Yellowstone volcano Ground Rising after 121 earthquakes

Yellowstone volcano Ground Rising after 121 earthquakes

YELLOWSTONE volcano’s ground is slowly creeping upward around its most active geyser basin, USGS officials have revealed after seismographs have confirmed more than 120 earthquakes across Yellowstone Park.

Yellowstone volcano officials are paying attention to an ongoing shift in the supervolcano’s landscape, which began as early as 2015. Yellowstone’s Norris Geyser Basin, Yellowstone’s hottest geyser basin, witnessed ground levels rise by almost an inch last year. Officials from the United States Geological Survey (USGS) confirmed in the latest Yellowstone activity update, the basin rose by 0.78 inches (2cm) in 2018. GPS data collected throughout the Yellowstone volcanic caldera suggests this part of the national park has been rising for at least three years now.

In the same Yellowstone update, the USGS revealed a total of 121 earthquakes were recorded in the Yellowstone area in December 2018 alone.

The earthquakes struck in rapid swarms and singular tremors throughout the park.

{ https://beforeitsnews.com/v3/ }

06-02-2019 om 14:54 geschreven door peter  

What Lies Beneath Area 51 + Man Who Spoke Out About Area 51 Has An Invention (Video)

MYSTERIOUS crater-shaped hole in the ground near to Area 51 is “unlike anything ever seen” and has prompted theories that the bizarre crater could be an entrance to an underground military base.

 A bizarre crater appeared on Google Earth earlier this week close to Area 51 and appears man-made with a strange tower emerging out of the huge ditch. The incredible discovery was revealed by Blake and Brett Cousins – of YouTube channel thirdphaseofmoon – who captioned the footage: “We Found Something Underneath Area 51.” In the footage, a large, thin object can be seen poking out of the middle of a large circular hole in the ground.

The shock revelaton has sparked a frenzy of theories, including that the huge tower inside the vent is the tower of a new top-secret underground military base.

Speaking about his discovery, Blake Cousins says: “Conspiracy theorists are going wild right now.

“This could be some sort of vent or a tower embedded within a crater close to Area 51. This not a natural phenomenon, it is quite a mystery.

He said: “It doesn’t relate to any of the other craters in the area – this one looks like a tower or a vent.

“It is a massive crater – the tower looks like it is dozens of feet tall.

“This crater doesn’t relate to any of the other craters. There is no measuring device coming out of it.

“There might be a base or something underneath. It has been dug out, carved out by humans. You hear about Area 51 as a massive city underneath the ground. This could be linked.

“It shouldn’t be there, it shouldn’t exist.

The crater is just miles from the top-secret military base Area 51, which has previously been linked to various alien experiments. 

The Man Who Spoke About Area 51 And Was Ridiculed, Now He Invented A Car That Runs With Water,

Source via  Raees Ahmad  

• https://www.infocrazy.xyz/2018/12/what-is-beneath-area-51-mysterious.html

{ https://beforeitsnews.com/v3/ }

06-02-2019 om 14:48 geschreven door peter  

Asteroïde kan mensheid vernietigen net als dinosauriërs, maar wetenschappers zijn bezig met plan om wereld te redden - HLN.be

Bron: The Baltimore Sun, The Washington Post

Algemeen wordt aangenomen dat de bekendste en meest ingrijpende inslag van een asteroïde 65 miljoen jaar geleden plaatsvond in de Golf van Mexico en verantwoordelijk was voor het uitsterven van de dinosauriërs. Het ging om een asteroïde van 8 tot 10 kilometer diameter. “We hebben alle asteroïden van die omvang in onze buurt intussen gelokaliseerd en hoeven daar niet bang voor te zijn”, verzekert Paul Chodas van het Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) van de NASA aan het California Institute of Technology. Maar kleinere asteroïden kunnen ook grote schade aanrichten.

Lees ook

NASA-wetenschappers verbijsterd: mysterieus eiland doemt op uit oceaan en krioelt nu al van leven

Verwoesting

“Zelfs een asteroïde van 1 kilometer doorsnee kan wereldwijde verwoesting veroorzaken als hij op de verkeerde plaats inslaat. Het zijn eigenlijk de kleine asteroïden die het meeste risico inhouden”, aldus de wetenschapper in de Amerikaanse krant The Washington Post.

Amper 100 jaar geleden was het al een keer bijna prijs. Op 30 juni 1908 ontplofte een meteoor boven een verlaten gebied in Siberië en die vernietigde 1.200 vierkante kilometers bos. Volgens onderzoek zou de vuurbal even krachtig geweest zijn als 185 keer de atoombom op Hiroshima en zou de lucht verhit zijn tot een temperatuur van bijna 50.000 graden. Was de meteoor 3 uur later ingeslagen, dan had hij door de draaiing van de aarde de Russische hoofdstad Moskou volledig van de kaart kunnen vegen. En dat zou de geschiedenis van de 20ste eeuw volledig herschreven hebben. (lees hieronder verder)

Maar ook recenter was er een incident. Exact 6 jaar geleden ontplofte opnieuw een meteoor boven Siberië, deze keer met de kracht van 1 atoombom. De meteoor had de grootte van een schoolbus en een snelheid van 64.000 kilometer per uur. De schokgolf vernielde bijna alle ramen in de stad Tsjeljabinsk. Meer dan 1.000 mensen raakten gewond.

Ramkoers

Wetenschappers overleggen al lang over wat er nu precies moet gebeuren als ze een asteroïde zouden ontdekken die op ramkoers met de aarde ligt. De NASA overwoog al om er kernkoppen op af te schieten, maar dan bestaat het risico dat brokstukken alsnog op aarde terechtkomen. Ander idee is om er met een ruimtetuig naast te gaan vliegen en de asteroïde door de zwaartekracht van zijn baan te doen afwijken. Maar er is nóg een optie en die wordt nu als eerste getest. (lees hieronder verder)

De wetenschappers van APL zijn begonnen met het ontwerpen en bouwen van een DART-ruimtetuig, wat staat voor ‘Double Asteroid Redirection Test’. Het doel is om het op een ruimterots af te sturen en het ermee te laten botsen: niet zo hard dat hij in stukken breekt, maar wel hard genoeg om hem van zijn koers te doen afwijken. Het ruimtetuig heeft de grootte van een Honda Civic en moet in de zomer van 2021 gelanceerd worden. Zijn bestemming: een kleine maan van een asteroïde.

De asteroïde en haar maan worden Didymos genoemd, wat Grieks is voor ‘tweeling’. Ze draaien rond de zon in een baan tussen de aarde en de Planetoïdengordel (ruwweg tussen Mars en Jupiter). De maan is maar een 150 meter in doorsnede: heel klein in astronomische termen.

