Outside The Interzone: Sep 26, 2010

Thursday, October 7, 2010

Thorsday

Almost forgot: it's Thorsday already!

So here's Freyja, a picture from Wikipedia.

My friend Al sent me a link earlier with the title "Instant Glacier," which I just got around to reading. Sort of funny, sort of amazing. According to an article in New Mexico Geology, Volume 26, #4 (November 2004),

Hail accumulations reaching 12 inches were followed by as much as 5 inches of rain. So much rain fell in such a short period of time that the pea- and marble-sized hail was carried along first as sheet flood and then concentrated in a small drainage tributary to Sand Draw (Fig. 3) estimated to be approximately 15–20 ft deep. Approximately 8 mi south of Clayton just off NM–402 (sec. 10 T24N R35E), the hail began piling up behind a 12–16 ft culvert that was unable to handle the flow. Hail filled the small draw, as rain continued to flow across the fields, through the tons of ice, and onto the highway.

And the result? Instant glacier! Check the link for many more photos and the full story. (579 kb PDF)

For The Record

I regularly see the claim from climate denialists that volcanoes dump much more CO2 into the atmosphere than human activities. Only rarely do I see it pointed out that this is simply false. The Guardian does so today:

If you have been a victim of the rumour, persistent in some circles, that volcanic CO2 emissions dwarf those of human activity, now is the time to be liberated.
According to the British Geological Survey:

The contribution to the present day atmospheric CO2 loading from volcanic emissions is, however, relatively insignificant, and it has been estimated that subaerial volcanism releases around 300 Mt/yr CO2.
The US Geological Survey estimate is lower still:

Volcanoes emit … about 130–230 million tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere every year. This estimate includes both subaerial and submarine volcanoes, about in equal amounts.

What I hadn't seen before was the estimate that human CO2 production was on the order of 100 times that of volcanoes. Wow.

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

A Gruesome Big Picture

I'm always a little surprised at the speed with which Boston.com's Big Picture delivers its timely photojournalism on recent events, though sometimes, as with today's edition, I find the results disturbing. Toxic sludge at an alumina processing plant broke through a retention dam in Hungary on Monday, inundating a nearby village, and severely impacting a number of others.

The volume of sludge is estimated to be a 700,000 cubic meters. From an article at The Guardian,

Hungary declared a state of emergency in three counties yesterday after a dam burst at an alumina plant in Ajka, releasing a torrent of toxic red sludge that swept through local villages. Four people were killed, three reported missing and 120 were injured.

And below is some video of the deluge, posted by The NYT, (more video of the cleanup at the link) looking for all the world like something out of a Bible story.

I haven't seen anything on the composition of this material, but apparently, it's quite alkaline- many of those hospitalized are suffering from chemical burns. I'd presume a large component is iron oxides- iron oxides and aluminum oxides make silica (SiO2) look highly soluble, but reports are saying there are lots of other toxic metals in this witch's brew. Gack.

Wednesday Wednesday

From Murderbomb

Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Tuesday Tits

Siberian Tit, Poecile cinctus, formerly Parus cinctus.

Today's Useless But Amusing Trivia Tidbit

According to Balloon Juice, SpongeBob SquarePants gets twice as many viewers as Glenn Beck.

You're welcome.

(Fair disclosure: the author of this blog doesn't watch either of them.)

Monday, October 4, 2010

Vote For The Canadian!

Clay Bennett of the Chattanooga Times Free Press gets it right, again. But I think all three of these characters are Canadian. Can we just do like Caligula, and vote for the horse?

Sunday, October 3, 2010

OSU Flash Mob Goes All Bollywood

This is cute, from the front of the MU last Friday, via KGW News.

In all, more than 70 Oregon State University students and staff -- co-conspirators in the surprise event, which had been months in the making -- shed jackets and sweatshirts to reveal bright orange T-shirts and join in the synchronized dance moves.

Since I can't not talk about rocks, there are some nice mafic xenoliths in the granite making up those steps and the piers on either side of them. There are actually quite a number of cool rocks in and around the MU.