RSOE Emergency and Disaster Information Service | High Winds hit Western Washington State - 50,000 without electricity - January 18, 2010

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High winds hit parts of Western Washington early Monday, knocking out electrical service for more than 50,000 utility customers. The National Weather Service reported gusts of 60 mph in Hoquiam, 56 in Olympia and 56 in Everett. Puget Sound Energy reported nearly 40,000 customers out of service. Spokeswoman Lindsey Walimaki (wall-uh-MAK'-ee) says the hardest hit areas are Thurston County and Kitsap County, especially Poulsbo. A spokesman for the Snohomish County PUD, Neil Neroutsos (ner-OOT'-soh), reported a peak of 9,000 outages, mostly around Arlington and Camano Island. The Cowlitz County PUD reported more than 5,000 outages, including the Kelso area. Weather Service meteorologist Dustin Guy said winds would ease late Monday morning.

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Victoria Times Colonist - ‎1 hour ago‎

Strong winds contributed to power outages across southern Vancouver Island and the Gulf Islands with more than 25000 customers without service this morning. ...

News Tribune - Olympia, Washington | $4 million in budget cuts - only areas that are up are alcohol and gambling taxes

OLYMPIA - November 3, 2009 – Fourteen city employees were told Monday that they will probably lose their jobs in January, the victims of a bad economy requiring about $4 million in budget cuts, City Manager Steve Hall said.

Those were part of about 27 fulltime positions he plans to eliminate next year in a massive reorganization of city government, including many unfilled positions.

“Those were good employees,” he said. “They worked hard, they were loyal.”

Hall unveiled his proposed $97.3 million budget for 2010 at Monday night’s City Council meeting, after a difficult day of informing employees of the job cuts. But the plan is just a proposal. The City Council, after six weeks of deliberation, will make the final decision.

The cost-cutting measures – from layoffs to positions unfilled – will affect just about every facet of city government:

• Funding for social services would be eliminated.

• The school resource officer program would end.

• The victim assistance prosecution program would end.

• Jail beds would be reduced.

• Parks would receive less maintenance.

By department, public works would take the biggest hit with eight positions eliminated. Parks would lose 6.5 positions, police 6.4 positions, general government 2.5 positions and municipal court 2 positions (including a probation officer).

Funding would also be eliminated for Amtrak station maintenance and the Economic Development Council.

Also Monday night, the council declared the need for a 1 percent property tax revenue increase, which is the maximum allowed under state law.

The culprit is the bad economy, which has caused sales tax revenues to drop to negative levels, year-over-year, for the past 18 months except for a small uptick last month. Those are the city’s biggest source of revenue.

“Month after month after month, we’ve been down,” Hall said.

Worse still, every other major revenue source is down. The only areas that are up are alcohol and gambling taxes and a one-time increase of building-related fee revenues from some downtown development projects, such as the Washington State Employees Credit Union building.

The city has gone from a high of about 540 employees in recent years to an expected 487 next year.

“These are very difficult choices for the community over the new few weeks,” Hall said.

Council members raised small concerns but didn’t spend much time on the budget Monday night. Councilwoman Karen Messmer was concerned that enough money be set aside for weather emergencies, such as a winter storm, in light of last December’s heavy snowfall.

Councilman Joe Hyer, chairman of the council’s Finance Committee, spoke highly of the budget, considering the circumstances.

“I actually think this budget is quite impressive for what we have to work with,” he said.

KFSM.com | Controversial study suggests vast magma pool under Washington state

MCT News Service - October 25, 2009 - WASHINGTON A vast pool of molten rock in the continental crust that underlies southwestern Washington state could supply magma to three active volcanoes in the Cascade Mountains Mount St. Helens, Mount Rainier and Mount Adams according to a new study that's causing a stir among scientists.

The study, published Sunday in the magazine Nature Geoscience, concluded that the magma pool among the three mountains could be the "most widespread magma-bearing area of continental crust discovered so far."

Other scientists dismiss the existence of an underground vat of magma covering potentially hundreds of square miles as "farfetched" and "highly unlikely." Rather than magma heated to 1,300 to 1,400 degrees, some think it could be water.

