Weekly Weird News for 20 January 2023
Welcome to another edition of Weekly Weird News where I’ve rounded up some of the fringe stories you may not have noted in your typical news feed. Thanks to all who share these posts and who have expressed appreciation for this newsletter I bring to you every Friday. I suppose I might get more attention if I bring it out on Monday, but the end-of-the-week roundup just feels right. On to the news. To start, I’ve collected several stories about the weather. They aren’t comforting.
Hot times on the way
A scary forecast is ahead for later in 2023 as El Niño returns. Predictions were clear that 2023 was going to be possibly worst than last year. The hottest year in recorded history was an El Niño year, 2016. 2024 looks even grimmer! El Niño would contribute to extreme weather events. Buckle up, we may face more deadly heatwaves, droughts and fires. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jan/16/return-of-el-nino-will-cause-off-the-chart-temperature-rise-climate-crisis
Scary turbulence
More explanation came out this week about the severe turbulence that struck a plane on its way into Honolulu in mid-December. It sounds mysterious, especially the way headlines portray it - “Plume-like cloud ‘shot’ in front of Hawaiian Airlines flight“ - but it’s not. The weather radar didn’t indicate a problem with the approach. No other pilots reported bad weather. But storms sprung up very quickly, too quickly for the pilots to deviate. The fast-moving cloud was indicative of rapidly moving air due to an occluded front (where a warm air mass is caught between two cold air masses). While the National Weather Service provided a warning for the potential turbulence, the “pocket” turbulence was unanticipated and resulted in dozens of people being injured because they were not belted in their seats at the time. The cause of the incident, while rare in its severity, is not mysterious. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/plume-cloud-shot-front-hawaiian-airlines-flight-seconds-turbulence-inj-rcna65800 and https://simpleflying.com/ntsb-cloud-turbulence-hawaiian-airlines-airbus-a330/
Doppler mystery
A strange Doppler radar signal appearing in the morning in Eastern Washington was a mystery to National Weather Service officials. The radar image shows an unusually symmetrical circular burst of activity from the ground that then disappeared. The NWS asked the public for help in determining what it could be - gas or dust from an industrial facility or farm, or a flock of birds. So they posted to their Facebook page for tips and, as I could have predicted, they got a bunch of chuckleheads making stupid comments about aliens and other nonsense stuff. It doesn’t appear they got a solid answer. The most reasonable guess is a flock of starlings. But there has been no official confirmation of what it was. https://www.tri-cityherald.com/news/local/article271300707.html
Video at https://fb.watch/i9DWMVC9lH/
Doomsday clouds
A cloud formation photographed in Russia is giving ideas to the doomsayers who think that the end is already upon us. These dramatic lenticular clouds were posted on social media along with others, triggering a certain fringe site to bolster their daily news that the apocalypse is upon us. These types of clouds signal unstable air. Things are definitely unstable.
Persistence of the fentanyl myth
Thanks to misinformation promoted by the US Drug Enforcement Administration in 2016, there is a widespread and persistent belief that brief contact with fentanyl, a synthetic opioid, is enough to cause immediate adverse effects. One can regularly find incidents where fentanyl exposure is cited for sudden illness. Instead, these cases resemble panic attacks or psychosomatic reactions to the idea of being poisoned. In Illinois this week, prison inmates and employees fell ill from an “unknown substance”. News reports suggest they think it was smuggled drugs. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-64333156
Eleven NJ police officers were treated for exposure, some of whom fainted. This is not a side effect of fentanyl exposure, but it is consistent with the stress-induced idea that one has been exposed to a dangerous substance. https://www.foxnews.com/us/eleven-new-jersey-police-officers-treated-fentanyl-exposure-search-suspects-arrested
A student and a deputy at an Oregon middle school were also treated this week after a suspicious odor was noted in a bathroom. https://www.yourerie.com/news/national-news/ap-2-treated-for-likely-fentanyl-exposure-at-oregon-school/
All these cases are no different than what used to be called “mass hysteria” - when groups of people, often students, fell ill due to a perceived threat, often a smell or behavior from one person that quickly spread to others. The media reports on many of these stories which just makes things worse. https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/22/media/fentanyl-exposures-reliable-sources/index.html
“It’s extremely unlikely that law enforcement officials or other first responders will experience an overdose after brief, unintentional exposure while caring for individuals who used opioids,” said Dr. Leana Wen, an emergency physician and CNN medical analyst.
