All-geo

Future Shock: The exceptional vulnerability of buildings in Nepal to a future earthquake

If you are reading this from the UK, you know already what I'm writing about, but to those elsewhere, the "Shipping Forecast" is mostly unknown. It's heard on BBC Radio 4 each day, and It's far more than a weather forecast, it's an insti...

The question of the headline, which was the title for the talks I gave last week in Phoenix was, I admit, a little cheeky. I'm just some schlub from New Mexico with an academic title and a book. That doesn't mean I know the answer to the question. But to the extent I have an answer, it is this - Arizona (and lots of other places) probably don't need as much water as they think.

Take your seasickness prevention pills and weigh anchor, my darlings. We are embarking on a long voyage, and I'm afraid it isn't the lovely salt sea, but an ocean of creationist bilge we be sailin'. BJU has got a lot to say about oceanography. A good portion of it is utter bunkum. And there's three bloody chapters of this shite.

A week ago, I looked eastward from my science lab and saw the sun setting on the Sierra Nevada crest from 80 or 90 miles away. It was quite literally moments before the first outliers of the storm arrived and hid the mountains from view. Over the next six days or so, California was pummeled by the worst storm in two decades. Flooding was widespread, and there were some huge changes in my local bailiwick, the drainages of the Merced, Tuolumne, and Stanislaus rivers. I've been able to directly document some out-of-control drainages like Dry Creek, and some barely controlled drainages like the Tuolumne River (short story, flood with Don Pedro dam, 9,000 cubic feet per second; flood without the dam, 45,000 cubic feet per second). I couldn't get up there, but I followed events in Yosemite Valley as the park service prepared for the biggest flood in a long time. One of the most incredible moments of the week was the opportunity that I had to inspect the activity at La Grange Reservoir, where the Tuolumne River was plunging over the dam ramparts at 7,000 cubic feet per second. I also took some video (below) that I wasn't able to post yesterday.

"This comment is so totally wrong on so many levels that it would be best to take your comments back, think about them, and send another try."

January. A time for half-baked resolutions, fully-baked apple crisp, 2.5 weeks of dutifully honoring my pre-paid annual gym membership, and a buttload of retrospective, end-of-the-year lists.

By Ned Rozell Scientists measure a cow's respiration at a lab in Toluca, Mexico. Photo by Octavio Castelán-Ortega. Many creatures, including you and me, emit methane from time to time. Microbes within our guts break down one substance and turn it ...

Although hybrid event beds (HEBs) occur in many of deep-water systems, the mechanisms responsible for their formation remain ambiguous. Most workers agree that acquisition of mud or muddy material is a key factor, with many hybrid flow models favoring an origin for the mud in up-dip channels, channel-lobe transition zones or slope sectors. In this study, Fonnesu and others describe outer-fan-lobe and confined-basin-plain sheet deposits of the Cretaceous-Paleocene Gottero Sandstone cropping out on Mount Ramaceto and Mount Zatta (NW Apennines, Italy). The succession includes cm- to m-deep erosional scours below sheet-like HEBs, features which appear to provide the mud necessary for local flow transformation. Extensive substrate delamination in distal deep-water environments has not been described in detail before nor linked to the local formation of HEBs.This hybrid flow model may apply generally, with implications for the distribution and heterogeneity of HEB muddy divisions and hence hydrocarbon reservoir properties.

There was a slight increase in local-scale dust storm activity this past week on Mars. Short-lived dust storms were observed over Alba, Tempe, Acidalia, and Chryse Planitia. Dust hazes were spotted over Xanthe Terra on the sol following activity over...

If you're looking toward the sun to help explain this decade's record global heat on Earth, look again. Solar activity has been below average for more than a decade, and the pattern appears set to continue, according to several top solar research...

We basically have a huge generation gap with Venus, and we really need something to launch in the early- to mid-2020s so we can maintain some kind of continuity." I'm not a planetary scientist, but I'm still disappointed that two proposed Ven...

Who doesn't adore a load of loveable lizardy dinosaurs dragging their tails through a bland, generic desertscape - especially when said dinosaurs are endearingly retro, carefully sculpted models? Back in the day, Toyway (known now for filling the Natural History Museum gift shop with awful tat) produced a range of postcards with just such a subject matter...and here are some of them.

Research Vessel Falkor. Credit: Schmidt Ocean Institute

What is it like behind the scenes before, during, and after the launch of a spacecraft?...

Curiosity planning started 2 hours later than usual today because the Sol 1575 data needed for planning weren't expected until almost 10 AM PST.  Unfortunately, the news was not good:  An arm fault prevented the MAHLI full suite from completing,...

The delicacy of mineral replacement and the serendipity of finding something so small and fragile. This is spectacular.