The tornadoes of May 2003 have come, but they are not gone. During the first two weeks of May there were almost 500 tornadoes. This is a record that will be broken year after year as Earths climate continues to warm. This brings on a question. If global warming can cause so many tornadoes, what kind of weather can be expected for the remainder of the summer
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Hostile, angry children are three times more likely to grow up to have heart disease than calmer, happier kids. Researchers found that children with high scores on tests for hostility were more likely to have developed “metabolic syndrome” when they were re-tested three years later. Metabolic syndrome includes obesity, insulin resistance and high blood pressure, which can lead to heart disease or diabetes–but the anger comes first. “The hostility seemed to precede metabolic syndrome,” says psychologist Kristen Salomon, who says this disease process starts very early in life.
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There’s new evidence that Vikings landed in North America long before Columbus. First, Texas engineer Richard Nielsen, who has spent 17 years studying the controversial Runestone, says it’s definitely a genuine Viking artifact. And Lauren Taylor writes in the May issue of Fate Magazine that Maine Coon Cats are related to the feisty casts brought by the Vikings to the Americas.
Joe Albert of echopress.com quotes Runestone Museum director LuAnn Patton as saying, “Basically, he has found documentation showing that every rune and word on the Runestone can be found in 14th century documents.” She’s talking about newly-discovered early Scandinavian documents, or land deeds, that show the same kind of writing as on the Runestone.
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We just got through having a record tornado season, and now NOAA forecasters say there’s a “high likelihood” that we’ll have a record number of hurricanes this year as well. The hurricane season begins June 1st and ends November 30. Author Henry Willis has some insights about the upcoming weather. NOAA predicts between 11 and 15 tropical storms this season, and 6 to 9 of these are expected to become hurricanes, with two to four of them “major storms” of Category 2 or higher. Category 2 storms have winds of 96 to 110 mph. Category 5 is the worst, with winds exceeding 155 mph. The average hurricane season has 10 storms.
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