They also discount speculation that a so-called "super volcano" such as the one under the Yellowstone National Park area might be beneath the region. They say there's no credible evidence to suggest a need to overhaul the volcanic hazard assessments for the three mountains.

Even so, the study is another piece of the puzzle as scientists try to understand the deep plumbing of volcanoes and, perhaps eventually, learn how to predict their eruptions better. FULL STORY

KOMOnews.com | Study: Fault line under Seattle bigger than thought

Oct 24, 2009 - SEATTLE -- The fault line under Seattle could be bigger than anyone thought, according to new research conducted by a University of Washington graduate student. Beth Martin found evidence that could mean quakes along the fault line could be larger, and even trigger a tsunami. The Nisqually earthquake that rocked the Northwest eight years ago was a 6.8 magnitude. The quake, centered deep in the Earth, caused a lot of shaking and some damage. But the ground didn't rise up like it did 1,000 years ago. That's when scientists believe a 7- to 7.5-magnitude earthquake hit the more shallow Seattle fault zone that runs from Sammamish, through Seattle and out toward Bremerton. FULL STORY

News1130.com | Baby giraffe born at Greater Vancouver Zoo - Yet to be Named

It's a girl! (Photo: Courtesy Greater Vancouver Zoo)

ALDERGROVE (NEWS11130) - The Greater Vancouver Zoo is celebrating the birth of a six-foot tall baby girl!

The zoo welcomed a new-born Rothschild's giraffe into the world Sunday evening.

The little giraffe is already standing on her own and is being nursed by a surrogate mother. The zoo is yet to choose a name for the latest addition. The baby giraffe will be making her debut at the zoo on Friday, when the public will be allowed to view her from the windows of the giraffe house from 1 to 2 P.M.

(Photos: Courtesy Greater Vancouver Zoo)

PhysOrg.com | Research gives glimpse of tectonic history on Puget Sound-region fault zones

October 19th, 2009 by Vince Stricherz

(PhysOrg.com) -- New research on the Kitsap Peninsula, at the west edge of Washington state's Puget Sound, finds evidence that land was raised at least 6 feet by ancient earthquakes.

They have seen evidence that a major quake, perhaps with a magnitude of 7 to 7.5, struck the fault more than a millennium ago and raised the south end of Bainbridge Island and Alki Point in West Seattle right out of the water. They know the quake triggered a tsunami on Puget Sound, and they have been able to track the fault zone east through Seattle and across Lake Washington........

Aerial view shows a massive landslide closing highway, destroying homes, blocking and changing the flow of Naches River west of Naches, Washington

Hwy 410 west of Naches, Washington likely closed for winter after huge landslide

A massive landslide that closed a section of State Route 410, destroyed at least two homes, blocked and changed the flow of the Naches River and prompted the evacuation of dozens of nearby residents could continue to advance for several more days. FULL STORY

EarthObservatory.NASA.gov | Visibility dropped to zero in parts of eastern Washington on October 4, 2009, as a large dust storm blew through

Visibility dropped to zero in parts of eastern Washington on October 4, 2009, as a large dust storm blew through. This image of the storm was captured by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite shortly after noon (Pacific Daylight Time). According to local news, the storm brought strong winds gusting to 43 miles per hour in places that propelled the dust across the southeast corner of the state. After numerous multi-vehicle accidents, sections of Interstate 90 near the town of Moses Lake and several local roads had to be closed for several hours.

A thick, rippling plume of dust runs northeast to southwest through the center of the image. Dust stretches as far south as the cities of Pasco and Kennewick, which sit on opposite banks of the Columbia River. In the north, the dust seems to rise primarily from the pale golden squares of fields farmed using dryland agriculture, a common practice in arid eastern Washington. The dryland fields are larger and less colorful than the bright green and gold fields of irrigated agriculture near the Columbia and Snake Rivers in the center of the image.

Dryland farmers rely entirely on rainfall to sustain their crops, and as a result, do many things to preserve moisture in the soil. Some of these practices—leaving a field fallow after harvest to allow water to build in the soil for a year or covering the field with dry soil to prevent underlying moisture from evaporating—make dryland agriculture very prone to dust storms. These fields are likely either fallow or newly planted, probably with winter wheat, a common dryland crop in eastern Washington.

