Recent methane leaks, sinkholes show more evidence Dangerous Gas Theory may be correct!

I haven't been posting much lately because I'm just sitting back watching, but I'll tell you that things are still happening. Die-offs, sky noises, booms, sinkholes, diseases, super-charged weather, quakes, mysterious explosions and deaths, fireballs, are all still happening and increasing. I'm thinking we're in for a heck of an interesting summer. We may see some unusually powerful storms, worse than last year. The long cold spring that America and Europe are experiencing are even the result of unusual weather.

Greenland Block stopped spring

It was back in January that a Siberian front pushed warm air into the Arctic that pushed the Arctic cold down into the states, resulting in a normal winter compared to the last two years. I think we were all getting spoiled. But, then this Greenland Block pushed the cold down into the states and western Europe and stopped spring from arriving. The good news...NASA satellite predicts that spring is close.

I mentioned the North Atlantic Oscillation in a recent blog post. The Arctic Oscillation is closely related to the NAO and many meteorologists often use the two interchangeably. The AO and NAO have been in a deeply negative phase for several weeks and this has brought unseasonably cold weather to Eastern North America and Western Europe

Notice how in this photo the warm weather over Greenland that pushed the cold Arctic air over America and Europe. NASA said this is one of the strongest of these events on record, but that it is rapidly breaking down.

When the Arctic Oscillation (AO) index is in its “positive” phase, air pressure over the Arctic is low, pressure over the mid-latitudes is high, and prevailing winds confine extremely cold air to the Arctic. But when the AO is in its ”negative“ phase, the pressure gradient weakens. The pressure over the Arctic is not as low and pressure at mid-latitudes is not as high. In this negative phase, the AO enables Arctic air to flow to the south and warm air to move north.

Some say that this strange, strong event may have to do with the decreasing Arctic sea ice. Just another example of these dangerous gas releases. This is another extreme weather result. Those who don't believe will argue that these cold temps just proved that global warming isn't occurring, but when you look at the facts here, it's just another example of how it is. Warm air occurring where and when it shouldn't be pushes the Arctic cold way down where and when it shouldn't be. These events have occurred quite often, but it always comes back to the "extreme" case of this one and every other weather event that we've experienced this past year. Extreme is the new norm.

reply to post by Rezlooper


Don't worry Rez old pal, things will be popping soon enough to keep all of us busy irritating Phage. My current concern is the increasing number of fireballs (meteorites?) being seen all around the world. I think one possible explanation is that we are entering an area of space where we will be running into increasing numbers of space rocks and we don't know when it will peak or how heavily loaded that peak will be.

In fact, one possible cause is disturbances to the asteroid belt and other asteroid heavy places in the solar system being caused by the recent and soon to come spate of comets. They are known to "stir the pot" as they pass through. What if one of the ones still headed our way is gravitationally dragging some of the space debris with it and right into earth's orbit???

There could easily be one or more asteroids capable of doing major damage still headed in with our name on it.

Originally posted by happykat39
reply to post by Rezlooper

 

Don't worry Rez old pal, things will be popping soon enough to keep all of us busy irritating Phage. My current concern is the increasing number of fireballs (meteorites?) being seen all around the world. I think one possible explanation is that we are entering an area of space where we will be running into increasing numbers of space rocks and we don't know when it will peak or how heavily loaded that peak will be.

In fact, one possible cause is disturbances to the asteroid belt and other asteroid heavy places in the solar system being caused by the recent and soon to come spate of comets. They are known to "stir the pot" as they pass through. What if one of the ones still headed our way is gravitationally dragging some of the space debris with it and right into earth's orbit???

There could easily be one or more asteroids capable of doing major damage still headed in with our name on it.

I agree with you Happy. These fireballs have piqued my interest. I hypothesized that these fireballs could be more visibly frequent right now due also to the methane release. I don't know for sure but I suggested in this thread www.abovetopsecret.com... that methane rises high into the atmosphere, up into the mesosphere where meteors usually burn up, and that we don't know how much methane is actually in these upper levels. I'm thinking that maybe the more dense the gas up there it has made the air less dense allowing these fireballs to come a little further into the atmosphere and becoming more spectacular.

What I've also noticed is that many of these fireballs are green. As I've studied what these colors mean (the spectroscopy) I've found that green can indicate nickel and magnesium, and also that the rock itself may be burning copper. I wonder though, if methane gases can also cause these rocks to burn green. I can't find an answer to that question no matter how much I search.

