The Earth Science Blog by Mr. Schwartz

The first science fiction books I read as a child were often included asteroid miners – people who traveled through space and dug up minerals on meteors (space rocks) and asteroids (really BIG space rocks).   Back then we hadn’t even sent a monkey into space.

Good science fiction writers know their science, and can be very good at predicting the future.

This week Planetary Resources, Inc. officially announced they’re going asteroid hunting.

You can read more about it on the Bad Astronomer’s blog:

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2012/04/24/breaking-private-company-does-indeed-plan-to-mine-asteroids-and-i-think-they-can-do-it/

Last month, 15,000 warm temperature records were broken in the United States.  The average temperature of 51.1°F was 8.6 degrees above the 20th century average for March and 0.5°F warmer than the previous warmest March.

In addition, it has been incredibly dry.  There is no snowpack on many mountains, and wildfires are burning in many states, including Connecticut.

And, that old saying about the weather changing every 15 minutes in New England has been proven wrong.

Now some researchers have come up with a hypothesis to explain all of this.  It has to do with that 3-cell global wind pattern you studied.

Warm air rises at the Equator and moves north towards the cold North Pole.  This sets up the 3-cell system and our prevailing westerlies, and creates the jet streams.  The polar jet stream is what steers our weather.

The arctic is warming much faster than the rest of the planet.  You should know why.   With less of a temperature difference between the Equator and the Poles, the jet streams are changing.

As a result of climate change, Arctic autumn temperatures have warmed by as much as 5 degrees Celsius (9 degrees F), reducing the temperature gradient between the Arctic and temperate latitudes. In response the jet stream appears to be moving northward and its wind speed slowing. In turn, this may be slowing the waves in the jet stream, which cause weather variation along their  path as they wiggle north and south.

The slowing of the jet stream, therefore, could cause weather patterns to remain in place for longer, resulting in prolonged heat waves or cold snaps.

OK, for extra credit, please explain why the arctic is warming faster than the rest of the planet.  Feedback?  I must have your response by 7:00 AM on Wednesday, April 25.

The Lyrid meteor shower, which we did not see because it was raining.

On Sunday morning, April 22nd, just as the Lyrid meteor shower was dying down, a spectacular fireball exploded over California’s Sierra Nevada mountain range. The loud explosion rattled homes from central California to Reno, Nevada, and beyond. According to Bill Cooke, head of NASA’s Meteoroid Environment Office, the source of the blast was a meteoroid about the size of a minivan.

“The energy is estimated at a whopping 3.8 kilotons of TNT, so this was a big event,” he continues. “I am not saying there was a 3.8 kiloton explosion on the ground in California. I am saying that the meteor possessed this amount of energy before it broke apart in the atmosphere.

On April 23, 2012 there were 1287 potentially hazardous asteroids being monitored.

From  History.com:  On April 18, 1906 at 5:13 a.m., an earthquake estimated at close to 8.0 on the Richter scale hit San Francisco, California, killing hundreds of people as it toppled numerous buildings.   The quake was caused by a slip of the San Andreas Fault over a segment about 275 miles long, and shock waves could be felt from southern Oregon down to Los Angeles.

Fires immediately broke out and–because broken water mains prevented firefighters from stopping them–firestorms soon developed citywide.   San Francisco Mayor E.E. Schmitz called for the enforcement of a dusk-to-dawn curfew and authorized soldiers to shoot-to-kill anyone found looting.   Meanwhile, in the face of significant aftershocks, firefighters and U.S. troops fought desperately to control the ongoing fire, often dynamiting whole city blocks to create firewalls.   On April 20, 20,000 refugees trapped by the massive fire were evacuated from the foot of Van Ness Avenue onto the USS Chicago.

By April 23 – 5 days after the quake, most fires were extinguished.   It was estimated that some 3,000 people died as a result of the Great San Francisco Earthquake and the devastating fires it inflicted upon the city.   Almost 30,000 buildings were destroyed, including most of the city’s homes and nearly all the central business district.

Also on this date:  The midnight ride of Paul Revere.

I have been reading Vanilla, a book about the history of this delicious plant.  Vanilla is a vine in the orchid family that is native to Mexico.

