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Submitted via IRC for TheMightyBuzzard
The supervolcano under Yellowstone National Park has once again become a point of focus for doomsdayers after scientists picked up some ominous earthquake activity this month.
Scientists from the University of Utah, responsible for monitoring the supervolcano in Wyoming, said a "swarm" of 464 earthquakes began on June 12 – the biggest being a 4.5 magnitude shudder on June 15.
"The epicenter of the shock was located in Yellowstone National Park, eight miles north-northeast of the town of West Yellowstone, Montana," UU scientists said in a statement. "The earthquake was reported felt in the towns of West Yellowstone and Gardiner, Montana, in Yellowstone National Park, and elsewhere in the surrounding region."
The 4.5 magnitude quake is the largest to hit the supervolcano since a 4.8 quake struck in March 2014. Scientists noted that the "energetic sequence of earthquakes... included approximately 30 earthquakes of magnitude 2 and larger and four earthquakes of magnitude 3 and larger, including today's magnitude 4.5 event."
They added: "This is the highest number of earthquakes at Yellowstone within a single week in the past five years, but is fewer than weekly counts during similar earthquakes swarms in 2002, 2004, 2008 and 2010."
Subbed because volcanoes are cool not because I'm askeert Yellowstone is going to blow any minute now.
Source: https://www.rt.com/viral/393331-yellowstone-swarm-earthquakes-supervolcano/
(Score: 4, Informative) by FatPhil on Monday June 26 2017, @04:34PM (6 children)
Here's the payload from the USGS's #yvo link above for those who refuse to bow to the USGSs retarded demands:
"""
YELLOWSTONE VOLCANO OBSERVATORY INFORMATION STATEMENT
U.S. Geological Survey
Monday, June 19, 2017, 3:09 PM MDT (Monday, June 19, 2017, 21:09 UTC)
YELLOWSTONE VOLCANO (VNUM #325010)
44°25'48" N 110°40'12" W, Summit Elevation 9203 ft (2805 m)
Current Volcano Alert Level: NORMAL
Current Aviation Color Code: GREEN
The University of Utah, a YVO member agency, sent out the following update about the ongoing earthquake swarm north of West Yellowstone.
The University of Utah Seismograph Stations (UUSS) is monitoring an earthquake swarm which is currently active on the western edge of Yellowstone National Park. The swarm began on June 12th, 2017 and, as of 13:30 MDT on June 19th, 2017, is composed of 464 events with the largest magnitude of ML 4.4 (MW 4.4) (Figure 1). The swarm consists of one earthquake in the magnitude 4 range, 5 earthquakes in the magnitude 3 range, 57 earthquakes in the magnitude 2 range, 238 earthquakes in the magnitude 1 range, 157 earthquakes in the magnitude 0 range, and 6 earthquakes with magnitudes of less than zero. These events have depths from ~0.0 km to ~14.5 km, relative to sea level. At the time of this report, there were 115 felt reports for the M4.4 event that occurred on June 16, 2017 at 00:48:46.94 UTC (June 15, 2017 at 18:48:46.94 MDT). The M4.4 event has an oblique strike-slip moment tensor solution (Figures 1 & 2).
Earthquake swarms are common in Yellowstone and, on average, comprise about 50% of the total seismicity in the Yellowstone region.
Related figures can be viewed on the original post: http://quake.utah.edu/research/special-events/ongoing-yellowstone-earthquake-swarm-north-of-west-yellowstone-mt
This is the highest number of earthquakes at Yellowstone within a single week in the past five years, but is fewer than weekly counts during similar earthquakes swarms in 2002, 2004, 2008 and 2010.
"""
(Continueing off-topic ranty aside: Quite how such sites (even NASA does it) pass governmental accessibilities guidelines, I don't know, as people shouldn't be forced into using a particular browser/screenreader. (According to a crazy poor-sighted loony lefty like me, anyway.))
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 26 2017, @05:05PM (1 child)
I noticed the government sites (nasa, etc) started getting crappy about 2 years ago. Maybe it is related to accessibility?
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Tuesday June 27 2017, @05:54AM
Pure text is still the most accessible form. You can change the font size any way you want, you can feed it to a screen reader, you can display it on a Braille line, there's no program that doesn't know how to deal with it.
So if anything, it is despite accessibility.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 26 2017, @06:18PM (3 children)
WTF? Can someone explain this with a car analogy or in terms of Libraries of Congress?
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Monday June 26 2017, @07:53PM
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by deadstick on Monday June 26 2017, @09:47PM
No, but logarithms could be arranged.
(Score: 3, Informative) by maxwell demon on Tuesday June 27 2017, @06:12AM
Let's define the car range magnitude M: It means that the car has a range of 10M miles before you'll run out of gas.
So if your car currently has a range magnitude of 2, you're on the safe side: You've still got 100 miles to go.
If your car has a range magnitude of 1, you probably should look out for filling stations; you've got just 10 miles to go.
If your car has a range magnitude of 0, you urgently should look for a filling station, you've got only one more mile until your gas is used up.
If your car's range magnitude is less than 0, you've got less than a mile to go.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.