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Hurricane Marty

The 2003 Pacific hurricane season produced tropical cyclones that mainly affected Mexico. Hurricane Ignacio killed 2 people in Mexico and Marty killed 12; together they were responsible for damage worth about $1 billion. Two other Pacific hurricanes, one Pacific tropical storm and three Atlantic storms also had a direct impact on Mexico. The only other significant storm of the season was Hurricane Jimena, which passed just to the south of the island of Hawaii, becoming the first storm in several years to directly threaten the island. The season officially started on May 15, 2003, in the eastern Pacific, and on June 1, 2003, in the central Pacific, lasting until November 30, 2003. These dates conventionally delimit the period of each year when most tropical cyclones form in the northeastern Pacific Ocean. There were 16 named storms, including 7 hurricanes; both totals are comparable with the long-term averages. This was the first Pacific hurricane season since 1977 with no major hurricanes, that is, storms Category 3 or higher on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale. (Full article...)

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Jessica Chastain

... that Jessica Chastain (pictured) received a scholarship funded by Robin Williams to study acting at the Juilliard School?
... that curve-shortening causes every smooth simple closed curve to become convex and then near-circular before it shrinks to a point?
... that a skeleton found at Auldhame in 2005 may belong to Olaf Guthfrithson, king of Dublin and Northumbria?
... that the Bank of California Building in downtown Portland, Oregon, has been described as being in the style of an Italian Renaissance palazzo?
... that Laura Wolvaardt made her Women's One Day International cricket debut for South Africa at the age of 16?
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... that Sedap Malam was the first Indonesian film directed by a woman?

In the news

EgyptAir SU-GCC

EgyptAir Flight 804 (aircraft pictured) disappears with 66 people on board over the Mediterranean en route from Paris to Cairo.
Max Verstappen becomes the youngest driver to win a Formula One race by winning the Spanish Grand Prix at the age of 18.
Jamala, representing Ukraine with the song "1944", wins the Eurovision Song Contest in Stockholm, Sweden.
Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff is suspended after both houses of the National Congress vote to impeach her.
A series of bombings in Baghdad kills at least 93 people and injures more than 165.

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On this day...

May 19: Greek Genocide Remembrance Day in Greece; Commemoration of Atatürk, Youth and Sports Day in Turkey; Ho Chi Minh's birthday in Vietnam

John Franklin

1499 – Thirteen-year-old Catherine of Aragon, the first wife of Henry VIII of England, was married by proxy to his brother, 12-year-old Arthur, Prince of Wales.
1776 – American Revolutionary War: A Continental Army garrison west of Montreal surrendered to British troops in the Battle of The Cedars.
1845 – Captain Sir John Franklin (pictured) and his ill-fated Arctic expedition departed from Greenhithe, England; the entire 129-man complement would be lost.
1911 – Parks Canada, the world's first national park service, was established as the Dominion Parks Branch under the Department of the Interior.
1991 – With the local Serb population boycotting the polls, voters in Croatia passed a referendum supporting independence from the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.

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Today's featured picture

The azimuthal equidistant projection is an azimuthal map projection in which all points on the map are both proportionately correct distances from the center point and at the correct azimuth (direction) from the center point. Distances and directions to all places, however, are true only from the center point of projection. This projection has been used for the flag of the United Nations, for the USGS National Atlas of the United States of America, and for large-scale mapping of Micronesia, among others.

Map: Strebe, using Geocart

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