Villagers kill Tiger in Uttar Pradesh.

A female Bengal Tiger, Panthera tigris tigris, was killed in a confrontation with a group of villagers in the Pilibhit Tiger Reserve in Uttar Pradesh on Wednesday 24 July 2019. The incident began after the animal attacked a man fishing in the reserve, prompting the villagers, who were working in a nearby field to try to drive it off. Unfortunately the Tiger did not choose to leave, instead attacking the villagers, killing another man and injuring seven more. This prompted a larger group of villagers to seek out the animal, armed with spears, clubs, and machetes, leading to a confrontation which resulted in the Tiger's death. Officials from the Indian Forest Service reportedly tried to intervene during this final confrontation, but were disarmed and had their phones confiscated to prevent them from calling for backup. Four villagers have since been arrested in connection with the incident, with local police wanting to talk to about 30 more.

Villagers attacking a Tiger in Uttar Pradesh this week. Outlook India.

The Pilibhit Tiger Reserve comprises 600 km² of forest and savanna bordering onto Nepal. It is home to the only surviving population of Tigers in India adapted to the Tarai ecosystem, and is popular tourists from both India and overseas. However, like other wild areas in India it is under pressure from the country's rising population, with more people living closer to the park each year, creating the possibility for conflict between people and animals.

Tigers are considered to be Endangered under the terms of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature's Red List of Threatened Species, with the Indian subspecies, Panthera tigris tigris, threatened by poaching, loss and fragmentation of habitat, with the result that the total adult Tiger population in India is currently thought to be about 3890 (up from about 1400 in 2006). As such Tigers are heavily protected in India, and the Indian Forest Service usually try to relocate Tigers that come into conflict with Humans to more remote areas, preferably within national parks, though the extent to which local people co-operate is variable, and where conflict occurs within national parks there is limited action that can be taken.

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Thirty six confirmed deaths following landslide in Guizhou Province, China.

Thirty six people have now been confirmed dead and a further fifteen are still missing following a landslide in Guizhou Province, China, on Tuesday 23 July 2019. Around 40 people have been rescued alive following the incident, in which over two million cubic meters of hillside collapsed onto a village in Shuicheng County following heavy rains. 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.

Rescue workers in Shuicheng County, Guizhou Province, China, following a landslide on 23 July 2019 that buried 22 houses under two million cubic meters of rock and mud. Xinhua. 

Central Guizhou has a warm temperate climate with high levels of rainfall all year round. Rainfall is typically highest in June when the area often receives over 200 mm of rainfall. July is drier, but typically still has over 100 mm of rain. This year's summer has been exceptionally wet, with a number of flooding incidents across the province.

Rescue workers in Guizhou Province, China, following a landslide this week. AFP.

Guizhou Province is largely comprised of blocky limestone hills, uplifted by the collision between India and Asia during the Tertiary period. The area has a monsoonal climate, with heavy seasonal rains which start in April, reach a peak in July and August, and tapir out in October. Historically the hills were covered by subtropical broadleaved forest, but, despite the area being considered to be a high conservation priority with a number of highly protected species and internationally recognised reserves, the province has been hit heavily by deforestation, making it vulnerable to landslide events as soils are washed of the underlying limestone karst. 

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Magnitude 6.5 Earthquake off the south coast of Honshū Island, Japan.

The Japan Meteorological Agency recorded a Magnitude 6.5 Earthquake at a depth of about 420 km, off the south coast of the Honshū Island, slightly after 3.30 am Japan Standard Time on Sunday 28 July 2019 (slightly after 6.30 pm on Saturday 27 July GMT). The event was felt across much of Honshū Island, though there are no reports of any damage or casualties. This is roughly what would be expected from an Earthquake of this size at this depth; the quake is big enough to be felt over a wide area, but most of its energy has dissipated before the shock-waves reach the surface.

The approximate location of the 28 July 2019 Honshū Earthquake. USGS.

