NASA Tweetup STS-135 in Washington, DC

          Yesterday, I got the chance to see astronauts Christopher Ferguson @Astro_Ferg and Sandy Magnus @Astro_Sandy at the NASA Tweetup STS-135 event in Washington, DC.  If you are wondering what a Tweetup is, according to NASA a tweetup is "...An informal meeting of people who use the social messaging medium Twitter. NASA Tweetups provide @NASA followers with the opportunity to go behind-the-scenes at NASA facilities and events and speak with scientists, engineers, astronauts and managers. NASA Tweetups range from two hours to two days in length and include a "meet and greet" session to allow participants to mingle with fellow Tweeps and the people behind NASA's Twitter feeds." People that follow @NASATweetup also are provided the opportunity to attend and the account features the latest information about NASATweeup events.  The first NASATweetup was On January 21, 2009 at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
         I saw that NASA was having a tweetup at their headquarters in Washington, DC through my @weathersavvy1 account and I registered during the September 29th to September 30th period.  I saw that 150 participants would be selected at random and I crossed my fingers. On October 4th I received an email from Social Media Manager and Public Affairs Specialist at NASA, Stephanie Schierholz @schierholz, that I was not selected and I was on the waiting list. I crossed my fingers again and on October 6th, I received the confirmation that I had been selected!
       The event started at 4:00 pm EST, and was an hour long. At the event highlights of the STS-135 mission and the space program were discussed. STS-135 had actually started out as a rescue mission, delivering 9,400 pounds of spare parts and 2, 677 pounds of food. This is to help operations at the space station for the next year. The mission also brought back 5,7000 pounds of material from the station that was not needed. STS-135 was the final shuttle flight and also the 135th space shuttle to go into outer space.  25 states where represented at the event with the farthest United States attendees, coming from California. Attendees also came from Canada and Germany. The event was also broadcasted live on the NASA website.
      I wrote about STS-135 back in July when the space shuttle successfully landed on July 21, 2011. Here is that blog entry. I would have never thought, that some three months after writing that entry, I'd be seeing two of the astronauts aboard the space craft in person, and getting my picture with Sandy Magnus. Here is that picture:

I also got her signature :-)

      The event was amazing and I really want to thank everyone who made this event possible. It is a great way to connect with the NASA and people that share common interests. Our world is definitely changing and like Astronaut Sandy Magnus said, "It's about learning." It was my first NASA Tweetup and I will assure, it definitely won't be my last :-)

Here are more pictures from the event:

 Me in front of the NASA building

 Astronauts Christopher Ferguson and Sandy Magnus.

 The program.

 List of the participants.

 The NASA swag bag.

 The commemorative pin, it contains metal flown aboard a space shuttle!

 For more information about the STS-135 mission, check out this link.

Thanks again everyone involved, for this amazing opportunity and thank you to my boyfriend, Rex for taking some of the photos.

Mount Tambora Ready to Explode Again

 

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 From Jesus Diaz, Gizomodo

 The Deadliest Volcano In the Planet Is Ready to Explode Again

The last time the deadliest volcano in the planet exploded it was 1815. It killed more than 71,000 people on the spot and it was responsible for a volcanic winter that caused the worst worldwide famine of the 19th century.Now it may explode again.

Its name is Mount Tambora and it's located in the island of Sumbawa, Indonesia. And while it wasn't the most powerful volcano explosion in history, it's the one that caused more direct and indirect deaths. When it happened in April 1815, Sumbawa was obliterated. The caldera collapsed then, following some months of heavy activity. Most of the island's population was killed and its vegetation was reduced to ashes. Some trees were uprooted and pushed into the sea along with ash, creating three-mile-long rafts. And tsunamis generated by the explosion affected islands nearby. But its destructive power wasn't just limited to that area. It affected the entire world. The volcano's ash rose into a column that reached 140,000 feet (43 kilometers) high, right into the stratosphere. The heaviest particles eventually went down, but a stratospheric sulfate aerosol veil remained for years, dimming the sunlight everywhere. This disrupted the entire global climate in a big way, which started a chain of events that killed millions through the Northern Hemisphere.

Deadly volcanic winter

The next year there was no summer and temperatures went down an average of 0.5 degrees Celsius. It doesn't seem like a lot but the suspended sulfur released by the volcano caused agricultural crops to fail and livestock to die everywhere. The United States experienced extreme frosts and heavy snow well into July, ruining everything in the fields. The same happened elsewhere, causing a worldwide famine. This famine helped to spread a new strain of cholera in Asia and a typhus epidemic in southeast Europe and the eastern Mediterranean. It wasn't fun at all.

Experts are now saying that Mount Tambora is ready to erupt again. A steady stream of earthquakes are shaking the island, from less than five a month in April to more than 200 now. Columns of ash are already venting as high as 4,600 feet. The authorities have already established a 2-mile danger perimeter and its inhabitants are fleeing under government orders. But most of the people know the story from 1815 and don't need any orders to start running. In fact, people outside of the danger zone are also fleeing out of pure fear. Nobody knows for sure if Mount Tambora would explode with the same intensity as it did in 1815 and nobody knows when it would explode. But we know it is awakening, and that's not good at all.

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Did They Listen?

