Portents of Doom

A guest post by Tallis Rockwell

If you go to Daily Mail or some other tabloid magazine, you will see the next apocalyptic event popular within the media, whether it is Yellowstone, World war 3, or an asteroid that is getting a little close. Not a lot of people take global catastrophe seriously and it easy to see why with it happening every year in magazines. The media loves catastrophes, and the public is beginning to mix up the scientist’s words with the media’s words. Climate change is legitimate science but the media dirties it with ridiculous statements and a focus on politics rather than the environment or the science.

People love hype, they love to build things up, and they do this for wars and other disasters because they have never experienced a true disaster, one where you barely have time to prepare or one where no can help you. Could you imagine the reaction of the people of Indonesia if someone wrote an article about a future Mega-tsunami? What about the people of Iraq with the threats of large scale bombing? They would take these articles seriously because they have experienced these disasters and be angry that it was just soulless clickbait.

This just shows that the public and the government does not take global catastrophe seriously even with climate change but as scientists, we take them very seriously because we know how frequent they are and just how many the machination of men will cause. Soldiers, victims of hurricanes and tornadoes, and scientist take these portents of doom seriously because we know either through experience or knowledge just how terrible they are.

Doom is not imminent but it is foreseeable and people can’t see the bigger picture What if Mt. Aso decides to produce a high end VEI 7? What if Iceland decides to throw us a mini flood basalt? What about non hyperbolic climate change? All of these are legitimate threats but people see them nothing more than clickbait.

People really think that modern society is an unmovable pillar that will stand through whatever nature or even God would throw at it as seen through ridiculously optimistic sci fi shows like star trek. I am a true nihilist and if people can’t take these threars seriously and if the media continues in saying ridiculous garbage, we are never going to walk on Mars surface.

The past

History is full of catastrophe and the overcoming of that pain to build the society we live in now, history is more important then most people give it credit for. Imagine the feeling of fear from the men who fought in World war 2 for the Allies to win and in the next 20 years some one will say “What does that have to do with me?” while doing their homework.

A VEI 7 is going to happen sometime in the future and as much as I would like to ramble about its effects, I am sure you all know just how bad it could get so I am going to move on. People in western society have lost their strength and are detached from reality and that reality is that this level of comfort can’t last forever.Life was never supposed to be easy whether God exists or not. This society wasn’t built on pleasure and the only way to push forward into true progress is with pain. As bad as everything that might happen and what is going tohappen will be, it won’t be the end of the world and will only be the end of us if we let it.

The Present

If one wants to look at the future all you have to do is look at the past and present. Pesticides are poisoning the soil, plastics are poisoning the ocean, the air is being pumped full of emissions. This isn’t a threat to the comfort of modern society yet so no one will fight it. Comfort is the dominant thought on the people’s mind and if doesn’t threaten it yet then why worry? You can see this with sweatshops in foreign countries, as long as people get their iphones for cheap and they don’t see any pictures who cares?

The future is shown to be full of hope and the delusion of strength resonates within western society. The next season of Game of thrones takes paramount instead of real world issues, this way of thinking has been around for hundreds of years and will not leave until things start going wrong and by that point it will be too late.

The messengers of these threats are focused on making money or becoming famous like Al gore. They have been making headlines like “There is only 5 years to save the Earth.” for forty years. They are the ones who get the coverage. I take portents of doom very seriously and the reaction from the media and the public is the most insulting thing I can think of.

I am sorry this has been a little grim especially for my first post but I have been needing to get that off my chest, I am not what you would call the most stable of individuals . Please tell me what you think down below.

76 thoughts on “Portents of Doom

  1. You remind me of what I was like at the beginning of last year

      • And I will continue to do so, ive been doing some research on kilauea again….

