Category: Earth

The Sweet Tale of the Mysterious Tree Lobster

By Anupum Pant

I do realize how big our world is and the sheer number of species that live in it. Also the fact that about 86% of the species are still unknown has me in awe all the time.

Yet, after having read about so many kinds of animals that live on our planet, after having documented them on this blog, I always feel that I’ve known and written it all. The very moment I start losing hope that I would never find an interesting animal ever again, something incredible comes across. Always!

Today, that happened again when I was reading an NPR blog. This time, there’s more than the species itself. The place where it lives is pretty awesome too. The most amazing part – This six-legged giant lives only there. That means, nowhere else on Earth will you find it! First, let’s see where it lives…

This is where it lives:

balls pyramid

I know, it looks like a CG mountain done for a fantasy movie. Trust me, it’s real. It’s called the Ball’s Pyramid (named after a European named Ball who first saw it in 1788) and was formed 7 million years ago due to a volcanic eruption. It is an awkwardly tall (1,844 feet) and an extremely narrow rock sitting in the centre of the sea. To the East of Australia, the red place marker in the following picture shows where the rock is located.

balls pyramid location

 What lives there? And how was it found?

There is an island – Lord Howe island – close to the rock. In the island lived huge “tree lobsters” (actually they were huge stick insects with a hard exoskeleton – Dryococelus australis). In the year 1918, a ship crashed on the island and brought with it some rats. The rats loved these tree lobsters and finished them off within 2 years. After 1920, these tree lobsters were thought to be extinct.

tree lobster

Of course there were stories of these insects living on a rock near the island. But no human wanted to climb the narrow rock to hunt insects at night.

Only in the year 2001 when 2 researchers David Priddel and Nicholas Carlile decided to climb up the rock to find out if these stories were real, they found something incredible. Poop of a large insect. When the came back at night to investigate, the shiny black huge tree lobsters were found! These insects had probably never been extinct.

For more than 80 years, 24 of them had been living on this rock, in a bush and no one knew how they got there. Probably they clinged on to birds or something. Also, according to the researchers, these creatures have never been seen anywhere else.

Where are they now

I’m not sure about where they are now. According to the 2012 NPR article which I read, a pair of these creatures – Adam and Eve – were brought into Australia. Eggs got laid and little Tree lobsters came into the world. Thankfully, the species was saved from going extinct. But it isn’t known if they’ll be sent back to their home island because the great-great-great grandsons of those rats must still be there waiting to finish these insects off again.

This is how the first ones hatched in the zoo…

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Walking from Cape Town to Buenos Aires

By Anupum Pant

You could theoretically walk from cape town in South Africa to Buenos Aires in Argentina. No, I’m not talking about you walking on the deck of a cruise liner while it’s sailing across the South Atlantic ocean. I’m talking about a really really long walk on land, that would require you to walk to Argentina from the other side of the globe!

This is the path you could take if you are adventurous enough –

cape town to buenos aires

Winter time: If you ever plan to do that, remember to plan your journey in such a way that you get to cross the Bering strait during the winters.

Since the land masses are separated by sea, it won’t be possible to cross it on foot. But during winters, when there a couple of chunks of ice floating around, you could theoretically jump from chunk to chunk and complete your almost impossible journey. Two things to remember would be that it is illegal to do that and is extremely dangerous too. Read on to know why.

Bering Strait: At the closest distance, the mainlands of America and Russia are just 85 km apart. The main lands are separated by the Bering strait. But the 2 seemingly distant countries get much closer to each other at edges of these 2 islands in between the Bering strait – The Diomede islands. Separated by just about 4 km, one of the islands is in Russia while the other is in America. A date line passes from right in between the islands and the times one island is 23 hours ahead of the other.

bering strait

During winters the parts of Bering strait freeze and they have huge chunks of ice floating around. But almost always, even during winters, there is a very strong current of water flowing across the Bering Strait. If you are lucky enough, the top part could get clogged for some time due to big ice chunks and could allow you to walk across to Russia, from Alaska.

In fact, people have done it in the past. In the year 2006, two friends Karl Bushby, and his friend Dimitri Kieffer were able to walk across the Bering strait from Alaska to Russia. They were immediately detained and deported for entering the country illegally. Most other attempts have ended fatally, involving rescue teams almost every time.