Maan

Het DART-ruimtetuig zal energie krijgen van zonnepanelen die op vleugels zullen lijken en zal meer dan een jaar onderweg zijn naar zijn bestemming. “We zullen de maan pas zien als we er nog maar een uur van verwijderd zijn”, aldus de hoofdingenieur van de missie, Elena Adams. (lees hieronder verder)

DART zal een snelheid van 24.000 kilometer per uur halen en moet in oktober 2022 de maan bereiken. Een kleine satelliet die meevliegt, moet registreren wat het effect van de inslag is.

Doel is om op termijn met dergelijke ‘duwtjes’ een asteroïde van koers te doen veranderen. Als één duw niet genoeg is, kunnen er nog meer volgen. Volgens de betrokken wetenschappers is de missie momenteel de beste strategie om de aarde te beschermen tegen een potentiële inslag. Desalniettemin hopen ze dat ze haar nooit zullen moeten gebruiken.

{ https://www.hln.be/ }

06-02-2019 om 14:31 geschreven door peter  

AMATEURASTRONOOM ONTDEKT VLOOT RUIMTESCHEPEN ( VIDEO )

Vroeger waren we voornamelijk afhankelijk van NASA om ons beelden uit de ruimt te bezorgen. 

Steeds vaker echter komen amateurastronomen, in het bezit van krachtige telescopen, met verbluffende opnames, zoals een vloot ruimteschepen.

En steeds vaker komen er bijzondere ontdekkingen uit de buurt van de Orionnevel. 

De Orionnevel, ook bekend als M42, is een prachtig diep-luchtobject in het sterrenbeeld Orion. Hoewel de meeste nevels (wolken van interstellair gas en stof) moeilijk of onmogelijk te zien zijn met het blote oog, is M42 vrij eenvoudig te zien aan de nachtelijke hemel gedurende een groot deel van het jaar. Met een beetje hulp kun je de Orionnevel zien met je ogen, een verrekijker of je telescoop.

Een groot Youtubekanaal zoals dat van Secureteam heeft het voordeel dat veel abonnee's leuke dingen insturen of hen ergens op attenderen. 

En zo kwam Tyler aan beelden van een amateurastronoom die met een sterke telescoop de Orionnevel observeerde en via zijn camera iets merkwaardigs vastlegde.

Je ziet de beelden van wat in eerste instantie één langwerpig ruimteschip lijkt, maar wat volgens Tyler van Secureteam bestaat uit waarschijnlijk vier schepen die in een rechte lijn door de ruimte koersen.

In de video onderaan dit artikel zie je de bewegende beelden van deze objecten. Links zie je de Orionnevel en het is bijna onmogelijk om te schatten op wat voor afstand die schepen zich bevinden.

Alleen al het feit dat er duidelijk vanaf de aarde is te zien dat er ruimteschepen door het heelal koersen, zou reden moeten zijn voor onmiddellijke Disclosure. Planeten bewegen niet met grote snelheid noch met een kaarsrechte koers door de ruimte.

Met wat daar beweegt en hoe, is het redelijk om aan te nemen dat we hier te maken hebben met een object dat onder intelligente controle staat.

Het merkwaardige is dat er regelmatig vreemde objecten/ruimteschepen worden waargenomen in de buurt of richting van de Orionnevel.

Een voorbeeld daarvan is de volgende, eerder gemaakte opname (oktober 2017).

In de video van Secureteam zie je nog meer grote sigaarvormige schepen in de buurt van of zelfs in de Orionnevel.

Aan het einde van de video is er nog een interessant onderwerp en dat is dat er in een haven aan de Oostzee duizenden dode vissen zijn aangespoeld. Op zich niet zo bijzonder, want de laatste jaren gebeurt dit op talloze plaatsen op aarde, alleen hier is iets opvallends aan de hand.

De meeste vissen drijven in het water zonder kop. Dat niet alleen, als je goed kijkt dan zie je dat er iets is gebeurd waardoor die koppen met een soort chirurgische precisie/mechanisch zijn afgesneden.

Een beetje zoals dat regelmatig gebeurt met verminkt vee dat wordt gevonden en vaak verwondingen tonen die ook chirurgisch lijken en waar een duidelijk verband bestaat met ufo's.

{ http://niburu.co/ }

06-02-2019 om 13:56 geschreven door peter  

These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds. To seek out new life and new civilizations. To boldly go where no man has gone before!

If only we knew what was the true mission of the “USS Enterprise” spotted above California this week. One of the most mysterious aircraft in the world, a U-2 Dragon Lady, was seen flying above California last week broadcasting the call sign NCC-1701A – the same registry as the legendary USS Enterprisefrom the Star Trek franchise. The U-2 spy plane took off from Beale Air Force Base in Northern California on January 30th then flew a trapezoidal pattern above Northern California for four hours, crossing into Nevada at one point before circling back. Beale Air Force Base is home to the USAF’s 9th Reconnaissance Wing which conducts high-altitude surveillance and intelligence missions in support of combat forces.

A U-2 Dragon Lady. Not exactly a Constitution-class starship but still very impressive.

What was the plane doing up there, and why was it broadcasting such an iconic, conspicuous call sign? In all likelihood it was merely a test flight or basic exercise and the call sign was someone’s way of making their work day slightly more interesting. However, it could very well be that the plane was conducting reconnaissance ahead of a mysterious and slightly unnerving special operations exercise which took place in California this week.

The U.S. Armed Forces are currently conducting urban operations drills in Los Angeles and Long Beach known as Emerald Warrior/Emerald Trident. The operations have seen military helicopters conducting mock raids in densely populated urban environments and all manners of spy planes circling overhead conducting electronic and visual surveillance of the ground below. Videos posted to social media show MH-6 Little Bird helicopters landing on L.A. rooftops to pick up and drop off special operators. Curiously, the public and LAPD were not notified of the operation until moments before the first helicopters started landing.

As aviation watchdog blogs have noted, those exercises have seen some of the American military’s most advanced and secretive spy planes fly curious circular routes above California. Again, it’s highly likely these are all just part of the Emerald Warrior/Emerald Trident drills, but I’m left to wonder why the military would risk conducting drills in such densely populated areas where the risk of harming civilians is so high. Is there something to these secretive operations the military isn’t telling us? Probably not, although how can we know for sure?

{ https://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

06-02-2019 om 12:55 geschreven door peter  

40 years ago a very strange cylinder UFO has been photographed over Cheadle staffordshire, UK.

The photographer who has submitted the image to Mufon states:

A little late on reporting something that happened 40 years ago, but then I had no idea who you would report it to, and perhaps more so.... who would believe it anyway.

So my experience. Well as I say.... it happened some 40 years ago when I was working a night shift on security.

