Four feared dead following Vietnam landslide.

Four men are feared to have died following a landslide in the Tây Hòa District of Phú Yên Province in south-central Vietnam. The men left the villages of Tinh Tho and My Binh on a hunting trip on Friday 22 November 2013. A search on Saturday 23 November discovered the bodies of three of the men, Truong Quoc Cong (33) and  Bui Cong Khai (30) from Tinh Tho, and and Pham Ngoc Nghia (31) from My Binh buried among the rubble from a landslide. The fourth man, Luong Ngoc Tinh (34) from Tinh Tho is still missing, and is believed to be buried beneath the landslide. Debris from the event reportedly covered about 800 m of slope and included numerous large trees.

Rescue workers searching for the missing hunters at the site of the 22 November 2013 Tây Hòa landslide. Talk Vietnam.

Vietnam has a single rainy season lasting from May to September, and usually has low rainfall in November. However an unseasonal tropical depression passed over the country in the days before the landslide brining 180 mm of rain in a day in places. Landslides are a common problem after severe weather events, as excess pore water pressure can overcome cohesion in soil and sediments, allowing them to flow like liquids. Approximately 90% of all landslides are caused by heavy rainfall.

The approximate location of the 22 November 2013 Tây Hòa landslide. Google Maps.

See also Landslide kills four people at Paris Beach, north Sumatra, Family has close escape as landslide hits house in Penampang, Malaysia, Worker killed by landslide in Vietnam, Five killed and four injured in Yunnan Landslide and Three construction workers killed in landslip at Kuala Lumpur construction site.

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Magnitude 6.2 Earthquake off the north coast of Morotai Island.

The Indonesian Baden Meteorologi, Klimatologie, dan Geophysica (Meteorological, Climatological and Geophysical Agency) recorded a Magnitude 6.2 Earthquake at a depth of 11 km off the north coast of Morotai Island in the Halmahera Islands, slightly after 10.30 pm local time (slightly after 1.30 pm GMT) on Tuesday 19 November 2013. There are no reports of any damage or casualties, but this was a large quake and is likely to have been felt across the island.

The approximate location of the 19 November 2013 Morotai Island Earthquake. Google Maps.

The Halmahera Islands arc a volcanic arc; formed where one tectonic plate is being subducted beneath another, with the underlying plate being melted by the heat of the Earth's interior, and lighter minerals bubbling up through the overlying plate to form volcanoes. However the Halmahera Islands are unusual in that they lie on a double subduction zone. The underlying plate, a northeaster extension of the Molucca Sea Plate, is being overridden form the Philippine Plate from the east and the Eurasian Plate from the west. The Halmahera volcanoes are located where the Philippine Plate is overriding the Molucca Sea Plate; to the west the Sangihe Islands lie where the Molucca Sea Plate is being overridden by the Eurasian Plate.

Sea also Magnitude 5.7 Earthquake of the north coast of Sulawesi, Explosive eruption on Mount Lokon, Eruption on Gamalama, Earthquake hits Sulawesi and Volcanic activity in the Halmahera Islands.

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A new species of fossil Pig from the early Pleistocene of Ethiopia.

Pigs (Suidae) are found throughout the Old World. They are members of the Artiodactyla, the group that also includes Cattle, Deer and Antelopes (and, curiously, Whales), though they are considered less highly derived than other members of the group, lacking a rumen (additional stomach compartment) and retaining four toes on each foot (though two of these are held permanently above the ground). The earliest fossil Pigs appear in the Oligocene of Asia.

In a forthcoming paper in the journal Acta Palaeontologica Polonica, available online from 26 July 2013, Antoine Souron of the Institut de Paléoprimatologie, Paléontologie Humaine: Évolution et Paléoenvironnements at the Université de Poitiers and the Human Evolution Research Center at the The University of California, Berkeley, Jean-Renaud Boisserie also of the Institut de Paléoprimatologie, Paléontologie Humaine: Évolution et Paléoenvironnements at the Université de Poitiers as well as the Ministère des Affaires Étrangères, Ambassade de France en Éthiopie, and Tim White of the Human Evolution Research Center and Department of Integrative Biology at The University of California, Berkeley, describe a new species of fossil Pig from the early Pleistocene of the Middle Awash region  of the Afar Depression in northern Ethiopia.

The new species is placed in the genus Kolpochoerus, which has eight previously described species from the Pliocene and Pleistocene of Africa, and which is thought to be ancestral to the modern Giant Forest Hog (Hylochoerus meinertzhageni), and is given the specific name phillipi, in honour of the South African paleoanthropologist Phillip Tobias of the University of the Witwatersrand, who passed away in 2012.

Kolpochoerus phillipi is described from a partial cranium and associated mandible and a second partial mandible, as well as a series of detached teeth. It is similar in size to the skull of a modern Giant Forest Hog, and is thought to be about 2.5 million years old.

Cranium of Kolpochoerus phillipi in (A) dorsal, (B) ventral, (C) anterior, and (D) lateral views. Souron et al. (2013).

Mandible of Kolpochoerus phillipi in (A) dorsal, (B) anterior, and (C) lateral views. Souron et al. (2013).

