Results of the year 2020

• Emergencies analytics
  • On the analytical conclusion of 2020
  • A distinctive feature of climate changes in 2020
  • Overview of the main emergencies of 2020
    • Magnetosphere
    • Atmosphere
    • Water
    • Earth
    • Storms
    • Earthquakes
    • Volcanoes
    • Environmental pollution
  • Volcanic activity statistics for 2020
  • Epidemiological situation in 2020
    • About the COVID-19 pandemic
  • Aviation accident statistics 2020
  • Railway accident statistics for 2020
  • Statistics of major accidents with buses for 2020
  • Erosion of the earth´s surface for 2020
  • Major impacts of climate change 2020
  • Major anomalies of 2020
  • Author´s opinion
• Frequency of emergencies
• Comparison of 2019 and 2020 by emergency category
• Map and list of events

Quote of 2020: "A year and a half ago, I swam across the English Channel. Not across, but along. The swim lasted 49 days. During this time, I saw several dolphins, one turtle, several birds and nothing else. Every beach on the UK side was contaminated with plastic. As if all the fish were simply taken from the ocean and replaced with plastic", said the British extreme athlete, goodwill ambassador of the UN Environment Program Lewis Pugh.

News of 2020: "The Greek government will return cut down pensions to two million pensioners".

Remember how 2020 began? Someone traditionally celebrated it in the family circle, someone on the "post" was on duty or at work, someone celebrated in a fun company, someone in solitude (not in self-isolation) with the "native and close" TV, that is, differently and at will. Both the fires in Australia and the pneumonia outbreak in China, and all the troubles of the world were far away. Not ours. But only a month passed, and everything turned upside down. Leap year 2020 has come - Year of the Rat. How not to believe in mysticism?

Emergencies analytics

On the analytical conclusion of 2020

Events of 2020 imprinted not only on this report, but also on the entire site as a whole. The site has become more "mobile", since almost all of its pages have received adaptive versions, also including this section "Analytical Conclusions (FMD)". It is hoped that in 2021 the transition to an adaptive version of the System will be completed.

The hard work of adapting the System, and the COVID-19 pandemic had made it significantly more difficult to collect and process the events of 2020. This is good seen in the number of events allocated by the System in a year. If in 2019 year 2853 emergency situations fell into the archives, then in 2020 - only 1802.

The reduction of important events for the year does not say that there are fewer of them in fact. Just sources of information transferred almost all their resources to the category of emergency "Epidemic". This was especially noticeable in February, March and April. In the same months, enterprises were stopping around the world, and transport traffic decreased significantly. Which, of course, reduced technogenic pressure on the environment and accident rate. If it is conditionally assumed that in 2020 there was no pandemic, then it will be correct to the total number of emergencies this year add another 50%. But history does not tolerate a subjunctive mood. Therefore, analysis had to be carried out on existing data.

I would like to note that in 2020 the situation with the monopolists of the IT market has not improved. They continue to draw a hard and unconstructive line, putting pressure on all scientific resources, depriving users of access to them through forced reduction of positions in search engines.

Such anti-state behavior significantly reduces the intellectual level of runet, nullifies all efforts to popularize the results of research by Russian scientists, since users are further breaking away from the primary sources of scientific ideas, primarily receiving from web developers "burgers from restaurants" brought by "web carriers".

A distinctive feature of climate changes in 2020

The magnitude of the emergencies recorded, their power and uniqueness impressed, but also aggravated many of the contradictions between humanity and its environment. This has been reflected as in the pandemic and also in the decline in the standard of living of a large part of the population, up to hunger and humanitarian disasters, and in the accidents that despite of everything have occurred, and in climate changes itself, many of which are only under development.

Nevertheless, the main distinguishing feature was the complexity of emergencies caused by climate change.

So, for example, to phrases like: "never for the entire period of observation", - we are already used to. But the fact that the Arctic has ceased to be an Arctic climate zone is fully accepted and understood with difficulty.

Or a collapse in world medicine that came with the detection, or rather, with the identification of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. After all, virus is still not classified, and a year already passed. Neither nature, nor source, nor region of origin is clear. In fact, the vaccines that will now be used are vaccines against the virus "without a passport". Naturally, people subconsciously have a lot of questions occur that neither science, nor modern practical medicine, nor world leaders can answer. In addition, this problem feed a lot of "capital", so much political populism flourishes that it is simply impossible to separate the "grains" of truth from the informational "weeds". However, all this "unfinished history" in excess is presented in the About the Epidemics summary and in archives.

Of interest is that the first example is closely intertwined with the second. And there are great suspicions that the answers that have not yet been found to pandemic questions lie in the plane of climate change and are closely related to ecology. In the restructuring of human body to a rapidly changing situation. Understanding this requires breaking many templates and dogmas which exists at population of the Earth.

I would like to highlight another feature of climate change in 2020. This is a steady aspiration and a substantial leap of emergencies to continuity. And as necessary conditions: the sudden occurrence, uncertainty of completion and repeatability. Moreover, the development of these conditions or trends is greatly influenced by the behavior of people. So unintentional and conscious pollution of the atmosphere and near space significantly reduced the Earth´s protection from space threats in terms of their detection, making these threats more sudden. The lack of engineer solutions protecting from icing made the recovery period after hazardous hydro- and meteorological events uncertain. The decline in the level of creativity in the management of space projects (for example, the ISS) deepened the crisis in space investigation and led to recurring accidents. With songs and poems, even with the help of a "trampoline," you will not fly to the moon.

The listed features seemed to "scream" in the events of 2020, but many did not notice them, continuing for various reasons the previous life, as if nothing had happened. And in vain!

Overview of the main emergencies of 2020

If someone thinks that now we will talk only about pandemic, then he is deeply mistaken. The emergence of new viruses for the Earth is an ordinary event. They may be more or less virulent, but this process occurs regularly. Another thing is how the state, its society, economics, medicine and science as a whole are ready for this. The purpose of this project is not to criticize or praise the actions of specialists or their groups, countries and international organizations, but to find the reasons that caused the emergency to identify ways to solve the problem. Although no one is immune from the manifestation of emotions. But we will leave this for household conversations, social networks and mass media.

Magnetosphere

Traditionally, let´s start with the Sun. It was it that brought a little "positive" in the gloomy surrounding environment. The Sun finally "earned" and actively began to get out of its minimum (the main thing is not to overdo it). So in early November, X-ray radiation began to grow, and groups of spots appeared on the surface of the Sun that had not been observed for several years. These spots with stronger localized magnetic fields produced several class C flashes and even a flash M4 November 29.

The Earth´s magnetic field has thus "lost about 9% of its strength on average over the past 200 years". The field weakened to such an extent that ships that fell into one of the anomalous zones with a weakened magnetic field in the Atlantic, off the southwestern part of Africa, "suddenly lost course" and began to "drive" a round dance due to mechanical compasses responding to changes of magnetosphere. And this is more of a funny case for a inhabitant than a serious warning. However, like the other. The surrounding outer space still managed to "sparkle" with a significant event during the period of minimum Sun activity. Beside supermassive black hole located in the center of the galaxy in the constellation of Ophiuchus, 390 mln light years from Earth an explosion was recorded. It was so powerful that after it a break was formed in the disk of the hot plasma surrounding the black hole. As a result of the explosion, there was an energy release five times higher than the previous record. And charged particles along with energy, flew in all directions.

With the increase activity of the Sun, there is a hope for stabilization and strengthening of the Earth´s magnetic field, although, naturally it will take time. And the approaching of the magnetic reconnection process and the penetration of cosmic radiation should remain the rarest, anomalous events. Although the change of magnetic poles humanity will still have to survive.

In the meantime, the magnetosphere of our planet was fevered all the year, and at the same time, in the atmosphere under the influence of solar wind and cosmic radiation, as well as global warming from the Earth´s surface, phenomena was developed which intensified visible "light shows" against the background of giant ozone holes in both the Arctic and Antarctica. And at the beginning of the year, NASA´s "ACE" spacecraft showed how the magnetosphere is destabilizing. It "found that the interplanetary magnetic field near the Earth turned sharply 180°, and the density of the solar wind jumped more than 5 times. 15 minutes after that, experts at the "Polarlightcenter" geophysical observatory in Lofoten recorded that in northern Norway, the currents of the earth and of magnetic field suddenly changed. A small crack opened up in the magnetic field of our planet, through which a solar wind flowed to Earth. Then he provoked the activation of the polar lights".