It was a bitter cold night with the ground covered in ice, and the sky was very clear. I was walking from one building to another as my job routine. While walking I noticed a light in the air flying very low and head towards me from a north eastern angle. My first and obvious thought was of course... helicopter!

There was something that was a little odd though. First was the fact... one single white light. Then I conceded that it was now getting very close and heading more or less straight for me.

I thought that I should be able to hear the thing by now. You could have heard a pin drop in these early hours and it was very still with zero wind. It intrigued me enough to stop me in my tracks for me to observe.

It came towards me slowly, at around maybe 10mph. By the time it got to within around 50 feet away from me, I knew I was seeing something beyond the ordinary.

It came to a complete halt right in front of me, directly hovering in total stillness over the roof of the building. 

Suddenly it shot of as fast as light. No noise no fuss. It looked for all the world like a comet. I did not like the experience one bit. 40 years ago and I still remember it as if it happened yesterday.

One fact remains.... we are being visited and that is a simple fact. I saw more than enough. For 40 years I have thought the same thing, that if I know.... I am dam sure the government and even our scientists must surely know.

{ http://ufosightingshotspot.blogspot.com/ }

06-02-2019 om 12:33 geschreven door peter  

Ancient Fossil Was Run Over By @NASA Rover And Ignored, Feb 2019, Photos, UFO Sighting News.

Date of discovery: Feb 6, 2019

Location of discovery: Mars

Source photo: 

• https://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/raw/?rawid=0719MR0030550060402769E01_DXXX&s=719

I found this fossilised bone on Mars this week and it has been run over by the Mar rover. Now scientists at NASA often say how careful they are not to hurt or destroy their chances of finding life on Mars...and yet, we see the evidence of the rovers tire marks treading over this ancient fossil as if it were nothing. If a person had found this at a park or beach...it would turn into an investigation into a murder...since it looks a lot like a leg bone. But since its Mars NASA makes it into their personal road, driving over and ignoring any real evidence of life on Mars. 

 

If president Trump wants real discoveries from Mars, then Trump needs to make me head of NASA and I will expose the truth, unmask all secrets held in their vaults and use the evidence to announce that evidence of alien life on Mars is real and also expose any and all evidence they hold of any life or intelligent beings living on any planet, moon or space in our solar system. That would be real change.

Scott C. Waring

FULL RESOLUTION 

 { https://www.ufosightingsdaily.com/ }

06-02-2019 om 12:25 geschreven door peter  

Lost City Of Atlantis found in the North Sea?

Divers from oil companies in the North Sea have discovered the remains of a drowned ancient city that once stretched from Britain to Denmark.
An ancient city so massive that its population is suspected has been estimated to be in the tens of thousands.

A team of climatologists, archaeologists and geophysicists have now successfully mapped the area. This has shown how large and far-reaching this once “lost land was .” Many specialists claim that this is once the “true heartland” of Europe.

This enormous civilization is thought to have declined about 8000 years ago and that the landmass was sunk over several thousand years, an immersion that began about 20,000 years ago.

Dr. Richard Bates, from St Andrews ‘ Department of Geosciences, who organized the Drowned Landscapes exhibition and covered the finds in the UK, says the data reveals the human history behind Doggerland, a now flooded one City of the North Sea, which used to be larger many modern European countries.

Could these discoveries expose Doggerland as the truly lost city of Atlantis?

Several hypotheses have placed the sunken island of Atlantis within modern northern Europe, among which Olaus Rudbeck is best known.
Anyone who suspected that Doggerland, as well as Viking Bergen Island, which is said to have been swamped by a megatsunami after the Storegga slide in 6100, is the real setting for Atlantis, a suggestion he proposed as early as the 16th century.

Some have suggested the Celtic shelf as a possible location and there are certainly links to Ireland.
Many places have been proposed for the possible location of the sunken city over the years, but no ruins worthy of such claims have been found. Many of these areas were too small to have hosted such a huge city.

Doggerland, however, fits the law, it could not only turn out to be the largest ancient civilization on earth, but is also located in a possible place based on historical investigations, because the city of Atlantis had at some point sunk in England its History, and it reveals amazing ruins of a once great and hitherto unknown civilization.

Dr Bates, a geophysicist, said: ‘ Doggerland was the real heartland of Europe until sea levels rose to give us today’s UK coastline.

“We have speculated for years about the existence of the lost land of bones dredged up by fishermen across the North Sea, but it is only since we worked with oil companies in recent years that we have succeeded in rebuilding the lost land. Create.

‘ When the data was first processed, I thought it was unlikely it would give us useful information. However, as more area was covered, a huge and complex landscape was revealed.
“We have now been able to model its flora and fauna, build a picture of the ancient people living there and understand some of the dramatic events that have subsequently changed the country, including the rise of the sea and a devastating tsunami. ”

{http://aliensdocs.com/ }

06-02-2019 om 00:10 geschreven door peter  

05-02-2019 om 22:50 geschreven door peter  

THE US ARMY IS EQUIPPING SOLDIERS WITH POCKET-SIZED RECON DRONES

{ https://futurism.com/the-byte }

05-02-2019 om 22:18 geschreven door peter  

InSight gets to work as NASA's lander lifts its seismometer onto the Martian surface in bid to solve the mystery of 'Marsquakes'

• NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter snapped a series of photos of the InSight lander as seen from space
• This has allowed the space agency to pinpoint exactly where the lander and its parts touched down 
• Previous images show the lander's point of view, including 14-by-7-foot swath of land where it will soon dig  

By MARK PRIGG  and CHEYENNE MACDONALD FOR DAILYMAIL.COM

NASA's InSight lander has deployed its first instrument onto the surface of Mars. 

New images from the lander show the seismometer on the ground, after it was lifted onto the surface by the lander's robotic arm. 

It will record the waves traveling through the interior structure of the planet, and could help explain mysterious 'marsquakes' scientists believe occur regularly.

Scroll down for video  

New images from the lander show the seismometer on the ground, after it was lifted onto the surface by the lander's robotic arm. It will record the waves traveling through the interior structure of the planet, and could help explain mysterious 'marsquakes' scientists believe occur regularly. This was the first time a science instrument had ever been placed onto the surface of another planet.

WHAT WILL THE SEISMOMETER DO? 

NASA said the lander war performing flawlessly, and was ahead of schedule.

'InSight's timetable of activities on Mars has gone better than we hoped,' said InSight Project Manager Tom Hoffman, who is based at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. 

'Getting the seismometer safely on the ground is an awesome Christmas present.'

The InSight team has been working toward deploying its two dedicated science instruments onto Martian soil since landing on Mars on Nov. 26. 

To deploy the seismometer (also known as the Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure, or SEIS) and the heat probe (also known as the Heat Flow and Physical Properties Probe, or HP3), engineers first had to verify the robotic arm that picks up and places InSight's instruments onto the Martian surface was working properly.

