Volcano!

[FunkyTown]

Scientists fear larger volcanic eruption in Iceland could bring global consequences | StarTribune.com

Not to be outdone, a volcano in Iceland is grounding thousands of planes across Europe. Fears are that it will erupt.

This would be disastrous. There would be famine. There would be crop failures. There would be deadly smog that would choke the life from thousands of people. This happened back in the 18th century. Let's hope it doesn't happen again!

[Mahone]

I'd rather it had happened in asda.

[Elgama]

Iceland had been a bit Biblical this year:)

[WindRiver]

I read that a single large volcanic eruption can change (and has already changed several times in our era) the weather and so called Global Warming trends more than all of the pollutants put into the atmosphere in the last 400 years by humans.

One thing to remember though, NOTHING humans do or can do, and NOTHING that the "earth" does RE natural disasters will stop the progress and completion of God's plan.

Edited April 16, 2010 by WindRiver

[Dravin]

There are three main places where volcanoes normally occur — along strike-slip faults such as California's San Andreas fault line

Uh... say what?

Volcanoes normally occur:

[1] 'Behind' subduction zones as water forced from the subducting lithosphere lowers the melting point of the nonsubducting lithosphere and creates magma, which being buoyant, works its way to the surface.

[2] Along divergent plate boundaries where the crust separates allowing a path for hot magma.

[3] Along hot spots, such as those that form Yellowstone or Hawaii.

Transform plate boundaries (common places for strike-slip faults) do not cause volcanoes, nor are they particularly associated with them. IIRC California's volcanoes are either old from when it was a convergent boundary, as a result of the subduction of the Juan de Fuca Plate (Northern California's volcanoes), or in the case of the the famous Long Valley Caldera is from a hot spot unless I missed something rather important in class.

[Dravin]

There are three main places where volcanoes normally occur — along strike-slip faults such as California's San Andreas fault line

Uh... say what?

Volcanoes normally occur:

• 'Behind' subduction zones as water forced from the subducting lithosphere lowers the melting point of the nonsubducting lithosphere and creates magma, which being buoyant, works its way to the surface.
• Along divergent plate boundaries (or developing ones) where the crust separates allowing a path for hot magma.
• Above hot spots, such as those that form Yellowstone or Hawaii.

Transform plate boundaries (common places for strike-slip faults) do not cause volcanoes, nor are they particularly associated with them in the absence of something like a divergent boundary being present, as you find in the mid-ocean ridges, but the volcanoes are caused by the other boundry (or hot spot). The transform boundary is just along for the ride. IIRC California's volcanoes are either old from when it was a convergent boundary, as a result of the subduction of the Juan de Fuca Plate (Northern California's volcanoes), or in the case of the the famous Long Valley Caldera is from a hot spot unless I missed something rather important in class.

A link to help visualize: http://pubs.usgs.gov/gip/earthq1/fig13.gif

Edited April 16, 2010 by Dravin

[talisyn]

With the news reports of earthquakes and now a volcano I'm a bit more paranoid about Yellowstone than normal. Fortunately, a lot of the people from Iceland already left because of the economic meltdown.

[ADoyle90815]

The Long Valley caldera in California is also a hot spot, like the Yellowstone caldera, and if either one erupted, it would create a global catastrophe in addition to destruction to the surrounding area.

[Dravin]

With the news reports of earthquakes and now a volcano I'm a bit more paranoid about Yellowstone than normal. Fortunately, a lot of the people from Iceland already left because of the economic meltdown.

Yellowstone is at a normal alert level according to this: Yellowstone Recent Status Report, Updates, and Information Releases .

[Dravin]

The Long Valley caldera in California is also a hot spot, like the Yellowstone caldera, and if either one erupted, it would create a global catastrophe in addition to destruction to the surrounding area.

Yellowstone's big blows:

Though my understanding from a guest lecturer is that Yellowstone has cooled since then and could not produce quite as magnificent of an eruption, though certainly enough to ruin your day.

Long Valley:

Not as nasty, but it'd still ruin your day.

[talisyn]

Thank for the research

Either way, I'm buying filtering masks

[NeuroTypical]

[Blackmarch]

Scientists fear larger volcanic eruption in Iceland could bring global consequences | StarTribune.com

Not to be outdone, a volcano in Iceland is grounding thousands of planes across Europe. Fears are that it will erupt.

This would be disastrous. There would be famine. There would be crop failures. There would be deadly smog that would choke the life from thousands of people. This happened back in the 18th century. Let's hope it doesn't happen again!

Almost every volcano eruption has global consequences. We've survived Helens, and quite a few others... i'm pretty sure we don't all need to all panic and start building our doomsday shelters.

The ones in the immediate vicinity should be preparing however. Either way good incentive to work on building your storage.

[Moksha]

.

This would be disastrous. There would be famine.

Couldn't we start denying this now and eliminate the threat?