I've suggested the tie-in with fireballs to the gas theories because of its rising frequency along with many other things in the past few years;

Fireballs
Sinkholes
Quakes and volcanoes
Animal die-offs
Strange deaths
Unexplained explosions and fires
Sonic booms and light flashes
Strange sky noises
Drug-resistant disease
New strains of disease
Super-charged storms
Heatwaves, droughts, wildfires

In just the past few years, if you study this long enough, you'll find the many strange incidences occurring much more frequently and with more intensity. As I and others have posted throughout this thread and my other gas thread, the methane levels began rising in 2007 after a 10-year period of leveling off. Methane gases rose for 250 years, since the Industrial Age, until about 1997-98, when they leveled off. But, for some unknown reason, it started rising again in 1997 and at a much faster pace. Here is an article from MIT where they did a study on this in 1998 and said that the methane rose globally at the same time.

MIT study of methane increase in 2007

One surprising feature of this recent growth is that it occurred almost simultaneously at all measurement locations across the globe. However, the majority of methane emissions are in the Northern Hemisphere, and it takes more than one year for gases to be mixed from the Northern Hemisphere to the Southern Hemisphere. Hence, theoretical analysis of the measurements shows that if an increase in emissions is solely responsible, these emissions must have risen by a similar amount in both hemispheres at the same time. A rise in Northern Hemispheric emissions may be due to the very warm conditions that were observed over Siberia throughout 2007, potentially leading to increased bacterial emissions from wetland areas. However, a potential cause for an increase in Southern Hemispheric emissions is less clear.

This is where things get interesting. The article explores why methane levels rose in both hemispheres. They don't know. Something occurred during this time on a global scale and no one has any answers. At the conclusion of the article, they said it would be about a year for them to get answers, but then there is nothing. No follow up article to suggest what they may have discovered. No article that I could find anyways.

the next step will be to study this using a very high-resolution atmospheric circulation model and additional measurements from other networks." But doing that could take another year, he said, and because the detection of increased methane has important consequences for global warming the team wanted to get these initial results out as quickly as possible.

I really feel bad for Chalmette, LA. Several times this past year there have been "rotten egg" smell in this area, blamed on a local chemical plant that denied having anything to do with it. I posted about it because it may have been hydrogen sulfide plumes. One of the times the smell was out on the Bay when a riverboat ferry's passengers all complained.

Now this. EXXON leaks chemicals, mainly hydrogen sulfide.

Once the refinery’s leak reached the threshold that would require it to be reported, ExxonMobil announced that it had released 100 pounds of hydrogen sulfide and 10 pounds of benzene, a volatile compound known to cause cancer.

These guys may have been responsible the previous times that hydrogen sulfide was smelled in the area. In this spill, Exxon isn't even sure about how much spilled.

According to the Coast Guard’s National Response Center, however, the oil company is now unsure of the quantities and of which chemicals may have contaminated the area. According to readings at the spill site, the refinery measured 160 parts per million of hydrogen sulfide and 2 parts per million of benzene in the air. Meanwhile, an online version of the report filed by the company simply stated that an unknown amount of wastewater had leaked from its Number 1 flare drum.

It was over 12 hours later after the smell was out before residents knew. More evidence that this isn't the first time for them.

“My name is Earl, I live at phillip neighborhood. I felt bad all yesterday because yesterday I smelled some of that oil. I haven't seen a doctor yet. Thanks,” posted one user.

According to Bucket Brigade director Anne Rolfes, the process for both measuring and reporting such a spill in the area is severely lacking.

“It is surprising that we don’t know the source over 12 hours after the first reports were filed," Rolfes told the Times-Picayune. "We need an overhaul and an upgrade of the state’s skimpy and inadequate air monitoring network. A decent air monitoring network would help officials to locate the source of the odor automatically, rather than having to drive around looking for it."

Source

Here are a few more die-offs lately. In the original OP of this thread I put up links to a site that keeps track of these daily die-offs to see more.

