Is 2018 Our Year of Reckoning?

People out this way realize that the earthquake called the "Big One" could arrive any day. We've heard the seismologists tell us that we're probably overdue for that once every three to four centuries temblor that will rock the Cascadia subduction zone. It's expected to be an order of magnitude greater than the worst that can hit the San Andreas fault.

In 2015, Kathryn Schulz scared the bejesus out of a lot of people in the Pacific Northwest with her article in The New Yorker, "The Really Big One."  If you're in a mood for the willies, do read it.

Ever mindful of Ms. Schulz' fine article, my attention was snagged by this headline in The Guardian, "Upsurge in big earthquakes predicted for 2018 as Earth rotation slows." It seems there's some direct correlation between a slowing of the planet's rotation and a slew of really big earthquakes. Who knew?

Scientists have warned there could be a big increase in numbers of devastating earthquakes around the world next year. They believe variations in the speed of Earth’s rotation could trigger intense seismic activity, particularly in heavily populated tropical regions.

The link between Earth’s rotation and seismic activity was highlighted last month in a paper by Roger Bilham of the University of Colorado in Boulder and Rebecca Bendick of the University of Montana in Missoula presented at the annual meeting of the Geological Society of America.

“The correlation between Earth’s rotation and earthquake activity is strong and suggests there is going to be an increase in numbers of intense earthquakes next year,” Bilham told the Observer last week.

“It is straightforward,” said Bilham. “The Earth is offering us a five-year heads-up on future earthquakes.”

The Winter That Wasn't

I put a stand of firewood in my garage this year figuring it would spare me having to go out to the woodshed in back on cold winter nights.  I figured it would hold enough firewood to get through maybe six weeks of winter heating. As things are looking now, the modest cache in the garage won't even need refilling this winter.

Crocuses and daffs are coming up.  Trees are budding.  The herbs are re-awakening.  Before long it'll be time to fire up the lawnmower.

I never did get to dig out my snow shovel from the dark recesses of the garden shed.  We had a sprinkling of snow, maybe half an inch, one morning but it was gone as fast as it had arrived.

My daughter has noticed it too.  She figures we've entered a "sweater" climate. Her fireplace now turns her home into an oven so it's easier and more pleasant for all concerned just to throw on a sweater.

It's something of an annual rite of passage out here to needle our Eastern kin with accounts of early spring sprouting while they're still digging out from the latest blizzard.  It used to be good fun.  It's not funny any more.

What does this warming mean?  For urban dwellers it brings some obvious benefits in even lower heating costs and driveways that go from one year to the next without need of clearing.  But we share this big, sparsely populated, island with a great variety of wildlife for which this change may hold ominous consequences.

Warm winters mean reduced mountain snowpack.  That snowpack plays a vital role, especially during our summer "drought" months.  It's essential for salmon to spawn.  Not enough fresh water to dilute the seawater at the mouths of spawning rivers and the salmon will simply not head upstream.  If they do go up and spawn it takes a steady flow of cooling meltwater to keep their eggs from overheating and dying.  And, of course, the salmon spawn is critical for the survival of bears, wolves, eagles and scavengers of all sorts.

Those of us who live along the coasts - Pacific, Arctic and Atlantic - tend to see the changing climate perhaps a little more clearly than the inland population. From early-onset sea level rise to marine species migration there is a range of changes showing up at our doorsteps.  And just noticing it makes you wonder, okay, what's coming next?

Another Climate Change Calamity. This One is Personal.

Island Scallops is on the ropes.  The company, which produces an astonishingly-good hybrid scallop, has just lost three years' production to ocean acidification. 

As we've pumped ever more CO2 into the atmosphere, our oceans have absorbed increasing amounts of it, in turn acidifying.  The more acidic water attacks the calcium in corals, mollusc shells and so on.  It's been doing a job on Island  Scallops' production.

The disaster, which cost the company $10 million and could lead to its closure, is the latest vicious reminder of the submarine impacts of our fossil fuel–heavy energy appetites. As carbon dioxide is soaked up by the oceans, it reacts with water to produce bicarbonate and carbonic acid, increasing ocean acidity. 

The deep and nutrient-rich waters off the Pacific Northwest are among those that are especially vulnerable to ocean acidification, and oyster farms in the region have already lost billions of their mollusks since 2005, threatening the entire industry.

So get your shellfish gluttony on now. Our acid reflux is only going to get worse as rising acidity claims more victims.

Here's the write up from our local paper, The Parksville Qualicum Beach News:

High acid levels in the waters around Parksville Qualicum Beach have killed 10 million scallops and forced a local shellfish producer to scale operations back considerably.

Island Scallops CEO Rob Saunders said the company has lost three years worth of scallops and $10 million.

"I'm not sure we are going to stay alive and I'm not sure the oyster industry is going to stay alive," Saunders told The NEWS. "It's that dramatic."