        >:D

        • Honestly, with all the stuff you read about Hawaii you should really write an article about it. This would be a nice summary of the Hawaii volcanism that will be saved, in the comment section all your knowledge is more or less lost. Plus, if you mention one of your forecasts in an article it gives a bit more weight to it and the comment section may be cleaner :p

          With Kilauea being at rest right now it would be a very good moment as well!

          • I have been considering that, though I have to carefully consider what I say then because as of now I have been a bit inconsistent and have changed a lot of my theories with new information. I only recently concluded through research and completing outlines of old eruptions on google earth that eruptions like last year are probably not all that unusual for the area at all, and that historical observation is not likely to help much with forecasting, for example… I understand that HVO have to adhere to strict data which is why they compare to poorly analogous events like 1924 but in some cases this is too limiting and I think this will not be of any use for what kilauea is going to do this century. If anything mauna loa taking over again is the best case scenario in my future prediction…

  2. Interesting post Tallis, always good to have new contributors.

    I personally suspect the next catastrophe awaiting mankind will be biological in nature.
    Viruses work and evolve on a much shorter timescale than climate, geology or the orbits of sparsely spread cosmic bodies. Except for the ultra unlikely scenario of causing some kind of zombie like rage. “Bugs” really don’t make for “Tabloid Sexy Armageddon” in the same way exploding volcanoes, bolides or mega tsunami do, but a combination of modern population density and our poor defences against a novel, easily commutable, virus mean they are probably our biggest immediate threat.

    On an entirely different note and dropping down from global catastrophe to first world inconvenience – The EQ’s at Surtsey caught my eye. Does anyone know how stable (or not) the Surtsey edifice is? I’d imagine a prolonged eruption at Surtsey interacting with sea water will cause a few headaches for the airline business?

      • Working fourty years in life/medical science. Some old friends doing virus monitoring in outbacks round the world. Some really scary virus out there that kill humans now and then but can spread only from other hosts and not between humans. Takes some more mutations to fix that. BUT, I can asure you that modern scientists will very quickly be able to track new virus/ epidemics, identify spreading paths and therefore be able to limit epidemics. Vaccines or other curing treatments is another business. May take time!!

        • Once on the radar, i imagine containment to be feasible with viruses that are not extremely commutable, especially if they are also quickly symptomatic. As you say, tracking is viable as an antibody based assay for detection should be develop-able on a reasonably short time-frame.
          The nightmare would be something that is as easily spread as say a Norovirus or Rhinovirus, doubly so if it has a long incubation period. A scenario like that could be a case of the horse having bolted way before anyone is even remotely aware of there being a stable door left open.
          In either scenario, the quarantine procedures required for full containment would make for a level of disruption not seen since world war II. E.g. consider that a country like the UK is not self sufficient in either food or energy, the consequences of a full travel ban is genuinely scary.

    • I think its quite probable, possibly inevitable, that something will come along and curb the insane increase in the human population. Humans are quite good at doing it themselves and conflict is occurring as we speak where populations have grown way beyond carrying capacity.

      I Have said this multiple times before but its always perceived that famine causes war whereas mostly its the other way round. Have a large population of men with no work and no food and hand them food and a gun and you have your supercheap army. You can see this all over the world. Just look at how populations have grown in the last 70 years in conflict areas and make your own judgement.

      One example, you can find your own everywhere:
      GAZA Pop 1950 250k, pop 1980 450k, pop 2019 1900k. Still growing fast. No work, no food, no prospects but plenty of cannon-fodder produced annually.

      Failing that a global pandemic will result in the collapse of industrial society, no fuel, no pesticides no fertilisers and world food production will plummet by a factor of about 4. This may not even feed the survivors as they will not be able to access limited food supplies.

      Back to the middle ages, folks.

      • The containment of the human population has already happened – it’s called Good Healthcare and Education and Living Standards. Soon as you apply that, boom: people stop making so many babies. Hence Denmark and Japan getting all riled up about dropping population, and how on earth will the economy (that is based entirely on endless ‘growth’) will cope.

