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Drilling Might Be Getting a Bad Rap For Indonesia's Ongoing "Mud Volcano"
davide-nature writes "The freakish event has been blamed on a company that was drilling for natural gas nearby. But scientists have found a rock formation deep below the surface and shaped like a parabolic antenna. It could have focused seismic waves from an earthquake that occurred shortly before the eruption, and onto a clay layer. The clay then liquefied and somehow found its way to the surface."
This can explain the event; a multiple oddity. You know, when singular oddities gang up on you.
Or maybe the drilling had something to do with it...with that rock formation and all that.
A 'singular oddity' is an event that cannot be explained and only happens when you are alone.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but all I can see is that Earth has been trying to contact aliens long before we ever have.
I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer.
There is a very long Wikipedia article on this topic that contains a great deal of information on what occurred. While a great deal of work has been done to show that it is not fully the oil companies fault, drilling in to a hydrothermically unstable area with a faulty well design is a recipe for disaster.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sidoarjo_mud_flow
After Sharnado I don't think the Sci Fi needs any ideas like Mud Volcano for their next movie. Hopefully none of them read Slashdot.
This isn't the only mud vent in Indonesia and the others were not caused by drilling either.
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
Nice try Bakrie
There are earthquakes *all* the time in Indonesia, and mud volcanoes are known across many parts of Indonesia. Why would it pick this earthquake (275km away) at this moment to fail, within a short distance (200 metres) from a borehole that was in progress and which was penetrating high fluid pressure zones at depth? It's an awful coincidence. Why here?
B) best case, these guys drilled into a structure that was "ready to blow". That's a bad move potentially leading to disaster regardless.
C) I'm a little surprised this made it into Nature Geoscience.
Okay, the earthquake may have liquified the clay layer. No problem there.
Where, exactly, did that liquified clay layer decide to spurt out of the ground? Hint: Not any of the nearly infinite number of other places nearby that still had a few thousand feet of un-drilled rock covering them.
As full disclosure, I support drilling for natural gas. But we need much, much better quality control (which yes, will raise the price slightly), both during the initial drilling and in upkeep of the well-heads to prevent them wastefully leaking methane into the atmosphere (and ground water); and, we need criminal liability for the oil companies when the planet decides to liquify the mud layer they have chosen to disturb.
Not their fault? BS. They didn't make the mud, but they sure as hell made the tube it used to get above-ground.
"from the make-up-your-mind-son-it-is-mud-or-is-a-volcano? dept." I think we have a winner for the "most ignorant tagline" dept.
Drilling Might Be Getting a Bad Rap For Indonesia's Ongoing "Mud Volcano"
That is simply no way to refer to tubgirl.
It doesn't look as bad as it was in 2007 (read the article, looked at the photo...).
https://maps.google.com/maps?q=Sidoarjo,+East+Java,+Indonesia&hl=en&ll=-7.528426,112.710285&spn=0.14091,0.264187&sll=32.576226,-86.680736&sspn=7.662306,16.907959&oq=Sidoarjo,+in&hnear=Sidoarjo,+East+Java,+Republic+of+Indonesia&t=h&z=13
The mud area is about 1 mile square (or 1.8KM guesstimating from the legend).
BlameBillCosby.com
... the giant, buried, parabolic antenna. And what it's going to focus on next.