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Air Travel Disrupted Over Europe Again: A Major Global Disaster in the Making – Part I
Satellite photo of Iceland’s Eyjafjallajökull volcano May 7th, 2010 (via NASA Earth Observatory)
I know right now everyone is focused on the drama playing out in Europe over Greece et. al., but there is another little sideshow being produced over there by Mother Nature which has the potential to take centerestage and prove to be equally, if not more, devastating.
It is being reported that the Icelandic volcano Eyjafjallajokull is again causing flight disruptions across Europe, although not to the extent of the previous disruption in April, which was one of the largest in Europe post WWII and caused Eurocontrol, the agency in charge of European air traffic, to shutdown airports across Europe for six days. It grounded more than 100,000 flights and cost the airlines approx. $1.7 billion in lost sales.
The Current Disruption
The current ash plume is spreading south and east from Iceland as depicted in the figure below (courtesy WSJ):
The bulk of the cloud measures 2100 miles long and 1400 miles wide. The main ash cloud is spread over the North Atlantic with an offshoot spreading from Portugal through Spain, southern France and northern Italy, then up to Germany, the Czech Republic and Austria. A high pressure system in the mid-Atlantic is expected to continue to drive northerly winds into Europe for the next few days thus increasing the chances of further disruption.
Eurocontrol is reporting today that around 1500 flights were cancelled on Sunday. Flights were affected in Italy, France, Spain, Portugal, Germany, Switzerland, Ireland, Austria and Croatia. Regional airports in Spain France and Italy were closed for much of Sunday. Although no airports are closed today, about 500 fewer than normal flights are expected. Eurocontrol has the following latest update posted on its website:
Areas of high ash concentration have dispersed overnight over continental Europe. There is an area of ash cloud in the middle of the North Atlantic which is impacting transatlantic flights. While most of these flights are operating, many are having to make significant reroutings to avoid the area of ash cloud coverage, resulting in delays.
At the current time no airports are closed in Europe. According to the forecasts, during the afternoon, areas of higher ash concentration could move in a north-easterly direction from the Atlantic into the Iberian Peninsula.
Severe disruption continues to hit transatlantic flights as they are diverted around the ash plume north over Greenland and south of the ash cloud causing congestion on many routes. Eurocontrol has advised airlines to carry extra fuel to allow aircraft to fly around the ash cloud. Flights to and from US, Canada and the Caribbean were reported to be several hours late. Although the ash concentrations over Europe have dispersed today (remember the ash cloud is still there, only the “concentrations” are being deemed safe enough to fly), it is being reported that ash may head back towards Portugal and Spain this afternoon. The situation is pretty dynamic at this point as not only the ash cloud keeps moving around according to the prevailing winds, but nobody knows how long the volcano will continue to erupt and the volume and composition of the erupting material varying unpredictably as well.
The Iceland Met Office has said that there are no indications that the eruption is about to end.
As if the teetering economies of the world didn’t have enough to contend with already, the Iceland volcanic eruption (together with the Gulf oil spill) could be the straw that broke the camel’s back. Don’t get me wrong, these “teetering economies” fully deserve to collapse of their own sorry and corrupt weight; it’s just that Mother Nature might force the outcome that our Central Banking oligarchs are so desperate to avoid.
The Latest Eruption
On Wednesday, May 5th it was reported that explosive activity had again increased at the volcano (after the last major eruption on April 14th) with the ash plume reaching 6-9 km in the air (20,000 – 30,000 feet) – one of the highest levels so far – and was throwing out more tephra, i.e. ash rocks and larger chunks of material. About a dozen earthquakes had rocked the area (mostly below magnitude 2) on the 6th of May signifying movement of magma. The magnitude and force of the eruption can be gauged from the fact that noises from the volcano were reported to be heard 125 miles (!) away. Ash fall has been so severe that 65-70 km away from the vent, “everything has turned black” according to the Icelandic Met Office report. 65-80 km east-south-east of the volcano, people can barely see adjacent farms (a few kilometers).
The Icelandic Met Office has issued the following latest assesment today, which is not very encouraging, I might add:
The height of the grey or light gray eruption plume is ~5 km (17,000 ft) but sometimes it shoots up to 6 km (20,000 ft). It is heading southeast but low level winds are variable.
Ashfall was reported to have been almost continuous during the last 24 hours at farms Drangshlíð and Skarðshlíð just south of the eruption. The ash is rather coarse; the grain size is estimated by the farmers to be ~2-3 mm in diameter.