Atmosphere

It should immediately be stated that there is a lot of information about polar lights, pearly and silver clouds and other abnormal atmospheric phenomena in 2020. Here are the most unusual of them.

So in January, Finnish amateurs and scientists discovered a new form of polar lights. Its glow was not part of any known classification and looked like a pattern of greenish waves. They called this phenomenon "dunes". However, for some reason, the researchers focused only on vertical glow, without paying attention to horizontal. Although these are clearly not glares of light from the "dunes" on the clouds (they simply are absent and around is the starry sky). Then one analogy comes to mind with the refraction of light in different media. What environments are adjacent in the atmosphere, one of which "diffuses" dunes, and the other "builds dunes"?

Throughout the year, the polar lights abounded in shades of green (oxygen) and pink (nitrogen) at altitudes of about 100 km. But one case that occurred in October surpassed all observations. The pink polar lights were so bright that even the ocean became pink. Pink northern lights are called "nitrogen fringe" when energy particles hit nitrogen molecules at a height of 100 km and below. What is the density of nitrogen to give such an intense color with a minimum of solar activity (there were no magnetic storms on this day)? For comparison, you need to look at the "crown" of the northern lights, which was observed in September during the magnetic storm of G2. Then the radiance was observed in Karelia, the Murmansk region and Yamal in Russia, in Norway, Sweden, Finland and Canada. Is the difference noticeable?

However, both examples suggest that charged particles penetrated very deep into the Earth´s atmosphere (possibly the stratosphere) and steadily encountered an excess of nitrogen there.

The amazing celestial multicolor of the polar lights does not end on this. And in the same October, over Finland, the sky flashes in red color, which is emitted by oxygen atoms, but at altitudes of 150…500 km. The temperature and density of the atmosphere at these altitudes contributes to atomic transitions which emit bright red photons. And this is the flight altitude of the ISS. The heights where oxygen is now detected are impressive. People on the Earth surface choke and die due to oxygen deficiency, and it is in excess next to the ISS and satellites. It´s fantastic. No, well, "positivist scientists," of course, can explain this by a leak from the station, although there is nothing positive about it.

The mysterious distribution of gases is not the only 2020 anomaly in the atmosphere. And the colorful extravaganza of the polar lights during the year began to be supplemented by other anomalous "special effects".

So this year in Denmark was observed an unusual red glow, which, according to scientists, is not associated with polar lights. Such air masses glow is caused by chemical reactions in the upper atmospheric layers. The processes that give rise to them begin at bright time of day when the atmosphere is still permeated by ultraviolet radiation. This time, due to the activity of hydroxyl´s molecules at altitudes of 86…87 km, the glow acquired a red color.

As the experiments established in January, the polar vortex rotated at a speed of more than 600 km/h at an altitude of more than 25 km from the surface of the earth. He influenced the weather in the Northern Hemisphere, gained strength and reached its peak. The lowest stratospheric vortex temperature was recorded over Reykjavik. As a result, the "outbreak" of polar stratospheric clouds that began the New Year holidays intensified in Iceland. Around the same time, intense rainbow pearlescent clouds were also observed in Sweden.

In a typical Arctic winter, polar stratospheric clouds can appear at most two or three times. But in the winter of 2020 everything was different. Clouds appeared dozens of times and almost completely filled the Arctic sky.

The strong overwetting of the stratosphere led not only to the formation of a dense layer of "pure" PSC clouds, but also to a significant interlayer of high-altitude clouds, which consist of tiny drops of nitric, sulfuric acids, methane and other compounds. The surfaces of these droplets act as catalysts, converting relatively soft forms of anthropogenic chlorine into active free radicals capable of destroying ozone. They look like a yellow haze visible over the horizon. And this is apparently the first and one of the main reason for the formation of huge ozone holes over the Arctic and Antarctica.

And if at the beginning of the year was opened a hole only over the Arctic, then at the end there were already two of them, over both poles. So record low ozone levels were marked in winter and spring in the central part of the Arctic, which covers an area 3 times the size of Greenland, and which was "two steps" from Murmansk, Arkhangelsk and north of Siberia. This atmospheric phenomenon has become unprecedented in area, depth and duration. There was observed a 90% drop in ozone content at an altitude of 18,000 m in March. And after the "failure" in the ozone layer on April 12 over the Kola Peninsula, a sharp exacerbation began with the incidence of COVID-19 in the Murmansk region. In May, the ozone hole over the Arctic was collapsed, and the pandemic abruptly declined. Since mid-August, ozone began to disappear over Antarctica. At the same time, the second wave of pandemic began in Western countries. And in mid-October, the depletion of ozone over the Arctic began again, and the pandemic began to worsen in Russia.

Recall that ozone protects us from deadly cosmic radiation, which even in small amounts leads to cancer and a general decrease in human immunity.

Many hoped for an improvement in the environment during the pandemic-related restrictions, but this was not the case. Continuous production did not stop, and those production that stopped were more than compensated by the utilities. In addition, private vehicles continued to drive, despite the bans. As a result, only in Russia "in January-March of this year, 44 cases of increased air pollution were recorded in the country, which is 57% more than the same indicator of 2019".

In addition to harmful impurities in the atmosphere, various sources name the following reasons for the appearance of abnormal ozone holes:

• exceptionally strong and long-lived polar vortex, which allowed the formation of polar stratospheric clouds, which led to large losses of ozone over the Arctic;
• abnormal weakening of "wave events" in the upper atmosphere, which bring ozone from other parts of the stratosphere and replenish the Arctic reservoir;
• pulsating polar lights, that appear when electrons with a wide energy range fall into the upper and middle parts of the Earth´s atmosphere;
• methane emissions in polar zones when exposed to atmospheric electricity (thunderstorms);
• minor natural seasonal events, such as the melting of fresh snow cover.

And, most likely, all the listed phenomena had a joint effect on the formation of abnormal polar ozone holes in 2020. The trouble is that after the destruction they began to quickly reappear, becoming more stable and large-scale.

Since May, when Polar day came in the Arctic, the sky has been intensively and regularly was dragged by summer stratospheric clouds.

By the way back in March in the Southern Hemisphere, for the second time in history, summer or silver clouds were recorded on Macquarie Island. Both the discovery of silver clouds there and the anomalous ozone hole over Antarctica suggest that climate change processes in the atmosphere of both hemispheres proceed in the same scenario.

Since the second half of May, reports of silver clouds began to come from Europe and North America. In particular, in British Columbia they were observed at 49 degrees north latitude, which is a rather rare case. But if last year they were seen on the latitude of Los Angeles, then there is nothing surprising in this. But it is beautiful. And already in June, these clouds were also seen in many regions of Russia and, even, in Moscow, that in previous years in such numbers did not happen. Further, these clouds were recorded in Denmark and the USA, at the southern border between Utah and Idaho. In general, decent, but in June this had no effect on the ozone layer, although a yellow, smogs layer of PSC clouds was present everywhere.

But no one tried to explain where such a huge amount of moisture goes? Does moisture still soar above us or drop out on the surface? In the first case, there is a gradual and global accumulation of moisture in the stratosphere, in the second - raises the following question: how does stratospheric moisture transition to the lower layers of atmosphere, and are the growing intensity of precipitation falling on the Earth´s surface not related to the growth of PSC clouds intensity?

There is a suspicion that both of these processes are present. And accumulation, and falling out. In this case, humanity in the near future is waiting for great troubles, than it has. Simply, it is doubtful that at least one of the climatic models took into account PSC-cloud cover in such a context. Although everything can be. In favor of moisture accumulation, and therefore an increase in the density of the stratosphere and, even, the mesosphere, unexpectedly pointed out the case that occurred in the sky over Europe in the second half of September. Then a meteorite, flied over the territory of northern Germany at an altitude of about 91 km, "as if has slided on the earth´s atmosphere, and then began to move away from the planet".

