Huge volcano under Yellowstone Park rising

[The Straight Story]

Huge volcano under Yellowstone Park rising
It's building quickly, but that doesn't mean doomsday eruption is imminent

The huge volcano under Yellowstone National Park has been rising at an unprecedented rate during the past several years, according to a new study.

In the ancient past, the Yellowstone volcano produced some of the biggest-known continental eruptions, but the recent rising doesn't mean another doomsday eruption is looming, scientists say.

The recent rising is unprecedented for Yellowstone's caldera — the cauldron-shaped part of the volcano — but it's not uncommon for other volcanoes around the world. The new study has simply revealed a more active caldera at Yellowstone than scientists realized.

"It's pretty exciting when you see something that's five times larger than what you've seen in the past," said Charles Meertens, director of the nonprofit UNAVCO facility in Boulder, Colo., which aids geoscience research. Meertens is a former postdoctoral fellow under one of the study's authors, Robert Smith of the University of Utah in Salt Lake City.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41494177/ns/technology_and_science-science/


PS for those wanting to watch that really cool movie by the BBC on yellowstone (in 16 parts):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WF-RKzqNtz0

[Urban Prairie]

1. So this swelling of magma "isn't" a yikes!! situation yet?

Or does it merely merit a Mr.Spock/Dr.McCoy (Bones) one-eyebrow raise?

[L. Coyote]

2. Yellowstone is the largest geodetic bulge on our planet, to be taken very seriously

As in, disvest in the Midwest.

[A HERETIC I AM]

14. "Geodetic Bulge" would make great name for a rock band. n/t

[Forkboy]

+1

Glad I'm not the only one thinking of the important things. ;)

[A HERETIC I AM]

20. LOL....

Sometimes they lob one dead into the sweet spot, yanno?

[Forkboy]

25. Science is great for that.

Tell me you wouldn't shell out $30 to see Olympus Mons! :)

[A HERETIC I AM]

26. Only if they played "Your love is as deep as an extra-terrestrial rift valley" n/t

[Forkboy]

31. I light my lighter for that one!

:D

[alfredo]

40. I used to have a lot of those when I was a younger man.

[applegrove]

49. I think most people in the world will die if she blows.

[golddigger]

3. If Yellowstone blows, we can kiss our asses goodbye.

[nadinbrzezinski]

7. Depends how bad, but if the supervolcano goes, and it is due

in geologic time... yes it could very well be an extinction level event. The last time one of these went off humans went down to an evolutionary bottleneck

[tavalon]

16. Could well be?

If it blows, really blows, it is an extinction level event for all but those damn cockroaches. But that's one of the things that falls under my umbrella of "shit too big to worry about.".

[nadinbrzezinski]

36. Exactly, in north america, there is nothing to do about it

if you were clear on the other side of the world, perhaps

[tavalon]

37. Nope

Nuclear winter times 1000. Whole earth population extinction, some quickly, some a little slower. Thing is, it's just too big to worry about. It's like worrying about a huge asteroid hitting our planet. Odds are, it's going to happen some day. It happened before. But since there is nothing to be done, it's pointless to worry about.

[JonLP24]

39. That reminds me of a History channel thing I watched a year or so ago

There is a asteroid heading our way but we know for sure exactly for many years. I think we're expect to know one way or the other in the 2020s. I wish I could remember exactly what they said. Anyways they looked at ways we could prevent it from hitting us with cool graphics detailing what devices we have and what would happen to the rock. I think the most effective way they presented was planting a nuke on it, but they mentioned there is an international treaty that says we can't use nukes in space. They then went onto other ways but I forgot what they were.

I get your point and I'm not agreeing or disagreeing. Just that your post reminded me of that episode. :)

[NuclearDem]

4. Oh, quit yer whinin' Midwest, ash is good for your skin!

[Kennah]

5. Covers up the orange

[lonestarnot]

18. can we get a box of it shipped to the ickyleaker?

[alfredo]

41. It's a very good exfoliant

[Curmudgeoness]

6. Did you always want to visit Yellowstone?

I keep putting it off. Maybe it is time to get there before it is gone.

So where do I book my vacation plans?

[The Straight Story]

8. I will wait till it blows, then it will come to me

:rofl:

[Curmudgeoness]

11. But...but...but...I want to see Old Faithful. nt

[Ikonoklast]

9. If you're downwind, don't bother.

Yellowstone will come to you.

[The Straight Story]

10. Great minds think alike :) (nt)

[Ikonoklast]

13. OK, I'll bite. Who's the other one?

:P

[tavalon]

17. Go see it, but not because if the supervolcano blows, Yellowstone will be gone

Go because it's beautiful and if the supervolcano blows, you will be gone.