Saunders said the carbon dioxide levels have increased dramatically in the waters of the Georgia Strait, forcing the PH levels to 7.3 from their norm of 8.1 or 8.2. Island Scallops seeds its animals at its hatchery in Qualicum Bay and they are reared in the ocean in small net cages attached to horizontal "longlines," according to the company's website. The longlines are submerged about 10 metres  below the surface in water about 30 metres deep. From hatchery to harvest takes about three years.

Saunders said the company has lost all the scallops put in the ocean in 2010, 2011 and 2012.

"(The high acidity level means the scallops) can't make their shells and they are less robust and they are suseptible to infection," said Saunders, who also said this level of PH in the water is not something he's seen in his 35 years of shellfish farming.

Not only has the company had to lay off its employees but now the local oyster companies that employ hundreds of people along the coast are endangered.  As for me, one of the great joys of living here was hopping on my motorcycle and going up to Island Scallops where they used to sell a 5-pound bag of fresh, live oysters straight out of the ocean for 15-bucks.  Unlike an oyster, you could open a scallop with a table knife, easy as pie.  And delicious.  Oh my they were delicious. 




 

Banking on Neptune

Researchers hope they'll be able to give Victoria and Vancouver a 30- to 50-second warning in advance of the megaquake when it occurs off Vancouver Island.

That doesn't sound like much but it might be enough to shut down gas lines and activate emergency systems that will be needed to cope with the quake and aftershocks.

The Neptune monitoring network deployed off the western coast of Vancouver Island comprises a number of seabed nodules or monitoring stations.

It's hoped these sensitive instrument clusters will detect and report the primary wave of the mega-thrust earthquake, essentially outracing the seismic wave to afford some usable warning.

The type of quake that hit Japan is similar to the one that could occur off the coast of Vancouver Island, said Kate Moran, president of the University of Victoria’s Ocean Networks Canada.

“It is well known that we will have one of those earthquakes some time in the future, and the answer could be sooner than later.”
Moran said the same things that researchers found in Japan and Chile could also happen here, with a megaquake transmitting stress to fault systems hundreds of kilometres away beneath Victoria or Vancouver.


She said one of the advantages in B.C. is that the NEPTUNE fibre-optic cable observatory network has sensors placed near where mega-thrust earthquakes occur in the ocean.
Moran said a team of government and university researchers is working on a five-year project to modify the sensors to detect the first wave of energy seconds before shaking begins.


“We want to detect that primary wave, and we’ll be able to then send a 30- to 50-second warning to major centres like Victoria and Vancouver,” she said. “And with that information, we’ll be able to shut down elevators and potentially shut off gas lines — things that could save lives and save money.”

Today's Times Colonist editorial says we have to move past our antiquated thinking on earthquake response.


Vancouver Island must pay close attention to a new study that suggests some of our assumptions about quakes are dangerously wrong.

All our attention has been focused on surviving the initial shock of a quake, but the aftershocks can last for years and affect cities hundreds of kilometres away, U.S. and Japanese seismologists say in the journal Science.
The report means we might have to rethink our disaster planning. Buildings are being designed and upgraded to withstand heavy quakes, but our infrastructure doesn’t take into account repeated aftershocks.

Two years after the magnitude-nine quake that hit Japan, aftershocks in Tokyo are still three times more frequent than they were before the quake; in the immediate aftermath, they were 10 times more frequent. And Tokyo is 400 kilometres from the epicentre.

It is common for aftershocks to be only one magnitude smaller than the initial quake, and some aftershocks can even be larger than the first one.

Planning for earthquake recovery has long assumed that a major quake reduces the risk of more earthquakes because it relieves stress building up between the tectonic plates. The new research suggests that’s not true.

By the way, if you've wondered what the deep Pacific seabed looks like, Neptune Canada offers a variety of live video feeds.  The cameras are dark most of the day to avoid interference with the habitat but the lights come on at scheduled times each day that are listed on the site.  The reef cam revealing British Columbia's incredibly rich, cold Pacific waters and ecosystem is usually on during daylight hours.

On Vancouver Island, Women Still Get a Taste of Frontier Justice

If you're going to run afoul of the law on Vancouver Island, you had better hope and pray you're not female.

If a man is arrested in Victoria and goes before the court and his case is adjourned for a few days for a bail hearing, he arrives at the Vancouver Island Regional Correctional Centre that night, says Paul Pearson, co-chairman of the Canadian Bar Association’s criminal section in Victoria.

“He’s given medical access. He’s given a change of clothes. He’s given a shower, toiletries, access to a gym, a TV, a padded bed, all the basics of life,” he said.

“A woman in the same situation, is housed in a tiny cement cube with a rubber mat on the floor, usually beside the drunk tank with screaming drunks all night.”

Women clients have cried their eyes out, describing their detention in police cells, Pearson said. These women have not been convicted. They are presumed innocent.

There are also no medical facilities for these mentally and physically fragile women in the police lockups, he said.

“It’s a ticking time-bomb. These women have medical challenges and there are no nurses on staff. There’s no way to take care of their medical needs. They’re having their period and there’s no shower, no bath.

“Everyone knows it’s a problem. Everyone knows it’s a major issue. But it’s literally going to take someone dying, or almost dying to make a change,” said Pearson.