Another meteorite unexpectedly confirmed the hypothesis of expanding the atmosphere due to warming, which was expressed in last year´s report. This happened in Slovakia, when the meteorite falling was recorded from three points of observation. "Using these 3 images, a team of photographers were able to restore the physical path of the meteor through the atmosphere, and they found the following: while ordinary meteorites decay at an altitude of 60…90 km above the Earth, this meteorite began to burn much higher, at an altitude of more than 120 km". And such a shift does not indicate the great speed and uniqueness of the celestial object (as observers suggested), but the expansion of the Earth´s atmosphere. This means that the height of at least the mesopause has moved about 30 km from the Earth. Hence the oxygen in the ionosphere. And precisely because of the greater amount of oxygen in the ionosphere, red polar lights were recorded over Finland, as mentioned above. The expansion led to greater sparsity, which caused many meteorites in 2020 to reach the Earth´s surface (for example, in India in the states of Uttar-Pradesh and Rajastan, in China, Lebanon, Nigeria or Ecuador).

There is no contradiction between the sparseness of the atmosphere and the increased density due to overwetting. The size of the molecules increased, but also the distance between them increased due to the expansion of the atmosphere. When the meteorite moves at an angle or by tangent, the relative density of the substance increases, when meteorite falls vertically, it contacts less by molecules, that is, less friction. It is quite possible that this process can influence the formation of ozone holes, but only influence.

Abnormally many comets have been observed this year. I do not remember that so many of them flew within sight. In summer, there was even a period when in the sky in each hemisphere was observed per comet, and one more moved from the southern hemisphere to the northern, that is, three at once. But of all everyone remembered comet C/2019 Y4 (Atlas), or rather its wreckage. The "heavenly wanderer" still on the approaches to the naked eye visibility area surprised everyone. And a lot has been written about it. Until the comet became visible on the territory of Russia in the evenings from about 21:00 to 22:00 from mid-March to the first days of May in the west following the Sun leaving the horizon. The rear part of the comet was visible, so a small "stick" could be distinguished from the tail, pointing vertically down. Further, with the lengthening of the light time, the comet ceased to be visible.

In general, with climate changes, astronomers have had significant difficulties in observing celestial bodies in outer space surrounding the Earth, and, therefore the possibility of warning about the approach of dangerous objects has been reduced. The fact is that "astronomers faced the problem of reducing the "dome vision" of telescopes. This is when the resolution deteriorates due to turbulence inside the dome of the telescope. The researchers also noted increased turbulence in the air layer at the surface of the Earth, which makes the images blurred. An increase in wind shear in the upper atmosphere leads to the so-called "wind halo," which reduces clarity, and an increase in the amount of water vapor in the air leads to a weakening of the astronomical signal". And that´s not all. Musk launched a lot of mini-satellites for internet communication, and the abnormal hurricane season destroyed the largest "Arecibo" radio telescope in Puerto Rico. In addition, a surge of failures began on the ISS up to the leak of oxygen in the Russian module "Zvezda".

But the problem now is the lack of oxygen not only in space, in the stratosphere of the Earth (ozone holes), but also directly on its land and in the seas and oceans. It is well known about the decrease in oxygen in the atmosphere due to natural fires and deforestation. But now it has come to the situation that the oldest natural system of regeneration of this gas is suppressed on the root by pollution. It turned out, that cyanobacteria of the genus Prochlorococcus are very susceptible to "non-plastic" substances in plastic, which are necessary in its production to improve its properties. Thus, plasticizers give the polymers elasticity. But such substances inhibit photosynthesis and the growth of marine bacteria. "And Prochlorococcus is one of the main suppliers of oxygen to the atmosphere: their share of the total global oxygen production is 10%. That is, one of every 10 of our breaths is due to these tiny microorganisms". Everything on the Earth from the Mariana Depression to Everest is now littered with Microplastic. And the main source of this is not cellophane bags, not plastic bottles. They "float" on the surface, and they can be assembled.

But you will not see microplastic from cars (only from tires 4 kg from the wheel) and it can´t be collected with your hands. Together with exhaust (for example, benzapyrene, soot, hydrocarbons), with the cost of resources and raw materials for production, repair and maintenance, and "rolling" into asphalt of huge territories - this is auto - loop for life on Earth.

Previous annual reports have focused on air pollution issues. I don´t want to repeat myself. But the significant restriction of access to essential life resources due to pollution and the rate of degradation of regeneration systems is certainly new in our environment.

Water

The second most important resource after air is water. How much talk about wars between states. But most likely, the population of countries will themselves deprive themselves of access to water. What happens on the Black Sea coast of Russia. Back in winter, weather forecasters predicted a drought in the south of the ETR. And so in the Crimea and the Krasnodar Territory there were big problems with water supply, but local authorities ignored forecasts and allowed a full-scale tourist season, and the federal center, as always, loaded the built bridges with traffic with fanfare. Countless tourists, shock construction projects, profits flows like a river (or whatever). To make it clearer to those who, for various reasons, do not have access to this Covid - madness and who are a hundred times more numerous in Russia, we explain that tourists in the south do not so often rest in X-star hotels (expensive), as in private homes with mobile rather large swimming pools. Guess where the water in these pools comes from? You are right, running water system. As a result, wells are dehydrated, reservoirs are empty, river beds are dry, water is imported on schedule or for money. No matter how much they earn on tourists, they will still spend more on water, restoring water supply and habitual life. If they restored at all. Conceive about how much fault of nature is in this emergency and how much fault of people? There are already many examples in the world when people literally sucked all the water resources in drought conditions. After which other troubles come, but will we explain this to "positive" people? But we´re trying.

Accessible sources of drinking water within the habitat of the bulk of the population of the Earth become catastrophically few. After 30 years, glaciers can preserved only at an altitude of more than 4...4.5 km, but, for example, in Europe there are no such mountains. Previously, summer in the mountains lasted two months - July and August, and now the summer period lasts almost five months. The steady melting of glaciers in the Himalayas alone over the past 20 years has resulted in more than 5,000 glacial lakes. And the number of glacial lakes around the world increased by 53%. This phenomenon not only threatens the rapid disappearance of water resources, but also flash floods and mudflows. So over the past few years, in the highlands of Pakistan "more than 3,000 melt lakes have appeared, 33 of which are considered dangerous, and more than 7 million people living in mountain valleys are threatened with possible flooding". In the mountain massifs of the planet from Canada to New Zealand, i.e. everywhere, glaciers disappear quickly and without trace.

Freshwater reserves in the Arctic and Antarctic, of course, are huge, but people do not live there. In fact, for us it is like water supplies on the moon. And due to global warming, the ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctica lose mass 6 times faster than in the 1990s. Ice melts rapidly, and fresh water mixes with the ocean water, without quenching the thirst of mankind. In Greenland, for example, "for the period from 2002 to 2018, this figure over the summer period amounted to about 268 billion tons. 600 billion tons of water that went into the ocean would be enough for providing Los Angeles with fresh water for 600 years". Moreover, the ice sheet is being destroyed in jerks, which leads to unpredictable sea level rise and complicates the preparation for the consequences. For the first time since the beginning of observations the Laptev Sea in Siberia did not start to freeze at the end of October. Warm Atlantic currents have been cited as the main cause of this phenomenon, but this is not the case. Rivers from the mainland are the real culprits of both rising water temperature and heavy pollution. And it was warm and extremely polluted river water, as in 2019 in the neighboring Kara Sea, that became the culprit of methane emissions from a depth of 350 m into the Laptev Sea, discovered by the expedition of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Seismic activity in the Aleutian Islands has nothing to do with it. An earthquake can destroy, but not catalyze, chemical reactions if neither the temperature nor the pressure of methane "conservation" in hydrates do not change.

