Kilauea is putting on quite the show once again! Live stream here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=tk0t...

Yeah yeah yeah, I saw the xkcd today, but mantle plumes DO exist, you just shouldn't be really intellectually lazy about it.

I have just heard an ALARMING report that my former Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at the University of Nebraska is threatened with elimination, due to a university & state-wide budget crisis, and despite their ongoing success in scholarship and teaching. This is really shocking.

Trump’s mysterious disappearance from public raises new questions about Joe Biden’s advanced age

Okay, why do introductory textbook materials (written by geologists!) always seem to tell students that only silicic magmas can produce volcanic glass?? Is my entire career studying basaltic glass a lie???

The core attacks!!!

Ooh, look. When we covered the climate impacts of machine learning (“AI”) on Rare Earth in June we found it really frustrating that none of the tech companies would tell anyone the water and energy costs. Now Google has made at least some of it public. More of this! (and preferably raw data too).

"None of the 35 methane gas turbines that help power xAI’s massive supercomputer is equipped with pollution controls typically required by federal rules. The company has no Clean Air Act permits."

I'll admit, I was skeptical when they said Gemini was just like a bunch of PhDs. But I gotta admit they nailed it.

Unbelievable footage from NOAA’s Hurricane Hunters inside the eye of Hurricane Erin. Simply incredible.

This is incredible

“A legitimate PhD-level expert in anything,” they said. “Show me a diagram of the US presidents since FDR, with their names and years in office under their photos,” I said.

Furthest I've been... N: Northern Kolbeinsey Ridge (71ºN) E: Rotorua, New Zealand W: Oahu, Hawaii S: Cape Horn

!!!

We can design nuclear reactors for space, we've been doing it for literally decades. It's just that the government hasn't flown (almost) any of them. There's an active multi-year program right now to design this reactor system (Fission Surface Power), if it gets launched successfully that's a win!

I'm not kidding here. Project Rover was started before Sputnik was launched

I expected geoscientists to be more informed about things like plans to have nuclear powered bases on the moon and Mars. This isn't a new idea and has been planned for a long time, right? There's plenty to be upset about right now, but this doesn't seem like one of them.

Delighted to report that we have hired a herd of goats to eat invasive and noxious weeds from our farm property! They are hilarious and I love them.

i saw a guy on here asking people what they thought was the GREATEST OF ALL TIME tv show and i cant think of anything better than weather channel local on the 8s

Oh, look where I just moved, also tomorrow we're having new downspouts put on

Reminder that the 'ring of fire' isn't a real thing, old oceanic plates just subduct and that's also like half the planet right there

Per Tsunami.gov, the largest tsunami heights were: 5.7ft at Kahului, Maui 4.9ft at Hilo, HI 4.0’ at HALEIWA HI 3.7’ at Crescent City, CA. Complete list and wave periods are linked: www.tsunami.gov/events/PHEB/...

Just a reminder that tsunamis aren't just one wave. This tide gauge in Alaska has recorded 5 hours of surges so far from the Kamchatka quake - still more to come!

Approx. 5.5 foot tsunami wave recorded at Kahului Harbor on the north shore of #Maui. #Tsunami waves ongoing.

On X, Masaki Nobushiro posts a recurring (and useful) drawing about how people wrongly think a 1m tsunami is a cresting wave when it's actually a wall of water filled with dangerous and deadly debris that's strong enough to sweep up a car. #tsunami

Aftershock distribution shows that the Mw8.8 #earthquake has propagated southward from offshore S #Kamchatka to the northern #Kuril islands, for at least 300km. It likely started (epicenter of the Mw8.8 in blue) at the limit of the Mw7.4 rupture of the 20th of July. 2/2

Someone earlier today incorrectly said the M8.8 Kamchatka earthquake hypocenter was too deep (preliminary depth was ~74km) to generate a tsunami. This was *badly* wrong, and the FF solution shows why: rupture may start at a point but it spreads over an *area*, with the main slip much shallower here

For some perspective: The recent earthquake off the coast of Russia has been revised to M8.8, which would tie the 2010 Chile and 1906 Ecuador quakes as the 6th strongest earthquake ever recorded. USGS source: www.usgs.gov/media/images...