On November 1, 1998, at the age of 29, Bushby began walking from Punta Arenas, Chile at the southern tip of South America. Everything he owned was in a makeshift trolley called “The Beast.” He only had $300 in his pocket. Since then he has traversed the entire length of South and North America, completed the first recorded crossing of the Bering Strait on foot and progressed two thousand miles into Siberia. His goal is to finish the remainder of his journey across Asia and Europe back to England. To date, he has walked 20,000 miles of the 36,000-mile journey over the course of 15 years.

Even crossing this strait on a boat could prove to be dangerous as you’d be bombarded by intense storms constantly. And of course you’d end up in jail for attempting it. There is also no chance you are getting a legal permission to do it.

In short, provided you cross it in winter, have the ability to survive wind chill temperatures up to -100 degree C, are ready to risk your life and are ready to face legal consequences, you can cross the Bering strait and literally walk across from America to Russia.

In addition, if you are sure you can walk for several thousands of kilometres to make a one of its kind journey, you could actually walk from Cape Town to Buenos Aires.

[Read more]

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A Mountain on Earth Taller Than The Mt. Everest

By Anupum Pant

Background

Of course there are taller mountains than the Everest. Like if you consider the whole solar system, the tallest mountain is in Mars. It is about 2.5 times the height of Mt. Everest, and had it been on Earth, going to its peak would have required you to wear a space suit. It is about 21 km tall!

But here on earth, you’d think Mt. Everest is the tallest mountain. No, it is not. In fact, the peak of Mt. Everest is of course the Highest peak. So, it is the “Highest” mountain, not the “tallest”. The tallest one would be the Mauna Kea in Hawaii. Subtle differences, you see…

Tallest means – Measuring the mountain from its base to the peak. (Which seems pretty fair to me, but it isn’t the norm).
Highest means – Measuring the mountain from the sea level to the peak.

Measuring Heights

Mountain peaks are measured from the sea level. Suppose a mountain is in the sea, the part of it which lies below the sea isn’t added to it’s height. So a mountain lying in the sea says, “unfair!”

Measuring sea level in turn is another complex problem because the sea isn’t at the same level everywhere. In fact, the sea level is much higher at the base of a mountain because the mountain’s mass increases the gravity and pulls the sea water making it higher there. Even if there isn’t any sea around mount Everest, the calculated sea level (higher than normal) is used as the base of the mountain. From this raised sea level to the peak, Mt. Everest measures 8,848 m.

This is how sea level is calculated:

Therefore, Mt.  Everest is 8,848 meters tall, because there is no part of it which is under the sea (because there is no sea there). Also, Mt. Everest is 8,848 meters high because its peak is 8,848 meters from the calculated sea level.

Mauna Kea

Mauna Kea, a dormant volcano in Hawaii, is not popularly known because it’s peak is just 4207 m above the sea level. So, it is 4,207 meters high. Mt. Everest is much higher!

But the important thing to note is that a huge part of the volcano is under the sea level. In other words, its base is on the ocean bed, not on land. So, if measured from the base, it is 10,100 meters tall! That is more than 1.2 kilometres taller than the mount Everest.

Mount kea is tallest mountain

That means, if there were no sea, Mauna Kea would have been a clear winner. Think of it this way – Suppose you cut both the mountain at their bases and place them on a huge flat land, Kea would be 1.2 kilometers higher! Given it is not a constant, I wonder why “sea level” is used as a standard to measure heights of mountains.

Clearly, Kea should be known better. School text books should at least have a mention of it.

 Another Twist

Now if you think that is all I have to say about the highest and tallest things, you are wrong. There are all sorts of complex measurements we can do. What if, you start measuring the height of a mountain from the centre of the earth?

I don’t think that would be fair given the odd shape of earth – It is about 42 km farther across the equator than it is at the poles. That is too much distance to ignore. Had earth been a perfect sphere, this measurement would have made sense.

earth measured at poles and equator
earth measured at poles and equator

Nevertheless, let’s imagine that we have started measuring the height of a mountain peak by measuring its distance from the centre of the earth. In that case, Mt. Chimborazo, an ice-capped inactive volcano and the highest mountain in Ecuador, would have been the highest one. Even with a peak which is at an elevation of 6,268 meters from the sea level, it is still the most distant place from the centre of the earth. The peak of it is 6,384 km from the centre, while that of Mt. Everest is 6,382 km from the centre of the earth. In some way, even Chimborazo is taller than Mt. Everest. Still, we’re never taught about it in schools!

If there are any science teachers reading this, please tell these things to the kids. I’ll be honoured!

