Tag: weather

Wildfires of Russia

Hundreds of wildfires followed last week all time high high temperature and drought.  Dry forests and wind is not the best combination for fire safety.  As a result, more than 40 people dead and more than 1500 houses burned down across the country.  And with no changes in the weather, it’s probably not the end of it yet.

My grandfather’s house got nearly burned down by the wildfire as well.  Luckily, in the last moment there was a change in wind direction which turned the fire away.  Even if nobody died in my home city, fire destroyed more than 500 hectares of the forest.  That’s 5,000,000 square meters!

Big Picture blog covers the story.

Nature sounds

Via Michael’s blog post I discovered an excellent web service – free nature sounds.  Once you get there, you can select up to four different nature sounds and mix them into a single loop, varying volume and stereo balance.  It’s very easy to use and there is a good selection of sounds.  You can save the result as WAV file (which can later be converted to MP3), or you can save it as a link which can be shared.   For example, here is my mix, which I called “Fireplace“.  Just imagine: you are sitting in your own house, it’s dark and a bit chilly, thunder and rain outside, wood burning in the fireplace, giving you light and warmth, and your cat is on purring on your lap.  It sounds so good, the only thing I am missing is cat’s vibration which I am trying to replace with my mobile phone.

Try it out for you self, save results, and share links in the comments.

Lots of snow

If you are in the mood for some cold weather, ice and snow, check out these pictures.  It’s amazing what mother nature can do sometimes.

My dad told me a story of a similar snow fall that he experienced once when he was a kid.  They had to dig their way out of the house and into the main street.  He said that they walked over the garden fence without even noticing it.  This sounds awesome, but I bet you blisters from the shovel will cut into the fun part of it.