The crater is getting higher. Lava flow is low and not visible on cameras. In the afternoon there was a slight increase in explosive activity, which resulted in a higher plume for a while.
Seismic tremor has been similar for the past 3 days. A sequence of earthquakes started around 11:00 this morning at depths of 18 - 20 km and magnitude range 1 - 2. The earthquake sequence this morning indicates that magma is still flowing in from the mantle. Presently there are no indications that the eruption is about to end.
Ash plume from Eyjafjallajökull on May 8th, 2010
It’s All Good – Until It Isn’t
It is likely that either the authorities are underestimating the potential for a far bigger eruption and subsequent devastation or, as usual (look no far than the cover-up surrounding the Gulf oil spill), are simply hiding the facts from the public so as not to “rock the boat” i.e. keep the sheeple calm and let them go about their slavery as usual. Virtually no steps are being taken to inform/prepare the public if this eruption takes a turn for the worse, and evidence seems to be increasing that it will (not only this, but it appears that many pilots are not fully on-board with Visual Flight Rules (VFR) which means that pilots should fly around ash clouds using their on judgement instead of using onboard instruments such as radar which cannot detect ash particles. Neither has enough research been done to find out with precision what, if any, is a safe limit for volcanic ash concentrations for jet engines. It appears that not enough research has been done to arrive at the supposedly safe limit, i.e. .002 grams per cubic metre of air, defined by the European aviation regulators - more on this in part II).
I almost fell off my chair when I read this little nugget in The Times of UK:
Scientists have produced the first internal map of Eyjafjallajokull's network of magma chambers, which extend 12 miles below the ground.
The map shows how the volcano's tubes plunge deep down through the earth's crust to the start of the mantle, which is made of semi-molten rock. It reveals the huge scale of the eruption and the potential for a far greater one. This is because the magma chamber of Eyjafjallajokull is dwarfed by the much larger one under Katla, a volcano 15 miles to the east. Two of Katla’s eruptions, in 1612 and 1821, are thought to have been triggered by those of its neighbour.
The workings of the volcanoes have been provisionally drawn up by Professor Erik Sturkell, a geologist at the Nordic Volcanological Centre, University of Iceland. Sturkell suggests the Eyjafjallajokull eruption has been building since 1994, when new lava began rising, forming two reservoirs three miles beneath the volcano. They now feed into a much larger magma chamber a mile under the crater.
A surge of earthquakes under Katla mean it has experienced a similar influx of lava, Sturkell said. "This suggests the volcano is close to failure [eruption]."
Uh-oh…
Now Katla, as they say, is the Motherload.
Of course, it doesn’t help that Iceland sits directly on top of a the Mid-Atlantic ridge - a tectonic plate boundary located along the floor of the Atlantic Ocean separating the Eurasian and North American Continental Plates and a hot spot for volcanic activity. With around 35 volcanoes surrounding Iceland, the thing is a freakin’ powder keg at this point.
(More to follow in the next part)
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http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/newsnight/8631343.stm
GODBLESSTHEM.ICELAND,WERE WITH YOU,ERUPT AWAY,
GANGSTER BANKSTERS WILL NEVER MESS WITH YOU AGAIN.
Gordon,
Good post. Look forward to part 2.
Thx MsCreant. I see you got your avatar back!
I did it for you, then I got so many compliments I kept it!
It's definitely much more sexier!
There is a solution to all of this. Lower taxes. That always works. Ask George.
Either Discovery or NG has been running specials on Iceland's volcanic history and on the current eruption. I suggest you check 'em out when they are on. They are used to this activity (every 10 years like clockwork). Apparently everything these days is a "big deal" now and get's blown out of proportion. Volcanoes have been erupting since the beginning of time especially there, so why the big deal? We need to be worried about Yellowstone going off. Now that would be a world ender.
I think both volcanoes have direct lines to the ECB, Greek bank, Icelandic National Bank and the Fed. If one of these go off, it's all over.
The volcanoes are a conern and maybe the potential to be a greater hazard than the financial crisis. But the thing that really concerns me is that oil spill and if it isn't stopped soon. How much oil? and if it hits the gulf stream what damage will it do to marine food supplies globally? Which will lead to increased competition for other food supplies. And the associated effects of a ruined marine ecosystem.
It pisses me off that someone would name something Eyjafjallajokull. What the fuck kind of word is that?
If they stopped at, say, 12 leters, I might sound it out. Instead, it's the bla bla bla volcano. They should rename it to Mt. Ass.