  3. Over the years, several times I have found myself in a conversation with others in which the topic was “What is the greatest threat to humanity right now”.
    My answer has never changed.
    Convenience.
    I think it is self-explanatory.

  4. I live in Eugene Oregon, and we have known for some time that this area is subject to periodic devastating subduction earthquakes about every 300 years; the last one was in 1700. This undeniable fact is being used to sell all sorts of things, from building retrofitting to disaster kits, to political agendas, designed for a disaster of lesser magnitude. Americans really think they can personally, and as a nation, buy their way out of disasters, and it is particularly comforting to the ego, and lucrative for the fear mongers, to think you can buy your way out of super disasters.. Fear is a powerful marketing tool.

    • Unfortunately, a lot of the most expensive “disasters”, especially in the developed world, are self-inflicted.

      In Eugene, you are probably pretty safe from the next Cascadia subduction zone tsunami, but there is a 100% chance that the low-lying coastal areas are going to be wiped out eventually. It is insane that people are living in an area where there is a 100% chance of it being wiped out.

      On Hawai’i, anything north of Mauna Kea and the Waliuku River is probably a fairly safe bet but pretty much everything else to the south of that is virtually guaranteed to be inundated at some point.

      In California, people build multi-million dollar homes on the side of a cliffs or in coastal valleys that were LITERALLY formed by mudslides and then are shocked when there are mudslides.

      In Houston after Hurricane Harvey the majority of the most serious flooding damage was in areas where city planners and developers made a bet on the risk based on a flood plane map made before hundreds (or thousands) of square kilometers of already flat swamp land was paved over.

      Anyone living in or near an evergreen forest should never be surprised by a fire They periodically happen and always will. Forrest communities should have at least a 1000 meter fire break outside the city as a buffer. Individuals with homes in an evergreen forest need to keep their property maintained (free of most trees and brush near structures and needles and other fire fuel cleaned up).

      Before the wind had even died down they were already “vowing to rebuild” in Florida in an area that was completely wiped out by Hurricane Michael. News flash…it will happen again.

      I could go on and on.

      We need to quit encouraging and even subsidizing stupidity.

      • That “vowing to rebuild” thing isn’t playing with the Government. There is already a moratorium against building efforts until a new assessment can be conducted. For now, the big gnashing of teeth on the news is to get damage and structures unfit for occupation torn down to get rid of the eyesore.

        “Like several other Bay County communities, the city had put a moratorium on new construction projects. During the ban, officials are assessing their land, development and building regulations, including the codes that govern requirements for wind load speed and base flood elevation.”

        https://www.ocala.com/news/20181210/2-months-after-michael-mexico-beach-plans-for-new-normal

        Essentially, anything new is gonna have to be up on sticks. (Pilings)

      • I know I’m living too far inland to be wiped out by a tsunami but the entire population of the central valleys from Vancouver BC to Eureka, millions of people, is living in an area likely in the near future to be hit by an earthquake that will destroy roads and bridges, trigger massive landslides, destroy water lines, collapse or render uninhabitable most buildings, sever gas lines.. if it happens in the summer, Eugene, a town of wood-frame houses interspersed with conifers, will burn. So will Medford, Roseburg, Salem, Portland, Vancouver WA, Centralia, Olympia, Tacoma, Seattle… Maybe the majority of people can escape the flames on rubble-clogged streets. How long is it going to be before any disaster aid reaches us? If ever; the disaster capabilities of the USA were severely strained by Katrina.

    • “…This undeniable fact is being used to sell all sorts of things…”

      But the only PROVEN sure fire way to avoid injury?

      “Don’t be there.” And depending on your mobility, is only as expensive as you wish it to be.