Engineers tested the commands for the lander, making sure a model in the test bed at JPL deployed the instruments exactly as intended. 

Scientists also had to analyze images of the Martian terrain around the lander to figure out the best places to deploy the instruments.

NASA InSight

✔@NASAInSight

Whew – winding down after a long day, but I’ve done it: I’ve placed my seismometer on the surface of Mars! With SEIS, I’ll be able to listen in for marsquakes and help reveal the heartbeat of #Mars. http://go.nasa.gov/2QGBeYX 

• 11.7K

6:51 AM - Dec 20, 2018

• 2,914 people are talking about this

On Tuesday, Dec. 18, InSight engineers sent up the commands to the spacecraft. 

On Wednesday, Dec. 19, the seismometer was gently placed onto the ground directly in front of the lander, about as far away as the arm can reach — 5.367 feet, or 1.636 meters, away).

'Seismometer deployment is as important as landing InSight on Mars,' said InSight Principal Investigator Bruce Banerdt, based at JPL. 

'The seismometer is the highest-priority instrument on InSight: We need it in order to complete about three-quarters of our science objectives.'

The 'Martian rock garden' it built in a Pasadena warehouse to test its InSight rover Engineers practice deploying InSight's instruments in a lab at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. Several of them are wearing sunglasses to block the bright yellow lights in the test space, which mimic sunlight as it appears on Mars.

The seismometer allows scientists to peer into the Martian interior by studying ground motion — also known as marsquakes.  

'Having the seismometer on the ground is like holding a phone up to your ear,' said Philippe Lognonné, principal investigator of SEIS from Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris (IPGP) and Paris Diderot University. 

'We're thrilled that we're now in the best position to listen to all the seismic waves from below Mars' surface and from its deep interior.'

In the coming days, the InSight team will work on leveling the seismometer, which is sitting on ground that is tilted 2 to 3 degrees. 

The first seismometer science data should begin to flow back to Earth after the seismometer is in the right position.

INSIGHT'S THREE KEY INSTRUMENTS

The lander that could reveal how Earth was formed: InSight lander set for Mars landing on november 26th

Three key instruments will allow the InSight lander to 'take the pulse' of the red planet:

Seismometer: The InSight lander carries a seismometer, SEIS, that listens to the pulse of Mars. 

The seismometer records the waves traveling through the interior structure of a planet. 

Studying seismic waves tells us what might be creating the waves. 

On Mars, scientists suspect that the culprits may be marsquakes, or meteorites striking the surface. 

Heat probe: InSight's heat flow probe, HP3, burrows deeper than any other scoops, drills or probes on Mars before it. 

It will investigate how much heat is still flowing out of Mars. 

Radio antennas: Like Earth, Mars wobbles a little as it rotates around its axis. 

To study this, two radio antennas, part of the RISE instrument, track the location of the lander very precisely. 

This helps scientists test the planet's reflexes and tells them how the deep interior structure affects the planet's motion around the Sun.

'We look forward to popping some Champagne when we start to get data from InSight's seismometer on the ground,' Banerdt added. 

'I have a bottle ready for the occasion.' 

Meanwhile, the Rotation and Interior Structure Experiment (RISE), which does not have its own separate instrument, has already begun using InSight's radio connection with Earth to collect preliminary data on the planet's core. 

Not enough time has elapsed for scientists to deduce what they want to know — scientists estimate they might have some results starting in about a year. 

This image shows some of the instruments visible in the selfie image sent back to Earth by InSight early last Tuesday morning

NASA also recently has finally pinpointed the exact landing location of its new Mars explorer, thanks to a powerful camera on its Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.

While the space agency knew InSight had landed within an 81-mile-long (130 km) ellipse on the red planet, there was no way to determine exactly where it touched down within this region.

Now, a series of images captured this week by MRO's HiRISE camera have confirmed that the lander, heat shield, and parachute all sit within 1,000 feet of each other on a lava plain called Elysium Planitia. 

NASA has finally pinpointed the exact landing location of its new Mars explorer, thanks to a powerful camera on its Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. While the space agency knew InSight had landed within an 81-mile-long (130 km) ellipse on the red planet, there was no way to determine exactly where it touched down within this region

In the images released today by NASA, InSight and its parts appear as bright teal specks on rust-colored landscape.

But in reality, this is only a trick of the light.

'Light reflected off their surfaces causes the color to be saturated,' NASA explains.

'The ground around the lander appears dark, having been blasted by its retrorockets during descent. Look carefully for a butterfly shape, and you can make out the lander's solar panels on either side.' 

Just days ago, NASA's new InSight lander snapped its first selfie from the red planet, giving the mission team (and the rest of the world) a good look at its solar panels and deck now that it's settled in.

InSight also sent back the first complete view of the 14-by-7-foot swath of land that will soon serve as its 'workspace.' 

In the images released today by NASA, InSight and its parts appear as bright teal specks on rust-colored landscape. But in reality, this is only a trick of the light

A series of images captured this week by MRO's HiRISE camera have confirmed that the lander (red dot), heat shield, and parachute all sit within 1,000 feet of each other on a lava plain called Elysium Planitia. Previously, the space agency only knew they'd landed within an 81-mile ellipse (blue)

Each of the new images is a mosaic of several captures stitched together.

While the selfie, captured by the robotic arm, is a composite of 11 pictures, the workspace view includes 52 individual photos.

This is allowing scientists to get a good look at the area well before InSight starts putting down its instruments and digging into the ground.

'The near-absense of rocks, hills, and holes means it'll be extremely safe for our instruments,' said InSight's Principal Investigator Bruce Banerdt of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

'This might seem like a pretty plain piece of ground if it weren't on Mars, but we're glad to see that.'

NASA has confirmed the landing sites for InSight, its parachute, and other components thanks to new images from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter 

InSight previously sent back the first complete view of the 14-by-7-foot swath of land that will soon serve as its 'workspace,' indicated in the blue crescent. The team says it looks 'extremely safe'. Its parachute, back shell, and heat shield all landed about 1,000 feet away

Even Mars robots act like tourists every once in a while. NASA's new InSight lander has snapped its first selfie from the red planet, giving the mission team (and the rest of the world) a good look at its solar panels and deck now that it's settled in

Over the last week or so, InSight has sent back the first of its observations – including a clip of light passing over the surface, and recordings of Martian winds.

All of this comes as the lander and the team behind its operations prepare for it to begin work in the next few months.

For now, however, InSight is taking baby steps.

The lander flexed its 6-foot-long arm this week, snapping images of the terrain directly in front of it.

'By carefully swinging my arm out in front of me, I'm starting to get a better look at the ground in front of me where I'll be doing my work', the Nasa InSight account tweeted.