The destructive processes in Antarctica are no less dynamic. Only in 2020, glaciers were mentioned on this topic: Pine Island and Thwaites, Sirase and Totten, Denman, Branta, George VI. For example, Eagle Island lost about 20% of its ice cover from February 4 to 13. The area of summer sea ice in the Weddell Sea region over the past 5 years has decreased by 1 million square kilometers - this is an area 2 times the size of Spain. And all ice shelves are susceptible to the destructive and infamous hydraulic fracturing of formations due to meltwater on their surface. As noted earlier, in previous analytical opinions, rapid liberation from the ice destabilizes Antarctica. And one cannot circumvent the fact that this led, as in the Arctic, to the beginning of the release of methane reserves "mothballed" in hydrates. Methane emission was recorded from the bottom of the Ross Sea. It is alarming that this information is not new, it is at least 5 years old, and that "microbes that usually consume methane before it enters the atmosphere appeared at the gas release site only 5 years after its detection. One leak will not affect the climate globally, but the waters around Antarctica contain up to 25% of the Earth´s marine methane, and now emissions natural methane can occur that no one knows about".

The behavior of methane-absorbing microbes in Antarctica can only talk about one thing: climate change has emerged from the framework of evolutionary development of the Earth, when events gradually follow one another, and functional systems appear during and at a place where there is need for this and conditions are created.

Earth

The next most important resource for human is earth. We have plenty of earth. We are not an island state after all. And the attitude of people, unfortunately, is appropriate, careless. Forests are everywhere littered with dead wood and overgrown with shrubs, fields are not cultivated in most areas (the old were destroyed, and nothing new was built), river beds are cleaned only after somebody was heavily flooded. All this is sprinkled by different amount of garbage of different aggregation, which is much or not very much watered by waste from the results of functioning of the fuel and energy complex and transport. Somewhere oil from the car will begin to drip, somewhere the petroleum transfer pipe will burst, somewhere fuel oil tank will give leakage, somewhere the plane will drain fuel to make an emergency landing. All this gets into the ground. Moreover, the more such "sources", the denser the layer of pollution. And on earth, we grow bread and breed animals that consume what grows on earth.

Remember, a few years ago, videos with rice that burned like plastic "walked" on the Internet. Then everyone talked about his fake. Now look at the scheme given by the Chinese Academy of Sciences. So rice, wheat and other cereals absorb everything, small pollutants, including plastic. Or rather, now mostly plastic. So, that "fake" rice is not a fake at all, it is the most real one. Just in one place, where it grows more plastic, in another less, but plastic is present everywhere. And the word "everywhere" should be understood in the broadest sense, that is, in you and me, and plastic accumulates. "The study showed the transmission of microplastic along the food chain: if particles penetrate crops, they are also found in meat and dairy products". The situation with river fish is even worse. Yes, not only elephants in Sri Lanka or bears in Russia "feed" in landfills.

If we consider the above given scheme in a broader sense, then instead the cereal products you can safely substitute any representative of the flora. And, of course, trees. Thus, tree trunks, especially young ones, are now stuffed with combustible and toxic polymers. As was warned in the analytical conclusions of previous years.

Of the three basic resources of life, it is solid earth that ensures a normal life for a person. If, of course the earth is stable, steady, filled with nutritious minerals and good moistened. And problems are everywhere. "Already today, the bearing capacity of soils in the permafrost zone has decreased by an average of 17% compared to the 70s of the last century, and up to 45% in some regions. Dangerous deformations will be received by objects of railway, automobile and pipeline infrastructure located on a long-term permafrost", - the Accounts Chamber of the Russian Federation about the national project "Ecology". Unfortunately, new facts suggest that prognosis models about the degradation of long-term permafrost are wrong. Already in the summer of 2020, temperatures over +30°C were recorded in northern Russia, which means that everything will be much faster and more extreme. Due to the strongest warming on Earth, the more frequent cases and increase in the scale and duration of droughts and floods, as well as due to the "sharp intensification of environmental management" by human, the process of destruction and fertile layer began. The tragedy is in that"restoring the soil layer with a thickness of 2...2.5 cm, (which has been affected by erosion) will take about 500 years. Unique chernozems were formed for thousands of years, and man destroyed them in a short historical period 150...200 years. Naturally, in 500 and even in 1000 years, the soil in the form in which it was originally formed will no longer recover". Useful minerals are often simply weathered during droughts and washed out from the soil in floods. So only in the Tambov region (Chernozemye) "the area of such soils over the past decades has increased immeasurably and reached in some areas 30...70%. Humus reserves also decreased. The total area of the so-called washed away land already exceeds one million hectares and may soon double due to the development of flushing on potentially erosive soils".

A person tries to increase the yield in order to get more profit, fills the land, often without measure, with fertilizers and pesticides from pests, thereby poisoning both the crop and the environment. And nature removes the restrictions, as if in response, trying to wash it all out and weather it out. And the soils quickly turn into useless sand and dust, which also lose their stability. Droughts lead to soil failures and dust storms, and floods - to landslides and mudflows. And in this aspect, the situation with uncontrolled water consumption in Kuban and in the Crimea is extremely dangerous, since this has already been and continues to develop in many parts of the World. The most famous example of nonrational water consumption is the state of California in the United States, where years of drought, exacerbated by immense groundwater consumption, led to dehydration, soil failures and/or global soil subsidence, uncontrolled landscape fires, and even powerful earthquakes. And the process of disasters in the state has become year-round and, it seems, irreversible. Moreover, natural fires for a long time deprive the territories of access to drinking water.

If the southern regions of our country do not want a repeat of the California natural disasters scenario, local authorities need to urgently begin to tighten control over water consumption. And, first of all, it is necessary to reduce tourist flows, as well as to stop creating "the only and unique" breadbasket in the south of the country with record harvests. Otherwise, sudden desertification cannot be avoided! It is the enlargement of agricultural enterprises that causes excessive, concentrated water consumption and the use of a huge amount of chemistry to produce record yields, and in animal husbandry provokes the uncontrolled use of antibiotics. Drilling new wells, water transfer, desalination, etc. are temporary solutions. Temperatures, consumption, warming and desertification are growing more dynamically and unpredictable.

Storms

Together with the depletion and pollution of basic life resources on Earth, in 2020 there was much less habitable space. This was felt in all countries of the planet. Against the background of "tough" and "soft" pandemic lockdowns, countries struggled with the elements, the parameters of which exceeded many meteorological records. So the Atlantic has almost completely rewritten the annals of hurricanes and storms, as if to compensate for the "quiet" year of 2019.

The most notable storm events in this part of the Earth were:

• the number of storm systems exceeded all forecasts, and there were 30of them. Accordingly, the time frame and names of these systems have shifted;
• in mid-September, five storms systems existed in the region at the same time. One of them Teddy storm, reached the East of Canada and, in the rank of post-tropical, hit the province of New Scotland, bringing a strongest wind and flooding Halifax with abnormal precipitation. The most striking in the "second life" of "Teddy" was its size. The zone of gale winds have reached about 836 km from the center, or about 1600 km from one end of the storm to the other, however in a typical hurricane, tropical gale winds usually extend from the center approximately only for 160...320 km;
• In October, another hurricane, Delta, set a record on the speed of transition from an unnamed tropical depression with wind speed in the center of a vortex of 56 km/h to the hurricane of 4th category at a speed of 225 km/h in just 36 hours. He has gained strength over the water area with a water surface temperature of about +31°С, and the high temperature extended already to a depth of about 75 m. Just is fantastic;
• In November, the double hit of Hurricanes "Eta" and "Iota" marked the first time that two major hurricanes formed in the Atlantic Basin in November since observations began. Moreover, if the "Iota" became a short-lived storm system, then the "Eta" traveled through Caribbean basin for almost two weeks and passed through Guatemala, Honduras, Panama, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Costa Rica, hit Mexico, hit the Cayman Islands and Cuba, then entered Florida and caused flooding in the North Carolina. Moreover, everywhere at least 200 mm of precipitation was poured out of it, and in some places 400 mm.

The forerunner of all these anomalies became storms on both sides of the North Atlantic, both in Europe and in North America. For example, since January, Iceland has been hit several times by severe snowstorms, which very quickly covered the area with powerful winds and abnormal amounts of snow. So at the Keflavik airport, about 4 thousand passengers were stuck for several hours, moreover many passengers were not even able to leave the planes. In April, a storm hit the island again. So much snow fell that avalanches descending into the sea in Suganda Fjord, on the extreme northwest coast, caused a tsunami. And at the end of the year (in December) 570 mm of precipitation fell in the north of the island in five days (as in the tropics), which provoked a massive landslide and damage to local roads by cracks. No less impressive winds and precipitation were recorded in the USA, Canada, Great Britain and Europe. And so all year and all over the Earth.