  5. well this will come as a surprise to some: Eat, Drink and be Merry, for tomorrow (or the next day, or the next or …. : ) Systems work and dinosaurs die or adapt and survive….. and we are part of the system. So we will die or adapt and survive like the rest of creation. The unadaptable will get out of the way of those going forward. Do all deserve to survive? i’m very glad i don’t have to fight my way thu dinosaurs to check the mail box. Do i believe in culling the undesirable? Never…. natural processes will accomplish that very conviently. No one has the right or the intelligence to decide who ‘goes forward’. Go to extreme measures to secure your life and whatever you do, you cannot live past Your lifetime. In the short run (read our individual lifetimes) what can we do to lessen the dark certainty of death for us all? Live while You can… Love as much as possible…. and be Kind to the next person who faces the same fate as You. Remember; You are not alone. You can give kindness. It’s going to get dark…. and should we all cower in the darkness? Why not light that candle anyway. Let there be light. Let there be laughter. Make Your life count for the Best! no matter the future, motsfo

  6. The actual climate change is going that slow humans don’t notice. But if you would know where to look you can easily see the proces.
    Bugs till Christmas are an example.
    But how to actually make the masses step into a different market model where everyone would decide to chose for the least harmfull solution.
    The masses aren’t accepting the next steps required to support a transit to sustainable energy sources, higher taxes on road fuel. The French yellow jersy mouvement is a good sign a critical level has reached, at least in rural Europe. The richer north understands and accepts till now.
    Politics are also quite narrowminded and inconsistent. Example is the fossil fuel lobby is still allowed to promote their products.
    Pollution prevention is one of those domains where a critical mass has been reached to enforce and accept regulations. Mostly due people starting to correlate their never ending respiratory agitation with the air pollution.

    • And that’s the thing. “The Masses” are not here for the meddling and interference of the self chosen elite. If they want to lead, then do it by example. Don’t give us some two-faced dog and pony show bleating about how things need to be done in order to fit their pet worldview.

      Though I am a bit long winded about “Homo-Stultus” we are not incapable of adapting. After all, we did learn about herding and pastoral management from the dogs ancestral wolves. So though “stupid” we are not total waste cases.

    • Let’s not kid ourselves, certainly we can all do better but the US and Europe have actually already been declining in overall CO2 emissions for a while. In the history of history there has never been anything remotely on the scale of what China is now producing annually.

      The real CO2 imbalance started about the time that China, and to a lesser extent, India began to seriously industrialize. China in particular is fueled by massive amounts of cheap coal.

      Yes, I know it is not “fair” that China and the rest of the developing world still produce less per capita. The per capita statistic is irrelevant to the calculation of the overall atmospheric loading of CO2.

      China is, by far, the biggest problem and that there will not be a meaningful decline until a viable cheap alternative energy source can be implemented there.

      • Good luck with that. It sort of depends on how many more billions are shoveled down the perpetual “Just 15 years away!” fusion hole.

        Mature fission technology has been stymied by self serving oil concerns and potentially cleaner and more efficient research “died on the vine,” much like the superior Alpha 21164 RISC processor from Digital died as soon as Compaq/HP got a hold of it.

      • It’s easy to point fingers at China, but who consumes all the stuff they produce? A lot of China’s production exists only because of our desire in the western world to buy cheap stuff. Also many companies like to place their production lines in China because it’s cheap. Sure, the pollution happens there, so why should I care. I drive an electric car powered by nuclear, water and wind power from the Swedish grid…

        • It is not pointing fingers, it is just a fact. China and the developing world account for practically all of the increase in CO2 in the past 20 years. If atmospheric CO2 loading is truly the emergency/catastrophic/earth ending factor, then stopping it is literally the ONLY solution. Period.

          The “why” it is happening in China or anywhere else is no more relevant to the discussion than the per-capita argument. Those are among the arguments that are used as distractions by the media and politicians to blame others and further their own twisted agendas.

