Teo Blašković founded The Watchers in 2011 and edited it until 2026, covering seismic and volcanic activity, extreme weather, space weather and near-Earth objects. Articles on this page are his archive.
A powerful storm has swept over parts of the West Coast U.S. this week, wreaking havoc across California on January 16 and 17, 2019. At least 6 fatalities have been reported. The storm downed trees and power lines all around Northern California, causing evacuations…
An impactful Pacific storm will move east and redevelop into a significant winter storm, NWS warns. Heavy snow to the north of this storm and heavy rain to the south with freezing rain at the junction will form over the Central U.S. Friday, January 18, 2019. This…
A strong and shallow earthquake registered by the USGS as M6.1 hit under the Bismarck Sea, Papua New Guinea at 15:06 UTC on January 17, 2019. The agency is reporting a depth of 10 km (6.2 miles). EMSC is reporting the same magnitude and depth. This earthquake can…
Mount Shindake on Japanese Kuchinoerabujima island erupted at 00:19 UTC (09:19 JST) on January 17, 2019, ejecting ash up to 6 km (19 600 feet) above sea level. The volcano is sporadically erupting since October 2018. The Alert Level remains at 3 (of 5). The…
Russian president Vladimir Putin has approved the use of 11 carriages of special explosives to move a huge amount of debris left after a massive landslide created huge natural dam at the Bureya River in remote Khabarovsk region of southern Russia. The slide took…
A bright meteor exploded over Cape Town, South Africa around 18:05 UTC on January 16, 2019 (20:05 local time). Bright light produced by the object was followed by very loud sound and ground shaking. The American Meteor Society has so far received 6 reports about…
Parts of Australia are enduring extreme heatwave conditions which already broke numerous all-time temperature records. An unusual extended period of heatwaves over much of Australia began in early December 2018 and continued into January 2019. The Australian mean…
Indonesian authorities are reporting increased activity at Mount Merapi over the past couple of days. Lava has so far flowed up to 800 m (2 624 feet) down the slope of the volcano. Authorities are preparing evacuation routes and emergency shelters as well as…
A powerful Pacific storm will hammer the West Coast into Friday, January 18 with strong winds, heavy rain and heavy mountain snow, NWS warns. Heavy rain will bring a threat of flash flooding along recent burn scars while blizzard conditions are expected in the…
A large number of dead fish emerged at various sites off the barrier reef just east/southeast of Mayotte, the oldest volcanic island in the Comoros Basin located between Madagascar and Mozambique. This is the site of an intense earthquake swarm that started in May…
