The space race had seemed a bit pointless. The first orbiting satellites were mainly there to demonstrate the capability of the carrying rockets – whose real task was to deliver missiles to whoever was deemed to be the enemy. Jodrell Bank became famous not by detecting the first Sputnik – anyone with a radio could…
The Mississippi valley had once been densely inhabited, but it was so no longer. The Indian cultures had been decimated by disease; their lands were emptied and their villages deserted. The area had just become US property, and American settlers were moving in but it was still early days, here on the western frontier, in…
A repost from 2013, written by Henrik Located some 60 km NNW of Naples in the Campanian province of Caserta lies the medieval town of Roccamonfina, cradling the slopes of an old stratovolcano, considered extinct since its last eruption was at least 50,000 years ago. Roccamonfina is famous for its cuisine based on chestnuts and…
When the ground starts to rise beneath your feet, it is time to sit up. Fishermen would be the first to notice, being unable to leave their harbours due to lack of sea. Governments would discuss the risk of reduction in tax income from fishing, and would commission research. The scientists report evidence of widespread…
It rains a lot in British Columbia. Here is where the Pacific Ocean dumps its excess moisture. The mountains are covered with trees; the lichen-covered branches drip in the seemingly perpetual rain or drizzle. The summers are mild and dry but don’t last long enough. The everlasting days soon end, and the autumn rains and…
The signs are everywhere. In some places, huge stones are found lying on the land, in a place where no rock exists. In other places, deep scratches in the stony surface, all pointing in one direction. U-shaped valleys are found in hills, a shape which rivers don’t do. To the readers of the landscape, it…
It was a spring without voices. On the mornings that had once throbbed with the dawn chorus of robins, catbirds, doves, jays, wrens, and scores of other bird voices there was now no sound; only silence lay over the fields and woods and marsh. (From Rachel Carson: Silent Spring) The history of life on earth…
Volcanoes affect life. That is as true for volcanoholics as it is for other life forms. As Bjarki pointed out, the puffins on Bogoslof are not going to be impressed, when returning to their nesting holes to find them all gone, blown up to bits or filled with ash and lava. They will be affected…
Volcanoes are the tip of an iceberg. 90% of the volcano is hidden, down to the magma chamber 10 km or more below the surface. What we see is only the cone on top of the conduit. The perfect cone of Fuji, or even St Helens (before it blew up), is like the hat on…
Child The volcano towers; forms a mountain sublime Build by eruptions and matured over time But a new site is feeding from its magma supply A small mountain is trying to reach for the sky The volcano watches a new cone unfold Child of its magma. New life to behold The little volcano plays with…