          Certainly, if the western world drastically reduced the buying cheap goods from China tomorrow the impact to the trajectory of the global CO2 loading would be immediate. A corresponding imploded China economy and a global supply chain and financial system in chaos would probably follow that particularly drastic choice. That would not be my choice, but, it is a choice and for those who think that immediately reducing CO2 really is an emergency, those are the types of consequences that you need to be OK with. Reality news flash, that is simply not going to happen.

          The bottom line is, absent a catastrophic global disruption from a large-scale war or from a 100+ Mt of atmospheric SO2 loading from a VEI7 (or similar scale basaltic eruption) there is nothing that is going to change the trajectory of the CO2 loading for the foreseeable future.

          For those who think that CO2 is a problem, longer term there are some really promising new fission technologies that could eventually be really be impactful in the developing (and even the developed) world.

          http://theliquidgrid.com/2017/12/05/floating-nuclear-power/

          These technologies should be supported 1,000,000% by those worried about CO2. However, even if everything with this type of technology goes perfectly and without any artificial political obstacles, any meaningful large-scale roll out of new energy sources like these are decades away.

          In the meantime, for those truly worried about the impacts of CO2, there is some bad news.

          Realistically, absent a disrupting event, there is nothing that is going to significantly change even the trajectory of the growth rate of CO2 output (especially in China and the developing world), much less actually reduce overall levels for at least the next 10-30 years, or more. The realistic near and medium-term discussion needs to first acknowledge these facts and money spent needs to be around realistic ways to mitigate the impacts of the ever increasing CO2 loading.

        • Yup, exported pollution. The joy of ecofreaks everywhere as they drive their electric car (very inefficient, exports pollution), made from chinese steel and copper (all those smelters) and the other host of green things that are not at all green and mostly not at all recyclable.

          Still I suppose it makes them feel good.

          PS IN europe we even import cement!

  7. I am not a total doomsayer but being prepared for an event makes sense to me, store some medical supplies, food and water a way to prepare food would help in any disaster, wind storm, ice storm, earthquake or the need to quarantine against communicable disease. Why would you not?

  8. When the SHTF, pick your scenario, will we survive? Not like we know life today. Will it be man made, natural? Best chances, man made, we are just too arrogant of a society. Who will survive, the ones who are smart learn to be adaptable quickly and have some luck (if you want to call it that).
    Today’s media is out of control, however really no different than from the past, just today’s news cycles are super-fast, however our lives are lived at a faster pace than even just 20 years ago. It all relative unfortunately. People are just too lazy to research what is fed to them or form their own opinions/beliefs. Here in the states the polar vortex is back, how many people have read David Ludlum’s books on early American weather? If you have the end doesn’t seem so near.
    Really like Café, don’t always agree with discussions/thoughts however, they do challenge me to think, question my beliefs

    Thanks

      • We just had a Clipper run through the Southern Great Lakes. It was pushed down the face of the arctic air mass (now called a Polar Vortex for some reason) and cut across Erie and Ontario on Monday. This is not the typical clipper path which brings it across Superior and into the NE US.

        It dumped 33cm of white sh*t on us in 8 hours and wind chills of -30C.

        Canadians were forced to put on a sweater.

  9. “The messengers of these threats are focused on making money or becoming famous like Al gore. They have been making headlines like “There is only 5 years to save the Earth.” for forty years. They are the ones who get the coverage. I take portents of doom very seriously and the reaction from the media and the public is the most insulting thing I can think of.”

    I’m not sure where you’re from, but one of our newly elected congress critters from New York jumped on the global doom bandwagon saying:

    “The world is going to end in 12 years if we don’t address climate change,” That’s a little bit longer than 5, but whatever…That’s also what we have to deal with in the U.S.

    I’m not sure if you’re familiar with H. L. Mencken ((1880-1956), but he was spot-on with the following quote:

    “The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by an endless series of hobgoblins, most of them imaginary.”

    • When i first heard of climate change I actually believed those claims but after 10 years of X years until the end, i started to think that is was just another political scare tactic. My thoughts have changed. I am just your usual swash buckling Texan.