'Meanwhile, kind of hypnotized by the play of light and shadow on my arm'.  

'By carefully swinging my arm out in front of me, I'm starting to get a better look at the ground in front of me where I'll be doing my work', the Nasa InSight account tweeted this week. 'Meanwhile, kind of hypnotized by the play of light and shadow on my arm'. This effect can be seen in the clip above

The data collected by InSight's Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure (SEIS) in the months before it's moved onto the ground will eventually be used to cancel out background noises as it works to detect marsquakes

Just days prior, NASA revealed the InSight lander captured the sound of a Martian 'dust devil' during its first days on the red planet.

According to the space agency, this is the first time we've ever heard Martian winds.

The low rumble detected by InSight's sensors are estimated to be blowing between 10 to 15 mph (5 to 7 meters a second) from northwest to southeast – and, the recordings are within the range of human hearing.  

NASA says the sounds recorded on December 1 line up with dust devil streaks observed in the landing area.

The vibrations were recorded at a very low pitch, though those with sharp ears will be able to hear it as is, using headphones or subwoofers.

To make it clearer, NASA boosted the pitch by two octaves, making it audible on laptops and mobile devices.

The space agency shared a series of high-resolution photos captured this week. InSight will soon begin snapping images of the terrain directly in front of it, so the team can select the best location to drill down. The solar panel that will help power the machine is pictured

While InSight didn't set out to record Martian winds, specifically, the team says this type of data collection comes with the territory.

The lander detected wind vibrations with two of its sensors: one designed to measure air pressure, and with a seismometer on the deck.

'Capturing this audio was an unplanned treat,' says Bruce Banerdt, InSight principal investigator at NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab.

'But one of the things our mission is dedicated to is measuring motion on Mars, and naturally that includes motion caused by sound waves.'

According to the InSight team, the two different instruments recorded the noise in different ways.

While the Auxiliary Payload Sensor Subsystem's air pressure sensor recorded the vibrations directly, the seismometer picked up vibrations caused by the wind passing over the lander's solar panels.

The data collected by InSight's Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure (SEIS) in the months before it's moved onto the ground will eventually be used to cancel out background noises as it works to detect marsquakes.

Its short period (SP) silicon sensors can detect vibrations with frequencies of up to 50 hertz, which sits at the lower range of human hearing, NASA says.

'The InSight lander acts like a giant ear,' said Tom Pike, InSight science team member and sensor designed at Imperial College London.

'The solar panels on the lander's sides respond to pressure fluctuations of the wind.

'It's like InSight is cupping its ears and hearing the Mars wind beating on it. When we looked at the direction of the lander vibrations coming from the solar panels, it matches the expected wind direction at our landing site.'

InSight touched down in a region known as Elysium Planitia. Its location can be seen in the map above, not far from the landing site of the 2012 Curiosity mission, the last NASA probe to land on Mars

NASA's InSight lander has finally removed the lens cover from its cameras, allowing the robotic explorer to take its clearest pictures yet of its new home

The team has released both a raw, unaltered audio sample of the seismometer recording and a second version that's been raised two octaves to make it easier to hear.

For the latter, the APSS sample was sped up by a factor of 100.

According to the experts, the source of the sound is pretty straightforward; vibrations detected by the instruments are much like the air pressure changes you hear when a flag whips around in the wind.

'That's literally what sound is — changes in air pressure,' said Don Banfield InSight's science lead for APSS from Cornell University in Ithaca, New York.

'You hear that whenever you speak to someone across the room.'

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/}

05-02-2019 om 22:08 geschreven door peter  

When Worlds Collide: Scientists Spot Hint of a Giant Crash in Alien Solar System

05-02-2019 om 21:39 geschreven door peter  

World’s oldest pyramid discovered - and it ISN’T the Great Pyramid of Giza

A PYRAMID thought to be the oldest in the world has been discovered in Indonesia, and even predates the famous Great Pyramid of Giza.

"The structures are not only superficial but rooted into greater depth."

It is thought the layers were built up over a number of periods over millennia.

{ https://www.express.co.uk/ }

05-02-2019 om 21:27 geschreven door peter  

Magnetic north pole finally gets a much needed update

BY TIBI PUIU

Earth’s northern magnetic pole isn’t fixed but, rather, is in a perpetual motion driven by the movement of the planet’s liquid outer core. In the last couple of decades, scientists have noticed that the northern magnetic pole has been shifting away from the Canadian Arctic toward Siberia at an unprecedented rate. This anomalous variation has forced scientists at the National Centers for Environmental Information to publish their update to the World Magnetic Model (WMM) a year early in order to avoid significant inaccuracies in navigation and positioning. The WMM is used by everything from smartphones to the military.

The planet’s outer core is formed of liquid iron which constantly moves as the planet’s interior gradually cools down. This motion creates electric currents as electrons move through the liquid and, in the process, the energy of the fluid is converted into a magnetic field. If we imagined that Earth’s magnetic field is similar to a bar magnet (or dipole), then we can locate a geomagnetic north and south pole. However, this is an oversimplification of the complexity and variation of Earth’s true magnetic field.

Confusingly, scientists refer to the places where the planet’s magnetic field is vertical as the north and south magnetic poles. If you were standing over the north magnetic pole with a compass, the needle would dip and point towards the south pole, hence its other name: the magnetic dip pole. Over the south magnetic pole, the compass needle would try to point upward.

The northern dipole is roughly off the northwest coast of Greenland and its position has changed very little over the last century. The same can’t be said about the northern dip pole (true magnetic north pole), which has marched north by hundreds of miles in the last couple of decades. Up until the 1950s, the north magnetic pole had been moving at a rate of about 11 km (7 miles) per year but since the 1990s, this rate has jumped to about 54 km (34 miles) per year. Strangely, the south magnetic pole has shifted very little during this time.

Credit: University of Kyoto.

Scientists aren’t sure what causes this anomaly but the leading theory is that surges and flows in the swirl of liquid iron in the core are creating a tug between two magnetic patches: one under northern Canada and one under Siberia. The latter patch seems like its exerting more influence, hence the rapid shift of the magnetic north towards it.

Historically, the WMM has been updated every five years in order to keep up with these movements. The most recent update was scheduled for 2020 but researchers at the National Centers for Environmental Information — a collaboration between NOAA and the British Geological Survey — decided that it had to be released much sooner so as not to disrupt navigation, especially over the Arctic. The new model was pre-released online in October 2018 but its official release was delayed by a 35-day government shutdown. It’s only recently, after President Trump temporarily lifted the shutdown on January 25, that the WMM has finally been updated. 

