Earthweek Sun 1 Apr 1990. A report issued by the U.S. space agency NASA concluded that there has been no sign that the greenhouse effect increased global temperatures during the 1980s. Based on satellite analysis of the atmosphere between 1,500 and 6,000 metres above sea level, the report said that the study found “a seemingly random pattern of change from year to year.”
EARTHWEEK: A DIARY OF THE PLANET (1990, April 1). The Canberra Times (ACT : 1926 – 1995), p. 4. Retrieved July 19, 2021, from
By Steve Newman
Global Warming
A report issued by the U.S. space agency NASA concluded that there has been no sign that the greenhouse effect increased global temperatures during the 1980s. Based on satellite analysis of the atmosphere between 1,500 and 6,000 metres above sea level, the report said that the study found “a seemingly random pattern of change from year to year.” While several government and university meteorologists around the world have concluded that average surface temperatures have increased significantly in recent years, the report’s authors said that their satellite analysis of the upper atmosphere is more accurate, and should be adopted as the standard way to monitor global temperature change.
El Nino
Sea surface temperatures in the central tropical Pacific rose by an average of two degrees Celsius each month since November, raising fears, and hopes, that another episode of the El Nino wind reversal pattern may have started. In the mid-1980s, the last El Nino brought severe flooding to California, drought from Australia to Thailand, and disruption of the south west monsoon in the Indian Ocean.
Suffering from its third consecutive year of drought, residents of California could benefit from the additional rainfall that El Nino might bring them next winter.
New Season
Thousands of locusts “as big as little sparrows” and grouped in several dozen swarms were spotted 240 km north east of the Senegalese capital Dakar, according to the national APS news
agency. Last year’s invasion in Senegal was so massive that the government needed international help in its aerial spraying efforts to save a large portion of the nation’s
crops.
Pre-Monsoon Floods
Flash floods killed at least 69 people in northern India’s Jammu and Kashmir state. Rain-swollen rivers in northeastern Bangladesh marooned about 10,000 people, and inundated
portions of the region’s rice crops.
Mudslides, avalanches and hail storms have wreaked havoc in the foothills of the Himalayas during the last half of March.
Earthquakes
Costa Rica was shaken by more than 1,500 tremors and quakes, including a magnitude 6.5 temblor that wrecked a beach hotel, damaged several other buildings, and was felt from
Panama to Nicaragua. In the Philippines, a woman was killed by falling debris loosened by a quake on the southern island of Mindanao. Earth movements were also felt in central Japan, western Nepal, eastern Iran, and the republic of Tadzhikistan.
Drought
The drought that has brought many water supplies to critically low levels throughout the Mediterranean worsened. The Greek Agriculture Minister warned that “the country is on the
brink of a national disaster, and unless it rains in the next 30 days, the damage to agriculture will be incalculable.” Reservoirs around Athens are at the lowest levels ever recorded after 75 consecutive days without rain. The head of the Greek
Orthodox Church, Archbishop Seraphim, asked the faithful to pray after Sunday mass for rain.
Testing Halt
The Soviet Union announced that it has sus
pended underground nuclear testing at its Semipalatinsk site in Kazakhstan until steps are taken to ensure greater protection from radiation. Local pressure to stop thetesting has mounted recently.
Aurora
A minor geomagnetic storm, at what is near the height of the sun’s 12-year sunspot cycle, produced a display of the Aurora Borealis viewed at high latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere.
Some radio and satellite communications were affected.
Epic Flight
Tass news agency reported that a dark brown pigeon was found in a suburb of the Ukrainian town of Luck after an apparent six-month hemispheric flight from the United States.
A tag attached to the bird’s leg read “Chicago. August, 1989. No. 4392.”
The pigeon alighted on the hand of a land reclamation worker who took it to a local pet store. Tass said that the bird likes its new dwelling and “has
chosen a bride.”
Additional Sources: NOAA Space Environment Laboratory, U. S. Climate Analysis Center, U. S. Earthquake Information Center and the World Meteorological Organization.