      • Guessin’ that you’re not all that concerned with the next 12-year doom prognostication from one of our recently elected representatives from the great state of NY?

      • Come on, It’s not like she thinks Guam is going to capsize and sink.

        • No, unfortunately that was a congress critter that has been around a little bit longer. I know VC doesn’t like getting too political and will leave it right there, but d*mn, that was funny.

    • Pure supposition… but what it’s a broken off shard of supposed solar sail from that object?

      • You are right. Pure supposition. Just coincidence in time, strange trajectory and appearence. Most likely more boring explanation will follow when checked up 🤔

        • Never did find that supermarket bag for life. Now I know where it is….

  10. Been a swarn in Surtsey now
    a star too.. its coud be geothermal explosion or small submarine eruption as Carl suggest

    • 12-15km deep if the IMO published data is correct. It’s a depth that makes me think magma on the move but i’ll let someone with a trained eye look at the seismo data and make that call.

    • The partial pressure of CO2 in the atmosphere is controlled by the temperature of the ocean via Henrys law. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry's_law At the current ocean temperature there is a 1:50 ratio between CO2 in the atmosphere an CO2 dissolved inthe oceans, so 98% of all Human CO2 would dissolve into the Ocean at Equilibrium.(at a fixed temp) The Atmospheric/ocean CO2 turnover is estimated at between 5 and 10% per annum. At the current rate of CO2 production it would take 5000 years to double the total CO2 in the system. This is why “scientist” cannot account for 50% of emissions, because the Ocean rapidly absorb CO2.
      Now if are worried about ocean acidification then think again. The Ocean has an inexhaustible supply of calcium carbonate in the form of chalk. When you also consider that the atmospheric CO2 was above 800ppm until 20million years ago, then life will have no problem adapting.
      As for human, well are Stone Age ancestors were able to colonise a temperature range of 80+ degrees C.
      The four horsemen of the Apocalypse still reign surpreme as threats to humanity.

      • The fact that you put ‘scientist’ in quotes is telling. They get accused of everything under the sun. Saying that they can’t account for 50% of CO2 emissions is highly misleading. There are detailed models of the CO2 goes and what the sinks are. The ‘total CO2 in the system’ is irrelevant: we are concerned about CO2 in the atmosphere where it has taken 50 years to add 40%. The take-up of CO2 by the oceans is continuing but is limited by the mixing with the deeper layers which is slow. Acidification is measured: sea water already has a measurable drop in pH. We are happy to have a scientific discussion but denying the data is a false start.

        And yes, the sea has been in such conditions before. But changes do normally take a lot longer so that life has a chance to adapt. New moluscs and corals have to develop. That takes tens of thousand of years.

      • It takes time for everything to come to equilibrium so without seeing figures I would not be surprised at it taking a hundred years of more for atmospheric and sea CO2 equilibrium to be achieved.

    • Oh I rather like the idea. After all its becoming clear that much of s.america was in fact farmland just like europe, hence the rather large populations supported.

      Reforesting the amazon basin would take quite a bit of CO2!

  11. I think the issue with the “5 years till” is that people were expecting some large scale disaster to happen. In reality climate change works far more insidious.

    The changing climate atributes to crop failures and higher food production cost. This in turn lead to civil unrest like the arab spring and refugee flows. Which in turn lead to unrest in richer nations like Trump and Brexit.

    Meanwhile we are also past the point of easy solutions and slow adaptations to prevent bigger issues. Which will eventually pop up. Making harsh straining choices that will hurt unavoidable.

    I think its not a stretch that people said we only have 5 years decades ago. By doing nothing then we lit the fuse. It just takes a while for the spark to reach a bomb. And all we have left is choosing the bomb it connects to.

  12. Just wait until Comet Swift Tuttle hits Earth
    3 times larger than Chixlulub impactor
    And almost 3 times faster

    • Just the twirk that the moon happens to show up between!! What will happen in that case??? On the moon and on earth???