Here it is necessary to highlight the following:

• in fact, all cyclones began to bring an abnormal amount of precipitation to land. Flooding of territories occurs either quickly with a high intensity of precipitation and/or surge, or over a long period of time and over large areas. All the territories of the tropics and subtropics of the Earth in 2020 were in the zones of abnormal continuous floods and/or droughts. So back in May, super-cyclone Ampan flooded the east of India and 2/3 of Bangladesh´s territory. Moreover, a significant part of the territories was flooded not by precipitation from above, but by a 3...4-meter high surging tide. Continuous rains also watered China in 2020, so that "the water level in 433 rivers across the country exceeded a dangerous level, floods occurred in 109 of them, and a historical record was broken in 33 rivers". "The Three Gorges" dam, the largest hydroelectric plant in the world, caused massive flooding on the Yangtze River, as the water level in the reservoir rose to 165.6 m at a safe level of 145 m. The toes of the 71-meter-high Leshan´s Buddha statue have been flooded by flood waters for the first time since the founding of the People´s Republic of China;
• Heavy air pollution and the mutual location of emission sources can reinforce storm (cyclonic) systems for several times. Researchers showed this anomaly on the example of Hurricane Harvey, which in 2017 flooded Houston, pouring 1250 mm of precipitation on the city. Then they considered that weather forecasters made an erroneous forecast, but the reason remained still not clear. The reason was "the previously one unrecorded variable - industrial air pollution. It was established that atmospheric conditions in Houston during the hurricane converged in such a way that the maximum effect from the presence of aerosols in the air above the city was obtained. This is because southern Texas has more than 400 closely located refineries, and particular in Houston national average annual air pollution levels "are often exceeded";
• In the seas and oceans, winds of tropical cyclones began to lift ocean water, moving this deeper and colder water from the depth of several hundred meters to the surface. The anomaly usually makes about 500 km wide and 1000…1500 km long and resembles the "cold tail of a tropical cyclone". At the same time, the difference in water surface temperature is 1...10°. Thus, evaporation is restrained and the amount of cloud cover and rainfall above the water area of the cyclone´s trajectory decreases on several weeks;
• The dangerous phenomena that accompany cyclones have become incredibly ferocious, powerful and renewable (repeatable). Almost all storm systems are now accompanied by a complex of dangerous phenomena: by floods, dust storms (sandstorms), tornadoes (whirlwinds), thunderstorms, fires, hail, ice rains, landslides, avalanches and mudflows. So storm in April in the United States was marked by series of 60 tornadoes. One of them reached a width of 3.6 km when it hit the city of Moss Point in Mississippi. And in August, a swarm of 88 water tornadoes was counted on the Great Lakes in three days. It is established that every 300th lightning is a super lightning, that is more than 100 times brighter than ordinary lightning. The most powerful of them produce more than 350 GWatt of energy. They were found not only over the water surface (as previously thought), but also over land. They arise during rare positively charged "cloud-to-earth" events, and not negatively charged ones, which are characteristic of ordinary lightning. In February, in Australia, in Victoria, firefighters in the city of Karlsruhe reacted to several calls related to the fire of trees from direct lightning. Large trees struck by lightning collapsed and burned in a matter of seconds, despite the heavy rain. And most of the fires in the western United States and in Siberia began from "dry thunderstorms." In October, the destructive and largest hail with a diameter of up to 20 cm (this is significantly larger than the Argentine Gargantua) struck the city of Misurata in Libya. On November 19, an ice storm hit the south of Primorye, de-energizing settlements led by Vladivostok, covering everything in the region with a powerful ice shell, interrupting transport connection for weeks. With difficulty everything was restored in December, but the damage to the networks was so severe that in January there were accidents in the electricity supply networks in the southern region. In November, landslides came down and repeated in Guatemala, which littered the area with mud up to 15 m thick.

You cannot pass by the most curious and difficult to explain cases related to hail:

• when a storm started over some region, hail often fell as well. Especially intense hail turned into a hailstorm, large (Gargantua) - into a giant hail, "soft" - into a graupel. During a hailstorm, very often the entire earth was covered with a "white blanket", sometimes in several layers. And if at the same time there was no precipitation in the form of rain or light rain fell, then the drifts of hailstones were motionless caking and and melted. Another thing is when a hailstorm fell along with a heavy rain, and the storm caused floods. Surprisingly, the hail in these conditions was caking together and swim like pieces of poly-foam on the surface of flood waters. Hail is a pieces of ice. And he can´t act like a shuga. Graupel instantly melts;
• if the first was met quite often in 2020, then the next case is simply unique. In March, a strong hail, in the municipality of Istapalapa in Mexico City led to the collapse of two sections of the roof above the market warehouse. "Immediately after the hail ended, eyewitnesses reported that the hailstones looked very unusual - instead of looking like rounded and hard pieces of ice, they looked like "balls of water with glue". This led to the fact that hailstones stuck to each other, did not roll off the roof, and the supports of the building didn´t withstand the enormous load";
• The following case is also unique. On September 6, heavy hail fell in the Kenyan district Narok, which melted only after 12 hours! A cohesive piece of ice from the freezer at room temperature melts after 3 to 5 hours. And this is Africa, and the ice is not cohesive.

Mentioned cases suggest the idea that the hail that is now falling out contains a mass of impurities, the lion´s share of which is carbon dioxide, methane or nitrogen. And most likely a hybrid. Precisely in this case change of the physical properties of the hail is possible. For some reason, in the last case, I remembered from childhood: steaming "dry ice" and an ice cream in a cup.

Earthquakes

Seismic activity in 2020 was moderate. This is most likely due to the low activity of the Sun and the extraordinary seismic activity in the Arctic and Antarctica and, interestingly, the north and south of the Atlantic, respectively. And it began at the very end of 2019, when a swarm of small earthquakes was recorded on the Reykjanes Peninsula in the area of the Torbjern volcano in Iceland. Perhaps these are the most important earthquakes in recent years with far-reaching consequences in climate change.

To better understand this fact, it is necessary to make a retreat and voice the results of research by Japanese scientists who published not new reasons of melting of the Greenland ice sheet, but significantly specified the geodynamics of this process. Recall that about the role of the mantle plume in the Greenland-Iceland system was mentioned back in 2016. What´s new? New - is a more detail structure of mantle plumes and its connections to the geothermal zones in this region. Moreover, according to these data (according to the above scheme) the plume does not go under Greenland, and the base of the island is heated with the help of heat released at a geothermal point on the island of Svalbard, as well as when volcanoes are activated on Jan Mayen Island and in the Iceland. Although earlier satellite studies have talked about the presence of a geothermal anomaly in central Greenland, we now have what we have. However, Japanese studies do not give an explanation: why did the heating of the plume itself begin? Apparently, this uncertainty and other controversial moments in the future will be specified more than once. In addition, the plume is still interesting here, going east according to the scheme. Is it related to magma accumulation that was discovered in the north of Europe or not?

In connection with the new data, the anomalous seismic activity in Iceland becomes more clear. Throughout the year, there were several swarm of seismic events in Iceland both in the south (15/12/2019, 20/07 and 20/10/2020) and in the north of the island (19/06 - 06/07/2020). Moreover, in the south there was growth of the magnitude: 3.7, 5.1 and 5.6, respectively. In the north, the swarm was longlasting (about a week) and very strong (three earthquakes with magnitudes of 5...6 magnitude, the rest are lower, but more 9000 earthquakes). The depth of all earthquakes was no more than 10 km. According to cautious statements by IMO specialists, no one swarm was associated with volcanic activity, but was a result of the movement of magma. And if there were periods of relative calm between the first swarms, then after the last one, moderate seismic activity is now constantly observed in the areas of the epicenters of the swarms. In addition, in the last swarms, the main tremors, which exceeded 5 magnitudes, began to clearly stand out.

In the analytical conclusions of previous years, it has already been suggested that the mantle plume activated due to the rapid decrease in the mass of the Greenland ice sheet and the gradual "rise" of the island of Greenland. Now we are observing the "feedback loop" of events when the heating of the plume in addition started the process of melting of ice on the island, and at the same time change the climate in the Arctic. It is in this area that all underwater Arctic currents "converge." And, apparently, the heating of the plume gives them an additional impulse.