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The Rainbow Coloured Lake – Grand Prismatic Spring

By Anupum Pant

Of all the “cool” places we have here on earth, lakes and other water bodies fascinate me the most. This is probably the reason I keep stumbling upon some of the most amazing lakes over and over. In the past I’ve written about the Taal lake and the bleeding lake of Antarctica. I have several others in mind, but this is the one I’ve picked for today, and it isn’t “cool” – The rainbow coloured lake.

Lying amidst the colourful geysers and hot springs of Yellowstone National park, located in the state of Wyoming, is a lake where you’ll see colours ranging from brilliant yellow, orange, red, green and of course blue. Here is what it looks like…

The lake is called the grand prismatic spring and it is the largest hot spring in the US. The water there is hot enough to burn you. And yet…

The hot spring, is home to different kinds of tiny living creatures. Organisms called thermophiles have learnt to thrive in the abnormally hot place. In fact, these creatures depend so much on the heat that they can’t live away from the hot water.

What makes it coloured?

The lake is coloured, yes. But what causes these bright vivid colours? Is it because there is something in the air around it, or is it due to a industrial chemicals leaking into the lake, or is it due to these organisms? Whatever causes the lake to appear coloured, that too colours appearing in the same order like they would be seen on a rainbow, I wanted to know.

Turns out, it isn’t just the lake that is coloured. The steam that arises from the hot water comes in different colours too!

The orange and other non-green/blue colours which appear there the most after blue are due to a multi-layered sheet of microorganisms that thrive in the lake. These are pigmented. The main pigment is chlorophyll (the same thing which helps the plants make food). But chlorophyll is green. So there are some other yellow, red and orange coloured pigments called Carotenoids, that protect the chlorophyll when the sunlight is bright enough to damage it.

The colour of the part of lake is a function of, amount of Carotenoids  present with chlorophyll. More the Carotenoid, more colours you’ll see. A greater ratio of cartenoids to protect the chlorophyll during summers is the reason why the lake appears not-so-coloured during winters and vividly coloured during the summers. So, it isn’t the variety of microorganisms or chemicals or atmospheric conditions that colour the lake, the colour is due to the different mix of chlorophyll and carotenoids at different patches of the lake at different times of the year.

The best time to visit this place would thus be the summer season!

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No One Knows Where This Water Goes

By Anupum Pant

Background

In the Judge Magney State Park, Minnesota, as the Brule river makes it way towards Lake Superior, something very unusual happens at the Devil’s Kettle Falls – The river splits into two streams, one of which moves away like a normal stream and joins the Lake Superior. But the other stream falls down several meters into a big dark hole. No one till date, has been able to find where the water falling into this hole ends up.

Although no one has been able to prove it, the current theory which holds to some extent, says that the water flows through underground passageways and makes its way to the Lake Superior.

What all has been tried?

  • Several gallons of dye to track the water stream has been poured into the hole. The dye once poured in has been never seen again.  Besides that, so many kinds of objects have been thrown in there. Nothing ever comes out. Moreover, with every tourist, geologist or scientist throwing something in there, it has still not got clogged yet. So, it is the best place to get free ping-pong balls and other objects.
  • Some say that a car fell into the hole once and was never seen again. But those are probably just stories because the place isn’t big enough to accommodate a car.
  • Throwing in GPS tracking devices also don’t work because the stream takes them underground where they can’t be tracked by the satellites.
  • People can’t be dropped in because it is 240 meters deep and no one knows how far it keeps going. There is a lot of uncertainty to risk a human life.
  • Water-proof cameras can’t be tied to ropes and sent down because the impacts break them. Moreover, the video stream would be impossible to receive if it goes too far and several rock layers come in between.

More Mystery

But there is more. Unlike other parts of the world, where underground rivers are formed cutting through soft-rock deposits (e.g: limestone) underground, this part of Minnesota has no soft-rocks underground. So, even large underground caves can’t be used to explain the Devil’s Kettle.

Scientists have even dismissed a theory that says probably lava tubes have been formed inside. Geologists say that the kind of rock that is there inside, can’t form lava tubes.

What do you think is down there? Do you have any ideas to help figure it out?

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Bill Nye vs. Ken Ham and Other Major World Religions

By Anupum Pant

So, despite being aware of its intimidating 3-hour length, with an open mind, I decided to watch the Bill Nye vs. Ken Ham debate last night. For a better focus I chose a time when everything around was super quite (0000 hrs to 0300 hrs) and hence, I was able to attentively watch it right from the first second to the very last second. Before starting, I had my mind cleared of all the prejudices and was ready to embrace the most logical points coming from any one of them. Yes, I was even willing to accept that the earth is six thousand years old, if Ken Ham would have  produced sound arguments.