      • We would see a flash and the moon suddenly turn fuzzy and red. With occasional flashes from debri falling back on it.

        A large portion will leave the moons gravity and form a ring system. This will rain out back on the moon and on the earth in the form of meteor showers.

        Some parts will possible impact. But the biggest junk will not escape the moons gravity probably. So wont endanger us.

        All in all more a scene of beauty than disaster. Unless you are one of the rabbits on the moon perhaps.

        • Yup correct description
          Glowing red fuzzy
          And white flashes as rock vapour from ejecta impacts that rains back on the moon

    • … and with little to no “spinning reserve” to buffer load fluctuations on the grid.

  13. Building huge deep underground cities …
    Protected a kilometer underground with own electricity and water sanitation and agiculture

    Thats the solution if Swift Tuttle or Eros or Hale Bob hits Earth one day.
    We woud survive the immense heatwave and destruction above … and years after emerge on the surface to reclaim our destroyed surface enviroment

  14. It will be superugly if Swift Tuttle impacts
    This object is around 3 times bigger than Chixlulub in size in diameter
    Its going more than twice as fast too near 55km a second. The results is around 40 times more energy than Chixlulub if it hits Earth the comming thousands of years. Souch an impact woud burn the surface world into ash.

    Largest Earth crossing object this one is
    next perihelion passage (July 11, 2126) was also off by another 15 days (July 26), the comet will pass perilously close to Earth or the Moon on August 14, 2126 (IAUC 5636: 1992t). Given the size of the nucleus of Swift–Tuttle is quite ugly

    The dangers is if the Gas Giants alters it orbit
    So it impacts Earth during next perihelion

  15. Swift Tuttle is an object around 30 km wide and
    Going almost 60 km a second
    Its about the same diameter as the Azores island Teceira is. Impact woud be very severe ..

    Tuttle is an old comet thats lost much of its volatiles in the regolith and as it nears the sun it likley wont ougass alot. Its composed of rocks and lots of carbon rich icey stuff. Its surface is likley extremely dark and almost coal like. This is a lump of carbon rich sillica rocks.

    It woud be fun to send probes and sample it.
    Rocks rich in carbons and hydrocarbons
    These are the stuff life is made of.

    • 1000 km from impact, using the above data.

      Time for maximum radiation: 11.2 seconds after impact

      Visible fireball radius: 595 km ( = 369 miles )
      The fireball appears 135 times larger than the sun
      Thermal Exposure: 1.55 x 1010 Joules/m2
      Duration of Irradiation: 2.43 hours
      Radiant flux (relative to the sun): 1770

      https://impact.ese.ic.ac.uk/ImpactEarth/cgi-bin/crater.cgi?dist=1000&distanceUnits=1&diam=30&diameterUnits=2&pdens=&pdens_select=1500&vel=60&velocityUnits=1&theta=45&tdens=1000&wdepth=&wdepthUnits=1

      • No way we let that happen.

        We can just send up Bruce Willis and Billy Bob Thornton to blow it up!

        • Swift Tuttle is a real threat
          If it hits in comming hundreds or thousands of years only deep sea life survive that and humans build her societies kilometers underground
          But a very very large nuclear explosion should change its orbit or accelerate it to escape the solar system

          • A nuke big enough to do that would be a bigger danger than the comet itself, and also impossible to launch into space. And would pulverise it into fragments most of which would hit anyway and still release all that energy as heat into the atmosphere. Basically the only way is to take it out if the equation before it is actually a threat with gravitational tractoring abd that takes a long time.

