Cumbria Floods November 2009

The BBC Cumbria website has a large amount of resources on the recent floods, including many, many photos which you can access here. You can read about the weather that caused the flooding here.

A Week of Natural Disasters

This week has seen a number of major natural disasters hit East Asia. You can read about the tsunami that his Samoa on Tuesday here - this page has links to information on which countries were hit, and an animated guide to tsunamis. This article is about a surfer who survived the tsunami by staying out at sea.

On Wednesday, two major earthquakes hit Indonesia - a magnitude 7.6 followed by a 6.8. So far, the death toll stands at 1 100. You can read about the earthquake and its aftermath here - again, there are many links to other related articles and sites on this page.

Earlier in the week Typhoon Ketswana hit Vietnam, Cambodia and the Philippines, where many people were affected by heavy rain, strong winds and landslides. You can read about it here. Today, the Philippines is being hit by Typhoon Parma, although the capital city, Manila looks like it will escape the worst of it. The BBC report of this typhoon is here.

Away from Asia, the city of Messina on Sicily (Italy) has been badly affected by heavy rain and mudslides. Information and film of this can be found here. So far, the death toll stands at more than 50.

All of these events can be used as case studies for GCSE and A Level. Think about the causes of the disaster, the consequences (social, economic, environmental, political) and the responses (local, national, international).

Atlantic Hurricanes

2008 was forecast to be a busy hurricane season. You can see the predictions that were made in August here. The hurricane currently wreaking havoc in the Caribbean and threatening Texas, is Hurricane Ike - this one has already hit Cuba and Haiti, and is now heading for the USA. You can see the damage it has already done in the Caribbean here, and video footage of the enormous waves lashing Texas as the hurricane approaches, here. Accounts of the devastation that Ike has caused in Haiti, the poorest country in the Caribbean, can be found here. Haiti has already been hit by several tropical storms this season. You can follow the progress of this season's hurricanes on the National Hurricane Center website.

Cyclone Nargis

It is now over a week since Cyclone Nargis hit Burma in South East Asia. The death toll is likely to be the highest from a tropical storm for many years, and the disaster is far from over. You can look at an interactive explanation of what happened here. For an explanation of the causes of tropical storms, look here. For general information about the disaster, there are up to date news stories here and here. If you want to find out how you can donate to the disaster fund, click here.

Depressions - Year 10

As promised, here are a few websites for you to look at about depressions.

Try this powerpoint to show what we learnt today. BBC bitesize has a good summary of depressions, fronts etc (make sure you look at the next couple of pages on this website). The BBC website has some information about how depressions form - click on the Fronts section on tbe right as well for additional information. The Met Office has a more comprehensive explanation, including the weather associated with the passage of a depression.

When you've looked at these, have a look at the current pressure chart and the satellite photo, and see if you can spot the different features of a depression and how the weather will change over the next few hours. Good luck!

And if you want to see it again, you can download Postman Pat does Depressions here!

Air Pollution in London

AS Geographers have been looking at examples of how different cities suffer from, and try to manage air pollution. Here is London's latest attempt to reduce smog and pollution problems. This is a relevant and very up to date case study with which you could wow the examiners!!

Weird Weather

For an unusual weather story, click here!

Cyclone Sidr hits Bangladesh

In the last few days, Bangladesh has been badly hit by Cyclone Sidr. There is some really useful information here including interactive guides, photos, video footage and eye witness accounts. This would make a useful case study for GCSE, AS (Climatic Hazards) and A2 (Coasts - the cyclone caused a 5m storm surge). BBC coverage is here and includes information about the management of the cyclone here . There is also an animated guide to cyclones.

Hurricane Dean

Normally I'm a little bit jealous of my sister who lives in the Cayman Islands. However, over the weekend, she and her sons have had to leave the island because of the imminent arrival of Hurricane Dean. It is expected to hit Cayman today, at Category 4, possibly 5 (the Saffir Simpson scale which is used to measure hurricane strength only goes up to category 5!). You can track the progress of Dean here - http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/#DEAN - it's already hit Jamaica, and is on its way to the popular tourist resort of Cancun in Mexico. The BBC website has a number of links worth looking at, like http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/6955163.stm(news story), http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/talking_point/6952773.stm (eye witness accounts) and http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_pictures/6956117.stm(for pictures). Makes our dismal "summer" that we've had this year not seem so bad!!