The Decade Volcanoes On 22 December 1989, the United Nations General Assembly designated the oncoming decade – the 1990s – as the International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction. The gist was to reduce the loss of life and property due to tsunamis, earthquakes, floods, storms, droughts, landslides, and volcanoes. The resolution intended to identify and study some …
Reschensee As World War II raged, an Italian energy company planned the creation of an artificial lake near the borders of Austria and Switzerland. The project would create a dam that would unify two natural lakes, providing hydroelectric power for the region. But there was a problem: people lived there. The formation of the new …
Point Nemo Way back in Episode #32, we explored Poles of Inaccessibility. These geographic curiosities are the spots on continents or countries that are the farthest from some criterion, usually the ocean. In North America, the point farthest from any major sea lies in South Dakota, 1,030 miles from salty water. We can also measure the …
The Sky Really Is Falling Chicken Little – originally known as Henny Penny – took a lot of flak for constantly touting the end of the world. If you watched the news over the preceding weekend and looked to the skies, you might be forgiven for giving Chicken Little a bit of a reprieve. Space …
A New Era for the New River If you live outside the eastern third of the United States, the New River Gorge might not be a name you’ve encountered much. Humans in the region, however, are well aware of West Virginia’s natural hotspot. The river and surrounding area are renowned for outstanding whitewater rafting, rock climbing, …
The Loudest Sound On 27 August 1883, reverberations from the northwest disturbed the morning serenity of sheep ranchers outside Alice Springs, Australia. The men later described the sound as “a series of loud reports, resembling those of artillery.” No war raged in central Australia in 1883; no military exercises took place. Were these ranchers under attack …
The Iron Catastrophe Everyone alive today owes their existence to a catastrophe. To explain that seemingly paradoxical statement, let’s foray into a brief overview of the universe, our sun, and the planet, courtesy of Columbia University. Somewhere around 13.8 billion years ago, the Big Bang kicked things off. There was hydrogen and only hydrogen. The …
The Danish Temblor In our previous issue, we explored the recent confirmation of a theory that Earth has five layers instead of the previously believed four. The standard model included the crust, the mantle, the outer core, and the inner core. Before 1936, the models would have indicated the earth had just three layers: crust, mantle, core. …
The Inner Inner Most children glean a bit about the geologic makeup of our planet in primary school. We learn the Earth is comprised of four layers: the crust, the mantle, the outer core, and the inner core. The basic construction of our planet by layer – image by BBC The crust is the layer …
Mt. Greylock – Massachusetts’ High Point This edition of the High Points series takes us to the northwestern corner of Massachusetts. Mt. Greylock rises 3,489 feet above sea level. Though the peak is often associated with the Berkshire Mountains, it is technically part of the Taconic Mountains. The whole region is filled with craggy goodness. The Green Mountains …