Severe storms cause mudslides and flooding in Washington, USA

Rain in Washington state unleashed mudslides on land left bare by wildfires, washing down hillsides, damaging homes and closing highways.

There were no reports of injuries from Thursday night’s mudslides, but specifics were hard to come by because some of the phone and radio towers that serve the remote north-central area of the state were knocked out in summer wildfires.

Multiple slides occurred overnight on two highways that marooned five to 12 vehicles, officials said. Troopers and sheriff’s deputies worked late Thursday night to get the people out.

North of the town of Carlton, mudslides knocked a house off its foundation, pushed an occupied vehicle into a creek, trapped a dozen vehicles between slides and left a mound of dirt and debris 5 feet thick and 145 feet wide blocking Highway 153, The Wenatchee World reported.

“It was freaky,” Okanogan County Sheriff Frank Rogers told the newspaper. “There was so much water, it was amazing.”

There are at least two slides on Highway 20 in the 30-mile stretch east of Twisp to Okanogan, Transportation Department spokesman Jeff Adamson said. That stretch and an 8-mile section of Highway 153 near Twisp remained closed Friday morning.

Another round of thunderstorms was forecast with a flash flood watch through Friday evening, said National Weather Service meteorologist Steven Van Horn.

The Wenatchee World reported that some people whose homes survived the largest wildfire in state history this summer had damage from the mudslides. The Carlton Complex of fires burned more than 400 square miles, and 500 firefighters were still mopping up.

“This flooding is in the areas that were burned,” Adamson said. “It brings down rocks, mud and water.”

More rain and mudslide threats will prolong the highway closures, he said.

“If you’ve got an unstable slope, you just have to pull the crew and wait until tomorrow,” Adamson said.

About an inch of rain fell in an hour at about 7 p.m. Thursday around Twisp, Van Horn said, and the potential for similarly wet storms continued Friday.

Residents say they’re feeling disheartened.

“It’s like another nail in the coffin,” Carlton General Store owner Jeff Lyman told the newspaper. “It’s pretty bad down here right now.”

Maggie Garrett, who lives on Benson Creek, described fences torn down and deep channels carved through driveways and backyards.

“It was literally like a river running through here,” she said. “And now, everything’s 6 inches under mud.”

http://tinyurl.com/nmrctn2

Deadly Ebola Virus; British national living in Sierra Leone tests positive for Ebola Virus

A British national living in Sierra Leone has tested positive for the Ebola virus – the first Briton confirmed to have contracted the disease.

 

The Department of Health said medical experts were assessing the situation “to ensure that appropriate care is delivered”. Consular assistance is being provided.

 

Professor John Watson, deputy chief medical officer, said: “The overall risk to the public in the UK continues to be very low. Medical experts are currently assessing the situation in Sierra Leone to ensure that appropriate care is provided.

 

“We have robust, well-developed and well-tested NHS systems for managing unusual infectious diseases when they arise, supported by a wide range of experts.”

 

Meanwhile, west African nations have imposed stringent new measures to stop the spread of Ebola as two new cases emerged in Nigeria that appear to indicate a widening of the circle of those affected.

 

The Ivory Coast has closed its borders with its Ebola-hit neighbours and Sierra Leone has said it will jail people who hide patients with the virus. The World Health Organisation (WHO) believes the practice has contributed to a major underestimation of the current outbreak.

 

It was announced on Saturday that the borders between Ivory Coast and both Guinea and Liberia had been closed the previous day as the death toll of the epidemic reached 1,427 across west Africa.

 

Agence France-Presse reported that the measure was put in place “to protect all people, including foreigners, living on Ivorian territory,” Ivorian prime minister Daniel Kaban Duncan said.

 

According to the WHO, Liberia has been the hardest hit by the outbreak, with 624 deaths since March.

 

Guinea has seen 406 people die, while in Sierra Leone 392 have succumbed to the haemorrhagic fever. Nigeria, meanwhile, has seen five people die.

 

The two new cases in Nigeria are causing particular concern because they are outside the immediate group of caregivers who treated a dying airline passenger.

 

The new patients were infected by their spouses, both medical workers who had direct contact with Liberian-American Patrick Sawyer, who flew into Nigeria from Liberia and Togo and infected 11 others before he died in July.

 

There are fears that the number of people affected is even higher than reported because many people – mindful of the stigma attached – are hiding Ebola patients.

 

“This phenomenon strongly suggests the existence of an invisible caseload of patients who are not being detected by the surveillance system,” the UN health agency said. This has “never before been seen in an Ebola outbreak”, it added.

 

According to the Associated Press, the Liberian government has delivered donated rice to a slum where 50,000 people have been sealed off from the rest of the capital Monrovia in an attempt to contain the outbreak.

 

In Sierra Leone, a new amendment to the country’s health act was passed, imposing jail time of up to two years for those caught hiding Ebola patients. The new law – an update to the country’s 1960 Public Health Act – was passed on Friday.

 

Lawmaker Ansumana Jaiah Kaikai said the measure was necessary to compel reluctant residents to cooperate with government officials. “This amendment seeks to address these emerging bottlenecks,” he added.

http://tinyurl.com/oo55bpc

Plane crash and man rushed to hospital by helicopter at South Cave, Yorkshire, UK

A man was airlifted to hospital after crashing a plane near South Cave.

Humberside Fire and Rescue Service said the light aircraft crashed off Beverley Road following take-off from the Mount Airey airfield, shortly before 6pm on Friday.