[lunatica]

12. That's one of the largest Super volcanoes in the world!

http://www.solcomhouse.com/yellowstone.htm

[Dogmudgeon]

15. Five times larger?

That's "five times larger than the swelling in the mid-1990s that led to the word 'Supervolcano' entering the English language and the making of at least five disaster movies on supervolcanoes and/or plain-old-regular-sized volcanoes".

Including the one posted at YouTube, and the one starring James Bond from that Abba movie, and Mrs. Terminator.

I'm not ready to panic yet. But then again, I live near Philadelphia.

--d!

[tavalon]

19. Don't panic

It wastes your energy. If this supervolcano goes, we all go, even in Philadelphia. But, that said, we don't have the technology to do anything at all about it, so the worry is non-productive. Panic, even more so.

[Bluenorthwest]

32. The one with James Bond is clearly based on Mt St. Helens

an actual volcano that actually blew.

[Poll_Blind]

21. This, like the sun going out, is an eventuality I intentionally ignore.

I'll just hug my family very tightly. Limited nuclear war is "survivable". But not Yellowstone.

PB

[WinkyDink]

22. And this is what they're TELLING us.

[Poll_Blind]

23. Didn't we recall ALL the ambassadors recently?

:shrug:

Probably just related to WikiLeaks or something.

PB

[HuckleB]

48. "They."

:shrug:

[Poll_Blind]

24. Hey does anyone know if my hippy ass in Oregon would survive something like this?

Just...wondering.

PB

[itsrobert]

29. Hopefully us on the West Coast gets a pass

as the wind currents blow for the most part from West to East. We are all goners if it's the big one, but let's hope that the Mid-West, East, and South are the only ones taken out with a moderate explosion.

But Oregon is so close, it probably a goner no matter how the wind blows.

[Poll_Blind]

33. Yeah, I was looking at the blast radius map and it looks like Oregon would be very dicey.

Maybe hightailing it up into Canada and not stopping till I hit the North Pole...

It really depends on which blast radius map you look at though. If we did survive I'm hoping the Canadians would claim the territory before the Chinese would.

PB

[HuckleB]

43. Why does it matter?

:shrug:

[Poll_Blind]

46. Oh oh, somebody's getting angry!

:rofl:

PB

[HuckleB]

47. If you say so.

:shrug:

[a la izquierda]

27. If you read the article...

you'll see that the headline in sensationalist. It clearly states in the article that the rise has slowed. And a brief perusal of the USGS website describes this activity as normal.

I'll defer to the experts on this. Isn't much I can do about it anyway.

[The Straight Story]

28. Heh

Watching the supervolcano movie right now and they are saying the same thing ;)

[a la izquierda]

30. Yeah...

we live in a blip of time in a geologic sense. The odds of the volcano actually blowing are minute. If the scientists are wrong, there's not much anyone can do. Several years ago, the caldera was rising quite a bit. And, at any rate, there's other eruptions that could occur that would be less traumatic to the planet. The belief that the volcano is "overdue" is untrue, based upon geologists' calculations.

[agentS]

34. The only safe place to be when a supervolcano blows

would be Earth orbit.

[tavalon]

38. And wouldn't it look just fucking awesome from there?

It might be tinged with quite a bit of sadness at the end of an epoch, but man, talk about cool pyrotechnics!

[begin_within]

35. I went there 2 years ago.

Here are my pictures from it:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/8601704@N06/sets/72157619617088166/

[LearnedHand]

42. Jeeeeee-bus, those are beautiful pics!

I used to go to Yellowstone every year. Haven't been in about 10 years now, and I miss it terribly. Your pics sure capture the awesome beauty of the place.

[begin_within]

50. Thanks... we got really lucky with the weather.

We went at the end of September and my sister was there the week before us and it was stormy every day she was there, but every day we were there, it was clear and 75 for the high... perfect weather and the aspen trees were at their peak of yellow... we just got lucky on the weather and scenery and the photos reflect that fact.

[Stardust]

45. Very beautiful pix...NatGeo quality. Thanks. nt

[begin_within]

51. Thank you,

although to me they are just snapshots... I just picked the best ones out of maybe 400 digital snapshots I took over a 4-day period. We were very lucky with the weather... crystal-clear and sunny and 75 degrees every day we were there, and very low crowds (end of September). The brilliant sunshine made for bright colors, especially among the aspen trees.

[Taverner]

44. Aw shit, that one will kill us all

All being the Northwest, Midwest, California and the Southwest

Fuck

[Esse Quam Videri]

52. Taking a week trip to Yellowstone this June.

Can't wait. Yellowstone is truly an amazing place. There is no other place on earth like it.

[a la izquierda]

53. And I'm pretty confident (as geologists seem to be)...

that you'll be able to visit and have a wonderful time. The headline of the article is sensationalist and over-dramatic. The good stuff is in the body of the article itself.