See also A fossil Porpoise from the early Pliocene of northern Hokkaido Island, Japan, A fossil Neobalaenine Whale from the Late Miocene of Argentina, How fencing the Tibetan prairies is effecting the endangered Przewalski’s Gazelle, A Giant Camel from the mid-Pliocene of Ellesmere Island in the Canadian Arctic and Small Llamas from the Late Pleistocene of Central Mexico.

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Asteroid 2011 JY1 passes the Earth.

Asteroid 2011 JY1 passed by the Earth at a distance of 2 572 000 km (6.69 times the distance between the Earth and the Moon) slightly after 3.45 am on Thursday 14 November 2013. There was no danger of the asteroid hitting us, and had it done so it would have presented only a very limited danger; 2011 JY1 is calculated to be between 24 and 75 m in diameter, and an object of this size would be expected to break up in the atmosphere between 20 and 3 km above the ground, with only fragmentary material reaching the Earth's surface, though being directly underneath an object towards the upper end of this range would probably be fairly unpleasant.

The calculated orbit of 2011 JY1. JPL Small Body Database Browser.

2011 JY1 was discovere on 3 May 2011 by the the Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research project at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The designation 2011 JY1 implies that it was the 49th asteroid discovered in the first half of May 2011 (period 2011 J).

2011 JY1 has a 521 day orbital period and an eccentric orbit that takes it from 0.74 AU from the Sun (i.e. 74% of the average distance at which the Earth orbits the Sun) to 1.79 AU from the Sun (i.e. 179% of the average distance at which the Earth orbits the Sun, outside orbit of the planet Mars). It is therefore classed as an Apollo Group Asteroid (an asteroid that is on average further from the Sun than the Earth, but which does get closer).

See also Asteroid 2013 VX4 passes the Earth, Asteroid 2013 VO4 passes the Earth, Asteroid 1997 WQ23 passes the Earth, Asteroid 2013 VD17 discovered after passing the Earth and Asteroid 6063 Jason (1984 KB) passes the Earth.

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The new species of Anthia from the Marquesa Islands in French Polynesia.

Anthias (Anthiinae), or  are small brightly coloured fish belonging to the Grouper Family (Serranidae) in the Perch Order (Perciformes). They are found in large numbers on many coral reefs, and tend to be highly endemic (i.e. species tend to have limited ranges), leading to a large number of different species. The variety, bright colouration and sociable nature of Anthias make them popular in the aquarium trade. All Anthias are born female, and join the harem of a male that controls a section of reef upon reaching maturity. Anthias grow throughout their lives, and when a male dies the largest female in his harem will  change sex, becoming male and taking over the harem.

In a paper published in the journal Zootaxa on 8 May 2013, Jeffrey Williams of the Division of Fishes at the Department of Vertebrate Zoology at the National Museum of Natural History and Erwan Delrieu-Trottin and Serge Plans of the Centre de Recherche Insulaire et Observatoire de l'Environnement at the Université de Perpignan describe two new species of Anthia from the Marquesa Islands in French Polynesia. 

The first new species described is placed in the genus Plectranthias and given the specific name flammeus, meaning fiery. Plectranthias flammeus is a 11.5–23.4 mm, white Fish with red, orange and yellow blotches. It was found living on a rock wall with a rubble and sand base near Nuku Hiva Island, towards the northwest end of the Marquesa Island chain.

Plectranthias flammeus. Williams et al. (2013).

The second new species is placed in the genus Pseudanthias and given the specific name oumati, a Marquesan word for the Sun, in reference to its brilliant yellow colour. Pseudanthias oumati is a 58 mm bright yellow Fish. It was found living near a sloping reef at a depth of 50-55 m near Fatu Hiva island at the southeastern end of the Marquesa group.

Pseudanthias oumati. Williams et al. (2013).

The localities where the two Anthia species were discovered. Plectranthias flammeus, green, and Pseudanthias oumati, red. Google Maps. 

See also New species of Wrasse from the Unfortunate Islands, A new species of deepwater Goatfish from Vanuatu, A new species of Goby from the southwest Indian Ocean, A new species of Blenny from Curaçao and A new species of Jawfish from the coast of Kerala State, India.

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Thousands evacuated following series of eruptions on Mount Sinabung, Sumatra.

Over 6300 people have been evacuated following a series of nine eruptions on Mount Sinabung, northern Sumatra, Indonesia on Saturday 23-Sunday 24 November 2013, according to the Badan Nasional Penangulanggan Bencana (Indonesia's Disaster Mitigation Agency). The volcano at its most active produced an ash column over 8000 m high and rained ash and rock fragments down on the surrounding countryside. Around 600 people had already been evacuated from villages closer to the volcano, following a series of eruptions that began in September this year, but this new surge of activity, combined with the onset of the rainy season and accompanying increased risk of lahars (ash-laden flash floods associated with volcanoes), has led to a widening of the evacuation area.

Eruption on Mount Sinabung. Ulet Ifansasti/Getty Images.