Mass die-off of sea lions in California

40,000 lbs of dead fish in China

Thousands of fish wash up on Australian beaches

2nd mass stranding of crustaceans in Chile

Major fish die-off Canada

Over a 1,000 dead ducks in China

Locals report loud boom and tremors in Houma, LA

Residents throughout Terrebonne and Lafourche say they heard a boom Monday morning and felt the ground shake. But officials with the U.S. Geological Survey said their computers hadn’t detected any seismic activity. A spokesman speculated that might be the case because the movement was too slight to be immediately apparent. Andrea Dupree of Houma said she heard the noise about 10 a.m. and saw items on her desk shaking.

Dozens more confirmed the tremble via the newspaper’s Facebook page in communities from ranging from Pointe-aux-Chenes to Thibodaux. “I felt it in Chauvin,” said Kathleen Scott, 57. “It was really noticeable with my trailer shaking and my windows rattling.”

Frackers lose $1.5 billion annually to leaking methane

The problem, he says, is that right now those emissions aren’t directly regulated by the EPA. In President Obama’s first term, the EPA set new requirements for capturing other types of pollutants that escape from fracked wells, using technology that also, incidentally, limits methane. But without a cap on methane itself, WRI finds, the potent gas is free to escape at incredible rates, principally from leaky pipelines. The scale of the problem is hard to overstate: The Energy Department found that leaking methane could ultimately make natural gas — which purports to be a “clean” fossil fuel — even more damaging than coal,

Source

The article states that methane gas escapes in every part of the operation, from wells, to processing plants to leaky pipes on the way to our homes. If they could capture it all they would increase revenues by $1.5 billion annually.

So what’s the holdup? For one thing, Bradbury says, that $1.5 billion in savings wouldn’t necessarily go to the companies making investments in fixing pipes: Gas inside a pipeline is owned by the producer, but the pipeline itself is owned by an independent operator who might not see any advantage in preventing methane leaks. The other issue is detection: Methane is colorless and can be odorless, so there’s no way to know when it’s escaping, where, and how fast, without special equipment. Gear to simplify the detection process is beginning to crop up on the market, but without a government mandate there’s less incentive for companies to invest in it. And without hard data on how much methane they’re losing, companies are disinclined to address the problem — especially across all of the nation’s 300,000 miles [PDF] of natural gas pipelines.

reply to post by Rezlooper
[mor
If I could give you a thousand stars it would not be enough. This is a story, "IMO" That should be shouted from the highest mountain tops.

We all love low gas prices. But what are really paying for that.

My feelings have been said over and over again here on ATS, so I won't go into a rant.

We as a people, need to get our priorities together. Maybe we didn't create this, but we have to find a way to fix it.

The future of our children depend on our actions. We wanted cheap gas, well we got it. At what price.

And the brown smelly substance just keeps hitting the rotary air moving device, ie TSHTF.

MASS ANIMAL DIE-OFF: NOAA Declares Unusual Mortality Event For Sea Lions - 1,100 Sea Lions Have Beached So Far This Year In America?!

FIRE IN THE SKY: Major Solar System Disturbance - Fireball Explodes In The Morning Sky Over Norway; Whitish Green Fireball Over Denmark, Norway And Sweden; Fireball Meteor Over Hermosillo, Mexico; Very Bright Long Path Meteor Over Japan; Bright White Fireball Over 3 Eastern American States; Meteor Sighting Over New Zealand; Greenish Fireball Over Ontario / Quebec, Canada!

PLAGUES & PESTILENCES: H7N9 Virus - Bird Flu Scare Spreads In China, Government Closes Poultry Sale In Third City After Bird Flu Outbreak!

EXTREME WEATHER: Major Storm Next Week - Plains Storm To Bring Big Rain, Snow And Severe Weather To The United States!

WORLD WAR III: Escalation Towards Armageddon - North Korea Could Trigger Nuclear Strike By April 10, Loads Missiles Onto Launchers, Tells Diplomats To Get Out; United States Sends Spy Drones To Korean Region For Surveillance; North Korea Releases Footage Of Dictator Supervising "Drone Drill" Attack!

EXTREME WEATHER ANOMALIES: Outrage In England At New Drought Alert - Water Firms Are Forcing Cut Back Despite Wettest Year?!

MASS ANIMAL DIE-OFF: 3,120 Livestock Dead From Snowfall In Northern Ireland!

PLAGUES & PESTILENCES: Mass Bird/Fish Die-Off In China - 20,000 Birds Killed Due To Bird Flu In Shanghai And 20 TONS Of Dead Fish Found Floating On A River In Shaoxing?!

