February 8, 2006
CRACK THE AYATOLLAHS:
Krakatoa helps to keep Earth cool (Roger Highfield, 09/02/2006, Daily Telegraph)
The huge eruption of Krakatoa is still keeping the world cool and damping down the rate of sea level rise caused by climate change, thanks to the ashes and aerosols that it spewed out in 1883.More than six cubic miles of rock, ash, and pumice were ejected from the volcano, near the Indonesian island of Rakata in the Sunda Strait.
The explosion generated the loudest sound in human history, and was heard from more than 2,500 miles away.
According to a study published today in the journal Nature, the sulphate aerosols and a worldwide volcanic dust veil acted as a solar radiation filter, reducing the amount of sunlight reaching the surface of the earth.
In the year following the eruption, global temperatures were lowered, keeping the Earth's surface waters relatively cool.
Combined with the fine work of Carl Sagan, we should be able to use the nuclear wintering effect of limited strike to counteract global warming while depriving North Korea, China, and iran of nuclear weapons. Posted by Orrin Judd at February 8, 2006 10:47 PM
that was a baaaaaad movie and I remember seeing it in the theater.
Posted by: Sandy P at February 8, 2006 11:28 PMKrakatoa may be keeping the earth cool, but Karaoke is releasing billions of CO2 molecules into the atmosphere
Posted by: Bruno at February 8, 2006 11:50 PMAs I belive has been metioned here before, Simon Winchester's book on Krakatoa noted that the eruption sparked anti-western rioting by Muslims in Indonesia, though as far as I can judge, there's no mention of any cartoons being spewed from the volcano by the force of the explosion.
Posted by: John at February 8, 2006 11:59 PM"The explosion generated the loudest sound in human history."
Statements like this make me doubt anything said in this article, like those that claim we've had the warmest winter in history - when records have only been kept for just over 100 years.
Posted by: obc at February 9, 2006 12:07 AMlaunching 6 cubic miles of earth into the atmosphere, isn't going to be a quiet operation. i wonder what kind of noise was made when those comet fragments slammed into jupiter 10 or so years ago.
Posted by: toe at February 9, 2006 12:28 AMSome Russian scientist is predicting a mini Ice Age within 50 years. We'd better fire-bomb them.
Posted by: ghostcat at February 9, 2006 12:59 AMobc -
I agree.
The explosion at Tambora (1815) was much larger and presumably that much louder. No doubt other 'loud' candidates are out there.
Posted by: Bruce Cleaver at February 9, 2006 7:01 AMAmazing. One burst by mother nature did more to adjust climate than one hundred years of human activity.
And we're to have how much effect on what? And by the way, how did Lake Superior get there, and when?
My take on global warming caused by man - Bah, Humbug!
Posted by: Mikey at February 9, 2006 8:11 AMNature is a tough mother. Just one recent volcano, Mt Pinatubo, knocked global temperatures down by 1.3C.
The hubris of the environmentalists is that they think human activity would upset the "delicate balance", which nature herself has been bashing quite nicely on her own.
Posted by: Gideon at February 9, 2006 8:59 AMAs I remember it, they couldn't even agree whether Krakatoa was east or west of Java or why it mattered.
liberals are like infants who think the world ends at their finger tips. If they're hot, it's getting warmer, if they're cold it's getting cooler. Politics has always shaped science and probably always will.
Posted by: erp at February 9, 2006 9:29 AMHere's the source of the majority of "greenhouse gases" emitted in the Upper Left Washington, and the EPA and Kyoto-freaks have done nothing to stop it. (Or is that the single largest source? Whatever.)