Japan has a complex tectonic situation, with parts of the country on four different tectonic plates. Eastern Honshū area lies on the boundary between the Pacific, Eurasian and Philippine Plates, where the Pacific Plate is passing beneath the Eurasian and Philippine Plates as it is subducted into the Earth. This is not a smooth process; the rocks of the two plates constantly stick together, only to break apart again as the pressure builds up, causing Earthquakes in the process. 

 

 The movement of the Pacific and Philippine Plates beneath eastern Honshū. Laurent Jolivet/Institut des Sciences de la Terre d'Orléans/Sciences de la Terre et de l'Environnement.

 

Witness accounts of Earthquakes can help geologists to understand these events, and the structures that cause them. The international non-profit organisation Earthquake Report is interested in hearing from people who may have felt this event; if you felt this quake then you can report it to Earthquake Report here.

 

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Charging Bison injures nine-year-old girl in Yellowstone National Park.

A nine-year-old required medical treatment after being charged by a Bison in the Yellowstone National Park this week. The unnamed girl, reported to be from Odessa, Florida, was part of a group of about 50 tourists that surrounded the adult male Bison on Monday 22 July 2019. The Bison apparently put up with the tourists for about 20 minutes before losing its temper and charging, with the girl being caught after adults managed to get out of the way.

Two images taken from a video clip of a Bison charging a nine-year-old girl the Yellowstone National Park this week. Yellowstone National Park.

Bison are large animals, the American Biron can reach 1.8 m in length and weigh around 900 kg, and have notoriously unpredictable tempers, often appearing placid and indifferent to their surroundings, and then charging without warning. They can reach speeds of 35 km per hour, and both sexes have horns, which can make unexpected charging highly dangerous.

North America is thought to have been home to about 50 million Bison at the beginning of the nineteenth century, a number that fell to less than a thousand individuals by the middle of the twentieth century due to overhunting, not just for the purpose of food, but as part of a conscious effort to change the landscape from one amenable to traditional, Native American, lifestyles to a landscape suitable to European-style farming. However since the mid-twentieth century conservation efforts and breeding programs have reversed this decline, with the population now measured in the hundreds of thousands, including around 5000 in the Yellowstone National Park.

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Possible meteorite lands in field in Bihar State, India.

A probable meteorite has been handed to the Bihar Museum in Patna after falling in a paddy field in the village of Mahadeva in Madhubani District, Bihar, on Wednesday 24 July 2019. The object is described as weighing about 15 kg, light in colour, and magnetic, which suggests that it may be an iron or nickel-iron meteorites, or octahedrites, which are the most common class of meteorite, and left a hole over a metre deep where it landed. The object is currently on display in the Bihar Museum, though it is planned to send it on the the Srikrishna Science Center to be studied properly.

Villagers in Madhubani District, Bihar, with a possible meteorite that fell nearby on Wednesday 24 July 2019. NDTV.

A meteorite falling from the sky without previously being seen seems unlikely, but a small object entering the Earth's atmosphere in daytime over India would not necessarily produce a bright enough meteor to be seen (a 'meteor' is a bright light in the sky caused by an extra-terrestrial object entering the atmosphere, a meteorite is a piece of rock that is derived from such an object). The brightness of a meteor is caused by friction with the Earth's atmosphere, which is usually far greater than that caused by simple falling, due to the initial trajectory of the object. Such objects typically eventually explode in an airburst called by the friction, causing them to vanish as an luminous object. However this is not the end of the story as such explosions result in the production of a number of smaller objects, which fall to the ground under the influence of gravity (which does not cause the luminescence associated with friction-induced heating).

 Impact crater left by the 24 July 2019 Bihar meteorite. CNN.

These 'dark objects' do not continue along the path of the original bolide, but neither do they fall directly to the ground, but rather follow a course determined by the atmospheric currents (winds) through which the objects pass. Scientists that have witnessed meteors are sometimes able to calculate potential trajectories for hypothetical dark objects derived from meteors using data from weather monitoring services.

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Asteroid 2019 OT passes the Earth.

