MACQUARIE ISLAND Earthquake Alert

M6.5 Strikes West of MACQUARIE ISLAND

Earthquake Details

Region: West of Macquarie Island
Magnitude: 6.5Mw
Date and Time: June 5, 2011 at 11:51:12UTC
Epicenter: 147.30°E 55.92°S
Depth: 10 km
Status: M – manually revised
Source: GFZ Potsdam – Earthquake Bulletin

Earthquake Location Maps

Source: USGS; enhanced by FIRE-EARTH

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Birth defects in China could rise by 66 pct

China’s pollution-related birth defects could reach 242 per 10,000 this year

The the number of birth defects in China is increasing at an alarming rate.

According to a report published in 2009:

• The coal-mining Shanxi province had the largest number of birth defects.
• A 2007 commission report covering the five-year period from 2001 to 2006 recorded a 40% rise in the rate of defects from about 105 per 10,000 births to 146.
•  Defective births accounted for up to 6 percent of total every year,  China’s family planning agency said. About 30 percent of the victims die and 40 percent are disabled.
• A child is born with physical defects every 30 seconds because of the environmental pollution.
• “Birth defects are now the single biggest killer of infants on the mainland,” Professor Hu Yali of Nanjing University told the Nanjing Morning Post.
• At least 1.2 million babies are born in China with “visible defects” each year.

Researchers said emissions from Shanxi’s massive coal and chemical industry, including carbon monoxide, nitrogen dioxide and particulates, was responsible for the defects.

“The problem of birth defects is related to environmental pollution, especially in eight main coal zones,” said An Huanxiao, the director of Shanxi family planning office.

Ming Yuan 2/04  –  Ming Yuan is a boy who was born with hydrocephalus or more commonly, “water on the brain”.  This is a serious birth defect and can cause mental retardation if left unchecked.  Ming Yuan had received a shunt before we got him so the excess fluid is going into a body cavity, relieving pressure on his brain.  He is a fussy little guy who demands lots of attention from his caregivers as well as visitors.  I think he has become aware of the “squeaky wheel” syndrome and is becoming a master at it! Image and caption courtesy of China Dream Home

Meanwhile the energy demand in China has risen almost exponentially. The electricity demand is set to rise by about 40 gigawatts over the capacity this summer, officials said.

More than 70 percent of China’s electricity is generated in coal-burning plants, and the official announcement has prompted China’s Railway Ministry to deploy more trains to transport coal around the country.

Based on the available data on China’s ever increasing demand for electricity, and projection of previous national birth figures, FIRE-EARTH estimates that the number of birth defects over the 2006-2011 period could climb to 242 per 10,000 births, a 66 percent rise compared with the previous period.

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Chile’s Puyehue volcano explodes

Puyehue-Cordon-Caulle erupted ejecting a 10-km high plume of ash into the air

“The Cordon Caulle has entered an eruptive process, with an explosion resulting in a 10-kilometer-high gas column,” state emergency office ONEMI reported.

The authorities were forced to evacuate at least 3,500 people from areas near the volcano.

A large cloud of ash was reported over the Patagonian ski resort town of Bariloche in the neighboring Argentina, about 160 km east of the volcano,   forcing the local airport to close.

“We’re trying to stop car traffic and ask that people stay at home and close their doors and windows to prevent the volcanic ash from coming in. The city’s airport was also closed,” an eyewitness told the local TV station.

“Ash was dumped like a snowstorm… The city is covered in grey ash.”

“Eyewitness Juli Kessler told the BBC she saw ‘big black clouds hanging over the Andes’ and ash dust lying on the road.”

Map of Chile’s volcanoes with the approximate  location of Puyehue-Cordon-Caulle volcano marked by FIRE-EARTH.

The governor of Chile’s Los Rios region was reported as saying that fire was seen in the volcano’s crater as a large plume of smoke billowed out.

“You can see the fire (in the volcano) and a plume of smoke, and there’s a strong smell of sulfur,” he told reporters.

The volcano is located about 840 km (522 miles) south of Santiago, the national capital. Its  last major eruption occurred in 1960, after a magnitude 9.5 earthquake struck Chile about 260km directly north of the volcano.

Chile is home to about 2,000 volcanoes (world’s 2nd largest volcanic chain after Indonesia), of which 500 of are classified as active, with about 55 of them having erupted historically. Llaima and Chaiten, two other Chilean volcanoes, have erupted in the past few years.

Puyehue-Cordón Caulle

Location: Central Chile
Last Known Eruption: 1990
Summit Elevation: 2,236m 7,336 feet
Latitude: 40.590°S
Longitude: 72.117°W
Source: GVP

The Puyehue-Cordón Caulle volcanic complex (PCCVC) is a large NW-SE-trending late-Pleistocene to Holocene basaltic-to-rhyolitic transverse volcanic chain SE of Lago Ranco. The 1799-m-high Pleistocene Cordillera Nevada caldera lies at the NW end, separated from Puyehue stratovolcano at the SE end by the Cordón Caulle fissure complex. The Pleistocene Mencheca volcano with Holocene flank cones lies NE of Puyehue. The basaltic-to-rhyolitic Puyehue volcano is the most geochemically diverse of the PCCVC. The flat-topped, 2236-m-high Puyehue volcano was constructed above a 5-km-wide caldera and is capped by a 2.4-km-wide summit caldera of Holocene age. Lava flows and domes of mostly rhyolitic composition are found on the eastern flank of Puyehue. Historical eruptions originally attributed to Puyehue, including major eruptions in 1921-22 and 1960, are now known to be from the Cordón Caulle rift zone. The Cordón Caulle geothermal area, occupying a 6 x 13 km wide volcano-tectonic depression, is the largest active geothermal area of the southern Andes volcanic zone. Photo by Klaus Dorsch, 2001 (University of Munich); caption: GVP

Inches of volcanic ash 100 miles away

Argentine resort city of San Carlos de Bariloche, about 160 km (100 miles) east of Chile’s Puyehue, seen covered by volcanic ash from the June 4 eruption. Photo Credit: Reuters/Trilce Reyes. Image may be subject to copyright. More images…

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