Bill nye vs ken ham
Bill talking about a tree in Sweden, Old Tjikko, that’s over 9,000 years old

Although there were no winners or losers in that debate, for me, Bill Nye’s arguments were clearly moving – in the sense that he was able to take me on his side with sound arguments and very specific data points. Specifically, both of their answers, for one question asked from the audience was probably a turning point in the debate. When some one asked – What would make you change your mind? Bill told the audience to bring in sound evidences and they would change his mind. Ken Ham disappointingly suggested that nothing could change his mind. Clearly, a person who was willing to accept good evidences to change his beliefs was the winner for me; not a stiff/adamant person.
All said, Ken ham was not able to persuade me to accept his argument that the world was around six thousand years old.

In fact, at the end of the debate when both of the speakers were done, I observed that Ken Ham silently moved into the darker background and surprisingly (surprising because it was Kentucky), several people from the audience started approaching Bill Nye for a handshake or an autograph. Although, it wasn’t clear why they had approached him, whatever it was, it was definitely some kind of an appreciation for Bill. Evidently, people were impressed with his arguments.

Also, not being well aware of the Christian belief, during an online discussion after the debate, I was surprised to find that despite having embraced Christianity, there is a chunk of Christian population that believes the world is indeed several billions of years old (It is the Creationists who believe in six-thousand-year-old-earth theory). This chunk of Christian population was on the side of Bill Nye. So, this was not a God vs. Science debate. It was exactly like it was advertised – Bill Nye vs. Ken Ham.

Now, that things were starting to get a bit clearer, I decided to explore what sort of beliefs, the three most followed religions held on this topic. This is what I found:

Christians (31.59% of the world population): The ones who interpret the biblical writing in a literal manner believe that the Earth is six thousand years old and discard the theory of evolution (molecule to man). However, there is a huge chunk of Christians, with a background in science, who firmly believe that the earth is indeed several Billions of years old and also to an extent, believe in evolution.

Muslims (23.2% of the world population): According to this about page, Islam does not take a fixed stance on the age of the Earth. They prefer to leave the knowledge to their deity. Their holy book, Quran describes that the creation of Universe took “six days”. Again, according to them, at that time, as the definition of day could have been different than what it is now, especially when the Sun did not exist then, they do not like to say that the universe got created in 6 x 24 hours. In other words, they have a view very similar to the Biblical writings, yet are pretty flexible about accepting new theories on the age of our universe.

In the 19th century the prominent scholar of Islamic revival, Jamal-al-Din al-Afghānī agreed with Darwin that life will compete with other life in order to succeed. He also believed that there was competition in the realm of ideas similar to that of nature. – Wikipedia

Hindus (15% of the world population): Among all the three, Hinduism, the third most followed religion, has a lot of new things to say about the age of the universe. Since 95% of followers of this religion live in a single country, and the religion itself isn’t missionary in nature, its views are not popularly known all over the world. Personally, the Hindu religion and the vast amount of documented science it has in its ancient holy books fascinates me more than any other extant religion (not more than science, if you consider it a religion).

The religion believes in a circular time rather than a simple linear time-line of the universe and suggests the universe is several trillions of years old. In fact the “kalp-chakra” – the life span of the universe – it mentions is the largest measure of time known to man. And the end, it states that the universe collapses and gets created again.

The fundamental books of Hinduism, the Vedas, are huge, believed to be around 3,800 years old and comprehensively document numerous mathematical and scientific calculations. These books contain writings that cover topics from almost every science or maths subject known to man. In fact, they depend so much on mathematics that the holiest Hindu number is believed to be 108 which is probably the most beautiful number in mathematics.

According to a Wikipedia page on views of Hinduism on evolution:

Most God-believing Hindus accept the theory of biological evolution. They either regard the scriptural creation theories as allegories and metaphors, or reconcile these legends with the modern theory of evolution.

My opinion?

If you ask me, Bill Nye was a winner in the debate because of the all embracing state of mind he held all along – as long as you can bring in logical evidences to prove your ideas.
Although Hinduism fascinates me to a great extent, I’m not a religious person. My views about things are in line with Bill Nye’s views – I’d believe in anything as long as you can show me a valid and logical proof (arbitrary or literary interpretation of written verses from a book aren’t valid proofs). Moreover, I’d be ready to even modify my views over and over again as long as you keep bringing me evidences that disprove the older views. That is how science works, that is how logic works and that is what Bill Nye believes in.