There is still a lot of ice, so seismic activity in Iceland should only grow. This is confirmed by strong earthquakes, which were recorded throughout the year throughout the Reykjanes fault before and after Iceland in zones that are not included in the IMO monitoring area. By the by, around Antatctica there were not so few such border earthquakes for tectonic plates. However, there were a lot of them near the South Shetland Islands. Moreover, from the beginning of the year until the end of August regular, but rare earthquakes of magnitude about 5 took place there, and from the end of August whole swarms of not strong and strong earthquakes up to 6 magnitude began to be recorded. In total Chilean seismologists in three months counted more than 30 thousand tremors, the epicenters of which were concentrated "in the Bransfield Strait, an ocean canal 96 km wide between the South Shetland Islands and the Antarctic Peninsula... Most of the tremors were recorded in September, when more than a thousand earthquakes occurred almost every day. Shaking has become so frequent and intense that the strait, which previously expanded at a speed of 7...8 mm per year, now grows wide by 15 cm annually. A 20-fold increase in distance suggests that the Shetland Islands are separating faster from the Antarctic Peninsula".

It seems that such geological activity and methane emissions in the Ross Sea are not local, but represent a single process. This is a sign of the destabilization of Antarctica as a whole. And, as in the case of Greenland, the rise of at least West Antarctica has begun, which is warming and losing ice much faster than its eastern part. The acceleration of the "separation of islands" resembles the distancing of neighboring small pieces of ice, when one of the edges of the ice floe rises during the ice drift.

Surprisingly, in fact, homogeneous processes began to occur almost synchronously at opposite ends exactly of the Atlantic Ocean. This is surprising and disturbing. What is hidden behind this?

In other parts of the World, the seismic activity was less significant, but noticeable.

In the south of Europe, several strong earthquakes occurred, one of which is worth highlighting. This earthquake at the end of October in the southeast of Greece, on the border with Turkey. A powerful tremor of magnitude 7.5 with a swarm of more than 1700 aftershocks with magnitudes up to 5.2, 44 of which had a magnitude of more than 4, occurred in the sea at a depth of 21 km near the island of Samos. "As a result, a tectonic rise was recorded in both the northern and southern parts of the fault. The seismic rise of the island is about 18...25 cm". The earthquake most affected the territory of Turkey, where by the tremors were completely destroyed or received serious damage 41 buildings, more than 1,040 buildings were partially damaged. The cities of Izmir, Aydin and Mugla were especially affected, in which there were problems with supply of electricity. The earthquake also caused a small tsunami that flooded coastal streets in the city Seferihisar. In 2020, Turkey was shaking pretty in different parts: in January in the province of Elazig (magnitude 6.7), in February in the province of Van (5.7 and 6.0), in June in the province of Bingel (5.9). All the hypocenters of these earthquakes were located at a depth of 10 km. Another seismically active region of Europe was Croatia, where in December a series of earthquakes of magnitude 6.4 and 5.2 (two) with aftershocks was recorded at a depth of 10 km about 40 km southeast of Zagreb. Then in the city of Glina 90% of all buildings were destroyed, people died.

Another region where serious seismic activity was observed was the Baikal Rift Zone. Here, in the second half of the year, two strong earthquakes occurred, which the region had not had for a long time. One earthquake magnitude 5.5, with an aftershock magnitude 4.9 at a depth of 10 km occurred in September in the Slyudyansky district of the Irkutsk region. Earthquake was felt in Irkutsk, in Slyudyansky and Shelekhovsky districts, in Buryatia and Mongolia. The other earthquake - with magnitude also 5.5 with aftershocks 3.6... 4.5 at a depth of 10 km occurred in December in the Kabansky district of Buryatia. The epicenter was located in the delta of the Lake Baikal and was felt both on the territory of Buryatia, including Ulan-Ude, and in the Irkutsk region, including Irkutsk.

In December, the seismic zone of the TRANS-Caucasian fault unexpectedly intensified in the North Caucasus. Near Grozny a series of medium-sized earthquakes from 3.2 to 4.7 magnitude at depths from 2 km to 25 km were recorded. It is noteworthy that the epicenters were distributed from north to south on a segment of 30 km, from Grozny to the Main Caucasian Ridge.

In addition, strong earthquakes in Russia shook: in February (magnitude 6.9) and in March (7.5) Kuriles, and in September - Kamchatka (6.4) and in December the Tatar Strait (6.4). They occurred at great depths, so they had no destructive effect.

Single significant earthquakes occurred also on the territory of the United States:

• At the end of March, an earthquake of magnitude 6.5 with aftershocks up to 4.8 magnitudes and at a depth of 10 km in Idaho state. As a result, soil subsidence occurred in the Sawtooth national tourist zone on a significant territory, and water flooded the beach, a number of points for fishing and a boat pier;
• in May, a similar earthquake, but at a depth of only 2.8 km in Nevada state;
• o In October, in the Pacific Ocean south from Alaska an earthquake of magnitude 7.5 at a depth of 42 km, which caused a small tsunami 60 cm high;
• in December, in the Aleutian Islands area, an earthquake of magnitude 6.4 at a depth of 23 km.

Very strong earthquakes occurred in Central America:

• January, series, magnitude up to 6.4 at a depth of 10 km, off the southern coast of the island of Puerto Rico. In total, about 300 houses were damaged. More than 2,200 people lost their homes. One of the largest electric power plant in the country, Costa Sur, which generated up to a third of the electricity consumed on the island, was disabled for more than year period. Approximately two thirds of Puerto Rico remained then without electricity. About a quarter of the population lost access to drinking water after the earthquake;
• January, single earthquake, magnitude 7.7 with aftershock 6.1 at a depth of 10 km, between Jamaica, the Cayman Islands and Cuba. Seismic shocks were felt in Havana, Kingston, and even in Miami, about 708 km from the epicenter;
• June, single earthquake, magnitude 7.4 with 447 aftershocks to 4.6 at a depth of 26 km, Oaxaco state in Mexico. The tsunami reached height of one meter. Some populated areas were cut off from the outside world due to rocksfalls. Landslides descended on 3 federal and 5 regional highways, 500 damaged buildings, as well as 4 archaeological zones. The earthquake was felt in 11 states of the country.

There were other seismic events, but less powerful or with less effect.

Volcanoes

Volcanic activity in 2020 was low, about the same as in the previous year and even lower. Although the year began quite actively. And this is the merit of the Taal volcano on the Philippine island of Luzon. On January 12, the volcano suddenly became more active, ejecting a column of gas and ash with a height of 10000...15000 m with frequent volcanic lightning. Rainfall with wet ash fell on a vast area up to the densely populated Quezon City. The eruption of the volcano caused the shallowing of the lake with the same name Taal, surrounding fire mountain. The soil under the lake shuddered and bent due to volcanic activity, the water went into deep cracks. Magma smashed the ground, breaking out. Tributary of Pansipit River, connected with the lake, also dried up. Numerous cracks appeared on the roads of Batangas province. The content of sulfur released by the volcano reached 409 tons per day. Seismologists recorded at least 1000 earthquakes up to 4.1 magnitudes. 14 settlements got into the zone with a radius of 14 km from the volcano, access to them was closed to residents. After a week of volcanic eruption, dilapidated houses without roofs stood around, boats and buildings were covered with a thick layer of ash. Civil aviation authorities recommended that pilots avoid airspace around the volcano. At the end of January, the Taal volcano suddenly calmed down and subsided. However, in December a message was received about the small activity of this volcano. In addition to it in 2020, only four volcanoes once threw ash to a height of 10,000 m and above. These are the Bezymyanny и Shiveluch volcanoes in Kamchatka, as well as the Sangai volcano in Ecuador and Anak-Krakatau in Indonesia.

Volcanic activity had little effect on climate change on the planet. The climate on Earth is changing due to depletion of resources and a high degree of pollution. In both the first and second cases, the main role belongs to a person.

