Current Events

  • 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.
  • Massive Tornado Outbreak on Tornado Alley
    The week of May 19 brings dozens of tornadoes to Tornado Alley in the states of Oklahoma, Kansas, Io...Read more

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    Massive Tornado Outbreak on Tornado Alley

    The week of May 19 brings dozens of tornadoes to Tornado Alley in the states of Oklahoma, Kansas, Iowa, Illinois and Missouri. On May 20th, a massive tornado struck Moore, Oklahoma, devastating communities - destroying over 100 homes and hitting two elementary schools and a hospital - with many casualties and deaths. Our thoughts are with our friends and colleagues suffering from these storms. For more on the May 20th storms, see the NOAA Storm Prediction Center Storm Report.
  • Kansas Legislator Proposes Bill to Outlaw Sustainability Education
    A bill has been introduced in the Kansas legislature this week that would prohibit the promotion of ...Read more

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    Kansas Legislator Proposes Bill to Outlaw Sustainability Education

    A bill has been introduced in the Kansas legislature this week that would prohibit the promotion of sustainability. Here is a link to the one-page bill: http://www.kslegislature.org/li/b2013_14/measures/documents/hb2366_00_0000.pdf. See report on Bloomberg News.

    Image courtesy of Cynthia Twohy.

From: Dr. Cynthia Twohy
Arica Hotel, Chile, South America, October 17, 2008

Traveling to Chile on the C-130 Aircraft

Hi: Greetings from the field site in Arica! I arrived on October 13th, having flown down on the Lockheed C-130 aircraft. It took us three days of travel from Denver, Colorado in the United States. The C-130 flies slow, but in some ways is more comfortable than flying with a regular airline, on a faster jet aircraft.

The first night we stayed in Corpus Cristi, Texas, and the second night in San Juan, Costa Rica. On the third day, we flew south along the western coastline of South America, which was really interesting. The photo shows a view out the aircraft window, over southern Peru. The landscape is very arid (dry) in this region. Also shown in the photo is part of a stratocumulus cloud deck. This is just the eastern edge of the clouds over land; most of the clouds are over the water, so that's where we will be flying our research flights.

We had our first research flight yesterday, and it went very well overall. More on some of our results later!

Adios, Cindy

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