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#StopTheMyth Saving Lives Leads to Overpopulation

By Anupum Pant

It only seems logical to think that spending millions of dollars to save lives of poor children must be aggravating another problem that Earth is facing today – Overpopulation. Fortunately, that isn’t the case. In fact the complete opposite of what seems logical, happens.

Saving lives of the poor is a necessity for stopping population growth. It doesn’t aggravate the problem. Saving lives is one big thing that will help in dealing with overpopulation.

Professor Hans Rosling explains how:

Other 2 common myths

  • Poor countries are doomed to stay poor for ever – This is not true.
  • Foreign aid is a waste – No! Foreign aid is important. Most poor countries that received aid 20 years ago are doing better than before.

A better place

Also, the earth is turning into a better place despite what the media has to say. As Bill gates puts it in the 2014 Gates Annual letter:

If you read the news every day, it’s easy to get the impression that the world is getting worse. There is nothing inherently wrong with focusing on bad news, of course—as long as you get it in context. Melinda and I are disgusted by the fact that more than six million children died last year. But we are motivated by the fact that this number is the lowest ever recorded. We want to make sure it keeps going down.

#StopTheMyth

Source: [Gates Foundation]

Blood Falls – A Strange Place Home to Strange Creatures

By Anupum Pant

Red colored water, which gives it name blood falls, emerges continually from the edge of a glacier in east Antarctica. The source of this red-colored-water is said to be a lake that is buried 400 meters under a glacier. The water of this lake is extremely salty and is about 3 times saltier than sea water. It is so salty that even at temperatures that Antarctica experiences, it doesn’t freeze. The lake is estimated to be around 5 million years old!

5 million years ago, this part of Antarctica was under sea water. Gradually glaciers started collecting around and over the lake. This made the water body isolated from the main sea and it became a lake eventually. Over time, as it got separated – like the Taal lake – it grew saltier (Taal lake got isolated too, but it turned less saltier). With this lake, the organisms living in it got trapped in this natural time capsule too.

What gives it the color red?

The falls are not red due to some mysterious spores that were found in the red rains of Kerala. What gives it that color, is a popular chemical phenomenon – iron rust.

The lake gets its supply of iron from the bedrock below it. As the water leaks out from the edge, the iron present in water gets oxidized. This oxidized or rusted iron gives the water its red color.

And since the lake has almost no supply of oxygen from around it, the water underneath is probably still like…water – not red (I’m not sure about it).

But that isn’t even anything interesting I’ve talked about the blood falls yet. The most incredible thing is the creatures that have been found living in those waters.

For millions of years, in the extremely salty waters of the lake with almost no oxygen or sun light, scientists have found a kind of micro-organism that has survived there. The kind of process they use to live has dazed scientists.

The microbes living there have been surviving on iron and sulfur! By breaking sulfates to get oxygen. And iron has been restoring the sulfates. It is a beautiful cycle that has never been seen anywhere else. This strange cycle has widened our view on how life could exist on other planets without oxygen in native state.

Source – SciShow by Hank Green.

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The Day When The Whole World Saw Auroras

By Anupum Pant

The record of geomagnetic storms has been kept for around 160 years now and among all the flares observed till date, the Carrington event was the most powerful ever.

The Carrington super flare

The 1859 Solar Superstorm, or the Carrington Event, was an enormous magnetic shock wave sent towards the Earth by the Sun. It caused a massive disturbance in Earth’s magnetosphere. The effects of this super flare observed here on earth were literally awesome.

Effects

Story: While studying sunspots on Sept 1, 1859 Richard Carrington, an astronomer observed a blinding white light that appeared over local parts of the sun. And 5 minutes later, it was all gone. As if nothing had happened.

Before dawn the next day, skies all over planet lit up. The lights in the sky were so brilliant that people said they could read text like they could read it in the daylight. Red, green and purple auroras pulsated even at  tropical areas like Cuba, Bahamas, Jamaica, El Salvador, and Hawaii. The whole world saw auroras that day.

An American newspaper reported:

The phenomenon was very similar to the display on Sunday night, though at times the light was, if possible, more brilliant, and the prismatic hues more varied and gorgeous. The light appeared to cover the whole firmament, apparently like a luminous cloud, through which the stars of the larger magnitude indistinctly shone. The light was greater than that of the moon at its full, but had an indescribable softness and delicacy that seemed to envelop everything upon which it rested. Between 12 and 1 o’clock, when the display was at its full brilliancy, the quiet streets of the city resting under this strange light, presented a beautiful as well as singular appearance. – from Wikipedia.