MASS BIRD DIE-OFF: Hundreds of Sea Birds Wash Up Dead On Kirkcaldy Beach In Scotland?!

PLANETARY TREMORS: State Of Uncertainty Continues In North Iceland - Constant Seismic Activity Near Grimsey Island!

MASS FISH DIE-OFF: "Marine Graveyard" - Thousands More Starfish Wash Ashore Dead In Cleethorpes, England; The Fourth Time This Year?!

RATTLE & HUM: Loud Booms Heard Across America - Flint, Michigan Isn't The Only Place With Mysterious Explosions?!

WEATHER ANOMALIES: "It's Fairly Uncommon" - Rare Tornado Touches Down In The Florida Keys?!

MASS FISH DIE-OFF: Thousands Of Fish Wash Up Dead On Lake Erie Shores In Buffalo, America?!

reply to post by Rezlooper


Another fine example of how greed triumphs over common sense.

How dare laws get put into place to make sure operations are more efficient, more evil regulations and all that.

This is a thread of mine that is closely related, looking at a different aspect of global warming.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

I just updated it, with the goal of continuing to post links and information on this subject, that I think is the massive issue on humanities event horizon.

I thought many of you might be interested. I will post a link to this thread on the other thread.

Imagine that, another storm with over a foot of snow expected. The 23rd Winter storm this season that will drop over a foot of snow in the United States, not counting storms throughout Europe and Russia. I don't think that's too normal.

Blizzard Warning: Colorado expecting two feet of snow

The skeptics argue that this snow and cold prove their theory that we're not warming, but it's actually proving the opposite. I posted a few posts up about the unusual warm weather event over Greenland (possibly caused by Arctic ice melt) that pushed the extreme cold air down over Europe and America extending spring so long. And also, I've posted before that when the global atmosphere heats up there will be an increase in moisture in the air which in turn is going to increase rain or snow event totals, thus, 23 winter storms producing over a foot of snow this winter.

This same storm over the next two days will also produce some wild severe storms and tornado outbreaks to the south and the plains. On one end of the storm is a return to the heat, temps in the 80's, while on the other side of the front, temps around 40. Quite a difference, which should produce some wild spring time weather. Probably another "extreme" event, or "rare" event, or "unusual" event. Either way, get ready for a wild ride this summer folks. This is just the beginning.

For those of you from more temperate climates, here is what two feet of snow looks like...

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reply to post by happykat39

This article says Gulf of Mexico may have "deep-cleansed" itself after the Deepwater Horizon disaster. With the sudden release of so much methane, the methanotrophs that sprang up to feed on it also fed on the oil once the methane was gone. So, the article says the rapid release of methane was a good thing for the clean up of the oil. This may be true, but the entire disaster itself causing a rapid release of methane, which I'm sure much escaped into the atmosphere, didn't help with the whole chain reaction presented in this theory.

A release like that of Deepwater Horizon contains a rich mix of carbon-containing molecules - alkanes, methane and what are called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), each presenting its own risks to the environment.

The new finding is about methanotrophs, which feed on methane - among the last compounds to be degraded. Prof Hazen said that the sudden release of methane, rather than slow seeps, created a lucky effect.

"All of a sudden the [methanotroph populations] go up to really high densities and they're fat and happy - and then [the methane is] gone." he told BBC News. "At that point, they degrade anything else that's there fortuitously, and they'll degrade it down below what would be usable as a carbon and energy source - so it's really sort of a 'deep-cleaning' effect.

The jury is still out on the long-term effects "That's why I think the Gulf of Mexico is cleaner than you would expect, not only from the oil but from everything else that goes into it."

A "lucky" effect...for the clean up of the oil and that's about it.

Deepwater Horizon: Gulf of Mexico "deep-cleaned" itself

Methane is venting at the poles

Methane is venting at the poles

Check out this site for some graphs about the amounts of methane in the atmosphere over the poles

Peak levels of over 2000 ppb over Antarctica have been recorded repeatedly over the past few months, which is extraordinary, the more so since the photochemical sink for methane is typically strongest during summer, while average levels of methane over Antarctica have historically been the lowest on Earth

Note that such high levels of methane occur in the Arctic during the northern winter, when lack of sunshine in the Arctic and low water temperatures make it unlikely that the methane was generated by biological processes. This indicates that the methane instead originated from hydrates and free gas in sediments underneath the sea.

