Subject: April 14: 1999 Sydney hailstorm
The 1999 Sydney hailstorm was the costliest natural disaster in Australian insurance history, causing extensive damage along the east coast of New South Wales. The storm developed south of Sydney on the afternoon of 14 April, 1999 and struck the city's eastern suburbs, including the central business district, later that evening. The storm dropped an estimated 500,000 tonnes of hailstones in its path. Insured damages caused by the storm were over A$1.7 billion, with the total damage bill (including uninsured damages) estimated to be around A$2.3 billion, equivalent to US$1.5 billion. It was the costliest in Australian history in terms of insured damages, overtaking the 1989 Newcastle earthquake that had resulted in A$1.1 billion in insured damages. Lightning also claimed one life during the storm, and the event caused approximately 50 injuries. The storm was classified as a supercell following further analysis of its erratic nature and extreme attributes. During the event, the Bureau of Meteorology was consistently surprised at the frequent changes in direction, as well as the severity of the hail and the duration of the storm. The event was also unique as the time of year and general conditions in the region were not seen as conducive for an extreme storm cell to form.
Read the rest of this article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1999_Sydney_hailstorm
_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:
1471: Wars of the Roses: The Yorkists under Edward IV defeated the Lancastrians near the town of Barnet, killing Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Barnet)
1865: Actor and Confederate sympathizer John Wilkes Booth shot U.S. President Abraham Lincoln at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Lincoln_assassination)
1931: King Alfonso XIII left Spain. The Second Spanish Republic was proclaimed by a provisional government led by Niceto Alcalá-Zamora. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Spanish_Republic)
1956: The use of the quadruplex videotape was first demonstrated in public. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/quadruplex_videotape)
1970: An oxygen tank aboard Apollo 13 exploded, causing the NASA spacecraft to lose most of its oxygen and electrical power. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_13)
1978: Thousands of Georgians demonstrated in Tbilisi against an attempt by the Supreme Soviet of the Georgian SSR to change the constitutional status of the Georgian language. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1978_Tbilisi_Demonstrations)
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persiflage: Good-natured banter; raillery. (http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/persiflage)
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