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  • Irish Chronicles Document Links Between Volcanoes and Weather
    A study of over 40,000 written entries in Irish Annals and ice core measurements shows a strong corr...Read more

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    Irish Chronicles Document Links Between Volcanoes and Weather

    A study of over 40,000 written entries in Irish Annals and ice core measurements shows a strong correlation between the occurrence of volcanic eruptions and extreme cold weather in Ireland over a 1200 year period. Data analyzed in this study cover the period from 431 to 1649, during which time up to 48 volcanic eruptions are identified in Greenland ice core records through deposition of volcanic sulfate in annual layers of ice. You can find the study (open access), published on 6 June 2013 in IOP Publishing's journal Environmental Research Letters, at http://iopscience.iop.org/1748-9326/8/2/024035/article. Find out more about how volcanoes can influence climate.
  • EF-5 Tornado in El Reno, Oklahoma Widest Ever Recorded in US
    The EF-5 tornado that hit El Reno, Oklahoma on May 31st was the widest ever recorded in the US, acco...Read more

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    EF-5 Tornado in El Reno, Oklahoma Widest Ever Recorded in US

    The EF-5 tornado that hit El Reno, Oklahoma on May 31st was the widest ever recorded in the US, according to the National Weather Service in Norman Oklahoma. The tornado, which remained on the ground for 40 minutes and reached 2.6 miles across (4.2 km), took the lives of 18 people including storm chasers Tim Samaras, Paul Samaras and Carl Young. For more information on the tornado, visit http://ow.ly/i/2hfDG.
  • Atmospheric CO2 Level Tops 400 ppm
    During the week of May 13th, the CO2 level at the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii topped 400 ppm rep...Read more

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    Atmospheric CO2 Level Tops 400 ppm

    During the week of May 13th, the CO2 level at the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii topped 400 ppm repeatedly. Daily levels of CO2 can vary due to weather, and there are seasonal trends as well. The level of atmospheric greenhouse gases continues to increase, now over 120 ppm since the Industrial Revolution began. For more on the Keeling Curve, see http://keelingcurve.ucsd.edu/. Find out more about greenhouse gases and warming.

    Image courtesy of Katrien Uytterhoeven

From: Katrien Uytterhoeven
European Southern Observatory, Chile, July 4, 2010

Winter observing in July

Remember me? Last month I was observing targets of the Kepler space mission at Teide Observatory on Tenerife. Now I am in Chile to observe targets of the CoRoT space mission. CoRoT is a satellite devoted to the study of stellar pulsations, and observes about 10 pulsating stars continuously for a period of 150 days, then moves on to the next 10 stars, and so on. By studying the light variations captured by CoRoT, we can obtain information about stellar oscillations, and through the oscillations we learn more about the stellar interior.

To understand the stellar oscillations better, we also study variations in the stellar spectrum. To do so, we observe the CoRoT targets with spectrographs from telescopes on the ground. To monitor the oscillations properly, we need to follow the stars over several weeks. Obtaining telescope time for many nights at the same telescope is very difficult! To solve this problem, we observe the same stars with different telescopes. For the CoRoT project we observe from Chile, France, Canary Islands, and New Zealand.

I am currently observing my fourth, and next-to-last night with the high-resolution spectrograph HARPS on the 3.6m telescope at the European Southern Observatory La Silla in Chile. The first two nights were perfect, but since yesterday we are fighting against the wind. If the wind blows faster than 15 m/s we cannot observe in the wind direction, and if the wind exceeds a speed of 20 m/s we have to close the dome. Yesterday I could not observe for most of the night. In Chile it is wintertime, which means that the nights are long. In good weather conditions I can observe for almost 12 hours per night!

La Silla is my favorite observatory, as the scenery and atmosphere are very magical. I love coming to observe here, which is on average once every 1.5 years. Several telescopes (with mirror sizes from 0.5m to 3.6m) are dotted on the mountain top, surrounded by the Atacama desert. Three weeks from now I will explore another observatory: McDonald Observatory in Texas, US. I am very excited as I have never observed there before!

Postcards from the Observatory

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