The new model has the North Pole a good 25 miles away from the one previously predicted. This gross discrepancy means that updates in the future will have to be made much more often than before, preferably yearly. But while the WMM is also incorporated by things like Google Maps, regular folks shouldn’t worry too much since the north magnetic pole’s movements aren’t all that important for latitudes below 55 degrees.

{ https://www.zmescience.com/ }

05-02-2019 om 21:08 geschreven door peter  

A fossil hunter found a “golden cannonball” rock on a beach, and when he opened it, he discovered an ancient fossil dating back 185 million years. Aaron Smith discovered the rock covered in iron pyrite while he was exploring Sandsend Beach in Yorkshire, England. Interestingly enough, the 22-year-old already has a huge collection of fossils that he found.

These pyritic concretions – or cannonballs – are often found in shales along the Yorkshire coastline. They get their “golden cannonball” name because of the smooth polished finish of the pyritic crust which appears to be a golden color when it’s polished.

Since Mr. Smith has been collecting fossils for a while, he had a hunch that the rock may have a fossil inside of it and that’s when he opened it to find a spiral-shaped cleviceras fossil inside which is a form of ammonite. Cleviceras are an extinct genus of cephalopod which once belonged to the Hildoceritidae family during the Jurassic period. The most commonly known cephalopods from the present time are octopuses and squids.

These ancient sea creatures lived between 240 and 65 million years ago before becoming wiped out along with the dinosaurs. Ammonites fed on starfish, small marine creatures, and other small crustaceans like shrimp. They moved in a similar manner as our modern-day squid by using a tube located near their mouth that squirted water.

Cephalopods are hardly found as fossils as they do not have a hard shell, which is why fossils like cleviceras and ammonites are often found perfectly preserved in the limestone core of the cannonballs which protects them.

Mr. Smith posted a video online of his discovery. He said, “It still impresses me that these 185 million-year-old fossils are along our beautiful Yorkshire Coastline waiting to be found.” He went on to explain how much he loves searching for fossils by saying, “I go fossil hunting twice a week when I’m at home from university. Fossil hunting is a hobby of mine, or perhaps more like a serious passion.”

He explained that he got into fossil hunting because his dad was interested in it. “I remember very distinctly searching for our very first ammonite, when we cracked it open we were all so excited! This lit the fire for our future passion to develop,” adding, “Often we can tell that a rock contains a fossil because you can see the edge of the fossil around the outside of the rock.”

Click here to see a video as well as pictures of Aaron Smith’s discovery.

A fossil hunter has uncovered a 185-year-old fossil after cracking open a 'golden cannonball' limestone rock on a beach in Yorkshire. Aaron Smith spotted the rock coated in iron pyrite while exploring Sandsend Beach and realised it showed signs that it contained a fossil

Footage shows Aaron Smith, 22, opening the cannonball-shaped rock to reveal the palm-sized Elegantericeras inside before closing it up again. He regularly searches for fossils on the beach nearby his home and has built up a huge collection

The golden cannonballs are given their name because the pyritic crust's smooth polished finish can appear golden when polished

WHAT ARE AMMONITES?

Ammonites (artist's impression) sported a ribbed spiral-form shell, and lived between 240-65 million years ago

Ammonites are perhaps the most widely known fossil, particularly in the UK where hundreds are dug up along the Jurassic Coast every year.

The ancient sea creatures sported a ribbed spiral-form shell, and lived between 240-65 million years ago, when they were wiped out along with the dinosaurs.

Ammonites were cephalopods; their nearest living relatives are animals like squid, octopus and cuttlefish.

They ate starfish, small crustaceans such as shrimp and other small marine creatures, using their tentacles to probe the seafloor before snapping up prey.

The creatures moved using jet propulsion via a tube near their mouth that squirted water, much like some species of modern squid.

{ https://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

05-02-2019 om 20:51 geschreven door peter  

Archaeologists working in the Sahara have published their findings outlining the discovery of mysterious stone structures found scattered throughout the world’s largest desert. The structures come in various shapes and forms and appear to date back thousands of years, although researchers still aren’t sure when they were build or what their purpose may have been.

“The archaeological map of Western Sahara remains literally and figuratively almost blank as far as the wider international archaeological research community is concerned, particularly away from the Atlantic coast,” write the University of East Anglia’s Joanne Clarke and independent researcher Nick Brooks, authors of a new book outlining their work studying these unknown and mysterious structures. Clarke and Brooks spent the better part of a decade studying these structures between 2002 and 2009 and have cataloged hundreds of them ranging from straight lines to rectangular platforms to giant circles or crescents. One structure appears to be a combination of smaller forms including lines, stone circles, and platforms, forming a structure over 2,000 feet (600 meters) long.

Some of the structures are thought to mark the location of graves, although most of the structures remain a complete mystery until further research can be conducted. Due to security concerns, however, archaeologists are unable to venture into the area due to the fact that terrorist groups like al-Qaeda operate in the region and are known to kidnap outsiders. For now, these structures will remain an enigma until the Western Sahara can be effectively secured.

While we’re just beginning to scratch the surface of what may lie beneath the shifting sands of the Sahara, these preliminary discoveries only further highlight how many chapters of hidden or unknown history may have been lost to the sands of time. The Sahara is full of mysterious ruins like these stone structures which hint at long-lost knowledge and civilizations. Could the Washington Monument or Eiffel Tower one day fall into ruin only for the historians of the future to puzzle over?

What will future archaeologists make of these ruins near Tunisia?

Perhaps the sonnet “Ozymandias” (1818) by Percy Bysshe Shelley can sum it up best:

I met a traveller from an antique land

Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone

Stand in the desert… near them, on the sand,

Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,

And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,

Tell that its sculptor well those passions read

Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,

The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed;

And on the pedestal these words appear:

‘My name is Ozymandias, king of kings;

Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!’

Nothing beside remains. Round the decay

Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare

The lone and level sands stretch far away.

What will the historians of the future make of our crumbling, irradiated stone and metal structures after we’re vaporized to dust?

{ https://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

05-02-2019 om 20:26 geschreven door peter  

NASA probes ANTARCTICA ANOMALY sparking shock ancient FROZEN CITY claim

NASA investigated a strange anomaly below the ice of Antarctica, which could also reveal an ancient civilisation, a bombshell documentary claimed.

05-02-2019 om 18:17 geschreven door peter  

Image Credit:

• Image via commons.wikimedia.org

News Source:

• motherboard.vice.com
• fas.org
• unknowncountry.com

{ http://www.unknowncountry.com/ }

05-02-2019 om 17:41 geschreven door peter  

Harvard's top astronomer says an alien ship may be among us - and he doesn't care what his colleagues think

Since publishing his controversial paper, Avi Loeb has run a nearly nonstop media circuit, embracing the celebrity that comes from being perhaps the most academically distinguished E.T. enthusiast of his time. This has some of his peers grumbling.

