Thursday, August 25, 2011

Tuscaloosa, Alabama

During the April 25-28th 2011 Super Outbreak, a series of tornados moved through the Southeastern United States. On April 27th, one of those tornados went through the heart of Tuscaloosa, Alabama as an EF4.  The path of destruction can easily be seen on satellite as an eerie brown line trending Northeast through the suburbs.

October, 2010


April, 2011


You can find it yourself on Google Earth using these coords:   33°11'42.87"N    87°32'03.62"W


Check back next week to see what you do with a neighborhood built on a toxic waste dump.

Thursday, August 18, 2011

Pasadena, Texas

I've talked about the problem of subsidence before in my post about Brownwood, the sinking neighborhood.  What you're looking at here is a small creek running into a marshy lake (Mud Lake), that connects to an estuarine lake (Clear Lake), which then connects to Galveston Bay.  However, after subsidence lowers the area by ten feet in some places, the bay waters can expand farther inland creating a large and very slow moving bayou setting.


December, 1944
This was 55 years ago.


May, 2011
That creek isn't so little anymore.


You can find it yourself on Google Earth using these coords:   29°34'44.79"N    95°04'13.52"W


Check back next week to see a tornado's path cut across a state.

I figured I'd show this diagram of the crazy drought we're having here in Texas:

Thursday, August 11, 2011

Gilchrist, Texas

Hurricane Ike in 2008 was all kinds of bad for the Houston/Galveston area.  My house suffered some roof dammage and the yard was a mess of branches.  The worst part of the hurricane is the storm surge which Ike, as a category 2 hurricane, was not powerful enough to send all the way to my house.  Unfortunately, the little Bolivar peninsula across from Galveston Island has a towering elevation of... ...nearly 3 feet.  Considering the storm surge for Ike was over 17 feet, you can imagine things didn't end up well at all...


September, 2007
Pre-Ike


September, 2008
Post-Ike


You can find it yourself on Google Earth using these coords:   29°30'45.63"N   94°29'30.94"W


Check back next week to see how a stream becomes a bayou.

Thursday, August 4, 2011

Las Vegas, Nevada

Las Vegas is an interesting place.  I've been there a few times but only when I wasn't old enough to participate in much.  One of my favorite casinos there is the Luxor Pyramid.  That thing is so cool looking and one day I plan on playing some poker there.  Anyways, I checked it out on google maps and found something pleasantly surprising:

March, 2006
Hairspray!


June, 2007
Motorola?


February, 2008
Chris Angel's Believe


June, 2009
Despite my dislike of the Transformers movies, this looks pretty awesome.


May, 2010
No advertisements this day I suppose but very beautiful reflections.


You can find it yourself on Google Earth using these coords:   36°05'43.68"N  115°10'31.88"W


Check back next week to see a peninsula wiped clean after a hurricane.