hydrosphere

The Flint Water Crisis – What is happening, and what are the consequences? - PAESTA Podcast Series: Episode 7

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Transcript for the podcast

Hello my name is James Clark and I am an undergraduate student at Penn State Brandywine. In this podcast, I will be answering the following questions that pertain to the Flint water crisis. Who is to blame? What caused the Flint water crisis? Was the Flint water crisis preventable? What are the lasting consequences? What are the political ramifications? Along with these questions, I will also answer some common questions that people are asking about the Flint water crisis.

PAESTA Podcast Series: Episode 4 - What is a Watershed?

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Transcript for the podcast

We all live in a watershed – think of it as your ecological address, and no matter where you are on land, any water that falls in that same location has a drainage destination determined by elevation and landforms. A watershed is an area of land where the surface water (including lakes, streams, reservoirs, and wetlands) and the underlying groundwater flows from a higher to lower elevation. Streams and rainfall within a watershed will typically drain to a common outlet, such as the outflow of a reservoir, mouth of a bay, or any point along a stream channel. The word watershed is sometimes used interchangeably with drainage basin or catchment.

PAESTA Podcast Series: Episode 3 - How do Scientists Measure Rainfall?

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Transcript for the podcast

Many schools will have a rain gauge installed, where students can measure and record the amount of rain that falls each day. But scientists do not measure precipitation on the ground – they measure precipitation from space, using a combination of active and passive remote-sensing techniques, improving the spatial and temporal coverage of precipitation observations on a global scale.  You see, reliable ground-based precipitation measurements are difficult to obtain because most of the world is covered by water, and many countries do not have precise rain measuring equipment (such as rain gauges and radar). Precipitation is also difficult to measure because precipitation systems can be somewhat random and can evolve very rapidly. During a storm, precipitation amounts can vary greatly over a very small area and over a short time span.

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