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CAMBRIDGE, Mass. - Before he started the whole alien-spaceship thing last year, the chairman of Harvard University's astronomy department was known for public lectures on modesty. Personal modesty, which Avi Loeb said he learned growing up on a farm. And what Loeb calls "cosmic modesty" - the idea that it's arrogant to assume we are alone in the universe, or even that we're a particularly special species.

You can find a poster for one of these lectures in Loeb's office today, though it's a bit lost among the clutter: photos of Loeb posing under the dome of Harvard's enormous 19th-century telescope; thank-you notes from elementary schoolchildren; a framed interview he gave The New York Times in 2014; his books on the formation of galaxies; his face, again and again - a bespectacled man in his mid-50s with a perpetually satisfied smile.

Loeb stands beside his desk on the first morning of spring courses in a creaseless suit, stapling syllabi for his afternoon class. He points visitors to this and that on the wall. He mentions that four TV crews were in this office on the day in the fall when his spaceship theory went viral, and now five film companies are interested in making a movie about his life.

A neatly handwritten page of equations sits on the desk, on the edge closest to the guest chairs.

"Oh, this is something I did last night," Loeb says. It's a calculation, he explains, supporting his theory that an extraterrestrial spacecraft, or at least a piece of one, may at this moment be flying past the orbit of Jupiter.

Since publishing his controversial paper, Loeb has run a nearly nonstop media circuit, embracing the celebrity that comes from being perhaps the most academically distinguished E.T. enthusiast of his time - the top Harvard astronomer who suspects technology from another solar system just showed up at our door. And this, in turn, has left some of his peers nonplussed - grumbling at what they see as a flimsy theory or bewildered as to why Harvard's top astronomer won't shut up about aliens.

What you can't call Loeb is a crank. When astronomers in Hawaii stumbled across the first known interstellar object in late 2017 - a blip of light moving so fast past the sun that it could only have come from another star - Loeb had three decades of Ivy League professorship and hundreds of astronomical publications on his résumé, mostly to do with the nature of black holes and early galaxies and other subjects far from any tabloid shelf.

So when seemingly every astronomer on the planet was trying to figure out how the interstellar object (dubbed 'Oumuamua, Hawaiian for "scout") got to our remote patch of Milky Way, Loeb's extraordinarily confident suggestion that it probably came from another civilization could not be easily dismissed.

"Considering an artificial origin, one possibility is that 'Oumuamua" - pronounced Oh-mooah-mooah - "is a lightsail, floating in interstellar space as a debris from an advanced technological equipment," Loeb wrote with his colleague Shmuel Bialy in Astrophysical Journal Letters in November - thrilling E.T. enthusiasts and upsetting the fragile orbits of space academia.

" 'Oumuamua is not an alien spaceship, and the authors of the paper insult honest scientific inquiry to even suggest it," tweeted Paul Sutter, an astrophysicist at Ohio State University, shortly after the paper published.

"A shocking example of sensationalist, ill-motivated science," theoretical astrophysicist Ethan Siegel wrote in Forbes. North Carolina State University astrophysicist Katie Mack suggested Loeb was trolling for publicity. "Sometimes you write a paper about something that you don't believe to be true at all, just for the purpose of putting out there," she told the Verge.

Most scientists besides Loeb assume 'Oumuamua is some sort of rock, be it an asteroid ejected from some star in meltdown hundreds of millions of years ago, or an icy comet wandering the interstellar void. But it's moving too fast for an inert rock, Loeb points out - zooming away from the sun as if something is pushing it from behind. And if it's a comet spewing jets of steam, the limited observations astronomers made of it showed no sign.

Loeb argues that 'Oumuamua's behavior means it can't be, as is commonly imagined, a clump of rock shaped like a long potato, but rather an object that's very long and no more than 1 millimeter thick, perhaps like a kilometer-long obloid pancake - or a ship sail - so light and thin that sunlight is pushing it out of our solar system.

And while he's not saying it's definitely aliens, he is saying he can't think of anything other than aliens that fits the data. And he's saying that all over international news.

"Many people expected once there would be this publicity, I would back down," Loeb says. "If someone shows me evidence to the contrary, I will immediately back down."

In the meantime, he's doubling down, hosting a Reddit AMA on "how the discovery of alien life in space will transform our life," and constantly emailing his "friends and colleagues" with updates on all the reporters who are speaking to him.

In a matter of months, Loeb has become a one-man alternative to the dirge of terrestrial news.

"It changes your perception on reality, just knowing that we're not alone," he says. "We are fighting on borders, on resources ... It would make us feel part of planet Earth as a civilization rather than individual countries voting on Brexit."

So now he is famous, styling himself as a truth-teller and risk-taker in an age of overly conservative, quiescent scientists.

"The mainstream approach [is] you can sort of drink your coffee in the morning and expect what you will find later on. It's a stable lifestyle, but for me it resembles more the lifestyle of a business person rather than scientists," he says.

"The worst thing that can happen to me is I would be relieved of my administrative duties, and that would give me even more time to focus on science," Loeb adds. " All the titles I have, I can dial them back. In fact, I can dial myself back to the farm."

Loeb grew up in an Israeli farming village. He would sit in the hills and read philosophy books imagining the broader universe, he says, a fascination that led him into academia and all the way to 'Oumuamua.

"I don't have a class system in my head of academia being the elite," he says, as he leads a reporter into the locked chamber of the Great Refractor - an enormous 19th-century telescope where he sometimes does photo ops. "I see it as a continuation of childhood curiosity - trying to understand what the world is like."

He joined Princeton University's Institute for Advanced Study in the late 1980s ("Where Einstein used to be," he notes) and later took a junior position in Harvard's astronomy department, where "for 20 years no one had been promoted from within ... They tenured me after three years.")

As he tells it, his life story sounds like a cerebral version of "Forrest Gump" - Loeb always singemindedly pursuing his science and intersecting with the giants of the field, whom he regularly name-drops. Stephen Hawking had dinner at his house. Stephen Spielberg once asked him for movie tips. Russian billionaire Uri Milner once walked into his office and sat on the couch and asked him to help design humanity's first interstellar spaceship - which he is now doing, with a research budget of $100 million and the endorsement of Mark Zuckerberg and the late Hawking.

Loeb mentions casually that when he was 24 years old he got a private audience with the famed physicist Freeman Dyson - and then pauses for effect beneath the 20-foot shaft of the Great Refractor, grinning until he realizes the reporter doesn't know who Freeman Dyson is.

At midday, Loeb leaves the telescope and his office and descends to a bare white classroom to introduce the basics of astrophysics to a dozen new students.

If he's mastered the national news interview by now, his lecture begins a bit stilted. He looks down at the table as he speaks. He asks the freshmen at this most prestigious of universities to go around the table and list their hobbies.