The Indo-Australian Plate, which underlies the Indian Ocean to the west of Sumatra, is being subducted beneath the Sunda Plate, a breakaway part of the Eurasian Plate which underlies Sumatra and neighboring Java, along the Sunda Trench, passing under Sumatra, where friction between the two plates can cause Earthquakes. As the Indo-Australian Plate sinks further into the Earth it is partially melted and some of the melted material rises through the overlying Sunda Plate as magma, fueling the volcanoes of Sumatra.

The Subduction zone beneath Sumatra. NASA/Earth Observatory.

This does not happen at a 90° angle, as occurs in the subduction zones along the western margins of North and South America, but at a steeply oblique angle. This means that as well as the subduction of the Indo-Australian plate beneath the Sunda, the two plates are also moving past one-another. This causes rifting within the plates, as parts of each plate become stuck to the other, and are dragged along in the opposing plate's direction. The most obvious example of this is the Sumatran Fault, which runs the length of Sumatra, with the two halves of the island moving independently of one-another. This fault is the cause of most of the quakes on the island, and most of the island's volcanoes lie on it.

The movement of the tectonic plates around Sumatra. NASA/Earth Observatory.

See also Landslide kills four people at Paris Beach, north Sumatra, Eruption on Mount Sinabung, Eruption on Mount Sinabung, Sumatra, Dating the Toba Eruption and Thousands evacuated following eruption on Mount Sinabung.

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Two Earthquakes in southern Iran.

The United States Geological Survey recorded a Magnitude 4.9 Earthquake at a depth of 44 km roughly 25 km to the southeast of the city of Khvomuj in southern Bushehr Province, Iran, slightly after 12.35 pm local time (slightly after 9.05 am GMT) on Tuesday 19 November 2013. This was followed by a second quake with a Magnitude of 4.6 at a depth of 27.4 km, 10 km to the northwest of the city of Arad in Fars Province, slightly after 5.00 pm local time (slightly after 1.30 pm GMT) on the same day. These are moderately large quakes, and are likely to have been felt across a wide area, though there are no reports of any damage or casualties.

The locations of the two 19 November 2013 southern Iran Earthquakes. The Bushehr Province quake is purple and the Fars Province quake is red. Google Maps.

Iran is situated on the southern margin of the Eurasian Plate. Immediately to the south lies the Arabian Plate, which is being pushed northward by the impact of Africa from the south. This has created a zone of faulting and fold mountains along the southwest coast of the country, known as the Zagros Thrust Belt, while to the northeast of this the geology is dominated by three large tectonic blocks, the Central Iran, Lut and Helmand, which move separately in response to pressure from the south, stretching and compressing the rock layers close to the surface and creating frequent Earthquakes, some of which can be very large.

The population of Iran is particularly at risk from Earthquakes as, unlike other Earthquake-prone nations, very few buildings in the country are quake-resistant. The majority of residential buildings in Iran are made of mud-brick, a building material particularly vulnerable to Earthquakes as the bricks often liquify, trapping people inside and quickly asphyxiating them with dust. This is particularly dangerous at night when the majority of people are inside sleeping, but it is to be hoped that this quake, which occurred in the late afternoon has caused less casualties than some historic nighttime quakes.

See also Magnitude 4.8 Earthquake in Markazi Province, eastern Iran, Magnitude 4.2 Earthquake in Khuzestan Province, southwest Iran, Magnitude 4.4 Earthquake in northwest Iran, Magnitude 4.2 Earthquake in Semnan Province, northern Iran and Magnitude 4.5 Earthquake in the Zagros Mountains of western Iran.

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Two new species of Armored Catfish from Columbia.

Armored Catfish, Loricariidae, are large river-dwelling Fish native to Central and South America. They are covered in plate-like bony scales, and have distinctive 'suckermouths' used to attach themselves to a substrate in fast flowwing waters while still breathing. They are the largest group of Catfish, with over 680  described species and a fossil record that dates back to the Miocene. They are known in the aquarium trade as 'plecs'.

In a paper published in the journal Zootaxa on 26 April 2013, Donald Taphorn of Belleville Illinois, Jonathan Armbruster of Department of Biological Sciences at Auburn University, Francisco Villa-Navarro of the Grupo de Investigación en Zoología at the Facultad de Ciencias at the Universidad del Tolima and Keith Ray, also of the Department of Biological Sciences at Auburn University, describe two new species of Armored Catfish in the genus Ancistrus as part of a wider study into the genus in Panama, Colombia and Venezuela.

The first new species described is named Ancistrus tolima, where 'tolima' refers to both to Yulima, a Pijao princes who was murdered by the Spanish conquistadores, and to the Department of Tolima in Columbia, where the Fish was discovered. Ancistrus tolima is a 26-77 mm dark olive or brown Catfish with light green or yellow spots. It was found living in shallow streams with little vegetation and a sand or gravel bottom in the Upper Magdalena River drainage system.

Live specimen of Ancistrus tolima. Taphorn et al. (2013).

The second new species is named Ancistrus vericaucanus, meaning 'true inhabitant of the Cauca'; another species has previously been named Ancistrus caucanus (inhabitant of the Cauca), however this species is now known to be restricted to the Magdalena River drainage and is not found in the Cauca River. Ancistrus vericaucanus is 47-72 mm Armored Catfish. The species is described from specimens collected in November 2006 and preserved in alcohol; the original colour of these specimens is unclear.