Telegraph systems all over the world went out of control. Some discharges shocked telegraph operators and fires were reported at few places. Due to the temporary disturbance in the magnetic field, current was induced in the wires and machines disconnected from the batteries still allowed telegraphs to be sent.

Luckily in those times, we did not have any satellites, or more importantly, any humans up in the sky; they would have been fried.

What if it happened now?

Today, electronic technologies have become far more refined and have moved into the common man’s life. If an event of such sizes takes place now, power lines and long-distance telephone cables could get seriously affected by it. A similar event of a little lesser intensity happened in 1989 – It was Friday the 13th and several ill effects were experienced.

Radar, cell phone communications, and GPS receivers could get disrupted. Humans in space would be in great danger. Astronauts, after having observed a flash of light would have only minutes to find shelter – probably a properly shielded spacecraft.

Scientists say that there is little we can do to protect our things from a storm like this. It is estimated that re-occurrence of a Carrington class event today, could cost the world economy around $2.6 trillion.

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Cryoseism – Frost Quakes in Canada

By Anupum Pant

Note: Remember that the ideas I share on this blog everyday don’t magically get formed in my brain. I’m no genius. What I am, is an average curious person. I read about things and then I experience a burning urge to find out more. I think of this blog as a record of everything I learn – kind of a public journal (NOT an Official gazette). I hope it helps you in some way. If it does, do mention it in the comments section below.

The Polar Vortex

For the past few days, in most of the things I’ve read, I’ve come across a reference to the extremely cold polar winds (incredible pictures) people are experiencing in the United States and Canada. 50 states have gone sub-zero in the US. Similarly, Canada is experiencing even  colder temperatures. While some have decided to stay at home, others are tossing boiling water to try out the Mpemba effect in the open. 8,500 miles away, almost sweating in a room with temperature 30 degrees (Celsius) above zero, I’m learning about new frost related phenomena that I had never heard of before.

My sympathies to the people who are suffering this bitter cold wave. 

Cryoseism

Thanks to the frost, I’m coming across some of the never-before-heard things that are appearing in the mainstream media. One of them which I came across yesterday was – Cryoseism or an Ice-quake.

People in Toronto woke up to loud sounds and rattling objects yesterday. People thought that an earthquake had hit Toronto. It wasn’t an earthquake. What they were experiencing was an Ice quake or Cryoseism.

What caused it?

Expanding water can be an extremely powerful force. It can break the strongest materials ever made. Industrial valves and pipes made of thick steel walls can be fractured by water as it expands. In this case, the earth got split open by it.

Unlike most other liquids, water expands on it freezing. Thus, ice formed is of higher volume and lower density. Although we aren’t dealing with density here, it is interesting to know, the phenomenon of expanding water is what makes gargantuan icebergs float on water. Apparently, there is nothing in the world that can contain expanding water without getting fractured (if you know about something that can, inform me in the comments section below). For a live demonstration, you can have a look at the video below, in which a metal pipe is split by freezing water.

This is what happened in Toronto. Water below the surface froze. As a result, it expanded and fractured the surface with a boom to find space for the 10% increase in volume. This was a Cryoseism.

With loud sounds some people have reported distant flashing lights. What was that about?

Electrical changes happen in the rocks when they get squeezed, pushed and rubbed around when pressure stored in the ground is released. The flashing lights are most definitely caused by these electrical changes due to rubbing and squeezing of rocks.

In the past the north and north-eastern parts of US have also reported such quakes.

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Tsutomu Yamaguchi Survived Two Nuclear Bombs

By Anupum Pant

Two nuclear bomb blasts which resulted in a complete annihilation of two Japanese cities, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, involved deadly X-ray-heated fireballs sending off a shock waves in all directions at a velocity greater than the speed of sound. In theory, no object, living or dead, should have stood straight after the shock wave passed. At least, some person standing at just a 3 km distance from both the places, where Little boy and Fat man were dropped, should have  completely been vaporized; Twice!

Tsutomu Yamaguchi

Tsutomu Yamaguchi didn’t die. He survived the immediate effects of, not one, but two nuclear bombs. Moreover, he was just 3 km away from both the ground zeros. Both of these bombings happened within a three-day span, during which, after having seen the first blast, he found the time to travel to the second site.
Although it is estimated that there are about 160+ such people, no one except Tsutomu Yamaguchi has officially been recognized to have survived both the nuclear bombs.