I guess not everyone knows it's a problem.  I mean, after all, we do have a woman premier, don't we?  If she's not attuned to really outrageous problems like this, who is?  Oh, I see.  Apparently no one.

The Province of Vancouver Island

There are more than a few VanIslanders wondering why we're not a province all unto ourselves.

 If Newfoundland and Prince Edward Island qualify as provinces, why not Vancouver Island?

In area, we're five times bigger than P.E.I. and four times more populous.   Prince Edward Island is the 23rd largest island in Canada.   That's it, a paltry 23rd.

Newfoundland is bigger than Vancouver Island, at least when you tack on Labrador, the 4th largest island in Canada.   But (you knew there was a "but" didn't you?) Vancouver Island's population of 638,000 is substantially greater than Newfoundland and Labrador's meagre 485,000.

In fact, VanIslanders also outnumber the populations of Nunavit, the Yukon, the Northwest Territories plus Prince Edward Island combined and we're catching up on New Brunswick.  BC's overall growth rate is more than double New Brunswick's.

So why in hell should Vancouver Island not be recognized as a Canadian province in its own right?  It's our due.

The Joy that is Vancouver Island

It's grey and wet and windy and cold today on Vancouver Island or what we like to call "normal."   An ability to tolerate these conditions month in, month out, for much of the year is a prerequisite for living here.   There is a good reason the region is called the Wet Coast.

We usually get two, occasionally three, good summer months when it can turn sunny and warm, even at times hot.   We call that "tourist season."   When the sun goes, the tourists don't linger.

A good many of us just love the place, even during the Rain Festival (runs every October to July, tickets subject to availability).  It's the mighty Pacific, the fresh ocean air, the vast emptiness, even the rocks and Christmas trees that blanket the island from one end to the other.

Even quirky Victoria, nestled at the southern tip, is endearing.  I like the way Times Colonist scribe, Jack Knox, wrote of his town this morning.

"...Victoria itself is a city of misfits, the last refuge of the disaffected and the disconnected, people from somewhere else looking for something else, stopping at the water's edge down here in the lower left-hand corner of Canada only because any further migration would result in drowning.   Vancouver Island is where the snowy part of Canada shovels its flakes."

Sigh.

The Exxon Valdez? Child's Play.

For decades we've used the Exxon Valdez incident to define oil supertanker disaster.  Yet what Harper is planning for coastal BC, south and north, will make the Exxon Valdez disaster a perversely fond memory.

Let's get one thing straight right now.   When you introduce several hundred mega-supertanker sailings through treacherous B.C. waters it's not a question of "if" something goes wrong, but "when" and "how often."   As sure as the sun rises and sets we are going to experience supertanker disasters on British Columbia's otherwise pristine coasts.   And when that happens you can be damned sure those responsible will fold up their tents and scurry off.

Jack Knox, writing in this morning's Victoria Times Colonist sheds a little light on what shipping traffic and, especially oil supertankers, mean to our coast.

"U.S. government statistics show 548 tankers entered Juan de Fuca Strait bound for Washington state ports in 2010.   Another 252 came in bound for Canada.

"Now, depending on whether you're a tanker half-full or tanker half-empty kind of person, you might find those numbers either reassuring or alarming as you consider the Kinder Morgan proposal, which would increase the number and size of vessels from Vancouver.

"Reassuring in that tankers regularly pass by without turning Oak Bay into a Greenpeace commercial.  Alarming in that every extra ship ups the odds of one driving into the ditch."

Knox points out that we have had close calls, enough that we created the Pacific States/British Columbia Oil Spill Task Force to explore the risks.   One of the first crises the Task Force had to deal with was the incident on December 23, 1988 when the tow cable pulling the fuel barge Nestucca parted near Gray Harbor, Washington, causing the spill of 875,000 litres of fuel oil.

"On the U.S. side, tens of thousands of birds died and the oil fouled the shore from northern Oregon to Dungeness Spit, right across Juan de Fuca Strait from Victoria.  The gunk also scummed up Vancouver Island beaches from Sooke to Nootka Sound.

And, Knox points out, the Nestucca spill was just 1/50th  the size of the Exxon Valdez spill.   The new supertankers to carry Alberta bitumen sludge will be several times larger than the Exxon Valdez.

"On Vancouver Island, we're lucky to be getting a free ride from a rescue tug based in Neah Bay, Washington, right at the mouth of the strait.  Between 1999 and 2010, it was deployed to help 46 ships that had lost steering or otherwise ended up in trouble, on 11 occasions taking them under tow before they drifted on the rocks."

The City of Vancouver is wrestling with how to stop the Kinder Morgan tanker traffic through its inner harbour.  They know how Exxon screwed the victims of the Valdez disaster.   In 2010, 21-years after the spill, Exxon was still dragging its feet in court.  At that point, 8,000 of its victims had died without seeing a penny in compensation.   Vancouver knows better than to trust scumbags like Harper and Alberta's Oil Patch to do any better and the city knows its potential losses would utterly dwarf the damage in Prince William Sound.