Specimen of Ancistrus vericaucanus, preserved in alcohol. Taphorn et al. (2013).

See also A new species of Armored Catfish from Peru and New species of Armored Catfish from Ecuador.

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Asteroid 2005 TG50 passes the Earth.

Asteroid 2005 TG50 passed the Earth at a distance of 6 059 000 km (a little under 16 times the distance between the Earth and the Moon) slightly after 11.20 am GMT on Wednesday 13 November 2013. There was no danger of the asteroid hitting us and should it have done so it would have presented little threat. 2005 TG50 is estimated to be between 21 and 65 m in diameter, and an object of this size would be expected to break up in the atmosphere between 22 and 5 km above the ground, with only fragmentary material reaching the Earth's surface.

The orbit of 2005 TG50. JPL Small Body Database Browser.

2005 TG50 was discovered on 11 October 2005 by the Lowell Observatory Near-Earth Object Search. The designation 2005 TG50 implies that it was the 1257th asteroid discovered in the first half of October 2005 (period 2005 T).

2005 TG50 has a 324 day orbital period, which takes in to 0.80 AU from the Sun (90% of the distance at which the Earth orbits the Sun) and out to 1.04 AU (4% further away from the Sun than the Earth). It is classed as an Aten Group Asteroid, a body which spends the majority of its time closer to the Sun than the Earth, but which does pass outside our orbit. 

See also Asteroid 2013 UB passes the Earth, Asteroid 2013 TN127 flies past the Earth, Asteroid 2013 TB6 to pass by the Earth on Wednesday 9 October 2013 and Asteroid 2013 SM20 to pass the Earth on Tuesday 8 October 2013.

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Five workers injured in explosion at natural gas facility in Wyoming.

Five workers were injured in an explosion at an Encana Oil & Gas operated storage facility in the Jonah Basin Gas Field 55 km south of Pinedale in Sublette County, Wyoming, at slightly before 10.20 am local time (slightly before 7.20 pm GMT) on Friday 22 November 2013. One was airlifted to the University of Utah Medical Center by helicopter in what is described as a critical condition. Three were taken by ambulance to Pinedale Clinic, from where one was flown to the  University of Utah Medical Center and another was airlifted to the Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center, while the third was treated and discharged. The final worker was taken from the scene of the accident to the Rock Springs Hospital, according to the Sublette County Sheriff's Department.

Areal photograph of the Jonah Basin Gas Field. A Land Out Of Time.

The precise cause of the incident is not clear at this time, though it is understood that maintenance work involving welding was being undertaken at the site prior to the incident The blaze was brought under control by firefighters and allowed to burn out, subsiding by 1.00 pm local time. A nearby drilling rig was unaffected by the incident.An investigation into the cause of the incident will now be carried out by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

The Jonah Basin Gas Field has been in operation since the mid-1990s. It is considered to be one of the US's richest shale gas fields, containing (at the time of discovery) around 300 000 million m³ of gas beneath a surface area of 85 km³. The gas is trapped within a series of stacked lenticular deposits of fluvial (river) origin, between about 1.5 and 2.5 km beneath the surface, and is obtained by using hydraulic fracturing (fracking) to break up the shale beds in which the shale beds in which the gas is held.

The approximate location of the 22 November 2013 Sublette County gas explosion. Google Maps.

See also Fatality at Wyoming coal mine, Drilling rig burning in southern Texas, Burning gas rig off the coast of Louisiana, Fuel pipeline explodes in western Illinois and Gas pipeline explosion in West Virginia. 

Cyclone Helen kills 10 in Andhra Pradesh.

Ten people are known to have died and several more are missing after Cyclone Helen made landfall in Andhra Pradesh State, India, at about 1.30 pm local time (8.00 am GMT) on Friday 22 November 2013, bringing with it high winds of over 100 km per hour, torrential rains (exceeding 250 mm in a day in places), and a 1.5 m storm surge. The storm also caused extensive damage to homes, infrastructure, agricultural land and seagoing vessels. A number of fishing boats are reported to be missing after the storm, and many areas are without electricity after power lines were brought down. Higher casualties were almost certainly avoided by the evacuation of around 17 000 people from low-lying coastal areas in the state.

Floodwaters washing over a road in Vizag, Andhra Pradesh. PTI.

Tropical storms are caused by solar energy heating the air above the oceans, which causes the air to rise leading to an inrush of air. If this happens over a large enough area the inrushing air will start to circulate, as the rotation of the Earth causes the winds closer to the equator to move eastwards compared to those further away (the Coriolis Effect). This leads to tropical storms rotating clockwise in the southern hemisphere and anticlockwise in the northern hemisphere.These storms tend to grow in strength as they move across the ocean and lose it as they pass over land (this is not completely true: many tropical storms peter out without reaching land due to wider atmospheric patterns), since the land tends to absorb solar energy while the sea reflects it.

Cleanup operations beginning in Andhra Pradesh in the wake of Cyclone Helen. AP.

