Ice Ages & such

[mubs]

I saw "The Day After Tomorrow" last night. They took a very important topic and marginalized it. Just like "Independence Day". Same Director, of course.

More importantly, see this Yahoo news item; Expert says "Super volcano" could dwarf Indonesia's earthquake catastrophes and set off Ice Age".

Get out the bottles, Mr. Bartender. Let's enjoy while we can.

 

[Groltz]

The Yahoo article only makes a veiled reference to the fact the we have our own "supervolcano" <VEI=8> right here in the USA. It's called Yellowstone.

It is also 40,000 years overdue for an eruption based on its calculated 600,000-year eruption cycle history.

 

[LunarMist]

Cool. But the volcano never erupts when I am in Yellowstone.

 

[blakerwry]

Unfortunately I don't think you'd want to be in this hemisphere when it goes off...

 

[CougTek]

Lake Toba exploded 74000 years ago. I don't think it had the time to refil its magma chamber nearly enough to re-produce a super-volcano-like cataclysm just yet. Super volcanoes have very long cycles and 74000 years is quite short for one to recharge.

There might be well enough magma out there for a big regular volcanic explosion like Krakatoa or Pinatubo however.

 

[mubs]

Unfortunately I don't think you'd want to be in this hemisphere when it goes off...

My understanding is that it doesn't matter where on the planet you are; the ash will create horrendously cold conditions all over.

One line of dialogue in "The Day After Tomorrow" is stuck in my mind; somebody says to Quaid, something to the effect of "We are all going to die", and he replies, "Man got thru ice-ages before and we'll get through this one too". Amazing how mankind survived the ice-ages in the past without the comforts of modern times.

 

[Groltz]

My understanding is that it doesn't matter where on the planet you are; the ash will create horrendously cold conditions all over.

So true. It has happened well within the last 200 years too. Tambora in Indonesia underwent a VEI=7 eruption (150 times bigger than Mt. St. Helens 05/18/80 eruption) in 1815 that caused a global cooling that was called the "Year without a summer" and there were massive crop failures. Death toll was estimated at 10,000 due to the eruption itself and another 82,000 due to starvation & disease.

 

[LunarMist]

Yeah, but it will be better in Escondido than Toronto, no?

 

[e_dawg]

Toronto? Huh? Hey, how did we get dragged into this? Take your crummy constipated volcanoes and keep them under control! I already had a big winter storm that came from the American south ruin my weekend vacation. Enough's enough!

 

[Onomatopoeic]

There might be well enough magma out there for a big regular volcanic explosion like Krakatoa or Pinatubo however.

Well, guess what. Even though Krakatoa blew itself to hell back in the late 1800s, it has slowly but surely rebuilt itself back to a fairly large volcano poking up out of the sea.

The "new Krakatoa" has a different name nowadays (forgot what it is). In any case, it's nearly as dangerous as the original Krakatoa was.

Krakatoa's devastating tsunami was around 60 meters high when it hit the shores of Malaysia, Siam, and Indonesia, not 5 ~ 10 meters like the recent one!

 

[i]

The "new Krakatoa" has a different name nowadays (forgot what it is).

Sally.

 

[LunarMist]

I've never been to Toronto, but I suppose Canada is cold compared to SoCal. What if I compare Escondido to Wiesbaden? I froze my ass off one winter there.

 

[CougTek]

Well, guess what. Even though Krakatoa blew itself to hell back in the late 1800s, it has slowly but surely rebuilt itself back to a fairly large volcano poking up out of the sea.

Yeah, but with Lake Toba's supervolcano, we're talking about a magma chamber around a thousand time larger than the one of the original Krakatoa. I'm not aware of any supervolcano that blew twice within less than 100,000 years. Their cycles are more around half a million years. So people wondering about Toba blewing again these days... I have other fears higher on my list.

It would be cool to see Sally let go a farth on CNN thought.

 

[GMac]

The Yahoo article only makes a veiled reference to the fact the we have our own "supervolcano" <VEI=8> right here in the USA. It's called Yellowstone.

It is also 40,000 years overdue for an eruption based on its calculated 600,000-year eruption cycle history.

The BBC recently ran a prime-time "docu-drama" (entitled Supervolcano funnily enough) that dealt with that very subject just a few weeks ago - it didn't make comfortable viewing.......:eekers:

Supervolcano

GM

 

[Groltz]

The BBC recently ran a prime-time "docu-drama" (entitled Supervolcano funnily enough) that dealt with that very subject just a few weeks ago - it didn't make comfortable viewing

Thanks for mentioning that GMac.

I found the BBC documentary Supervolcano: The Truth About Yellowstone parts I & II are being shared on emule. Hopefully they'll be good.

The "Supervolcano docu-drama" is also being file shared but I didn't go for that one.