Environment Pollution

There is in our lives an area of activity called marketing, which is used pretty often to quickly sell produced goods or provide services. In conditions of competition and overproduction, marketers are not very concerned about the consequences of their activities. Their main task: to sell the product, presenting it as useful and safe, although, at best, they do not know this, and at worst, they do not consciously mention negative information. At the same time, the latter is called "Positiv", which at all levels of society has become some kind of an "obsession". For example, this is how raw materials producers advertise their products from TV screens and web resources.

All the listed "achievements" of gas chemistry ("polymerization") are made with the help of various additives (for example, plasticizers). However, not a word is said about them in the video. Moreover, as a rule, specific buyers also do not know anything about them. Since these additives are declared a trade secret (for example, in the manufacture of treads for automobile wheels). But, as noted above, it is plasticizers that are "guilty" of reducing oxygen on Earth, part of oncological diseases, and the mass extinction of flora and fauna. Marketers actually act as classic biblical "tempters" of the Earth´s population, convincing people that an unfit and often unnecessary product is vital for everyone.. By creating ephemeral demand, marketers spin a flywheel of overproduction that drains the Earth´s resources and changes a calm climate to an aggressive one.

More often, "unsuitable" is called a structurally or functionally inappropriate thing. However, this category also includes unsafe, including toxic goods. And here philosophy ends, and the prose of life begins when millions of people and everything living on the planet Earth suffer and die because of the greed and narrow-mindedness of some.

A striking example of the highest degree of the damage to nature by the toxic pollution for the whole region is the accident near Norilsk at the end of May this year. That time depressurization occurred of the tank with diesel fuel of volume of 30 thousand cubic meters. As a result of what happened, more than 20 thousand tons of fuel spilled over an area of 180 thousand square meters with ingress into the waters area of the Daldykan and Ambarnaya rivers, and then into Lake Pyasino. According to official data, it took about 4 months to eliminate available pollution. Rosrybolovstvo assessed the situation less optimistically: "What is important to note: we found fish with a content of petroleum products. In this regard, it can be considered that this is a dead fish, since it will no longer go into production, it is unsuitable for food. Even some mutational changes are possible in the future...". However, this is not all. The river flowing from Lake Pyasino flows into the Kara Sea. Officials of all ranks so "positively-positively" say that pollution has not reached the sea, environmentalists doubt this. And there are grounds for doubt. But time will tell. Here we are talking about another. Due to the severe leakage of toxic substances in the area and its dependent ecosystems, all living creatures and plants were etched or poisoned. And although the appointed scientists assure the opposite, it will not be possible to revive nature in the Noril-Pyasinsky water system in its former form. The fact is that the environmental disaster of this particular area is only a small part of the environmental disaster in the north of the Krasnoyarsk Territory. It turned out that, the pollution produced by Norilsk, "triggers a negative feedback loop in the natural system - environmental degradation leads to a slowdown in the growth of trees, which, in turn, affects the amount of carbon that could be absorbed by these trees". In terms of the specific accident, it is extremely surprising that the decommissioned tank began to be used again. The tank must have been scrapped. And there could not be registered fuel in the scrapped tank. Why did they create reserves when they were perfectly fine without them from 2015 to 2019. And in general, was there an accident? Oh, these "stock up moles" - capitalists. They simply don´t know where to invest the stolen money.

Surely, the same "stocked up moles" hid in the port of Beirut saltpeter which exploded in August and destroyed part of the capital of Lebanon. The explosion left a funnel 43 m deep. Half of the city's buildings were damaged, including more than 50 thousand houses. The air was filled with nitrogen dioxide from the explosion and asbestos from the destroyed buildings. Hundreds of dead, tens of thousands injured. How many people will suffer from pollution after is unknown. And the reason is simple - "these stocked up moles" - capitalists hid for storage at a cheap price 2750 tons of ammonium nitrate, which, due to the large mass and abnormal temperatures (in the Middle East this year they reached +50°C) began to stick together and self-ignited. The result is known.

The same "stocked up moles"-capitalists, with the connivance of the authorities of various levels, create in densely populated residential areas of cities smaller in volume reserves of fuel for vehicles at gas stations, which are not less dangerous both as on toxic emissions, and on explosions and fires. The same can be said, but on a much larger scale about refineries and large railway hubs used to sort and store trains with fuel that are located within the city. Simply, the growth of cities led to the fact that such objects built earlier at a distance from residential zones were "absorbed" by the territory of cities. And their movement and reconstruction by the city administration, as well as by owners, is carried out only under great pressure from the side of population. Of course, the main fault here lies with officials who are not capable, but most likely not interested, in minimizing the costs which are invested in city security. In the end, and undoubtedly, such "insanity of urban governance" will lead to disasters. Already, we are seeing a steady increase in the number of "delayed" disasters - emergencies related to smog in cities.

Thanks to the media, these are only loud emergencies, which are hard to pass by due to the scale and relative novelty. But so to speak "typical", each year repetitive emergencies simply impossible to count. And growing fires, and temperatures, and landslides with soil failures, and pollution from motor vehicles, and emissions of methane and nitrogen oxide are growing. You can easily see this by opening the statistics items and the "Major Anomalies of 2020" or the Monitoring archives for 2020. Of course, we must take into account that the pandemic has significantly reduced the incoming flow of information into the System due to lockdowns around the world, so something may be missed.

Volcanic activity statistics for 2020

In total, in 2020 at least one earthquake was recorded on 141 volcanoes (in 2019 - 102; dynamics - 0.16). the same time, in Russia 8 volcanoes were active:

Kabardino-Balkar Republic: Elbrus.
Kamchatka: Bezymyanny, Karymskaya Sopka, Klyuchevskaya Sopka, Kozelsky, Mutnovskaya Sopka, Shiveluch.
Kuriles: Ebeko.

Epidemiological situation in 2020

During the observation period, 757 epidemiological facts were recorded in the monitoring system (in 2019 - 613; dynamics - 0.11), including in Russia: poisoning of various etiologies - 77 (in 2019 - 151; dynamics - -0.32), rabies - 47 (for 2019 - 54; dynamics - -0.07), African swine fever - 27 (for 2019 - 22; dynamics - 0.1). In this case, poisonings by various gases (for example, carbon monoxide) or toxic chemicals resulting from man-made accidents are not taken into account here. The monitoring system classifies cases of gas and toxic substance poisoning to other categories of emergency situations (not "epidemics") depending on the causes of their occurrence. The report also does not take into account cases of diseases such as diabetes, cancer, HIV, tuberculosis, SARS and general influenza. These diseases have become "traditional" or "background" for all regions. In the "complete statistics" in the menu on the map and in the table next to the name of the disease are indicated the dates or period of dates when it was recorded in the monitoring system.

About the pandemic COVID-19

In summer, with the temporary easing of the pandemic, many countries initiated an investigation into its occurrence, since there is still no accurate information about the primary source of infection. And the results of research in Europe say that the Asian origin of Cornavirus SARS-CoV-2 is a under large question. So a study of samples from sewage drains in Barcelona for March 2019 gave a positive result of the presence of this virus. In Italy, they at all discovered traces of an "unidentified causative agent", of pneumonia, similar to SARS-CoV-2 in 2018. The nature of the pandemic speaks not only and not so much about the medical and biological origin of the coronavirus, which is clearly not news. The nature of the pandemic suggests a direct dependence of its mutations and/or increased virulence on a high degree of environmental pollution and, as a result, on changes in the physicochemical properties of the environment, as well as on climate change in general. There is a lot of factors, and aggravation of a medico-biological situation is only the top of an "iceberg". "I think the virus was already here, and by" here "I understand" everywhere". It is possible that we are dealing with a sleeping virus that has been activated by environmental conditions (EC)", - Tom Jefferson. We clarify that by "EC conditions" it is necessary to understand the strongest pollution by petroleum products and gas-products, by derivative from them products and coal combustion, reducing of animal and plant world, which, in particular, "weakened" the virulence of such viruses, as well as the production and use without sense of measure of a wide range of antibiotics, especially in animal husbandry, making viruses superviruses. In Germany at the R. Koch Institute declared: "...it is definitely, undoubtedly, competently indicates that with 80% cases of infection, it is unknown and it is impossible to prove when they happened. This is a fact, we cannot clarify it". Is this not an argument to completely change the approach to solving the problem?

