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The Supervolcano Under Yellowstone Is Alive and Kicking
- falcolas 11y agoAnd it's moving, eastward. Old Faithful is getting a bit less faithful, and shorter, as the years pass, while new hotpots and geysers appear east of it's location. On the plus side, it appears that we will have a fair bit of warning before Yellowstone goes off, for all the good it will do humanity.
- sizzzzlerz 11y agoActually, the Yellowstone hot spot is stationary. It's the North American continental plate that is moving westward over the hot spot. If you look at a geological map, you can trace the path. It's similar to the Hawaiian island chain in the pacific and it's hot spot. Older islands trend to the northwest as the pacific plate has moved eastward.
- kissickas 11y agoThe Pacific plate is moving northwest, which is why the older islands are there... the hotspot stays in the same place, which is why the newer Big Island Hawai'i emerged southeast of the older islands. I think you had it right but just miswrote.
- sizzzzlerz 11y agoD'oh! Absolutely correct, kissickas. My fingers engaged before my brain.
- kbutler 11y agoStationary relative to what? And remember the earth is rotating...
- Pyrodogg 11y agoI remember having a "relativity" revelation as a kid riding in the back of our car. So we're cruising down the highway. But wonder, what if I could just stop. I would zip through the back of the car, being stationary on the road and watch the car zoom away. But wait... I know the earth is rotating too, and we're driving east. So if I stopped, then the car would be zooming forward on the road, but the road itself would be zooming forward even faster than the car's (relative) speed! But wait... The earth isn't just rotating, it orbits the sun. If I stopped, the road and the car on it, wouldn't just be going forward, they would be falling away at an even greater speed. Within seconds, I'd be floating in space at a snapshot point in the earths rotation and the earth would be cruising away from me. But wait... The sun moves too! If I were sitting in my car, on the road, on earth, and just stopped, Things would be moving away even quicker than before. Around this point, the wondering switched from bigger frames of reference to paradoxies if space were a thing we were moving through. In one second, our car would move a certain distance on the road. But the road was also moving so we really traveled an extra special distance forward. And the place we came from wasn't just one second back on the road, it couldn't be given all that extra motion. But it was literally just one second ago, how could it not be that same definite spot on the road. My young mind was blown. Consequently, my current mind is also blown having typed that out. Spacetime is weird, I need to go clear my head. It's currently being smeared across the solar system at speeds in excess of 100,000km/h
- omegant 11y agoIt would be great to create an animation with the different movements you just described!
- knodi123 11y ago> Actually, the Yellowstone hot spot is stationary. It's the North American continental plate that is moving westward over the hot spot. Actually, the north american plate is stationary. It's the stuff underneath that is rotating eastward. Now, show me how to tell the difference between those scenarios. :-P
- tonyarkles 11y agoObserve from above? Geosynchronous satellites? If you want to do it from the surface, sunrise and sunset times? That will tell you whether or not your position has shifted relative to the Earth's rotation.
- knodi123 11y agoAh, but that just raises more issues. Geosynchronous satellites are by definition pegged to a relative spot over the earth's surface. And the earth spins constantly, inside and out. The question is, is there any difference between the core spinning slightly slower, vs. the crust spinning slightly faster (assuming zero acceleration)? To a godlike observer outside of the plane of the ecliptic, I'm not sure the idea of one being stationary and the other "slipping" in some direction even has meaning.
- noir_lord 11y ago> for all the good it will do humanity. More all the good it will do America, it'll be pretty grim in Europe but they've found that the fallout wouldn't be as bad as expected due to Yellowstone having a low sulfur content. The rest of humanity would definitely feel it (dramatic weather shifts, much colder winters, crop failures) but it's not an extinction level event or even remotely close. I was reading a report the other day saying that they have not been able to tie major eruptions to extinction events, flora and fauna seem to come through them ok.
- idlewords 11y agoThe geyser systems aren't directly coupled to the hot stuff deep underneath, and you can't make inferences about the hotspot moving based on their changing behavior. Hydrothermal features appear and disappear on their own (much shorter) timescale. presses the geologist call button
- ph0rque 11y agoI wonder if eventually in the future it would be possible to tap into the hot spots, and use the heat as a source of geothermal energy. This would also have the advantage of gradually cooling down the volcano and preventing another eruption.
- ZanyProgrammer 11y agoIronically the plot of a season 2 episode of Stargate Atlantis.
- foobarbecue 11y agoThat's coincidental, but how is it ironic?
- akiselev 11y agoThe small civilization living on top of the caldera drew energy from the supervolcano to power a defensive shield around the clock. The irony is that this caused pressure to build under the caldera and an eruption to wipe out life on the surface.
- ph0rque 11y agoI should watch more scifi...
- mjklin 11y agoIsn't this used in Iceland?
- foobarbecue 11y agoYep, and many other countries including the USA. Using geothermal energy to "tap into hot spots" is called "geothermal energy."