Wen explained that opioids “are not well-absorbed through the skin except through prolonged exposure” and, outside biowarfare situations, are “not aerosolized and inhaled through the air.”
Yet the myth remains persistent and widely accepted as true.
Not something you want to find in an old abandoned building
Human remains were found in an unused building on the Univ of California Berkeley campus earlier this month. It’s unclear how long they had been there; they were skeletonized. There are no unsolved missing person reports so authorities are investigating. https://abcnews.go.com/US/human-skeleton-found-unused-residence-hall-university-california/story?id=96458418
Not something you want to come across on your property
A property owner in northwestern Arkansas made a gruesome and scary discovery of hundreds of deer carcasses on his land. After the sheriff’s office investigated, bringing in the Fish and Game officers, the dumped remains were raised back to a person hired to properly dispose of the animal parts from a processing and taxidermy business. He dumped them without permission instead. https://www.fox35orlando.com/news/arkansas-landowner-stumbles-upon-hundreds-of-deer-carcasses-prompting-investigation
Unique festival turns into horror show
Many people were injured and six people died at a kite festival in Gujarat, India. Most people had relatively minor cuts from the taut strings but six people including three children died after the kite strings cut them or they were entangled and fell. The kite festival has been the source of deaths before. Two children died in 2016. https://www.standard.co.uk/news/world/india-gujarat-festival-kite-strings-deaths-b1053912.html
Electric substations still experiencing vandalism, or something more
At the end of 2022, it was unclear if the attacks on electrical substations across the country had a specific intention. Continued incidents make it seem likely there is a deliberate effort to shoot at these facilities. What remains unclear is if the attacks are meant to disable power temporarily, to enable robberies, or if they have intentions on a wider scale. Or, if it’s just random idiots doing idiotic things like always. Shooting at utility structures is not new. But it’s now news. The latest was again in North Carolina. Gunfire damaged a facility but did not cause an outage. https://apnews.com/article/north-carolina-charlotte-law-enforcement-3db28f8dcf0eacaa23224acd298f2cad
The FBI had warned of threats from white supremacist groups’ plots to take down the power grid and cause societal collapse. https://www.opb.org/article/2023/01/19/surge-in-oregon-washington-substation-attacks-as-fbi-warns-neo-nazi-plots/ There have not been arrests or responsibility claimed for the attacks that ramped up in December of 2022. The utility industry is aware that the attacks will mean increase security measures and scrutiny by officials. Luckily, there is redundancy in place, but clearly not enough to prevent some major disruptions. The greater worry is from hackers who gain access through digital breaches. https://www.utilitydive.com/news/substation-attacks-may-lead-to-new-energy-security-rules-in-2023-experts-s/640138/
Haunted cops
A South African police station was temporarily abandoned because the cops were scared of attacks by ghosts. Just before the holidays, they said, the building shakes and noises are heard, the lights go off and on, and they hear footsteps. The location, they say is surrounded by graves. Sounds like a testable claim to me. Send Z Bags from Ghost Adventures there right away! https://www.citizen.co.za/news/limpopo-cops-haunted-station-vicious-ghosts-january-2023/
Hare-raising close call
A woman exploring the Grewignk Glacier in Alaska on ice skates found a dead snowshoe hair on the ice. She picked it up and was carrying it when she fell through the ice. Still holding the hare, she flung it onto the ice where it stuck, allowing her to pull herself out. People nearby were able to get her warm and dry quickly. They didn’t have to risk thin ice trying to save her, she had hold of a lucky rabbit’s foot for that. https://www.ktoo.org/2023/01/17/homer-woman-saved-by-dead-hare-after-fall-through-ice/
Fancy visitor
Birdwatchers in Milwaukee have been treated to a visit from a Mandarin duck who is hanging out with the normal birds in the area. This vibrantly colored species is related to wood ducks but is not local. It is native to Eastern Asia, but also found in western Europe and in parts of California and Florida where it was introduced. The unusual stunning visitor is likely an escapee from a private owner. https://www.tmj4.com/news/local-news/mandarin-duck-sighting-in-milwaukee-draws-eager-spectators-hitting-the-jackpot
Thanks for reading!
Yes, I spelled “taut” wrong. Sorry. It’s corrected.