Yorkshire Air Ambulance was called to take the man to hospital, while firefighters made the aircraft safe.

 

http://tinyurl.com/mknol3p

Plane crash at Cedar Mills Marina and Resort Airfield, Texas, USA

A plane crashed at Cedar Mills Marina and Resort Airfield Saturday morning, according to reports from WFAA-TV and Fox 4 News.

 

The airport is located on the south shore of Lake Texoma in Gordonville.

 

Fox 4 News reports the plane went off the runway and into trees.

 

WFAA-TV cites information from the Texas Department of Public Safety, saying four people aboard the plane were injured. Two were airlifted to a Plano hospital and two were taken to a Sherman hospital.

 

The injured persons’ conditions are unknown.

 

It is unclear what kind of plane crashed, or what led to the accident.

 

The FAA has reportedly been notified of the incident.

 

CBS DFW also confirms the crash.

 

News 12 has crews on the way for more information. Stick with us for updates.

 

This is the third plane crash in just over a week in the Texoma area.

 

On Aug. 15, a plane crashed in Montague Co., Texas, killing a 51-year-old man and a 10-year-old boy.

 

On Aug. 16, a plane crashed in Carter Co., Okla., killing a 63-year-old man and injuring a 58-year-old male passenger.

http://tinyurl.com/qaxzstr

Plane crash critically injures the pilot at Montgomery Airpark in Gaithersburg, USA

GAITHERSBURG, Md. (WJLA) – A small plane crashed at the Montgomery Airpark in Gaithersburg on Saturday afternoon, critically injuring one man.

 

An FAA spokesperson says the Piper PA-28 crashed around 12:10 p.m.

 

The FAA said the pilot reported a mechanical problem and tried to return after takeoff. The plane was only about 100 feet in the air when it ran into trouble, witnesses said.

 

During a landing attempt, the aircraft crashed at the intersection of Taxiways Bravo and Echo.

 

A 49-year-old man, who was piloting the plane, was transported to the hospital in critical condition, with possible life-threatening injuries. He was the only person onboard the plane.

 

The runway was closed as authorities investigated and cleaned up a small fuel spill that happened as a result of the crash.

 

The NTSB will be investigating the cause of the mechanical problem.

The identity of the pilot has not been released.

 

http://tinyurl.com/pugskh2

Plane crash in Langley, Canada

No one was seriously hurt when a small plane crashed near the Langley airport tonight (Friday).

Witnesses watched it flip over after it landed in a field around 6:30pm.

Police say the pilot, a man in his early 30′s, is okay, but his passenger, a woman in her early 20′s, hit her head.

The cause of the crash is now under investigation by the Transportation Safety Board.

http://tinyurl.com/nbdj36v

Tsunami could be generated by fragmentation of the volcano in the island of Nishinoshima, Japan

Scientists fear that if Nishinoshima continues to grow, now increased to five times its size in May, can generate a branch to sink and generate a tsunami

This is the island of Nishinoshima, located in the Pacific Ocean about 1,000 kilometers south of Tokyo, which quintupled its size at the end of May due to the lava solidified product of the eruption of a volcano that has since late last November spewing magma.

Before the eruption, the remote island measuring 290 square meters, but the area has grown to 1.4 square kilometers and continues to expand due to the emission of lava, according to the latest observations from helicopter.

The volcano spits every day some 200,000 cubic meters of magma, as estimated by a group of scientists from Tokyo’s Earthquake Research Institute.

If this pace is maintained eruptions in the coming months, some of the new branches of the island formed by solidified lava “could sink and generate a tsunami,” said the newspaper quoted the head of investigations, volcanic geology professor Fukashi Maeno .

The eventual tsunami would reach Chichijima Island, in which more than 2,000 people and the main living Ogasawa archipelago, about 130 kilometers east of Nishinoshima, according to a computer simulation by researchers.

Given this risk, Maeno stressed the need to install anti-tsunami barriers around the island and “continuous monitoring of its evolution.”

The eruption, which took place on 20 November, was the first of a volcano in Japan in four decades.

http://tinyurl.com/l4qyfv8

MAGNITUDE 5.4 IRAN-IRAQ BORDER REGION

http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/eventpage/usb000s5h3#summary

Subject To Change

Depth: 10 km

Distances: 47km (29mi) SE of Abdanan, Iran
48km (30mi) E of Dehloran, Iran
66km (41mi) WNW of Dezful, Iran
70km (43mi) NW of Shush, Iran
324km (201mi) ESE of Baghdad, Iraq  

Landslide Causes Multiple Car Accidents With Injuries In Sardine Canyon, USA

Five people were taken to the hospital after a landslide in Sardine Canyon caused several accidents.

 

The slide happened about four miles from Brigham City on SR-89.

 

The road re-opened Saturday morning but Highway Patrol will continue to watch the mountain in case there are more slides.

 

The road is damaged and UDOT is investigating.

 

Officials say rain is what caused the rockslide.

 

The five people taken to the hospital are expected to recover.

http://tinyurl.com/lnfmwaf

MAGNITUDE 4.7 ICELAND REGION

http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/eventpage/usb000s5q5#summary
    
Subject to change

Depth: 2 km

Distances: 104km (65mi) SSE of Akureyri, Iceland
229km (142mi) ENE of Reykjavik, Iceland
230km (143mi) ENE of Kopavogur, Iceland
233km (145mi) ENE of Hafnarfjordur, Iceland
613km (381mi) NW of Torshavn, Faroe Islands