However he did die due to lung cancer on January 4, 2010. He died at an age of 93. So, technically the bombs didn’t kill him and he lived decades past the average human age.

His Story

First Bomb: Yamaguchi was going back to Nagasaki after a three-month long stay in Hiroshima. On August 6, 1945 when he was heading to the railway station to catch the train to Nagasaki, he found out that he’d forgotten his travel pass. He went back to take it. It was on his way back to the station (the second time), he saw the bomb falling down with a parachute. An instant later, everything went white. He was temporarily blinded, his ear drums got ruptured and he was burnt all over.

Second Bomb: With great difficulty he made it to an air-raid shelter, spent the night there and left for Nagasaki the next morning.Three days later, on August 9th, he thought he was fine to go back to work. At work, When he was explaining his burns to his boss who was listening in disbelief, the second air raid happened. Again, it was the same blinding lights that fell over this city now. Luckily, the second time he wasn’t affected with as many injuries.  However, he had been exposed  to a huge radiation dose which probably caused the cancer that killed him.

Isn’t is fascinating how millions of tiny little events had to happen at the right time and place for Yamaguchi to see and survive both of the nuclear bombs.

[Read More]

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Making Fresh Water With Apple and Tomato Peels

By Anupum Pant

Water on Earth

It’s Christmas! On this happy day let’s take a minute to look at what the major part of the world is facing today.

The present situation might not look as bad, but the truth is that we are running out of fresh water. To give you an idea about how much water is actually there on earth, this image of the whole world’s water compared with the size of earth is, in my view, the best thing that could prove it to you.

Fresh water in all the lakes and rivers on the whole planet is represented by the tiniest dot.  Yes, there is a third water sphere in the picture. You might have to squint to find it. So, that is the amount of fresh water we have here on earth.

global-water-volume-fresh
Source: http://ga.water.usgs.gov/edu/earthhowmuch.html

War for water: If this image isn’t much of a proof that fresh water is scarce, probably this will do the trick:
Countries consider fresh water a very precious resource. Several countries all around the world are fighting with their neighbors for this blue gold. Two good examples of that – [India starts water war] and [This]

The Point

Today, economically and technologically backward countries require good cost-effective methods to purify water. Scientists are doing a tremendous amount of work in this area and coming out with innovative methods to deal with the problem. Also, it is one great idea for taking up as a science fair project by students. One such recent research regarding this caught my attention.

The fruit peel method

Note: If you are wondering why have I written fruit when we are dealing with a tomato here, this might come as a shock to you that Tomato is actually a fruit. And BTW:

Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is knowing that a tomato doesn’t belong in a fruit salad. – Miles Kingston

Mr Ramakrishna Mallampati, under the guidance of Associate Professor Suresh Valiyaveettil of the Department of Chemistry at the NUS Faculty of Science, have discovered a new way of purifying water which is both innovative and cost effective. Moreover, it uses the waste product of a fruit, its peel, for something good. They hope that their new technology will comes as a boon to the people living in areas where a water treatment plant cannot be set up.

According to their research, a tomato’s peel, under certain conditions, can remove dissolved organic and inorganic chemicals, dyes and pesticides. Additionally, an apple’s peel was also found to have these wonderful properties. Apple’s peel loaded with Zirconium were found to be effective in removing phosphate, arsenate, arsenite, and chromate anions. This is the first time ever someone has used to remove two different kinds of pollutants using two different kinds of peels. Notably, all their processes can be scaled up for large scale applications.

I hope that this new discovery will come as a respite to all the poor nations where people die everyday due to the unavailability of drinking water – due to diseases.

Source: http://water.org/water-crisis/water-facts/water/#
Source: http://water.org/water-crisis/water-facts/water/#

For more details – [NUS researchers developed world’s first water treatment techniques using apple and tomato peels]

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Gamburtsev Mountain Range – The Unexplored

By Anupum Pant

Unexplored

First, think of something that is 1,200 km in length, 3000 m in height and yet it is complete buried under the Antarctic ice. A whole mountain range called the Gamburtsev Mountain Range in Antarctica has remained unexplored, buried for centuries under a 2 to 4 kilometer thick sheet of ice. The range is named after Grigoriy A. Gamburtsev – a Russian geophysicist.

It amazes me how something of the size of European Alps, right here on earth, has remained unexplored for decades. Scientists estimate that these mountains are several millions of years old. But, till date they have no concrete idea on how they were actually formed.

