Slashdot Mirror
Is the Yellowstone Supervolcano About To Blow?
An anonymous reader writes "Apparently, Yellowstone National Park has been having a very unusual number of earthquakes. Many of the most recent tremors have been deeper underground, an ominous sign. Combine that with a rapid rise in elevation over the past three years, and the possibility that earthquake activity from surrounding areas could trigger such an eruption on its own, and you've got the possible warning signs of a supervolcano eruption that would wipe out half to 2/3 of the continental US, plunge global temperatures, and wipe out a very significant chunk of world food sources. Here's a little more info to make your New Year brighter!"
Suddenly the economy doesn't sound like such a big problem after all.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
After the fact.
It's more likely to cause global cooling, as TFS and TFA state.
I claim first use of "Error No. 0B" - or "No. 0B error." It'll be the new ID 10T!
It would more likely knock out all human life in the USA and burn/melt most of the populated areas of Canada and Mexico. Don't forget it will cause a huge drop in temperature which will cause a mini ice age Doesn't really matter where you are in the world as everyone will most likely starve to death in a couple years anyways. I think it was Mt Toba that went off last time... which dropped the human population down to 10,000 and kicked off a mini ice age 75,000 years ago.
Well, this is true, but what you have to remember is that those "mathematical models" were created by imbeciles who believed that all events in the financial market were independent (i.e no event in the market affects any other event), that the market can grow forever without limit, and -- worse -- still believe that when an event that the models say is a once-in-a-hundred-years event happens three times in six months, it's not an indication of a basic flaw in the model, but rather a rare fluke that means it's now statistically certain it'll NEVER happen again. The global financial sector's "mathematical models" are worthless, and always have been. They built a house of cards using imaginary money as cards, and the question was only one of when the house of cards would collapse.
The financial market and the Yellowstone basin are hardly related. Our models of vulcanism are incompletely understood, and based on what is -- on a geological scale -- a very short period of observation, a mere century and a half or so in the case of Yellowstone. But they are at least based on observation and study, not wishful thinking. Yes, many of the models indicate that there could be another supervolcanic event at Yellowstone "any time now". But on a geological timescale, that "any time now" could be a thousand years away.
This is interesting news, and absolutely bears close monitoring, but I think it's a little premature to run around shouting that the sky is falling. But regardless of the actual risk from Yellowstone, I don't think that the failure of the consensual delusion passed off as mathematical models of the global economy constitutes anything that can be used as evidence for anything except for how stupid a whole lot of ostensibly really smart people can actually be, when they're blinded by greed.
The Toba eruption is generally thought to have been larger than any of the Yellowstone eruptions. The largest Yellowstone eruption was pretty close, though. Source: http://www.armageddononline.org/known-super-volcanoes.html
a,e,i,o,u and sometimes w and y (at be if of up cwm by)
A "few meters" of ash covering most of the US would be a pretty major issue. Almost none of the roofs are rated to carry that. All the planted crops, except trees, are killed. All trees less than a few meters die, naturally. You can't plow it. Most plants won't grow in it. Cars won't run for very long when it's in the air and nobody's digging a car out of a few meters of ash without patience, and if you did there's no where to drive it where you won't get bogged down in soft crunchy ash. The ash is suffused with toxic gases, some of which precipitate as acids. When it rains it kills all the life in all the rivers, and the silt changes the course of major rivers and minor streams. When it gets to the Atlantic and the Gulf it kills almost all of the fish in the ocean. It interferes with cell phone reception, TV and radio. A few meters of ash is enough to clog every hydro power plant, every nuclear power plant in the country. It blocks all the railways and all the highways of course, and that's how we move food around. And if you're not directly affected but you don't like America, that would be a fine day to attack. In summary, it's a big deal. Lava? A local issue where a good plan is not to touch the lava, not to get downstream of the lava. Ash, though, it'll wreck your whole week.
Link. A few inches of ash is a big deal. I've been there. A few meters? It boggles the imagination.
Help stamp out iliturcy.