The low pressure above tropical storms causes water to rise there by ~1 cm for every millibar drop in pressure, leading to a storm surge that can overwhelm low-lying coastal areas, while at the same time the heat leads to high levels of evaporation from the sea - and subsequently high levels of rainfall. This can cause additional flooding on land, as well as landslides, which are are a common problem after severe weather events, as excess pore water pressure can overcome cohesion in soil and sediments, allowing them to flow like liquids. Approximately 90% of all landslides are caused by heavy rainfall.

See also At least four dead in Ridyadh flooding, Around 300 believed to have died in flooding after Tropical Cyclone Three hits Somalia, Cyclone Phailin kills 23 people in Orissa and Andhra Pradesh and Hundreds feared dead after collapse of Chorabari Glacier.

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Magnitude 5.2 Earthquake on west Timor.

The United States Geological Survey recorded a Magnitude 5.2 Earthquake at a depth of 27.2 km, 9 km to the northeast of the city of Kupang on the western (Indonesian) half of the Island of Timor, at the eastern end of the Lesser Sunda Islands, slightly after 5.30 am local time on Tuesday 19 November 2013 (slightly after 9.30 pm on Monday 18 November, GMT). There are no reports of any damage or casualties arising from this event, though it was a fairly large quake, and likely to have been felt over a wide area.

The approximate location of the 19 November 2013 Timor Earthquake. Google Maps.

The Lesser Sunda Islands are located on the northern part of the Timor Microplate. This is trapped between the converging Eurasian and Australian Plates, both of which are being subducted beneath it. This is not a smooth process; the two subducting plates continuously stick to the overlying plate, then break away as the pressure builds up, causing Earthquakes in the process. In the south the Australian Plate is passing under the island of Timor, with material from the subducted plate melted by the friction and the heat of the Earth's interior rising through the Timor Plate to feed the volcanoes of the island. In the north the Eurasian Plate is being subducted in the same way, feeding the volcanoes there.

See also Eruption on Batu Tara, Magnitude 6.5 Earthquake in the Barat Daya Islands, Eruption on Mount Hobalt, Six people killed by eruption on Mount Rokatenda and Earthquake beneath the Banda Sea.

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A Late Jurassic lagerstätte from central Poland

The term lagerstätte is used by Palaeontologists to describe a particularly rich fossil source; a site where fossils are either exceptionally numerous or exceptionally well preserved (or, ideally, both). One of the best known of these is the Solnhofen Limestone, or Solnhofen Plattenkalk, which formed in the early Tithonian,  towards the end of the Jurassic, as a result of intense global warming that covered most of what is now Southern Germany with a shallow tropical sea. This was populated by abundant reef-forming Sponges and Corals, leading to the formation of numerous lagoons, in which the waters became cut of from the surrounding sea, then became hyper-saline due to evaporation.

In a paper published in the journal Lethaia in January 2013, Adrian Kin of the Institute of Geological Sciences at Jagiellonian University, Michał Gruszczyński of the Institute of Geography at Jan Kochanowski University, David Martill of the School of Earth & Environmental Sciences at the University of Portsmouth, Jim Marshall of the School of Environmental Sciences at the University of Liverpool and Błażej Błażejowski of the Institute of Paleobiology at the Polish Academy of Sciences, describe a newly discovered fossil lagerstätte from the Owadów-Brzezinki Quarry in central Poland, thought to be of late Tithonian origin, slightly younger than the Solnhofen Limestone.

The Owadów-Brzezinki Lagerstätte comprises three distinct units with a total thickness of about 13m. The lowermost unit (Unit I) comprises yellowish marly limestones grading upwards into massive fine-grained limestones and is roughly 6.6 m thick This unit contains numerous Zaraiskites Ammonites. The second unit (Unit II) comprises thinnly bedded, fine-grained limestones with occasional distinctive parallel lamination. Zaraiskites is also present in this unit, though less numerous, whch also contains a single thin horizon with a mass occurrence of Polychaete Worm tubes (serpulite). The uppermost unit (Unit III) comprises fine grained limestones with a variety of bedding structures. Zaraiskites is rare here, but the bed contains a wide variety of other fossils, notably the bivalve Corbulomima obscura as well as avariety of other marine invertebrates, including Bivalves, Brachiopods, Arthropods, Fish, Sharks, Sphenodonts and  (non-marine) Insects and Pterosaurs.

The quarry at Owadów-Brzezinki showing the successive sedimentary units I–III of the studied Late Tithonian (= Middle Volgian) strata. In the right column are details of the studied profile: (1) thick-bedded limestones of unit I; (2) thin-bedded limestones of unit II; (3) lithographic- type limestones of unit III; (4) boundaries dividing units; (5) serpulite; (6) Corbulomima horizon; (7) tsunamite or mega-stormite. Kin et al. (2013).