Ten minutes later, Loeb goes off script.

"Did anyone hear the name 'Oumuamua?" he asks. "What did it mean?"

Almost everyone nods, and freshman Matt Jacobsen, who came to Harvard from an Iowa farm town, volunteers quietly: "There was speculation that it was from another civilization."

"Who made that speculation?" Loeb asks, smiling.

There's an awkward silence in the room, and then Jacobsen cries, "Was it you? Oh my gosh!" and the professor smiles wider.

peter2011

{ https://newsnite.org/ }

05-02-2019 om 16:36 geschreven door peter  

Ten Earthquakes Strike the Coast of Northern California in Less Than 24 Hours | Is the “Big One” Coming?

Ten earthquakes of preliminary magnitudes between 3.0 and 4.5 struck off the coast of Northern California between Saturday and Sunday, the United States Geological Survey reports.

The series of earthquakes rumbled beneath the Pacific Ocean, between 3 miles and 27 miles west of Petrolia in Humboldt County.

The first earthquake struck early Saturday morning at a magnitude of 4.3, while a second earthquake, of 3.2 magnitude, rumbled about 30 minutes later. Three additional earthquakes hit between 4:30 p.m. and 5:38 p.m. Saturday in the same area, registering magnitudes between 2.9 and 3.6, USGS reported. A 3.0-magnitude earthquake struck that night, at 11:37 p.m.

The geological activity continued into Sunday. USGS reported four earthquakes near Petrolia between 2:18 p.m. and 4:05 p.m. The earthquakes ranged in magnitude from 3.4 to 4.5.

More than 240 people, from Mendocino to McKinleyville, said they felt the 4.5-magnitude earthquake that struck Sunday at 2:18 p.m., according to the USGS’s online “Felt Report” page.

There was no initial word on damage or injury resulting from the quakes. The National Weather Service office in Eureka said Sunday afternoon there was no tsunami danger.

If you live in California, you’ll know the Big One is coming: 

a powerful earthquake of up to magnitude eight is headed for the state. Energy has been building up along the San Andreas Fault for more than a century. No-one knows exactly when or where, but that one day that energy will be unleashed.

It might strike at the heart of San Francisco, last devastated by a Big One in 1906. Or maybe it will tear through southern California like the magnitude 7.9 quake that hit in 1857 and ruptured some 225 miles of the San Andreas Fault.

More than 100 years on, it’s hard to predict exactly how hard the next Big One will hit. John Vidale, director of the Southern California Earthquake Center and affiliate professor at the University of Washington, told Newsweek it won’t look like in the movies—cities won’t collapse into rubble and tsunamis probably won’t sweep through California. But without adequate preparations, the Big One could “cripple” the finances of a state that just became the fifth largest economy in the world.

What exactly is a “Big One,” and where could such an earthquake hit?

A tectonic boundary between the North American and the Pacific plates cuts through California. It’s a big fault where the two sides are moving three or four centimeters a year sideways. Strain builds up for one or two hundred years along that boundary, and then finally that strain becomes so great that the fault can’t take it anymore. It breaks and moves 15 ft or so all at once, causing an earthquake.

There’s three, four, five sections, to this fault—and many other faults running in parallel—but we worry about a Big One striking in the north or in the south of the San Andreas. There’s a part between north and south in central California that seems act like a buffer. There’s some chance a rupture could go end-to-end, but we think it’s either unlikely or that it just doesn’t happen.

How often do these massive earthquakes hit?

It’s every few hundred years. The earthquakes that have happened in the meantime are still devastating to a local area, but instead of magnitude eight, they’re more like magnitude seven. It’s a logarithmic scale, so an eight has about 30 times more energy than a magnitude seven.

Don’t smaller quakes help to dissipate some of the energy that’s building up deep underground?

Those little earthquakes let out only a tiny amount of energy compared to the big ones. It would take 10 magnitude seven earthquakes to let out the strain of a magnitude eight. We don’t have that many, so those little earthquakes hardly slow the big ones at all.

Does that mean the next big one is inevitable?

That’s right. When we look at the history of the fault, we can see these big earthquakes have happened many times over the last few thousand years, so yeah, it’s an inevitability. We just don’t know if it’s going to be now or two hundred years from now.

What kind of impact would a northern or southern California Big One have?

The impact of the northern big one would be tremendous—I mean the San Andreas runs right through San Francisco. It’s quite a lot closer to San Francisco than it is to Los Angeles.

Downtown San Francisco is vulnerable—some of the oldest buildings survived the shaking back in 1906, but that doesn’t mean they’d be safe in the next earthquake by any means. Many of the buildings are built close to the fault and on kind of soft ground that might liquify.

A southern Big One would likely strike a little further away from the heart of Los Angeles, so the impact might be smaller. On the other hand LA has a lot more stuff to break than San Francisco—a lot of it is pretty old. So I think the net expectation is similar north and south. The fault is further away in the South, but it’s also riper, more ready, to go than the one in the north.

More generally, there’s a lot of disasters that come from the strong shaking of an earthquake. It would certainly cause landslides, and conceivably chemical spills. We’re also concerned about fires.

What about tsunamis?

Tsunamis aren’t a big worry here. For an earthquake to make a tsunami it would have to be offshore—not be on the main part of the San Andreas. The ground would move sideways, not so much vertically as in other places, and it’s hard to make a big wave moving sideways. But a lot of other things could happen.

When the Tōhoku earthquake hit Japan in 2011, it caused a disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. Are there are any nuclear reactors at risk from a Big One in California?

Not around here—there’s one up by San Onofre but it’s been turned off. There’s been a lot of debate about nuclear reactors. Engineers argue they can make reactors safe, but there have been enough accidents over the years that for safety’s sake they are tending not to build them in most places anymore.

If infrastructure doesn’t rebound, what effects will this have on California?

It’s certainly in the realm of possibility that the earthquake causes something that cripples the economy for a long time. Nobody expected the Fukushima reactor to be a dominant problem in Japan’s 2011 earthquake, for example. There’s always a small chance of some very serious unexpected problems.

It’s also possible that a big earthquake might have less effect than we expect. It’s just very hard to predict.

The Big One is worrisome for the government because it disrupts a large area. But for individuals, the moderate-size earthquakes that are right under our feet are often the worst threat.

Los Angeles, for example is filled with faults, and many of them could have a magnitude seven earthquake. A magnitude seven on a smaller fault might well do more damage than the Big One on the San Andreas. The Big One is only part of the danger here.

• https://amg-news.com/breaking-ten-earthquakes-strike-the-coast-of-northern-california-in-less-than-24-hours-is-the-big-one-coming/

{ https://beforeitsnews.com/v3/ }

05-02-2019 om 16:07 geschreven door peter