Yellowstone Supervolcano Making Strange Rumblings 411
Frosty Piss writes "Supervolcanoes can sleep for centuries or millennia before producing incredibly massive eruptions that can drop ash across an entire continent. One of the largest supervolcanoes in the world lies beneath Yellowstone National Park. Significant activity continues beneath the surface. And the activity has been increasing lately, scientists have discovered. In addition, the nearby Teton Range of mountains is somehow getting shorter. The findings, reported this month in the Journal of Journal of Geophysical Research, suggest that a slow and gradual movement of a volcano over time can shape a landscape more than a violent eruption."
Re:Horizon (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Yogi (Score:3, Insightful)
Tornado Alley and supervolcanos (Score:3, Insightful)
FYI, tornadoes are probably the easiest natural disaster to avoid; all you have to do is pay at least slight attention to the weather and have access to a basement or interior room. I've lived in Tornado Alley my entire life, and it's been 15 years since the last time a tornado came close enough to where I live that taking cover was justified.
On the other hand, even though it's very unlikely to happen in my lifetime, a Yellowstone eruption would almost certainly own much of North America. An eruption from that hot spot 10-12 million years ago killed wildlife halfway across the continent [wikipedia.org].
Re:I'm scared (Score:4, Insightful)
Sure, if it goes off it will ruin a lot of people's days. But if it goes off every million years or so, well, what are the chances of being alive to witness it? Not terribly good. Our species may not even be around the next time this thing blows. Same goes with other super-catastrophes like large asteroid impacts. I'm all for long-term thinking, but there's a danger in thinking too long-term as well, that is, let's worry about next year's hurricane season, or that hundred-year flood, rather than what happens when the sun goes into red giant phase a billion years from now.
Historically, it's the "normal" catastrophes that happen on the order of every few decades or centuries -like earthquakes, tsunamis, floods, plagues, famines, and non-super volcanoes- which have tended to kill hundreds of thousands or millions of people. Not to mention our incredible genius when it comes to killing each other. In terms of minimizing human casualties, odds are the most cost-effective solutions will be things like better building codes to withstand earthquakes, not letting people build in flood-prone areas, and perhaps most importantly, developing the ability to rapidly respond to disasters when they do happen.
How do they know it is increasing? (Score:5, Insightful)
sPh
Well, THAT'LL fix global warming... (Score:3, Insightful)
If Yellowstone went, we might expect "some 2,000 million tons of sulphuric acid were ejected into the atmosphere to block out sunlight over much of the planet causing global temperatures to plummet by between 10C and 20C." from here. [nucnews.net]
WMD's in Jackson's Hole: who would ever have thought? (Cue the Taco Bell jokes...)
That's a bit alarmest (Score:3, Insightful)
That's kind of like saying "it hasn't rained in a couple weeks, so it'll probably rain today". There is a very small chance this thing will erupt in your lifetime. We should be prepared anyway, though.
Re:I'm scared (Score:2, Insightful)
How do we know that?
Because it has erupted before?
In fact, we have no idea whether or not it will erupt again. It may or it may not -- the only way to know is to wait for it to happen. All we can say is that going by past eruptions, it is likely to erupt again at some time in the future.
Even if it does erupt again, it might not be a supervolcano the next time around.
Re:Horizon (Score:2, Insightful)
Science requires more data then this to make accurate predictions. Media on the other hand have no problem reporting based on guesses and bad math. So no, there isn't a pattern yet and I am inclined to believe geology rather then the media.
That there has been increased activity is interesting, but given that the Yellowstone Caldera has far more frequently has simple lava flows without erupting, I'm not going to break out the emergency pants yet.
Why be scared? (Score:5, Insightful)
Odds are very good that it will not happen in your life or you children's, or their children's. It may never happen.
This is a great example of an unreasonable fear.
You are far more likely to die in a car accident than from Yellowstone erupting as a super-volcano.
If you want make an effort to live a long happy life the best things you can do are.
Exercise at least 30 minutes a day.
Eat a good diet.
Don't smoke.
Don't drink and drive.
Don't drive late at night.
Oh and put aside money for your retirment and stay out of debt. That is for the happy part a long and happy life.
You should fear a sedentary life style and tobacco a lot more than volcanoes.
Re:50% (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:How much warning? (Score:4, Insightful)
GPS Accuracy (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:I'm scared (Score:3, Insightful)
Hey, we could use a little global cooling...
Re:I'm scared (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I'm scared (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I'm scared (Score:5, Insightful)
The big problem was what it did to engines -- that stuff is super corrosive well ok more correct would be super abrasive -- you have to have special filters on all your air intakes and they have to be cleaned frequently.
While not as easy as the GP makes it out to be -- farmers for the most part have the equipment to clear the fields and it can be done fairly quickly.
Re:How much warning? (Score:4, Insightful)
There will likely be warning signs years it advance, but we won't recognize them as such until afterwards.
Why would you think that? We only had two months warning with Mt. St. Helens, and that was plenty of time to assess risk and clear out the "red zone." There were 57 fatalities, but it's not like we didn't know it was coming.
The problem with warning signs years in advance isn't that they won't be seen -- the problem is people becoming complacent as they wait years for a geological event to play out. If scientists go on and on for years about an imminent disaster, people start to think the scientists are full of crap. Then, of course, the worst happens.
Re:I'm scared (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:I'm scared (Score:4, Insightful)
In the GP, rujholla explained the widely known experience of thousands of farmers in dealing with volcanic ash.
You appear to be trying to use your imagined idea of what farmers are capable of to disprove the results of this empirical evidence.