The sequence is thought to represent a progression from a shallow marine offshore environment to a nearshore environment, possibly coastal or lagoonal. Unit I appears to have formed bellow the storm wave base where sediments were heavily bioturbated by marine organisms, while Unit three shows signs of being influenced by numerous weather events, as well as horizons of tidal and evaporitic origin, suggesting that the waters were becoming shallower throughout the succession. The beds are believed to have been laid down in a shallow epicontinental (inland) sea which dominated central Europe during the Late Jurassic. The unit also contains a bed considered to be tsunamigenic in origin, which Kin et al. suggest may be related to Earthquake activity on the nearby Middle Polish Trough, an area of active subduction in the Late Jurassic.

Palaeogeographical map showing position of the Owado´w-Brzezinki quarry on the margin of the Middle Polish Trough. Kin et al. (2013).

The vast majority of fossils from the location come from a single bed within Unit III, referred to as the Corbulomima horizon, due to the presence of large numbers of the bivalve Corbulomima obscura. In addition to the bivalves his unit produces Ostracods, Ammonites, Brachiopods, Limulids (Horseshoe Crabs), Dragonflies, Beetles, Sharks, Boney Fishes, Sphenodonts (Squamate Reptiles related to Snakes and Lizards), Pterosaurs and a variety of other fossils.

Fossils from the Corbulomima horizon of Unit III. (A) Nearly complete exuvia of the Horseshoe Crab Crenatolimulus sp.. (B) Fragmentary preserved pycodontid fish skeleton (possibly tuberculate scales of Coelodus sp.). (C) Wing of the dragonfly Eumorbaeschna sp.. (D) Partial skeleton of indeterminate pycnodontid fish preserved in situ. Scale bars are all 10 mm. Kin et al. (2013).

Fossils from the Corbulomima horizon. (A) Bivalves:  

Mesosaccella sp. (1) and numerous representatives of Corbulomima  

obscura (2). (B) Indeterminate pterosaur tooth. (C) The only example  

of Zaraiskites zaraiskensis found from the Corbulomima  

horizon.  

Kin et al. (2013).

Examples of vertebrates from the Corbulomima horizon. (A) mandible of aquatic Sphenodontian Pleurosaurus goldfussi. (B) Nearly 

complete dentary bone of Actinopterygian (Ray-finned) Fish Caturus sp.. (C) Details of same specimen, showing teeth of the mid dentary in detail. Scale

bars are all 10 mm.

Kin et al. (2013).

See also A new species of Split-foot Lacewing from the Middle Jurassic of Inner Mongolia, Opportunistic Bivalves during the Early Jurassic Toarcian Oceanic Anoxic Event, A Caddisfly from the Middle Jurassic of Inner Mongolia, Choristopsychid Insects from the Middle Jurassic of Inner Mongolia and A Pliosaur from the Jurassic Coast of Dorset.

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Asteroid 2013 VX4 passes the Earth.

Asteroid 2013 VX4 passed the Earth at a distance of 5 537 000 km (roughly 14.4 times the distance between the Earth and the Moon) slightly before 7.25 am on Wednesday 13 November 2013. There was no danger of the asteroid hitting us, though were this not the case it would have presented a minor threat. 2013 VX4 is estimated to be between 34 and 110 m in diameter, and an object towards the upper end of this range could potentially punch straight through the Earth's atmosphere, and impact the planet's surface, leaving a crater over a kilometer in diameter and causing devastation over a wide area as well as global climatic effects that could last for several years.

The calculated orbit of 2013 VX4. JPL Small Body Database Browser.

2013 VX4 was discovered on 4 November 2013 by the University of Arizona's Catalina Sky Survey in the Catalina Mountains north of Tucson. The designation 2013 VX4 implies that it was the 123rd asteroid discovered in the first half of November 2013 (period 2013 V).

2013 VX4 has a 918 day orbital period and an eliptical orbit that takes it from 0.98 AU from the Sun (i.e. 98% of the distance between the Earth and the Sun) to 2.72 AU from the Sun (i.e. 272% of the average distance at which the Earth orbits the Sun, considerably outside the orbit of Mars). It is therefore classed as an Apollo Group Asteroid (an asteroid that is on average further from the Sun than the Earth, but which does get closer).

See also The origin of the Chelyabinsk Meteor, Asteroid 2013 VO4 passes the Earth, Asteroid 1997 WQ23 passes the Earth, Asteroid 2013 VD17 discovered after passing the Earth and Asteroid 6063 Jason (1984 KB) passes the Earth.

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Fatality at South African gold mine.

A worker as been killed at the Harmony Gold Mining operated Tshepong Gold Mine near Welkom in Free State, South Africa, on the morning of Friday 22 November 2013. Harmony have stated that the miner died as a result of a rockfall, and that part of the mine has been closed pending an investigation, but released no further information at this time.

The Tshepong Gold Mine. Harmony Gold.

Tshepong is a deep pit mine with a single shaft reaching over 2 km bellow the surface. The mine is considered to be Harmony's lowest cost mine, and produced 5287 kg of gold in 2012, down from 6468 in 2011, largely due to a stoppage relating to an industrial dispute. The mine has suffered a number of accidents in recent years; in December 2012 a worker was killed in a vehicle accident, in July 2011 one worker was killed and several others injured in a rockfall, and in 2010 another worker was killed in a similar incident. These incidents, combined with other accidents at Harmony operated mines in South Africa, have fueled a dispute between the companies management and the National Union of Mineworkers, which has accused the firm of flouting safety legislation.

