Why is danger so pretty?

Mount Vesuvius in Italy is a volcano that blew it's top in 79 AD, burying Pompei and Herculaeum, and has erupted many times since then. But people still live at it's base, and apparently, from what I've seen on TV Specials online, more people are moving there all the time. Why? Because it is a fabulously beautiful place to live.

I live in Vancouver, BC. It's in the Ring of Fire which surrounds the Pacific Ocean and is known for earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. And yes, we know, we're due for a big earthquake. So why do we live here? Because it is a fabulously beautiful place to live.

So what about the more physically "stable" areas in Canada? Well, there was an earthquake near Montreal yesterday - a place not in the Ring of Fire. And yes, you guessed it, it's a beautiful place as well!

The sun had a hiccup last weekend sending a coronal mass ejection (CME) our way. This image from NASA of what it looked like when it hit the earth in eastern Canada and the US is also stunningly beautiful! Sure, GPS tools everywhere had a hard time giving accurate distances for the past few days, leading to some dangerous situations, but people who see the Northern Lights far further south than usual still went "ooh, aah".

So why is danger so pretty?

Maybe it's a coping mechanism of evolution. We are attracted to dangerous places because the whole planet is a dangerous place to live, and if we didn't enjoy the scenery... we'd be a depressed bunch of monkeys on the verge of extinction. Not that we aren't in danger of extinction... but we can at least enjoy it. Because it looks so pretty.

Why am I always in a bathroom during an earthquake?

Since we moved to Vancouver, just over a decade ago, we've experienced 2 earthquakes.

The first time, back around 2004 or so, I was in the shower. I wondered why the water was splashing oddly on the bottom of the shower, and I felt a bit dizzy... I thought it was me. I heard that one of our hanging lights was swinging back and forth, but I didn't see it myself.

A few hours ago, I was on the loo. And we had an earthquake just off Vancouver Island, which could be felt in Vancouver. Again, I felt a bit dizzy, but I thought it was just movement from the building next door to us which was being demolished today.

So an experience that not everyone gets to have - the planet shifting underfoot - and I'm in the bathroom.

I'd like to see what happens outside during an earthquake - do the trees sway? I bet they did. Of course, with the building next door being demolished today, would I really have noticed anything that unusual that I wouldn't have attributed to the demolition? Probably not.

Not that I'm hoping for another earthquake... I just wish I wasn't always in the bathroom for them!

Is the wobble not just me?

I have MS, and problems walking from it. I tend to wobble. OK, as my spouse puts it, I walk like I'm on a small boat in the middle of the ocean. He occasionally complains of sea-sickness if he watches me for too long.

So I wobble.

But so apparently, does the planet Earth. And since the Japanese earthquake, it now wobbles more.

According to this National Geographic article, we may actually be able to measure the increase in wobbliness. To measure the earth wobbles, you need a lot of data, and in Japan, there is a lot of data. Not only from the earth-quake monitoring equipment, but from a large number of GPSs that were up and running along the Japanese coast when the earthquake happened.

So we got data, and we got wobble. This may help to predict earthquakes in the future, which would be very nice.

I can predict my wobbles too... if I walk, I will wobble. I'm a simple person. But it's not just me anymore... the whole planet is wobbling more now!

How do you simulate an earthquake?

A few years ago we had an earthquake tremor here in Vancouver which was big enough that we felt it in our apartment. The lamp in the dining room ceiling swayed and water sloshed. It was a memorable experience.

The Olympics started yesterday several blocks to the east of our apartment. Along with thousands of people really enjoying the event, we had about 200 protestors enjoying being annoying and complaining about... well, anything that struck them as something to complain about.

This morning there was a "big protest" about 2 blocks west of our apartment. About 200 protestors who are reported to be protesting "against capitalism".

That's a few decades old as a complaint, isn't it? A Bit lacking in either creativity or at least something a bit more meaningful to be against isn't it? They were right beside a movie rental store, a coffee shop, a convenience store, and a gourmet baking supply store. Maybe they could complain about getting to bed late because they had too much coffee, their cake baking experiment failed, they didn't win on the lottery ticket they bought, and it all made them return their movie late and they had to pay a late charge...

So the cops were out quelling the riot and nabbing the worst of the rioters to send them to jail.

One of the tools the police are using to quell rioters during the Olympics are helicopters. Big helicopters. Big powerful, loud helicopters flying close to the ground. They've been circling high in the sky for days now from early in the morning until very late at night, but they come in close when there is a riot.

Anyone seen the movie Apocalypse Now? Remember feeling the ground shake as the helicopters darkened the sky? It happens in real life too.

So with the lamp once again swaying, and water rippling in our apartment, we are left to wonder if someone is trying to simulate an earthquake, or if the rioters rented the movie Apocalypse Now, and that's the one they returned late and had to pay a late fee on.

And there the helicopters are again as I type... anyone got some popcorn?

Did anyone feel the ground move?

OK, so the ground - the earth - the planet - is constantly moving. But typically, we ape-descendants don't feel it moving.

In California, and all the way up the West Coast of North America, earthquakes are not uncommon. Earthquakes that we can all feel as they move the ground below us. Indeed, we are all waiting for "The Big One" to hit. Perhaps we are getting a bit impatient. Perhaps the Californians have found a new way to bring excitement into their lives. 

There is a place named "The Geysers" near Anderson Springs, California where people pump waste water into the ground to have it heated by magma, turning it into steam, and then they use the steam for energy. There are evidently thousands of little earthquakes in the area, and there is some evidence that pumping water into the earth's crust is what is causing these little earthquakes. (Who? Us? We're just pumping pressurized water into volcanic magma, what could go wrong?)

So to "up the ante" there are now plans to drill deeper, push more water deeper into the earth, and get more steam for more power so more ape-descendants can use more electricity. See this article in the New York Times for details. This article also has an Interactive Graphic which is worth playing for the enjoyment of watching the details of this plan.

The New York Times article also includes some interesting facts about what happened when people tried this in Basel, Switzerland. Yes, there was an earthquake. A big earthquake. But no, that's not going to happen in California because they're using better technology. And just because there are major fault lines in California is no need for concern, they won't be digging close enough to them for any problems. (No, those aren't linked to each other, we can't see underground, but we know there are no connections. Really.)

So maybe the California people have not watched enough science fiction movies to really scare themselves about this idea. Maybe they've watched too many. Maybe we've all watched too many and are getting really nervous about this for no reason at all.... yeah, that's it.