This December is going to be a a great month for amateur astronomers, and anyone else who wants to take a moment to appreciate the natural wonders of the night sky. The Geminid meteor shower returns every year, but that doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t consider letting the kids stay up a late on December 13th (or get them up early, the showers will peak at 6AM in the Eastern time zone of the United States, at which point it will be low in the Western sky) to catch sight of one of the most mysterious astrological phenomena out there.
“The Geminids are my favorite, because they defy explanation,” NASA astronomer Bill Cooke, a meteor expert at the agency’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama told Space.com. Meteor showers are the result of the Earth passing through a stream of space rocks, which light up the atmosphere with “shooting stars.” Comets are the source of most of these fields, but the Geminids are different. Their source is a mysterious rocky object called 3200 Phaethon, which doesn’t shed nearly enough derbies to explain the size of the Geminid meteor showers.
Even if you miss the Geminid’s this year, don’t skip the total lunar eclipse that will be visible from North America on the night of December 20th this year. Our continent won’t get another this good until April 2014.
For the Western Hemisphere, the eclipse will “officially” begin on Dec. 21 at 12:29 a.m. EST (9:29 p.m. PST on Dec. 20) as the moon begins to enter Earth’s outer, or penumbra shadow. The eclipse should last about 73 minutes. References : http://www.kidglue.com/2010/12/09/geminid-meteor-shower-and-lunar-eclipse-2010-the-best-show-on-earth/
Natural disasters are often frightening and difficult for us to understand, because we have no control over when and where they happen. What we can control is how prepared we are as communities and governments to deal with the dangers that natural disasters bring.
Places that are more likely to have natural disasters, such as the earthquake-prone Pacific Ring of Fire, or coastal areas vulnerable to hurricanes, require accurate methods of predicting disasters and warning the public quickly. Once the people have been informed, evacuation routes must be provided so that they can all leave quickly and safely, even if they travel by foot. Emergency warnings and evacuation plans are not enough, though. Where there is a high risk of earthquakes, buildings need to be strong and flexible enough to survive a quake without collapsing. Where hurricanes and flooding are a problem, levees and dams must be strong enough to hold floodwaters, and natural drainage systems must be maintained to allow waters to flow back into the ocean. The failure of the levee and drainage systems was responsible for most of the destruction and flooding in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina in 2005. It was the poor planning of evacuation routes and assistance for those trapped by the flooding that resulted in the many tragic fatalities.
Flooding in New Oleans, LA September ,2005
People need to be educated on the risks in their area, and what to do when a disaster strikes. After a disaster, even if no one has died, there is a lot of damage to people' homes, farms and workplaces that must be repaired. This takes a lot of time and money to fix, and a country damaged by a disaster usually needs a large amount of international help to get better. Donated food, clothing, medicine and experienced professionals are all important when there is a disaster, but when the emergency is over it can take years to rebuild and make sure that future disasters can be managed. The boxing-day tsunami which devastated Indonesia and the 2005 earthquake in Kashmir, Pakistan were both natural disasters whose effects were made worse by underdeveloped infrastructure and widespread poverty. Tsunamis, earthquakes, hurricanes or any other natural disaster can't be avoided, but with good preparation and well-organized help after the fact, it is possible to survive and go back to normal life afterwards.
Emergence aid during the flood in Pakistan, August, 2010.
after earthquake in Haiti, 2010
References from http://issues.tigweb.org/disasters