Diagram of the Tshepong Mine. Harmony Gold.

See also Illegal miner arrested in Free State, South Africa, One worker killed and three others injured at Marikana Platinum Mine, Rustenburg, South Africa, Worker killed at the Bokoni Platinum Mine in South Africa's Limpopo Province, Union official assassinated at Lonmin's Marikana Platinum Mine and Shooting at Lonmin's Marikana Platinum Mine.

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Oil pipeline explosion kills 35 in eastern Shandong Province, China.

Thirty five people are known to have died and 166 to have been injured following the explosion of an oil pipeline in the city of Qingdao in eastern Shandong Province, China, on Friday 22 November 2013, and it is feared that the death toll could rise further. The incident took place while crews were attempting to repair a leak on the pipeline that had been reported earlier in the day. After the initial explosion petroleum  leaked onto a nearby estuary covering about 3000 m² of water before igniting in a second explosion.

The scene of the 22 November 2013 Qingdao pipeline explosion. AFP/Getty Images.

The pipeline was operated by the Sinopec Group (China Petrochemical Corporation) and connected a series of oil depots in Qindao to an industrial complex in Weifang, 175 km to the northwest. Neither of these facilities was affected by the blast. 

The approximate location of the Qingdao pipeline explosion. Google Maps.

See also Oil spill of the coast of Maharashtra State, India, Oil spill in the Gulf of Khambhat, Oil spill devastates popular Thai tourist resort, Gas and oil leak at Taylor Creek in Bayelsa State, Nigeria and South Sudan denies involvement in Abyei pipeline explosion.

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Magnitude 4.6 Earthquake near Christchurch, New Zealand.

A Magnitude 6.6 Earthquake at a depth of 8 km hit New Zealand's South Island, 10 km southwest of Christchurch, slightly after 11.35 pm local time (slightly after 10.35 am GMT) on Monday 18 November 2013, according to the GeoNet project, which monitors quakes in New Zealand. There have been no reports of any damage or casualties arising from this event, though it was felt across much of South Island as well as southern parts of North Island.

The approximate location of the 18 November 2013 Christchurch Earthquake. Google Maps.

New Zealand is located on the boundary beneath the Australian and Pacific Plates. Beneath the islands the Pacific Plate is being subducted beneath the Australian Plate. This causes a great deal of friction which causes Earthquakes where the boundary between the two plates is close to the surface; this is to the east of North Island, but onshore on South Island, where it can lead to strong Earthquakes such as the ones felt in Christchurch recently. Technically such quakes also occur where the plate margin is deeper, but these are felt less strongly as the rocks between the boundary and the surface absorb much of the energy, making strong tremors much less frequent on North Island. As the Pacific Plate sinks deeper into the Earth it is partially melted by the friction and the heat of the planet's interior. Some of the melted material then rises through the overlying Australian Plate, fueling the volcanoes of New Zealand.

Witness reports of Earthquakes can help scientists to understand these events, and the underlying geologic processes that cause them. If you felt either of these quakes then you can report it to the GeoNet here.

See also Magnitude 4.7 Earthquake under Cook Straight, New Zealand, Eruption on White Island, Magnitude 6.6 Earthquake and series of aftershocks hit South Island, New Zealand, New Zealand rattled by Earthquakes and Pumice raft linked to Havre Seamount, not Monowai.

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Cyclone Cleopatra kills at least eighteen people on Sardinia.

Eighteen people including four children are known to have died, and several more are missing on the Mediterranean island of Sardinia after Cyclone Cleopatra hit the island on the morning of 19 November 2013, brining with it over 440 mm of rain in 90 minutes as well as high winds and heavy seas. Rivers across the island were badly swollen, leading to flooding in many areas, with the water in parts of the city of Olbia exceeding 3 m in depth. Parts of mainland Italy also received exceptional rainfall.

Flooding in San Gavino Monreale, Sardinia, following the passage of Cyclone Cleopatra. Reuters.

A family of four including two children drowned in a basement flat in Arzachena, from which they were apparently unable to escape. The family are described as being of Brazilian origin. Three people were killed when a bridge collapsed on their can near Olbia, and a police officer escorting an ambulance was killed by another collapsing bridge in a separate incident, this time as he was attempting to cross. A mother and her child were killed when their car was swept off the road by floodwaters in Olbia. In Uras a 64-year old woman drowned in her own home.

A flooded road near Nuoro. EPA.

Cyclones are caused by solar energy heating the air above the oceans, which causes the air to rise leading to an inrush of air. If this happens over a large enough area the inrushing air will start to circulate, as the rotation of the Earth causes the winds closer to the equator to move eastwards compared to those further away (the Coriolis Effect). This leads to tropical storms rotating clockwise in the southern hemisphere and anticlockwise in the northern hemisphere. These storms tend to grow in strength as they move across the ocean and lose it as they pass over land (this is not completely true: many tropical storms peter out without reaching land due to wider atmospheric patterns), since the land tends to absorb solar energy while the sea reflects it.