The dust storm persisted for several hours and was still visible when Aqua MODIS flew over the region at 2:00 p.m. local time. The Terra MODIS image shown here is available in multiple resolutions from the MODIS Rapid Response System.

1. References

2. Horton, P. (2009, October 4). Weather: Blowing dust shuts down part of I-90, record rain falls in Kennewick. Tricity Herald. Accessed October 5, 2009.

NASA image courtesy Jeff Schmaltz, MODIS Rapid Response Team. Caption by Rebecca Lindsey and Holli Riebeek.

60 residents of Nickelsville, homeless tent city located on Port of Seattle property has now been forced to move for the 9th time

Homeless advocate and Nickelsville resident Greg Lewis takes a stand and gets arrested by Port of Seattle Police at the Nickelsville homeless encampment at 2 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 30 at Terminal 107, which is owned by the Port. The Port issued the 60 or so residents an ultimatum, to vacate or get arrested for trespassing.

September 30, 2009

This was the camp's eighth location since it was first evicted from a South Park vacant city lot Sept. 26 of last year.

At about 1 p.m. Kurt Beckett, communications director Port of Seattle and Port Chief E.C. Wilson approached the camp surrounded by TV cameras, still cameras, tape recorders, and microphones, and of course, homeless residents. They stated peacefully that many talks between Port officials and Nickelsville residents have already taken place, that there was no other Port property available for the residents, and that now was the time for residents to leave.

There was an amicable question-and-answer portion between a few residents and Beckett, but he and Wilson finally said residents must leave or they would be arrested by Port police.

Three official warning announcements were made by an officer on a megaphone from his car, then more than 20 officers quietly entered the camp. Full Story

StanDeyo.com | Newly Discovered Fault Could Shake Washington with 7.5 Quake

AP | Dangerous staph bacteria have been found in sand and water for the first time at five public beaches along the coast of Washington

By MARILYNN MARCHIONE, AP Medical Writer Marilynn Marchione, Ap Medical Writer – Sat Sep 12, 3:02 pm ET

SAN FRANCISCO – Dangerous staph bacteria have been found in sand and water for the first time at five public beaches along the coast of Washington, and scientists think the state is not the only one with this problem.

The germ is MRSA, or methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus — a hard-to-treat bug once rarely seen outside of hospitals but that increasingly is spreading in ordinary community settings such as schools, locker rooms and gyms.

The germ causes nasty skin infections as well as pneumonia and other life-threatening problems. It spreads mostly through human contact. Little is known about environmental sources that also may harbor the germ.

Finding it at the beach suggests one place that people may be picking it up, said Marilyn Roberts, a microbiologist at the University of Washington in Seattle.

"We don't know the risk" for any individual going to a beach, she said. "But the fact that we found these organisms suggests that the level is much higher than we had thought."

She presented results Saturday at an American Society for Microbiology conference in California. Last year, her team reported finding a different type of bacteria, enterococci, at five West Coast beaches. And earlier this year, University of Miami researchers reported finding staph bacteria in four out of 10 ocean water samples collected by hundreds of bathers at a South Florida beach.

Many communities also commonly restrict bathing at beaches because of contamination with fecal bacteria.

In the new study, researchers tested 10 beaches in Washington along the West CoastPuget Sound from February to September 2008. Staph bacteria were found at nine of them, including five with MRSA. The strains resembled the highly resistant ones usually seen in hospitals, rather than the milder strains acquired in community settings, Roberts said. and in

No staph was found in samples from two beaches in southern California.

People should not avoid beaches or be afraid to enjoy them, scientists say.

"It's probably prudent to shower when you come out" to lower the risk of bacteria staying on the skin, said Dr. Lance Peterson, a microbiologist at NorthShore University Health System in Evanston, Ill.

"Make sure you get all the sand off," and cover any open cuts or scrapes before playing in the sand, Roberts added. Digging in the sand or being buried in it seems to raise the risk of infection, she said.

Examiner.com | Rare tornado hits Washington state: how bad will climate change impact the Northwest?

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