P.S. I would like to pay attention to two facts that few who remembered. First, before the pandemic in the UK and the USA began to switch to plastic bills, thereby creating incredibly favorable conditions for mutations. Just on plastic, viruses live for hours. Secondly, in recent years, secondary recycling of plastic has become widespread throughout the world and, especially in the West. Plastic contains toxic plasticizers, which during processing can uncontrollably release and get into the environment. Is this not another and decisive reason for the aggravation of the pandemic in Europe and the United States.

Aviation accident statistics for 2020

In total, in 2020, the Monitoring System recorded 256 aircraft accidents (in 2019 - 514; dynamics - -0.33), of which 112 aircraft crashes (190 in 2019; dynamics - -0.26). In Russia, 115 aircraft accidents occurred (in 2019 - 195; dynamics - -0.26), of which 29 aircraft crashes (in 2019 - 35; dynamics - -0.09). Aviation accidents include both flight accidents (FA) and prerequisites for them (PFA), including the impact of climatic and man-made emergencies on the infrastructure of airports and airfields that ensure flight safety.

Railway accident statistics for 2020

In total, in 2020, the Monitoring System recorded 58 accidents in railway transport (in 2019 - 123; dynamics - -0.36), of which 30 train or car derailments (in 2019 - 50; dynamics - -0.25). 26 incidents occurred in Russia (in 2019 - 43; dynamics - -0.25), 16 of which - derailments of trains or cars (in 2019 - 23; dynamics - -0.18). To accidents in railway transport include both train crashes, train derailments, including in the metro, and major accidents at railway crossings, as well as the impact of climatic and man-made emergencies on the infrastructure of railway lines that ensure the safety of passenger and freight traffic.

Statistics of major accidents with buses for 2020

In total, in 2020, the Monitoring System recorded 84 major accidents with buses (in 2019 - 194; dynamics - -0.4), of which 30 accidents occurred in Russia (in 2019 - 72; dynamics - -0.41). Incidents included only large road accidents with buses, minibuses and other transport, used for mass transportation of passengers by highways, in which the death toll and/or wounded not less than 10 people.

Erosion of the Earth´s surface for 2020

In total, in 2020, the Monitoring System recorded 211 incidents related to erosion of the earth's surface (in 2019 - 316; dynamics - -0.2), of which 45 incidents occurred in Russia (76 in 2019; dynamics - -0.26). Incidents related to erosion of the earth's surface and forming under the influence of both climatic and man-made emergencies include ground failures, collapses, landslides, erosion of coastlines; and also ravines, promontory, rockfalls and mud streams, as well as non-targeted processes of rock destruction under the influence of temperature differences, weathering and other ways of influence based on other physical principles. In addition, monitoring covers cases of destruction of the ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctica, perennial ice of the Arctic Ocean and mountain glaciers.

Major impacts of climate change in 2020

The main impacts of climate change remain the same to listed in the "Major Impacts of Climate Change 2019". Everything that was written then remains in development and has not yet been completed. Add to this the following:

• climatic changes have "increased" limit requirements to loads laid down in design of engineering structures, solutions and materials, which can undoubtedly lead to the destruction of many of them;
• depletion of the basic life resources listed above may soon lead to massive humanitarian disasters and an avalanche-like growth of climate refugees, both between countries and continents and within individual states;
• the climate has fully reached that level where each emergency can develop on a completely unpredictable scenario due to the scale of events, breakdown of connections (destruction of infrastructure, roads, communication networks), integration of hazardous events and sharp variations of weather parameters;
• "accelerating the rotation of the planet" due to the rapid transition of water from a solid state (ice) to a liquid or gaseous one will cause at least an increasing of seismic activity;
• the ability of many states to withstand aggressive climate change has reached its limit. More than 10% of the world's countries (32 countries) have already introduced global emergencies due to climate change. And their number will grow rapidly.

Major anomalies of 2020

In addition to the events already mentioned in the paragraph "Overview of the main emergencies of 2020," the following was remembered last year:

1. Global growth of temperature is simultaneously everywhere and at a higher speed than in previous millennia, the Earth - a greenhouse.

2. Fires in Australia with the death of more than a billion animals, with a military operation to save the population and with the strongest smoke in New Zealand.

3. Mass death of the animal world from birds to elephants, from corals to whales.

4. Disaster on Lake Victoria in Africa.

5. Fires in Arctic, including fires-zombie.

6. Fires in the Amazonia.

7. Acid river in the Urals.

8. Doomsday storm in Republic of South Africa.

9. Large-scale floodings in Africa.

10. Icy rain in the south of Primorye, icing of the bridge to Russky Island.

11. Floods in Nakhabin and Khimki, in Ruza, Moscow Region.

12. An instantaneous flood in Milan.

13. The fastest melting of Shishper Glacier in Pakistan.

14. The worst droughtin the last 500 years in the Czech Republic.

15. Soil failure in the Nizhny Novgorod region.

16. The disappearance of a waterfall on the Coca River in Ecuador due to soil failure.

17. Three monthly rainfall for 20 minutes in Seville.

18. Landslide in the village of Verkhnyaya Ilenka in the Sverdlovsk region.

19. Landslide in New York state.

20. Landslide in Ireland.

21. Locust invasion in Sardinia in Italy, in Kenya, Somalia, Ethiopia, in the north and center of India, in Pakistan, Iran, in northeast of Argentina, in Paraguay.

22. Changshou´s "Eternal Flame" in the southwest of China.

23. Landslide in the south of Norway.

Author´s opinion

The call of UN Secretary General A. Guterres to "end the war with nature" is correct, but hardly feasible. Since this call is addressed in its essence not to specific people, but to impersonal entities united by the general status of "shareholder".

For any shareholder, the loss of their money is more important than some kind of ecology, nature or disaster of unfamiliar population. And the current world economy is holding exactly on this. On stocks. And is holding also on the inflated bubbles of the bank loans, as on the reverse side of one and the same medal with investments of shareholders. Based on this, we can safely say that we should not expect improvement in the ecology of the planet, the "war on nature" will continue, and "by the end of the century it will be warmer by 5° on the planet" or more, and, so, "ecosystems will release significantly more methane into the atmosphere than previously thought".

So it will be until shareholders are responsible before the law for their investments, including bankers issuing loans, as well as direct executors. So it will be until raw materials companies, and with them all humanity, understand that nature has not for nothing "hidden" coal, oil, gas and other useful, but toxic resources from the surface of the Earth. You can't do without them. But you need to take to the best. And if took and used, then return them to the same state, to the same conditions, for future generations. This what is the real disposal.

P.S. From a young age, I love the forest. I walk, collect mushrooms, observe changes, wonder how quickly everything changes. Everything except the land terrain. No matter how heavy the showers are. Well, the "fairy tale" about the streams that bored and widened the ravines does not work. Doubts intensified after I began working on this project. And this year I came across an article about the results of research by American scientists who found that in the winter of 1861-1862 a mega-storm hit California. "The rains that lasted several weeks caused water flows to fill a large part of the Central Valley, creating a whole inland sea 65 km wide and 240 km long... By the annual rings of trees, scientists were able to find out that over the past 1800 years, California has experienced at least six floods, which surpassing the scale of the natural disasters of 1861-1862". Such cataclysms cannot be the private phenomenon for only one place on Earth. And only such cataclysms quickly and for a long time change the terrain. In this regard, I recommend that everyone observe to the PSC-clouds more.

Frequency of emergencies

Totally 245 emergencies were selected (in 2019 - 233; dynamics - 0.03), for which the date of the last similar event is known, and of which 132 events (116) were first recorded, did not occur for more than half a century 41 (56), did not occur for several decades 53 (40).

Comparison of 2019 and 2020 by emergency category

* - Explanation of the categories, please, see in the 2013 results.

Note. Quantities of events are calculated taking into account nested events found in the description of events, but occurred in other regions, that is, geographically unrelated to the title of the main event.

ТThe tables "List of events" and "Event Maps" by month, showing on the geographical map the distribution of the epicenters of events on Earth, which have the colors of the "Spectrum (color scale) of natural and man-made emergencies", are located in the section of the system "Monitoring Archive".