Sunday, August 23, 2009

RT @sivamenaan: rains in chennai. its been years i got myself drenched in chennai rains. its a beautiful evening
RT @the_hindu: Happy birthday, Chennai (Madras, now Chennai, is 370 years old.) http://bit.ly/Ruu5O
very Heavy rain over north-west Maharastra, orissa coast and Chatisgarh, signs of LOW over north-west Bay.. http://ping.fm/DLl6g
chennai - Pallavaram zone got heavy showers while Egmore is receiving now 8:22pm mild showers.
chennai - Heavy electric storm lashed south-west suburbs and moving across to East.
chennai - From 2pm Rain clouds were builing up and clearing. At around 6pm thunder cell formation was heavy over south-west horizon.
2012 :: 7 reasons ... http://ping.fm/NnFhP

2012

SCIENTIFIC EXPERTS from around the world are predicting that five years from now, all life on Earth could well come to an end. Some are saying it’ll be humans that would set it off. Others believe that a natural phenomenon will be the cause. And the religious folks are saying it’ll be God himself who would press the stop button. The following are some likely arguments as to why the world would end by the year 2012.

Reason one: Mayan calendar
The first to predict 2012 as the end of the world were the Mayans, a bloodthirsty race that were good at two things -- building highly accurate astrological equipment out of stone and sacrificing virgins.

Thousands of years ago they managed to calculate the length of the lunar moon as 329.53020 days, only 34 seconds out. The Mayan calendar predicts that the earth will end on December 21, 2012. Given that they were pretty close to the mark with the lunar cycle, it’s likely they’ve got the end of the world right as well.

Reason two: Sun storms
Solar experts from around the world monitoring the sun have made a startling discovery. Our sun is in a bit of strife. The energy output of the sun is, like most things in nature, cyclic and it’s supposed to be in the middle of a period of relative stability. However, recent solar storms have been bombarding the earth with lot of radiation energy. It’s been knocking out power grids and destroying satellites. This activity is predicted to get worse and calculations suggest it’ll reach its deadly peak sometime in 2012.

Reason three: The atom smasher
Scientists in Europe have been building the world’s largest particle accelerator. Basically, its a 27 km tunnel designed to smash atoms together to find out what makes the universe tick. However, the mega-gadget has caused serious concern, with some scientists suggesting that it’s properly even a bad idea to turn it on in the first place. They’re predicting all manner of deadly results, including mini black holes. So when this machine is fired up for its first serious experiment in 2012, the world could be crushed into a super-dense blob the size of a basketball.

Reason four: The Bible says it
If having scientists warning us about the end of the world isn’t bad enough, religious folks are getting in on the act as well. Interpretations of the Christian Bible reveal that the date for Armageddon, the final battle between good an evil, has been set for 2012. The I Ching, also known as the Chinese Book of Changes, says the same thing, as do various sections of the Hindu teachings.

Reason five: Super volcano
Yellowstone National Park in United States is famous for its thermal springs and old faithful geyser. The reason for this is simple -- it’s sitting on top of the world’s biggest volcano and geological experts are beginning to get nervous sweats. The Yellowstone volcano has a pattern of erupting every 650,000 years or so, and we’re many years overdue for an explosion that will fill the atmosphere with ash, blocking the sun and plunging the earth into a frozen winter that could last up to 15,000 years. The pressure under the Yellowstone is building steadily, and geologists have set 2012 as a likely date for the big bang.

Reason six: The physicists
This one’s case of bog -- simple maths mathematics. Physicists at Berkely University have been crunching the numbers.
They’ve determined that the earth is well overdue for a major catastrophic event. Even worse, they’re claiming that their calculations prove that we’re all going to die, very soon. They are also saying that their prediction comes with a certainty of 99 per cent; and 2012 just happens to be the best guess as to when it occurs.

Reason seven: Earth’s magnetic field
We all know the Earth is surrounded by a magnetic field that shields us from most of the sun’s radiation. What you might not know is that the magnetic poles we call North and South have a nasty habit of swapping places every 750,000 years or so -- and right now we’re about 30,000 years overdue. Scientists have noted that the poles are drifting apart roughly 20-30 kms each year, much faster than ever before, which points to a pole-shift being right around the corner. While the pole shift is under way, the magnetic field is disrupted and will eventually disappear, sometimes for up to 100 years. The result is enough UV outdoors to crisp your skin in seconds, killing everything it touches.
Chennai - Temperature just touched 33.8°C (11:46am)
Chennai Day - 22-Aug-09 ... http://ping.fm/lwGaz

Chennai Day - 22-Aug-09

Are SunSpots Dissapearing?


According to NOAA sunspot counts, the longest stretch of spotless suns during the current solar minimum was 52 days in July, August and Sept. of 2008. The current spate of blank suns is putting that record in jeopardy. The sun is entering its 43rd consecutive day with no sunspots, and there are none in the offing. Deep solar minimum continues.

Sunspots are made of magnetism. The “firmament” of a sunspot is not matter but rather a strong magnetic field that appears dark because it blocks the upflow of heat from the sun’s fiery depths. Without magnetism, there would be no sunspots. According to Bill Livingston and Matt Penn of the National Solar Observatory in Tucson, Arizona, sunspot magnetic fields are waning. The two respected solar astronomers have been measuring solar magnetism since 1992. Their technique is based on Zeeman splitting of infrared spectral lines emitted by iron atoms in the vicinity of sunspots. Extrapolating their data into the future suggests that sunspots could completely disappear within decades.

Don’t count out sunspots just yet, however. While the data of Livingston and Penn are widely thought to be correct, far-reaching extrapolations may be premature. This type of measurement is relatively new, and the data reaches back less than 17 years. “Whether this is an omen of long-term sunspot decline, analogous to the Maunder Minimum, remains to be seen,” they caution in a recent EOS article

Weather collapses roof at Indian airport

An aviation official said Saturday top officials need to explain how heavy winds and rains could collapse a section of the roof at an Indian airport.

An unidentified civil aviation ministry representative told the Indo-Asian News Service that Friday night's collapse of a roof section at Indira Gandhi International Airport in Delhi will be investigated by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation.

"The government has taken a serious note of the terminal flooding. We have sought a full report from the developers on flooding and the damage caused to a brand new terminal," the aviation official said.

"This is not the first time it has happened. We propose to summon the top officials for an explanation soon. Action may also be taken accordingly."

No injuries were reported, but the incident prompted 10 incoming flights to be diverted.

Delhi International Airport Ltd., which operates the Delhi airport, told news service the roof collapse also prompted 20 outgoing flights to be rescheduled
Chennai - Cloudy with high dead clouds, warm morning .. http://ping.fm/A4hiB
North Bay is getting ready to host a New Monsoon LOW .. http://ping.fm/kktiO