Oct 19 2005
Fly By 10/19/05
The news is quite interesting today on many fronts. We again are seeing weather history with the 21st named storm of the season (a record tie) in Wilma with record low pressure measured (for us geeks that was 26.05 inches). Sustained winds at 175 mph. This one grew up fast – very fast. The good news is the core is very tight at 15 mile radius for hurricane wins. More here at NOAA (hat tip drudge) and at Yahoo News. This is a really powerful storm, no doubt about it.
In a truly stunning update, the death toll for the Kashmir region quake has now reached 79,000. The earth’s crust seems to be getting more active (though I have seen no scientific data on the matter yet). Tokyo was also rocked with a 6.2 mag quake today. California saw a minor one within the week as well. It would be interesting to find out if we are heading into a period of increased tectonic activity, which also could be the reason we see global warming. My biggest problem with the El Nino phenomena has been the amount of water we see heated in the hot spot in the Pacific Ocean. It is a truly enormous volume to heat with solar power. I have wondered if there was not actually some increased heat rising from the volcanic trenches that make up the center of the ocean basins – the mid-ocean ridges (see map below) which causes the El Nino. The increase in rising heat would not need to be much to get the El Nino results.
The dark ridges in the ocean basins are where magma comes up through the crust and pushes the sea floor apart. If you notice the Pacific ridge is pushed up to West coast of Central America – right where the El Nino occurs. Anyway, just a theory.
For some background on the Baltimore Tunnel threat please check out some good internet sleuthing being done by Jeff Quinton.
Saddam’s trial started and halted today, with the next hearing November 28th. Of course he is ‘not guilty’.
Bush’s administration seems ready to tackle the illegal immigration issue all of a sudden – which is good. It is long past time to get onto this matter. I would hope the right can temper their frustrations and try and work through a good answer which allows workers in as long as they are documented and follow the rules. Extreme punishment for lack of paperwork is not an answer to this problem. This is not a solution.
Finally, the news from Fitzgerald is there will be no final report. While the tea leaf readers see this as a sure sign of indictments, the truth is there have been doubts he could make any report under his charter. I am not a fan of tea leaves.
The real news is on the inside of the CIA. And for that I point you to Mac Ranger who already said what I planned to say today on the Plame Game (my previous posts here).
UPDATE:
Tom Maguire looks to the NY Times for some hint on the Hannah story and finds they don’t even put much substance into it.
Also, Dr Sanity reminds us there is a very important 100 year anniversary to observe!
END UPDATE
Hope everyone has a great day.
I don’t know if there has been an increase in tectonic activity or whether there is a relationship between global warming and quake activity, however some earthquakes are induced by man made activity.
The California quake you mentioned is at the Geysers Geothermal Field. Water is being pumped into the subsurface. Small magnitude quakes are known to be induced by pumping. A similar affect was found at the Rocky Mountain arsenal years ago when water was disposed in deep granitic rocks.
Your proposal that the Pacific may be heating up from volcanic trenches is interesting, except the heat would be coming from hot spots (of the Hawaiin type) or at mid-oceanic ridges rather than trenches. I would think heat flow measurements have been made in the Pacific basin; however if not, it would make a great (but expensive) thesis project.
GranitRoc,
I was not aware of the man induced quakes – very interesting.
I think if you reread the section you will see I referrenced the mid-ocean ridge. It would be an expensive experiment, but fascinating. But also maybe too late to determine anything for a decade at least.