And what the hell is ___ times twelve equals -444? CAPTCHA pisses me off too. CAPTCHA is a dumb name.
That was a great piece Gordon. I look forward to your upcoming piece on the Gulf oil disaster, I briefly worked in the business on some of those offshore rigs (1980s).
O/T, but Chumbawamba decided that he too would like join a drinkfest when gold reaches 50k per oz. If the Internet still exists, I will ask for your emails to coordinate, unless we just each promise to have such drinkfest wherever we are holed up all at the same time. Cheers!
....now just need one more event to push things off the cliff....
Dont worry, The world cup soccer should get everybody back together singing the new version of we are the world..Dont worry, be happy....Wait a minute, no drama in Africa is it?
No, no drama. nothing to see here, move along please. LOL
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This is how it works. As a Christian you will no doubt adhere to the belief that Jesus is returning to earth at some point in time for a second visit to terra firma. Because you hold this belief and that is why you are a Christian, you may be prepared to commit to something. Now I don't believe in the idea of the second coming, even though I believe Jesus was real and was one of the most important people to have ever lived. Now I will bet that he will never return. You can take a position and quite rightly profit from your belief. Jesus had a reasonable problem with the money-changers but he wasn't completely against the stuff.
For every dollar you invest I will pay you an amount = Your Stake x A Multiplier of 100 x The Number of Months Expired from the Start of the Contract when he Appears.
If he doesn't appear by the year 2020, you lose your stake. If you would like to bet again then we can renegotiate another "Special Carpenter Futures Contract". It is a very generous offer. To make things worthwhile the minimum bet you can make is $10.
Example...
Jesus of Nazareth reappears descending from the clouds with his donkey at the gates of Jerusalem via YouTube in December 2012. (Just to shut those silly mayan pagan worshippers up and those smart-arse film directors aswell.)
Your bet $10 x 100 x 37 months = $37,000 HOLY JACKPOT !!!
A good return in any stockbroker's language.
Interested...
P.S. Some Christian denominations are currently destroying themselves. Case in point...Jesus approving of gay marriage would be like Michelangelo approving of the destruction of the Sistine Chapel. Homosexuality to the Jews in the first century was completely abhorrent. That is not to say there were not terrible violations also in the Jewish community of the time, thus the later exile. The Greeks and Romans were pederasts and homosexuals from way back and had tried to take over the region completely. Jesus was born a Jew remember. He would turn in his grave at the rubbish that has been promulgated in his name.
(Dill-dill. Dill-dill-dill, dill-dill.)
My volcano's erupting. (Dill-ooh)
I got hit by a cloud. (Dillll-ooh)
Big ol' cloud. (Dill. Dil-dil-dil-dil-dil)
I'm gonna get that cloud! (Dih-dill-dih. Dill-dill-dill.)
Can't they just throw a TARP over it?
Seems to be the answer for everything else.
LOL. Yeah, a tarp ! Why not. One of those big old olive green military buggers; heavy kind.
You picked a fine time to erupt Eyjafjallajokull.
8 billion hungry children and a GMO crop in the field
We can do it better in the USA--Yellowstone super-volcanoe eruption anyone?
I MISS THE GOOD OLD DAYS
WHEN ALL WE HAD TO FREAK US OUT
WAS Y2K , WHICH IN 1999 LOOKED LAME
AND AS ABOUT AS CREDIBLE AS AL GORE
AIR FILTERS , BITCHES !!!!!
i agree. These people love to come on here and forecast disasters. The airlines lost 1.7 billion? just give me 10 million and i will design a filter for you so you can fly right over the volcano without dropping out of the sky.
Yeah, I bet.
It is just so easy to make a filter to almost submicron levels that will withstand the volume of air those turbofans ingest each second - with an unimaginable velocity to boot. I don't even want to think about how quickly the filter would deplete while in the ash dispersal plume.
Can someone please photoshop a Chinese SARS mask to a 757 and set up a pretty (text-centered, black background) website for this entrepreneur?
The real disaster is in the gulf, BP's imploded rig is spewing out 200,000 gallons of crude a day. No one seems to know how to plug the hole. Another 3 months of that and the world's oceans would be black and dead sludge, life in the ocean would perish on massive scale and ocean currents get totally disrupted. What implications are there for the weather, no freaking scientists dare say, everyone especially the politicians are behaving like ostriches. A global disaster is at the doorstep and here we are transfixed on europe because steel birds cannot fly? Anyone lived in europe through Chernobyl here? Which was scarier? Volcanic dust or nuclear ash?
is it me, or our the latest ideas to stop the spill sound desperate...just pretend.. shoving golf balls down the pipe, really?..have they tried duct tape yet...some guys have book about how to use that...probably better written than BP safety plans
Maybe Kotex could come up with a giant tampon?
that was a good one...but wish it was a Ms.Creant comment instead...would have been even funnier...