In the book the author, Tim Ecott, describes a ride through Mexico with a member of the Veracruz Vanilla Council.  As they drove through the farmland, they saw “low hills … in the fields on either side … and around the hills … saw striations [lines] where cattle hooves had worn narrow terraces in the soil.

“We need to encourage the vanilla growers”, said the Council member.  “You see what damage the cattle do to the land.  And the ranchers cut down the forest for grazing for the animals, and then we get less rain.”

Trees do add moisture to the air, and do increase rain.  Where forests are removed, rain is removed also.

ScienceDaily (Apr. 11, 2012) — Researchers at Oregon State University have definitively linked an increase in ocean acidification to the collapse of oyster  production at a commercial oyster hatchery in Oregon, where larval growth had declined to a level considered by the owners to be “non-economically viable.”

A study by the researchers found that elevated seawater carbon dioxide (CO₂) levels, resulting in more corrosive ocean water, inhibited the larval oysters from developing their shells and growing at a pace that would make commercial production cost-effective. As atmospheric CO₂ levels continue to rise, this may serve as the proverbial canary in the coal mine for other ocean acidification impacts on shellfish, the scientists say.

See the rest of the story at http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/04/120411132219.htm

Yesterday, the Connecticut Public Health Committee let die a proposal to prohibit the use of tanning beds by anyone under 18.  In other words, the committee took no action, and our legislators never even had a chance to vote on it.

If the bill had passed, any tanning facility worker who allowed someone under 18 to use a tanning bed would face a fine of $100.

At present the state requires anyone under 16 to provide written consent of their parent or guardian before using a tanning bed.

Among those who offered testimony for a public hearing on the bill earlier this month, many were medical workers who favored the measure. Other supporters included people who either had skin cancer or had family members who died of it.

At least four four people who work in the tanning industry submitted testimony against the bill.

“I’m quite disappointed that they didn’t take this further,” said Dr. Andrea Asnes, a professor of pediatrics at Yale School of Medicine. “I think it’s an embarrassment for the state.”

According to Karen Bentlage of the Indoor Tanning Association, if the bill passed young people might then take to unsupervised tanning outside, which would be more dangerous.

What would you write to your congressman?  Let me know by 7:00 AM on Monday, April 2 for extra credit.

Over 100 firefighters from 25 different fire departments were called along with the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection to battle a large wild fire at Devil’s Hopyard State Park in East Haddam Tuesday March 27, 2012. Over 50 acres were burned in the fire which was called in Monday night.  Not only have we not had enough rain so far this year, but the relative humidity right now is only 10%.  That’s desert conditions.

Can you find out how many campsites there are at Devil’s Hopyard State Park?   Tell me by 7:00 AM on Wednesday, March 28 for some extra credit!

Study the past to understand the future

The National Science Foundation has reported on a study that shows that the natural state of the Earth with present carbon dioxide levels is one with sea levels about 70 feet higher than now.

The study, led by Kenneth Miller of Rutgers University, reached their conclusion by studying rock and soil cores taken in Virginia, New Zealand and the Eniwetok Atoll in the north Pacific Ocean.

They looked at the late Pliocene epoch, 2.7 million to 3.2 million years ago, the last time the carbon dioxide level in Earth’s atmosphere was at its current level and when atmospheric temperatures were 2 C higher than they are now.

“The difference in water volume released is the equivalent of melting the entire Greenland and West Antarctic Ice Sheets, as well as some of the marine margin of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet,” said H. Richard Lane, program director in the National Science Foundation’s Division of Earth Sciences, which funded the work.

“Such a rise of the modern oceans would swamp the world’s coasts and affect as much as 70 percent of the world’s population.”

“You don’t need to sell your beach real estate yet, because melting of these large ice sheets will take centuries to millennia,” Miller said.

“The current trajectory for the 21st century global rise of sea level is 2 to 3 feet due to warming of the oceans, partial melting of mountain glaciers and partial melting of Greenland and Antarctica.”.

That doesn’t mean that you can just sit back and not care.  After all, the largest cities of the world are seaports.

For extra credit tell me by 7:00 AM on Friday, March 23:  What is the lowest elevation of New York City.