Also, if you are in a warned area and near a coast, remember that most tsunami arrive as a series of waves, and the first arrival is usually _not_ the largest. Arrivals can be spread out over many hours. Just don't race out to the shoreline after the first one; wait until warnings are lifted.

A very quick and dirty annotation of the Kamchatka subduction zone on this cross section just to illustrate where this M8.7 earthquake occurred (orange) compared to where the volcanoes are and magma is formed (green). Pay attention to the scales!

Updated to a M8.7

This is a VERY large earthquake, possibly/probably among the 10 largest ever recorded. A clear subduction zone megathrust event. And it is another M>8.5 event with a notable foreshock (the recent M7.4 in same location), like Tohoku in 2011.

Not only is M8.7 extremely large, but 18.2 km is also pretty shallow for a subduction zone, so there is a greater possibility of vertical displacement at the ground surface (which can generate tsunami). And that's a nice compressional moment tensor. earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/...

The earthquake off Kamchatka upgraded by the USGS to M8.7. That is a monster temblor: earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/...

Magnitude 8.7 #earthquake in Kamchatka, following a M7.4 last week - may be largest earthquake since 2011, 8th largest on record globally, #tsunami warning in place for US west coast and Canada - the historic 1952 M9 closely caused a destructive tsunami across the Pacific

Update for folks: Following a very large (M 8.7) and relatively shallow undersea subduction zone quake in the West Pacific east of Kamchatka, Russia, there is a considerable threat of a damaging basin-wide #tsunami. For late-breaking details, visit: https://tsunami.gov

I just heard that Bill Rose passed away. He has left a legacy in volcanology! I applied to work with Bill for my masters, and he hosted me for a lovely visit to MTU at the time. I ultimately went elsewhere, but I was very tempted. He was also my academic great-uncle on my Stoiber side. RIP.

www.tumblr.com/gammija/7858... finally, a good explanation of how evolution really works.

Omg, I finally got back to my Philly hairdresser and it’s so, so much better. No one in the Midwest could get my hair right. ❤️

Holy shit. This guy saved a PNG to a bird. (he drew a bird into a spectrogram, played that sound to a starling, and the starling reproduced it back to him with enough accuracy he got his bird drawing back in their call's spectrogram) www.youtube.com/watch?v=hCQC...

Tough question! Ethnomusicology of Insular Southeast Asia shaped my life the most, since I've played gamelan ever since, visited Bali, & own my own instruments. Such an unexpected impact! But also Sky I: Time, where we designed water clocks and sundials and learned the archeoastronomy of henges.

#academicsky #episky #publichealth #socialepi #science

With Tom Lehrer's passing, I suppose this is a moment to share the story of the prank he played on the National Security Agency, and how it went undiscovered for nearly 60 years.

My last living musical hero is still my hero but unfortunately no longer living. RIP to the great, great Mr. Tom Lehrer.

Okay, so... editors. Let's talk about nonsensical headlines. Temperatures don't multiply like that, what does it even mean to be '14 times the melting point?' And anyway, kinetics is always a thing, like, being out of equilibrium is not 'skirting the laws of thermodynamics,' that's not how it works

Omg, the sweet corn is so, so much better back east. 🌽

"I asked ChatGPT" "I asked Grok" yeah well I asked my friend Joe, I asked my friend Jake, they said it was fhqwhgads

Rolling my eyes as I walk across the house with my face buried in a book, as I have done nearly every day since I was a small child.

Sorry but personally if a miniature horse woke me up from anesthesia by banging out nonsense on a miniature keyboard it would send me into a liminal space between life and death from which I would never return