The gulf spill will be a gigantic ecological mess, but you are miss-guided in thinking the ocean currents will be disrupted. There are roughly 346,049,000,000,000,000,000 gallons of water in the earths oceans and the currents are governed by the sun and tidal forces. Stop watching "the day after tomorrow" and buy some shellfish while it's cheap.
If the algae in the ocean dies, there goes the world's biggest source of O2 (Google it, some sources say 70-80% of our oxygen comes from algae). Breath deep while the air is free.
You needn't distress yourself; nothing is going to die; it's a very minor event; perfect media event / blog rant; but in reality; basically meaningless; it'll be forgotten about in a few months in favor of the next exciting thing for the numerically, physical science, challenged to whip up about.
346,049,000,000,000,000,000 looks more like our National Debt circa 2015.
To think that they thought the Large Hadron Collider was going to create a Blackhole that was going to swallow the earth... Instead it was Deepwater Horizon spewing goo from the bowels of the Earth out its annulus.
maybe the dust will meet the oil in the middle of the atlantic, do a little dance and make a new atlantis. anything's possible at this point of the story.
I agree it's a disaster of similar magnitude (if not greater) - if you note I mentioned it in this article as well. I'm planning to do a piece on that as well.
Wonder how all this ash has/will affect crops. May be time to buy some dairy, wheat, agricultural stocks here in Australia. Also to stock up on bags of rice.
Very unlikely to work out as an investment. Rains "on" now in the "lucky Country"; you have large basic food surpluses this year already in the pipelines; shouldn't be any problems with either prices or supply for the next year.
having some food stored up is always a good idea, cheap preparation and with our JIT world, any natural or man made disaster will quickly lead to shortages...stock up. Regional power outages, satellites taken out by sun, tornado, earthquake, hurricane, floods, terrorist attack, food contamination, drought, ocean contamination...you name it could cut food source at any time...we live in an efficient but fragile world...
Buy mixed varieties of heirloom vegetable seeds. I have some great stuff coming up. 7 different varieties of tomatoes, beans, corn, squash, carrots....
Here is a good place to find lots of heirloom seed sources.
http://shop.ebay.com/?_from=R40&_trksid=p3984.m570.l1311&_nkw=heirloom+s...
The seeds keep for years properly stored and you get new seeds each year from your own crops. Fresh veggies are the best, especially your own.
Fortunately where I am sweet potatos grow like weeds, and mango trees are in surplus abundance, many of which rot on the ground for the lack of a good price.
Where is your home. I am Keaka from Kau on da big Island.
I'm screwed if we have problem in winter...in MN. I collect lots of those chemical packets that get warm in your pockets, blankets, and freeze-dried food...
Two thoughts:
1. Can't they just drop a dome over it and divert the rock and ash into awaiting ships?
2. It's too bad that given the depth of this volcano (down to the magma) that it doesn't spew chunks of gold into the air, which would make Iceland the richest nation in the world.
"2. It's too bad that given the depth of this volcano (down to the magma) that it doesn't spew chunks of gold into the air, which would make Iceland the richest nation in the world."
The U.S would just go back on the gold standard out of spite and make it worthless again. Turbo Timmay would just have Brock O'Bomma (he's really Irish, you know) pick up where we left off in '71. Gold now $35 per ounce!
I would sell mine{if I had any} to china or russia then, because they will have different thoughts of a fair price...
I'm surprised that Bernacke hasn't been dumping $100 dollars bills from helicopters into the vent to staunch the flow. Seems to be the answer to everything else.
Isn't Iceland where the Jules Verne heroe's started their adventerous "Journey to the Center of the Earth ?
Yes, it was --- in the neighboring Vatnajokull volcano.
Unfortunately, once the the intrepid explorers had reached the hellish Stygian depths, they discovered Ben Bernanke and Lloyd Blankfein lording over the doomed inhabitants in torment and suffering for all eternity, tied to their stations with chains made of alternating links of Fiatscum and Debtium, highly toxic elements which were just being recognized in Verne's time. The ending of the book had to therefore be rewritten, as it was considered too excessively depressing for the optimistic 19th century reader.