  16. Thats a very nice simulation of Swift Tuttle impact Geo Lurk : ) thanx
    Wow and it says around 240000 km3 of 23 000 C rock vapour is injected into the upper atmosphere and space from impact
    Plus alot of ejecta

    The ejecta and vapour is most dangerous
    Up in space the rock vapour and ejecta cools and condense into zillions of glass spheres.. that later reenters the atmosphere…
    The global skies fills with meteors making the skies white hot everywhere
    On the ground the forests and our cities bursts into flames .. the heat pulse will be enough to boil away shallow lakes

    • Oh thanks! Our house (south of London) is inside the Transient and Final crater. I can actually zoom in and see our humble abode on the map, only to discover it will be obliterated. I suppose the upside is we would not know much about it!!

    • Also mentioned ….

      The average interval between impacts of this size somewhere on Earth during the last 4 billion years is 4.5 x 10^9years

  17. With all this talk about meteors and impacts, the ultimate hit and run would be an intergalactic asteroid. The escape velocity of the milky way is several hundred km/s one of those would be like a planetary impact concentrated to an object less than 100 km across…….

    Or a neutron star where it flies into the earth and the entire planet gets crushed into the surface of a tiny glowing sphere and any that doesnt (probably most of it) gets thrown around everywhere and then afterwards the neutron star races into the sun makes a mess of it or even merges with it. I wonder whether the massive gravity of the neutron star would induce a nova event inside a sunlike star if they merged. Or cause heightened fusion and then a type 2 supernova.

  18. Also @Turtlebirdman Im curious to hear your new research on Kilauea!
    Remeber Kilauea is my favorite volcano too…

    • It wont be too different from what I have said in the past, but it will probably be an actual article as opposed to long comment. Might not be ready for a while as I have a busy week this week.

      I’ll just say that if property damage is what people dont want to see then mauna loa taking the supply for 100 years is the best case scenario right now in my research, I think that says enough on its own… I would believe the ideas of kilauea slowing down more if it wasnt for the fact that nearly nothing has actually changed post eruption, pu’u o’o signals still reflect the summit and now even more of the east rift responds than before, and the ERZ is still inflating. The way things are going now i think is analogous to the period between 1955 and 1959, and we all know what happened when that ended…

      Very simplified, summit eruptions in 2019-2023 with at least one probably being a pretty big ring fault eruption like 1959, then sizable to large ERZ eruption downrift from pu’u o’o in 2023-2024, either that eruption or another shortly after in the same area builds into a shield, then LERZ eruption whenever that eruption ends and then likely a further collapse below the water table. Mechanism and expanded explanations in the main post.

  19. I’m an eternal optimist so I have the philosophy that you just can’t dwell on any of the many possible catastrophes that could end or nearly end the human species. Global warming gets a lot of attention, but personally I feel that a large colossal volcanic eruption a VEI 7 would be devastating to the modern world, and many are oblivious to such a potential catastrophe. It seems that VEI 7s tend to be separated by several centuries though, so they are rare. But a large VEI 6 eruption like Krakatoa or Pinatubo will likely happen sometime this century. That could also cause devastating local effects and casualties, to say nothing of global temperature effects. I think we also really need to start paying attention to potential nuclear war as a real threat, given the current political situation we are moving into. With the dismantling of the INF treaty, intermediate nuclear missiles once again may be deployed by the US in Europe to counter Russian intermediate missiles which they have already been developing despite the treaty for years. If the US devlops intermediate nuclear missiles again and deploys them in NATO countries in Europe, the situation will be pretty precarious. Room for miscalculation will decrease. Intermediate nuclear missiles in any war would probably be used first, and once those are used, intercontinental missiles would follow, leading to a full nuclear war. I don’t think Trump or Putin would start such a war, but the danger is misinterpretation, a perceived slight, or miscalculation. Nuclear war remains a real and even increasing threat I think.

    • Operative phrase; “despite the treaty”

      Definition of treaty

      1a : an agreement or arrangement made by negotiation:
      (1) : a contract in writing between two or more political authorities (such as states or sovereigns) formally signed by representatives duly authorized and usually ratified by the lawmaking authority of the state.

      Many are not worth the paper they are printed on.

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