Science and weather historical look back

Here is a brief look at a few of the events that happened this first week of January. We find big winter storms hitting the Northeast and Ireland, destructive ice storms, a historic earthquake, and big scientific feats.

On this day in 1913, a major coastal storm hit the Northeast. This system produced the lowest confirmed barometric pressure reading, 955.0 mb (28.20 inHg), for a non-tropical system in the contiguous U.S. It was recorded in Canton, N.Y.,

The storm caused 90 mph winds in New York City and caused a barge to sink and another schooner to be heavily damaged.

On January 4, 1998, an historic ice storm began across eastern Canada and the bordering area of northern New York and western Maine. Freezing rain fell for several days and ice accretion of several inches accumulated on trees and powerlines.

More than 4 million people in Ontario, Quebec, western New Brunswick in Canada, and adjacent areas of northern New York and northern New England were without power. Power was not restored to the hardest-hit, rural areas for at least a month. More than two dozen people died, due to hypothermia from loss of heat.

During the height of the Great Depression, construction of the iconic Golden Gate Bridge began. The red-painted suspension bridge links the northern tip of the San Francisco Peninsula with Marin County to the north.

The bridge gets its name from the 1-mile Golden Gate strait that connects the Pacific Ocean to its west and the San Francisco Bay to its east. The bridge was opened on May 27, 1937.

On January 6th, 1839, a massive windstorm dubbed the Night of the Big Wind struck Ireland and western England, causing massive destruction and several hundred deaths.

It is estimated that upwards of a quarter of the homes in Dublin were damaged by the massive storm, with many of them destroyed in the process. Most of the storm deaths occurred on the several dozen ships that were wrecked along the island’s West Coast.

It is believed that the Big Wind event was the inspiration for the cup anemometer, commonly used to measure wind speed.

Using his telescope on this day in 1610, Galileo Galilei made his first observation of Jupiter’s largest moons, Ganymede, Calisto, Io, and Europa.

Galilei’s discovery changed astronomy thinking at the time. Before the discovery of moons around other planets, it was believed that heavenly bodies should circle the earth.

On January 7th and 8th, 1973, one of Georgia’s worst ice storms since the Great Depression occurred. Up to 4 inches of ice accumulated across northern Georgia, causing power outages to 300,000 homes and businesses.

Schools were closed for up to a week and the National Guard brought emergency generators to the Atlanta area.

The last “big one” southern California earthquake occurred on this day in 1857. This estimated 7.9 magnitude San Andreas tremor shook central and southern California with an epicenter near Fort Tejon, 75 miles northwest of Los Angeles.

At the time of this earthquake, southern and central California was rural with a low population. If this earthquake were to occur today, millions of people would be affected.