimbabwe Transition to Democracy and Economic Recovery Act, its sanctions law.

"The Minerals Marketing Corporation of Zimbabwe also lost over US$30 million in revenue to OFAC."

The newspaper estimated that Zimbabwe's economy has shrunk by some 40 percent over the past 13 years, and blamed "the West's illegal sanctions regime."

U.S. imposed sanctions against President Robert Mugabe's government in 2003 following his crackdown on opposition groups in the country.

And, finally, to Mexico, where 7 out of 10 people say the national soccer team doesn't deserve to play in next year's World Cup in Brazil, according to a poll by El Universal newspaper.

The national team has suffered embarrassing losses and failed to qualify directly for Brazil. The team takes on New Zealand in a playoff next month.

Source: http://www.npr.org/blogs/parallels/2013/10/21/238977122/headlines-from-around-the-world?ft=1&f=1009
Category: Scandal   miami dolphins   Ariel Castro   Hyon Song-wol   new york times