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Scientists Attempt To Calm Volcano

Posted by samzenpus on from the you-can-plug-anything dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Since May 2006, a mud volcano in Indonesia has spewed out up to 126,000 cubic metres of mud a day, flooding an area of more than 4 square kilometres. This unprecedented natural disaster has become so bad that geophysicists now plan to enact an untested scheme to try and slow the flow: dropping concrete balls into the volcano."

14 of 244 comments (clear)

  1. tha audacity! by User+956 · · Score: 5, Funny

    This unprecedented natural disaster has become so bad that geophysicists now plan to enact an untested scheme to try and slow the flow: dropping concrete balls into the volcano.

    They've got a lot of balls, trying something like that.

    --
    The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
    1. Re:tha audacity! by antarctican · · Score: 5, Funny

      They've got a lot of balls, trying something like that.

      High pressure, large projectile type object....

      Why do I have visions of this turning in to one giant canon? :)

    2. Re:tha audacity! by lysergic.acid · · Score: 4, Funny

      yea, if they wanted to calm it down, they shoulda just poured a few truckloads of valium into it instead.

    3. Re:tha audacity! by Lloyd_Bryant · · Score: 5, Funny

      yea, if they wanted to calm it down, they shoulda just poured a few truckloads of valium into it instead. The *traditional* method is to toss in a virgin (hey, if somebody tossed ME a virgin, I'd calm down....eventually).

      Unfortunately this method runs afoul of modern legislations (it violates the Endangered Species Act).

      --
      Don't tell me to get a life. I had one once. It sucked.
  2. Sacrifice a virgin by antifoidulus · · Score: 4, Funny

    I'm sure you can find plenty here *looks around nervously*

    --
    Monstar L
    1. Re:Sacrifice a virgin by MyLongNickName · · Score: 5, Funny

      Ha! Mine turned me down. And you call yourself a nerd...

      --
      See my journal for slashdot ID's by year. Mine created in 2005. http://slashdot.org/journal/289875/slashdot-ids-by-year
  3. It'll never work by Loadmaster · · Score: 5, Funny

    They want to drop concrete balls into it? Do you take concrete balls when you have an upset stomach? Me neither. What they need is a dump truck full of Tums and a concrete mixer full of Mylanta. If that doesn't work you can always use a virgin. But concrete balls? These "scientists" need to get a real scientist--a witch doctor. They're witches and they're doctors. That's a lot of school. And if they can't fix it you can just throw them in there and save your concrete balls for outside a library or something.

    Swi

  4. How Interesting by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Teabagging a volcano...

  5. Just use by geekoid · · Score: 5, Funny

    Chuck Norris's balls.

    I don't know why I said that.

    --
    The Kruger Dunning explains most post on /. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect
    1. Re:Just use by Watson+Ladd · · Score: 4, Funny

      Why bother? He should just roundhouse kick it shut!

      --
      Inventions have long since reached their limit, and I see no hope for further development.-- Frontinus, 1st cent. AD
  6. Re:Not a natural disaster. by umbrellasd · · Score: 4, Funny

    The real disaster will come when citizens start dying left and right from the concrete bowling balls that come spewing out of the volcano. "Ok, maybe we were wrong on the drilling thing, but concrete bowling balls--that's a no brainer; nothing can possibly go wrong."

  7. Re:Doesn't seem like a good idea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    The company selling the concrete did several studies, and dumping concrete into volcanoes is definitely good.

  8. Uh, Hello?! We are Geeks... by WED+Fan · · Score: 5, Funny

    Aren't we missing the most obvious solution here?

    We are geeks after all. And we know what will calm a volcano.

    V I R G I N S

    O.K., I need 3 Linux nerds, and 3 Linux nerdettes (come on, you know, you mention Linux at a party, you ain't getting laid).

    Volunteers?

    Free trip to Indonesia.

    --
    Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong fix.
  9. Re:A more practical solution by Anonymous+Know-It-Al · · Score: 5, Funny
    Except for that tedious problem of obtaining, placing and detonating a few thousand tons of HE in the right spot deep down inside a mud volcano that is busily spewing mud upwards. But that's just a minor engineering problem, isn't it?

    This is were Bruce Willis comes in.