Damage to houses in Olbia. Alessandra Chegria/AFP.

The low pressure above tropical storms causes water to rise there by ~1 cm for every millibar drop in pressure, leading to a storm surge that can overwhelm low-lying coastal areas, while at the same time the heat leads to high levels of evaporation from the sea - and subsequently high levels of rainfall. This can cause additional flooding on land, as well as landslides, which are are a common problem after severe weather events, as excess pore water pressure can overcome cohesion in soil and sediments, allowing them to flow like liquids. Approximately 90% of all landslides are caused by heavy rainfall.

Flooded streets and a swollen river in Uras. AFP.

However such events are unusual in the Mediterranean, and Sardinia was poorly prepared for this event, with roads and buildings not designed with severe flooding in mind. The Italian Government has declared a state of emergency on the island, and pledged €20 million (US$ 27 million) in government funds to help with repair efforts.

Clean-up operations in Terralba. AFP.

See also At least four dead in Ridyadh flooding, Around 300 believed to have died in flooding after Tropical Cyclone Three hits Somalia and Five dead and one missing as western Europe is hit by worst Atlantic Storm in a decade.

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The foot of a small Alvarezsauroid Dinosaur from Inner Mongolia, China.

Alvarezsauroids were small Maniraptoran Theropod Dinosaurs known from the Jurassic and Cretaceous of Eurasia and North and South America. They had long hindlimbs and tails and large heads but small teeth, and the forelimbs were greatly reduced in many species, though they retained a large and impressively clawed thumb. They were probably good runners, and it has been suggested that the clawed thumbs may have been used to break into termite mounds or similar structures, though despite a reasonable number of specimens, their biology and taxonomic affinities are not well understood, largely due to their small, delicate skeletons, which are seldom preserved in their entirety.

In a paper published in the journal Acta Palaeontologica Polonica on 27 January 2012, David Hone of the School of Biology & Environmental Sciences at University College Dublin, Institute of Vertebrate Palaeontology and Palaeoanthropology in Beijing and School of Biological and Chemical Sciences at Queen Mary University of London, Jonah Choiniere of the American Museum of Natural History in New York, Qingwei Tan of the Long Hao Institute of Geology and Paleontology and Xing Xu of the Key Laboratory of Evolutionary Systematics of Vertebrates at the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology & Paleoanthropology in Beijing describe the hind-foot of an Alvarezsauroid Dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous Wulansuhai Formation at Bayan Mandahu in Inner Mongolia.

The Bayan Mandahu Alvarezsauroid foot in anterior (A), medial (B), posterior (C), and lateral (D) views. Abbreviations: mt, metatarsal; I–IV, digits; 1–3, phalanges of a given digit. Hone et al. (2012).

The specimen is assigned to the genus Linhenykus, which is known from a single specimen (Linhenykus monodactylus) from the same location. The previous specimen had only partial feet. Due to the limited material the new specimen is not classified to species level.

See also A new species of Abelisauroid Dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous of Madagascar, A basal Tetanuran Dinosaur tooth from the Late Jurassic of the Czech Republic, Early Cretaceous Dinosaur footprints from Sichuan Province, China, Why were Dinosaurs so big? and An Abelisauroid from the Late Cretaceous of Brazil.

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Asteroid 2013 UC1 passes the Earth.

Asteroid 2013 UC1 passed the Earth at a distance of 9 179 000 km (a little under 24 times the distance between the Earth and the Moon) slightly after 7.55 am GMT on Tuesday 12 November 2013. There was no danger of the asteroid hitting us, and had it done so it would have presented little threat. 2013 UC1 is estimated to be between 22 and 68 m in diameter, and an object of this size would be expected to break up in the atmosphere between 20 and 4 km above the Earth's surface, with only fragmentary material reaching the ground, although being directly beneath an object towards the upper end of this range would probably be fairly unpleasant.

The calculated orbit of 2013 UC1. JPL Small Body Database Browser.

2013 UC1 was discovered on 22 October 2013 by the University of Arizona's Mt. Lemmon Survey at the Steward Observatory on Mount Lemmon in the Catalina Mountains north of Tucson. The designation 2013 UC1 implies that the asteroid was the 28th object discovered in the second half  of October 2013 (period 2013 U).

While 2013 UC1 occasionally comes near to the Earth, it does not actually cross our orbital path. It has an elliptical 722 day orbit that takes it from 1.04 AU from the Sun (1.04 times the distance at which the Earth orbits the Sun), slightly outside our orbit, to 2.11 AU from the Sun, considerably outside the orbit of Mars, so unless an encounter with another body causes it's orbital path to alter in a very specific way (highly unlikely) there is no chance of it hitting the Earth. As a Near Earth Object that remains strictly outside the orbit of the Earth it is classed as an Amor Family Asteroid.

See also Asteroid 138095 (2000 DK79) passes the Earth, Asteroid 2013 VQ13 discovered after it passes the Earth, Asteroid 2013 UL9 passes the Earth, Asteroid 2013 UR4 passes the Earth and Asteroid 2013 TY5 passed the Earth.

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