Video: Canada seal slaughter opens – ‘Climate change and economics have combined to kill the hunt’

[This horrifying video shows harp seals being slaughtered with hakapiks; not for the faint of heart.] The Canadian seal hunt opened this week with fewer animals being killed. Record-low ice kept sealers at home, with only four boats on opening day killing 1200 seals. Even though Canada has set the limit high, the slaughter has […]

Wal-Mart: Our shoppers are ‘running out of money’

By Parija Kavilanz, senior writer28 April 2011 NEW YORK (CNNMoney) – Wal-Mart’s core shoppers are running out of money much faster than a year ago due to rising gasoline prices, and the retail giant is worried, CEO Mike Duke said Wednesday. “We’re seeing core consumers under a lot of pressure,” Duke said at an event […]

Graph of the Day: Height of Violent Storms Over Eastern U.S., 28 April 2011

Contact: Rob GutroRobert.j.gutro@nasa.gov443-858-1779NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center28-Apr-2011 The Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission or TRMM satellite again flew over severe thunderstorms that were spawning tornadoes over the eastern United States on April 28 and detected massive thunderstorms and very heavy rainfall. TRMM, a satellite managed by both NASA and the Japanese Space Agency, captured the rainfall rates […]

A Tale of Two Lakes: One gives early warning signal for ecosystem collapse

Media ContactsCheryl Dybas, NSF (703) 292-7734 cdybas@nsf.govTerry Devitt, University of Wisconsin-Madison (608) 262-8282 trdevitt@wisc.eduApril 28, 2011 Researchers eavesdropping on complex signals from a remote Wisconsin lake have detected what they say is an unmistakable warning–a death knell–of the impending collapse of the lake’s aquatic ecosystem. The finding, reported today in the journal Science by a […]

Desperate U.S. sprawl developer gives away cars with houses

By Sarah Goodyear26 Apr 2011 My head nearly exploded at the breakfast table on Saturday morning. I was reading a piece in The New York Times about an Illinois developer who has finally found a way to unload the new houses he has built some 50 miles from downtown Chicago, in a place he has […]

U.S. releases report highlighting impacts of climate change to Western water resources

Contact: Kendra Barkoff (DOI) (202) 208-6416Dan DuBray (Reclamation) (202) 513-057425 April 2011 WASHINGTON, D.C. – Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar today released a report that assesses climate change risks and how these risks could impact water operations, hydropower, flood control, and fish and wildlife in the western United States. The report to Congress, prepared […]

2011 sets U.S. record for most acreage burned in April

By Jeff Masters26 April 2011 According to the Interagency Fire Center, wildfires in 2011 have already burned nearly 2.3 million acres in the U.S. This is the greatest acreage on record so early in the year, and is more area than burned all of last year. The largest U.S. acreage to burn since 1960 was […]

Americans depend more on federal aid than ever – Wages at historic low

By Dennis Cauchon, USA TODAY 26 April 2011 Americans depended more on government assistance in 2010 than at any other time in the nation’s history, a USA TODAY analysis of federal data finds. The trend shows few signs of easing, even though the economic recovery is nearly 2 years old. A record 18.3% of the […]

In Texas, questions of drought and climate change

By KATE GALBRAITH22 April 2011 The severe drought across Texas has hit the oil and gas city of Midland especially hard, as I reported in Friday’s New York Times and Texas Tribune. Since Oct. 1, Midland has received only 0.13 inches of rainfall — making it “most likely the driest six-and-a-half-month period in recorded history,” […]

Pesticide exposure in womb reduces IQ: study

By Liz Szabo, USA TODAY21 April 2011 Children exposed to high pesticide levels in the womb have lower average IQs than other kids, according to three independent studies released today in Environmental Health Perspectives. The studies involved more than 400 children, followed from before birth through ages 6 to 9, from both urban and rural […]

Social media & sharing icons powered by UltimatelySocial