In the words of Robin Bell, a geophysicist at Columbia University:

Amazingly, we have samples of the moon but none of the Gamburtsevs’.

Discovery: year 1958

In the year 1958, these mountains were discovered by a Soviet expedition. For exploration, this expedition investigated the surface using seismic sounding at around 10 points. During this time, not much detail was known.

Year 2000: It was only in the year 2000 that a project by British Antarctic Survey was able to produce a fairly detailed 3D map of Antarctica to date. As a result, some more information about these mountains was gathered. Still, it wasn’t enough for finding out their origins.

To solve the mystery of their origins, in the year 2011, aircrafts equipped with radars, lasers and various other meters were sent out by researchers to image the last unexplored mountain range on earth. They flew a distance of around 3 times the earth’s circumference over Antarctica – about 120,000 kilometers.
In the end, this flying around returned good results.

This Image gives you a rough idea about how deep these mountains are buried. [PDF]

I hope that in the coming years, scientists will be able to drill through the ice that has accumulated there for millions of years. And then, probably they’ll be able to retrieve real Gamburtsev rock samples for detailed investigation.

Note: Pardon me if I’ve been writing too much in the “Earth” category for the past few days. Trust me it is just a coincidence. In my defense, It is completely possible that a truly random die roll can land 6 consecutive 6s.

The Feynman point is one such example. It is a sequence of 6 nines somewhere in the decimal digits of pi. In short, you cursing me for writing under the same category for the past few days is not justified, logically.

Feynman point

Raining Frogs and Fish

By Anupum Pant

Raining cats and dogs is a bit unlikely, but there is nothing wrong about saying, “it is raining frogs and fish”. It happens more often than you think. So, don’t be alarmed if one day you wake up and find fish on your terrace.

When we talk about rain, the one place in India which stands out is Kerala. As we’ve seen in a previous post that Kerala has seen red rains, it has also seen raining fish. This isn’t a joke. On February 12, 2008, people actually saw fish falling down from the sky.

Not just that. I’ve seen reports of water birds, tomatoes, coal, and even a boats falling from the sky.

Raining Animals

After a few moments of awe, when you look at the occurrence of raining animals with the science microscope, you’ll find that it is not something very extraordinary. In fact, there is a whole Wikipedia page on raining animals. It turns out, several places around the world have experienced raining frogs, fish, spiders, worms etc. And as always, science has an explanation for it.

How does it happen?

Water Sprouts: When tornadoes move on land, they can pick up trucks, houses, trees and what not. They suck up several things from the ground and cause total destruction along the path they travel. But, when such storms travel on water, they suck up water, fish and of course, frogs.

This experiment proves how a low pressure can pick up things. – [Experiment]

These things can stay up with the storm for a long time. And eventually when the storm comes on land and weakens the animals may drop down with rain. As a result, we see fish and frogs raining from the heavens.

There Is No Lake Like The Taal Lake

By Anupum Pant

Geologically this is quite a phenomenon and might get a bit confusing to grasp if you stop paying enough attention. Here we go…

Island in a lake on an island in a lake…

Taal lake is a freshwater lake on the Luzon island of Philippines. Almost at the center of this lake, is an island called the volcano island. At the center of this island is another lake called the main crater lake. And in this lake is a small landmass called the Vulcan point. [map]

Now take a deep breath…in short, it is, Luzon island > Taal lake > Volcano island > Main crater lake > Vulcan Point.

The main crater lake: Even though the crater lake isn’t a very big lake, it is still claimed as the  world’s largest lake on an island (Volcano Island) in a lake (Taal Lake) on an island (Luzon). Of course it is, where else in the whole world would you find a lake on an island in a lake on an island?

Vulcan point: On this world’s largest lake on an island in a lake on an island, is a tiny land mass called the Vulcan Point which is the world’s largest volcano in a lake (Main Crater Lake) on a volcano (Taal Volcano). It isn’t even big enough to support a small house.

Home to Unique Species

But all that is just a part of what is interesting about the Taal lake. Ecologically it is another marvel in a way that it is home to a few species of animals that are found nowhere else on earth. In this lake you’ll find the only varieties of fresh water sardines, sharks and sea snakes.

Reason: This lake was not a lake several thousands of years back. Then, due to volcanic eruptions, it got separated from the sea. Now the only thing that connected this water mass and the sea was Pansipit river. Gradually, several hundreds of years of precipitation converted this lake from a saltwater lake to a freshwater lake. For centuries, animals living here have remained isolated and have evolved into unique species to adapt to this desalination.