- sizzzzlerz 11y ago
- protomyth 11y agoAnd Farrell isn’t convinced another super-eruption will happen at all. “The system might be dying,” he said. “The Yellowstone hot spot is moving into thicker, colder continental crust. And it takes a lot more energy to burn through that crust than it did the thinner crust that it’s been burning through for the last 17 million years.” I wonder what imaging we will be able to see in the years ahead.
- calgoo 11y agoI always think we are going to have some hard times in the future when one of the big volcanos (ok maybe not supervolcano, but a big one) explodes and we get a ash cloud for a few years. Apart from the natrual issues caused, what happens to our electrical grid if we accomplish moving most of our infrastructure to renewable energies...
- jschwartzi 11y agoIt's far more dangerous than that. If we had an ash cloud significant enough to dim the sun then plants would receive less sunlight, which means a poorer growing season, which means worldwide famine. If that thing erupts, renewable electrical supply will be the least of our worries. I would say we'll spend most of our time trying to grow enough food.
- freehunter 11y agoBut given enough electricity, we could easily grow enough food to feed the entire planet in a relatively small amount of space. Plants don't care if they're growing under the sun or under a UV bulb, if they're growing in earth or hydroponic, if they're growing on land or vertical. At that point it's merely a distribution issue. Existing distribution channels wouldn't necessarily be interrupted, with the possible exception of air travel (and of course, all of the area that is now a crater from the super volcano). The problem really starts if all of our electricity is generated by the sun, and then the sun goes away for a bit. It's not actually an "alternative power" problem, it's just a solar problem. Wind, nuclear, and hydro power wouldn't be affected.
- julienchastang 11y agoOur family just visited Yellowstone a couple of weeks ago. What surprised me apart from the geysers and hot springs which I never grow tired of, is the variety of the landscape from stunning water falls, to mountain peaks, and lush valleys full of wildlife. We saw plenty of bison, and even a grizzly and her two cubs from a safe distance in Hayden Valley. But all is not well in Yellowstone. The park is being overrun by tourists. At the main sites, it feels more like Yellowstone City than Park. There are literally people jams on the boardwalks. There is a fair bit of trash at most of the hot springs sites, not out of neglect (we saw plenty of park volunteers cleaning up after the tourists, and we even chatted with one to talk about his techniques — he uses a fishing pole), but simply because of the sheer number of people visiting the park. There are tourists getting airlifted all day out of Old Faithful Village (we must have seen five helicopters land and take off) because, with that many people, there are bound to be medical emergencies. Morning Glory pool is not what it once was because tourists feel the need to throw coins and whatnot in the pool [1]. Last year someone crashed a quadcopter in Grand Prismatic which is still at the bottom of the pool [2]. There is now a ban on quadcopters in the park. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morning_Glory_Pool https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morning_Glory_Pool [2] http://www.digitaltrends.com/photography/tourist-crashes-drone-popular-yellowstone-hot-spring-possibly-damaging/ http://www.digitaltrends.com/photography/tourist-crashes-dro...
- fabrice_d 11y agoWe went there 2 years ago, and the best time we had was by taking hikes. If you want to experience Yellowstone, don't stay on the road. We've been lucky enough to even spot a wolf in the distance checking on a lone bison, and to be just on time for a geyser after an hour of walking. Most people only stay in the park for a couple of days so they rush to all the touristy spots in their cars. Big mistake... Lodging in Yellowstone is cheap by scarce, so you need to book very early.
- ghaff 11y agoThis is pretty much the norm for any of the busy national parks. 90% of visitors never leave the roads and a few adjacent attractions and 90% of the rest don't get more than a 1/2 mile from the road. Even in places like Yosemite, you can pretty quickly get away from almost everyone surprisingly quickly.
- 2sk21 11y agoThere is a great section about the Yellowstone super volcano in Bill Bryson's book "A brief history of everything". Pretty much no spot on Earth would be safe if this one erupted - probably an extinction event.
- thomasfoster96 11y agoLots of places would be safe during the eruption - just probably not the United States or southern Canada. Humans have survived many super volcanic eruptions before. The real problem if you survive the eruption would be the decade or so of crazy weather and food shortages, not to mention general unrest.
- agarden 11y ago“Good science is nothing more than a progress report. It’s what we know at a certain time with the data that we have.” That is the best definition of scientific knowledge I have read.
- dmritard96 11y agoSo they imaged it - I would love to 1) see some images and 2) understand their technique/instruments/etc.
- glennon 11y agoIf you are ever looking for geyser data, I helped build an ODbL database of observations -- http://geysertimes.org http://geysertimes.org ; API: http://www.geysertimes.org/api/v3/docs/index.html http://www.geysertimes.org/api/v3/docs/index.html. We use the data to predict geyser eruptions when enough data are available. For instance, here's the next prediction for Old Faithful (JSON / unix epoch): http://www.geysertimes.org/api/v3//predictions_latest/2 http://www.geysertimes.org/api/v3//predictions_latest/2 -or- (cleaned up): http://geysertimes.org/predictions.php http://geysertimes.org/predictions.php
- JulianMorrison 11y agoI do wonder if it's possible to cool Yellowstone artificially and reduce the risk? Could be possible to get geothermal energy out of it too.