Asteroid 2019 OT  passed by the Earth at a distance of about 6 627 000 km (17.3 times the average distance between the Earth and the Moon, or 4.43% of the distance between the Earth and the Sun), slightly after 9.25 am GMT on Tuesday 23 July 2019. There was no danger of the asteroid hitting us, though were it to do so it would have presented a significant threat. 2019 OT has an estimated equivalent diameter of 140-460 m (i.e. it is estimated that a spherical object with the same volume would be 140-460 m in diameter), and an object of this size would be predicted to be capable of passing through the Earth's atmosphere relatively intact, impacting the ground directly with an explosion that would be between about 7500 and 300 000 times as powerful as the Hiroshima bomb. Such an impact would result in an impact crater between 2 and 8 km in diameter and devastation on a global scale, as well as climatic effects that would last decades or even centuries.

The calculated orbit of 2019 OT. JPL Small Body Database.

2019 OT was discovered on 24 July 2019 (the day after its closest approach to the Earth) by the Atlas MLO Telescope at Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii. The designation 2019 OT implies that the asteroid was the 19th object (object T - in numbering asteroids the letters A-Z, excluding I, are assigned numbers from 1 to 25, so that T = 19) discovered in the second half of July 2019 (period 2019 O).

2019 OT has an 820 day orbital period and an eccentric orbit tilted at an angle of 47.3° to the plane of the Solar System, which takes it from 0.77 AU from the Sun (i.e. 77% of he average distance at which the Earth orbits the Sun) to 2.66 AU from the Sun (i.e. 2.66% of the average distance at which the Earth orbits the Sun, which is almost twice the distance at which the planet Mars orbits). 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). As an asteroid probably larger than 150 m in diameter that occasionally comes within 0.05 AU of the Earth, 2019 OT is also classified as a Potentially Hazardous Asteroid.

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First discovery of the Horsetail Neocalamites in the West Qinling Orogenic Belt of China.

The fossil Neocalamites is a Horsetail, Sphenopsida , known from Permian-Jurassic deposits around the world. In China Neocalamites has been reported from the Late Triassic of Xinjiang and Qinghai in the northwest of the country and Hubei Province in Central China, plus the Early Jurassic of North China.

In a paper published in the journal Acta Geologica Sinica on 11 March 2019, Li Zuochen of the Key Laboratory of Western China’s Mineral Resources and Geological Engineering at Chang’an University, and the Department of Geosciences at Eberhard Karls University Tübingen, Pei Xianzhi, also of the Key Laboratory of Western China’s Mineral Resources and Geological Engineering at Chang’an University, Wei Liyong of the No. 5 Gold Geological Party of China Armed Police Force, Guo Junfeng, Xiao Liang, Li Ruibao, and Pei Lei, also of the Key Laboratory of Western China’s Mineral Resources and Geological Engineering at Chang’an University, Zhao Wenchuan, also of the No. 5 Gold Geological Party of China Armed Police Force, Wang Meng, Chen Youxin, Liu Chengjun, Zhao Shaowei, Gao Feng, Shao Jiakun, and Qin Li, again of the Key Laboratory of Western China’s Mineral Resources and Geological Engineering at Chang’an University, and Zhao Changcun and Zhang Zhen, again of the No. 5 Gold Geological Party of China Armed Police Force, describe the first known occurence of Neocalamites from the West Qinling Orogenic Belt of Central China.

Li et al. report the discovery of numerous Neocalamites fossils from the Late Triassic Daheba Formation in Lintan County of Gansu Province, part of the West Qinling Orogenic Belt, which separates the North and South China Blocks. The specimens comprise trucks from 5 to 12.5 cm in length and from 0. 8 to 1.5 cm in diameter, with an internode length (length between the nodes from which leaves or stems arise of 6.2 to 10.5 cm.

Neocalamites Fossils from the Upper Triassic Daheba Formation in the Lintan Area, Western Section of the West Qinling Orogenic Belt. (a) Field photograph; (b) Samples photograph; (c)–(d) Micrographs. Li et al. (2019).

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