Image 4., from the Arctic-news blog, shows that methane emissions in the Arctic line up very closely with the contours of sea ice and land, which makes it unlikely that the methane originated from leaking natural gas pipes or industrial activity on land.

In conclusion, at both poles methane levels can be very high, i.e. higher than elsewhere on Earth, and this methane likely originated from hydrates that have become destabilized by temperature rises.

This site also has a lot of great information about the amounts of methane hydrates and free methane gas under the ice sheets at the poles.

An estimated 21,000 petagrams (1Pg equals 1015g) of organic carbon are buried beneath the Antarctic Ice Sheet, estimates a research team led by Jemma Wadham. The potential amount of methane hydrate and free methane gas beneath the Antarctic Ice Sheet could be up to 400 billion tonnes (that is, 400 Pg of carbon, or 400 Gt, see table below). Image 5. on the right shows the ice margin of an Antarctic glacier, depicting frozen lake sediments in the foreground. When ice sheets form, they overrun organic matter such as that found in lakes, tundra and ocean sediments, which is then cycled to methane under the anoxic conditions beneath the ice sheet. The methane could be released to the atmosphere if the ice sheet shrinks and exposes these old sedimentary basins.

If the ice sheet melts...I think we're seeing this already in the Arctic. I've posted a few posts back about the Greenland Block that has a large pocket of warm air sitting over Greenland right now that has pushed the Arctic cold air down over Europe and America extending this unusually cold and snowy spring well into April.

Notice this graph here showing how scientists have changed their perspective of methane's Global Warming Potential several times in recent years.

Figures in above table are for the current methane burden, i.e. about 5 Gt. IPCC figures for methane's lifetime (12 years) reflect the time it takes for a perturbation of methane to be reduced to 37% of its initial amount. The IPCC gives a figure of 8.4 years as the time it takes for half a perturbation to be broken down.

Methane's global warming potential (GWP) will rise in case of large releases, since methane's lifetime will be extended as the burden rises, due to hydroxyl depletion. This is a feedback effect that the IPCC estimates will amplify the climate forcing of an addition of methane to the current atmosphere by lengthening the perturbation lifetime relative to the global atmospheric lifetime of methane by a factor of 1.4.

There's a lot more information on this site.

Methane is venting at the poles

reply to post by Rezlooper


Good post, I wish I could give you more than one star for it.

Go back up to the post I made with all the links in it and you will find more stories that could be methane related. I can't believe that all of the animal die offs are from anything but methane releases both on land and in the ocean. The poisonous red alga blooms haven't been reported in nearly enough places to account for all the dead fish and aquatic mammals.

Now the nasty storm that brought a blizzard to Colorado and severe weather in the plains bears down on me with a foot of snow expected through tomorrow. The snow in our yard just melted in the past few days and now this. We're expecting anywhere up to 15 inches of snow and it's April 10. I dug out my golf clubs yesterday thinking I might finally get to hit the links this weekend. Oh well, I guess I'll take the kids sledding. I can definitely say this will now officially be the latest spring start to golf in my neck of the woods.

reply to post by happykat39


That's quite a list you posted there Happy. It's pretty alarming. There are some highly unusual events. As this summer rolls on and these things continue to pick up steam with increasing frequency and intensity, it's going to become more and more difficult for the skeptics to argue about what's really happening here. I predict it won't be long that more and more of these guys are going to become believers that something is off and methane gas has a whole lot to do with it.

190 vultures mysteriously drop dead out of the sky

190 vultures fall from sky in Trinidad & Tobago

As the birds fell from great heights, some burst open, while others were able to glide weakly to the ground. Liquid could also be seen dripping out of the beaks of the sick birds. And, while some of them were too weak to move, others fed on their dead.

“We have been working in the area doing investigations. The EMA’s main purpose was to determine whether any environmental factors, such as toxic gases or chemicals released in the area, were involved in the deaths. However none were identified,” stated Singh.

A biological event has also been ruled out after testing.

Instead, Singh said they were working with the theory that the birds fed off an animal that had been laced with poison. The organisations were continuing the investigation as there was no confirmation on the cause of death.

Would someone please call down there and tell them that these birds may have flown through a hydrogen sulfide or methane plume. I'm just saying! Sounds more plausible than feeding off of a poisoned animal.