Earthweek: a diary of the planet
Hotter heat
Heat records have tumbled around the Northern Hemisphere this summer, from California to Europe and the Middle East, with disastrous wildfires being sparked in some areas.
Though parts of the planet were cooler than average for this time of year, climate experts caution the trend toward more maximum temperature records being broken is a product of the planet getting increasingly warmer overall. There is mounting evidence that a warmer Arctic is altering the strength and pattern of the jet stream, meaning when heat waves set in, they tend to last longer.
The more frequent and intense heat waves are proving to be deadly for the vulnerable and elderly, with more than a dozen deaths already being blamed on the recent heat in Canada.
Where’s summer?
experiencing its grayest and wettest summer since 1914. According to Icelandic meteorologist Trausti Jonsson, the high pressure blanketing the continent with heat is driving cooler and wetter winds over the far North Atlantic. Long-range outlooks don’t offer much hope for Iceland’s struggling ice-cream vendors, swimming pools and campsites.
New Stone Age
A small group of wild monkeys on a Panamanian island appears to have entered into their own version of the Stone Age, scientists say.
Though only a handful of the many white-faced capuchin monkeys that live
on Jicarón have displayed the ability to use stones to crack open nuts and shellfish, they join only three other groups of nonhuman primates that have used stones for tools.
Other species that appear to have learned the practice include chimpanzees in West Africa, macaques in Thailand and another species of capuchins in South America. Until a few decades ago, it was believed that humans were the only species to turn stones into tools.
Earthquakes
An unusually sharp earthquake knocked items off shelves in metropolitan Tokyo. Earth movement also was felt in northern Israel. Electric propulsion
A scientist believes that she has solved the centuries-old mystery of how spiders can launch themselves into air and fly on silken threads for hundreds of miles at heights of nearly 3 miles. Researcher Erica Morley at the University of Bristol in England found that Linyphiid spiders can detect electric fields, actually generate their own currents and use the fields to control their flights. Morley found that when an electric field was available to the spiders, they began a behavior known as “tiptoeing,” which is seen only when spiders are about to balloon. That’s a practice that involves the spiders straightening their legs, raising their abdomen and releasing silk.
Crashing the party
The rare sight of a Southern right whale frolicking in New Zealand’s Wellington Harbour caused officials to postpone the city’s annual fireworks display. The untimely arrival of the marine mammal coincided with the Maori new year celebration known as Matariki. Concerns from experts that the flashes and sounds of the pyrotechnics could cause the whale to harm itself or the boats in the harbor loaded with people prompted the event to be postponed for a week.
Tropical cyclones
Typhoon Maria briefly attained Cartegory-5 force before striking Taiwan and eastern China, causing more than 250,000 to be evacuated from their homes. Beryl was briefly a hurricane before passing through the Windward Islands as a tropical storm. And Hurricane Chris passed just off the Atlantic Seaboard, causing swells off the coast of North Carolina and other Mid-Atlantic states.