I posted a blog entry yesterday around this time, stating the frustration I had over television stations like CNN and The Weather Channel posting pictures and videos of people driving their vehicles through flooded waters. I tweeted my entry to the Weather Channel and not too long after I tweeted them the blog entry, I saw that they tweet message relating to people driving through flood waters.  The tweets are shown below:

 

Did they listen? The tweet could be purely coincidence but the tweet was a link to meteorologist Tim Ballisty's article The Power of Water. The article can be found here. In the article, Ballisty writes about facts associated with flowing water. The facts pertain to what flowing water can do to a person, a car and a house. I took a screenshot of one of the images featured in the article: 

Underneath the picture Ballisty writes,"We see it all the time: people misjudge the force of water and drive right into flowing floodwaters. Some are rescued by first-responders; others perish." Then why Weather Channel do you show images of people driving through the waters without any type of safety tip or statement such as this?  

I commented on the article stating the article is very educational, which it is.  With all this rain and flooding it is more of a time to educate, not just show the extent of what nature can do and the situations that can make matters worse.

I also noticed that the Capital Weather Gang, addressed the issue on their blog, of people basically ignoring "Turn Around, Don't Drown."Here is the link. If we are going to report what's going on, we need to get on the same page. Educate! Don't devastate the campaign of "Turn Around, Don't Drown."

Turn Around Don't Drown: The Lost Campaign

In wake of the Hurricane Irene and the remnants of Tropical Storm Lee dumping rain along the East coast, I have seen numerous pictures and videos of people driving through the flooded waters, on major television stations like CNN or The Weather Channel. Does anyone remember the "Turn Around, Don't Drown" campaign? By showing viewers vehicles driving through the waters, some may be under the impression that their vehicle can make it. In fact, more than half of flood related deaths occur from vehicles caught in the flood waters and floods are the number one cause of weather related deaths in the United States.

A road may look like it is passable but the actual depth of the water is not always certain from behind the wheel. It's frustrating to see channels such as CNN or the Weather Channel show these kinds of images from I-Reporters without stating the safety behind the images they choose to display.

I follow The Weather Channel on Twitter and recently saw this tweet:

The first picture that pops up when you click on the tweet is of a truck driving through flooded waters. Yes this image shows the extent of flooding from that viewer's perspective but so does a clear street with no cars driving through it. That would be the more safe approach and would not make it seem as though the "Turn Around, Don't Drown," campaign has been lost. Maybe a picture like would be better to get the point across:

One thing that is very certain is that flash floods can quickly occur and even though a driver may make it through one stretch of road, a flash flood could have occurred on another stretch and their vehicle might get stuck on that one.

So next when you post a picture or a video from a viewer showing the extent of what's going on in their area, follow it up with a safety tip or so. We report the weather to help save lives not just show the extent of what nature can do.

For more information on the "Turn Around, Don't Drown" campaign, lease visit this link.

Evolution Of Hurricane Irene In 10 Seconds

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Want to see the formation of Hurricane Irene in 10 seconds? Well, the NOAA Environmental Visualization Laboratory website, features time-lapse imagery of Hurricane Irene's evolution from tropical wave to Category 3 storm. The images were taken using GOES-East satellite and starts from August 19th and ends with 1754z August 25. The animation has been recently updated. Check it out here.

5.9 Earthquake Shakes Parts Of Mid-Atlantic

A 5.9 Earthquake has struck outside of Washington DC today. It's epicenter was 4 miles south southeast of Louisa, Virginia. I was sitting in my apartment building in Adelphi, MD and felt the building shaking. At first I thought maybe someone on the floor below me dropped something really heavy but I realized that the building was shaking for more than a few seconds. After the earthquake was done I took to the social media outlet Twitter to confirm some of my suspicious. Sure enough, Twitter became flooded with news of the earthquake.

My friends in NYC and Virginia were tweeting about feeling the earthquake too. Below is a map from CNN of the epicenter:

Here is a map of people reporting what they felt:

Update here

The quake was felt from North Carolina to Rhode Island. If you felt the earthquake and would like to report what you felt, follow the link here. This is the 25th earthquake Virginia has received since it officially became a state. This is also the strongest in VA since 1897 according the the USGS.

Update 3:38 PM EST
The magnitude of the earthquake has been dropped to 5.8.

Weather Of The Outer Banks

Here are a few photos I took of some of the clouds and sunsets, when I was in the Outer Banks, NC (I was in Rodanthe.) The weather was amazing. There were a few thunderstorms while I was there and it was absolutely gorgeous to watch them over the ocean or on the deck of the beach house.

The stars were spectacular and I saw the Milky Way for the first time one night. I've never seen as many stars as I did that night. I wish I could have gotten a picture of the stars and the lightning. My camera unfortunately died and I forgot my charger. I took some of the pics with my cell phone, hehe. Enjoy!

Thunderstorms over the ocean.

The Cape Hatteras Weather Bureau/Lighthouse

Recently I went on a trip with some of my friends to the Outer Banks, NC. We stopped at the Cape Hatteras Weather Bureau. According to the National Park Service, the Cape Hatteras Weather Bureau was, "The first U.S. Weather Bureau Station managed by the Army Signal Services on Hatteras Island, established at the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse Keepers' Quarters in 1874, moved to the Hatteras Life-Saving Station on December 1, 1880, and later transferred to a Hatteras Village private residence, known as Styron’s Building, on October 1, 1883." It is such a cute building and very welcoming.

We visited the lighthouse as well.

The light keepers' houses.


View from the top.

For more information about the Cape Hatteras Weather Bureau check out this link. For more information about the Lighthouse click here :-)