Yellowstone Caldera

Just found this while looking at Cephalopods.

http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2....php?utm_source=networkbanner&utm_medium=link

Interesting, note the bit about where the geologists live in relation to the Cauldera.

Reminded me of an ex railway worker friend of mine. He always travels in the middle of the train. The bit where you are most likely to survive an impact.

 

[size=large]...if elves are looking after you.[/size]

 

Hi Petal,

Is that Elves and Safety :D

 

Ziggy - I have seen a couple of programs about that on TV. Its very scarry - except that it may not happen for several thousand years yet.

There are numerous examples where we know of major earth quakes or volcanos that will take place. A smaller but even more scarry program was about San Francisco and the San Andreas fault. They know that a major earthquake is not far away. But they are still building all around, because the land is cheaper, and they have put a dam, seven schools and the Earthquake emergency centre on the very line of the fault itself. How stupid is that.

But its not restricted to nature, We are creating financial ones as well. Before the financial crisis there were loads of people that knew it was coming. One interviewed on TV said a crash was inevitable - but there should be time to make one more fortune first. E-mails showed that the assets, sub prime mortgages, that Lehmans was bundling together and selling to investore were being described by its employees as Goat Poo (that was what was used on TV - the actual words may have been different).

Like the San Andreas fault, the financial crisis, in the opinion of many people, has not gone away - it was caused by too much credit. The danger is now thought to be even bigger than before as a result of all the credit that has been created by governments since.

 

Both a major worry Peter.

2 other major concerns about the North American continent are 1, a fault off the coast from new york
That when it goes will cause longitudinal shaking for several minutes at a time.

Now the skyscrapers have been built to withstand this, they will sway and panels will pop out, but they are likely to stay up.

Not so the thousands of tenement buildings around the city; like the ones shown in "Friends"

These are built with lime mortar and several minutes of shaking will turn that to powder.
2. The volcanic Island off the coast of africa. Pre historically, part of the ash cone had become saturated with rainwater causing a massive part of it to collapse into the Atlantic. It caused a Tsunami that killed trees 40 to 50 foot up from the shoreline on the Eastern Seaboard of the USA.

Its due to happen again, but this time there are millions of people living in the danger zone.

And, as is the way of plate tectonics, what if they both happened at once :DOH:

 

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[size=large]...if elves are looking after you.[/size]
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Is that Elves and Safety :D




[size=large]ahahah [/size]

 

Yes there is a big volcano on the La Palma (Canary Islands), where several cubic miles are expected to fall into the sea. A program was talking about a 350 feet tsunami which would hit the Eastern seaboard of the USA.

Whilst some skyscrapers may be safe in an earthquake, I would rather not be in one. I have a book on earthquakes in Japan, where some major ones are overdue. By law, in Japan, all constructions must be built to certain standards to be earthquake proof. But it is thought that, as a result of fraud amd corruption, many buildings and tunnels have used only a fraction of the concrete that they should have done. With things like tunnels and dams, once they are build there is no way of proving that they were or weren't build properly. There was talk of empty cement lorries turning up at sites, being counted, and then going away and coming back and being counted again.

 

Thats scandalous, but it does happen.

After that big bomb in the City of London, all the masonry on the surrounding buildings had to be checked. On one building, I think it was only 10years old at the time, non of the parapet had been bedded on mortar. The masonry had just been stacked and pointed up.

I bet the contractors thought they would be dead by the time it came to need re pointing & that it would not be discovered. They didn't count on the IRA.[hr]
350 foot Tsunami, blimey,didn't realise it was that big.

This one looks to be over 1000 metres, but you get the idea of the damage.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zxQSJj3pypA&feature=related

Wouldn't want to be next to a shaking sky scraper either. A few tonnes of falling glass panels could ruin a good hair style when it reaches terminal velocity.

 

When you walk around the geothermal springs in Yellowstone you can imagine the immense power beneath your feet. Despite the fear of what may happen I'd gladly go there again tomorrow it is such an amazing place.

 

If you were a space Alan & you knew Earths history, volcanoes, earthquakes, continents charging around all over the place, crashing into each other & sliding under each other, polar ice caps that actually met each other at the equator during one epoch, asteroid collisions & a star so close it would burn your skin off without protection; you'd probably not even want to land here.

Ironically enough, its these dangerous geological processes that keep the planet habitable.

If plate tectonics had stopped and no new land was being created then weathering would have reduced the continents to flat plains and eventually the whole planet would be covered in water as the last of the continental plates dissolved into the deep oceans.

Lets hope it keeps going for the next 5 aeons

After that, it doesn't matter anyway.

 

This is a more balanced view on the potential threats to the vegetable garden.

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/38/20110304/tsc-five-ways-the-world-could-end-98fda55.html