Yellowstone Caldera and terrorism

[franksolich]

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20090109/D95JJIGG0.html

CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) - Run for your lives ... Yellowstone's going to explode!

Hundreds of small earthquakes at Yellowstone National Park in recent weeks have been an unsettling reminder for some people that underneath the park's famous geysers and majestic scenery lurks one of the world's biggest volcanoes.

In the ancient past, the volcano has erupted 1,000 times more powerfully than the 1980 blast at Mount St. Helens, hurling ash as far away as Louisiana. No eruption that big has occurred while humans have walked the earth, however, and geologists say even a minor lava flow is extremely unlikely any time soon.

Some observers are nonetheless warning of imminent catastrophe......

Okay, question time.

This is apparently the largest volcano on earth, and when it goes, so goes all of America east of Idaho and Utah, and probably 90% of Europe.

It however doesn't look likely to blow any time soon.

However, would it be possible for some human agency to make it blow prematurely?

I'm thinking of busting off the crust there, so that everything blows out, sort of like using a rifle to puncture a hole in a pressure-cooker full of boiling water.

The largest nuclear explosion, the largest man-made weapon, was detonated by the peace-loving Soviets in the Soviet Arctic on October 30, 1961; never anything like it before, never anything like it since.  I guess it was millions of times the power of the firecrackers dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but am not positively sure.

Would this sort of bomb be strong enough to break the crust at Yellowstone, causing that volcano to erupt.....destroying almost perfectly all those parts of the world the Islamacist terrorists wish to destroy?

Of course, hundreds of millions of Moslems would die too, but remember, these people don't think the same way we do; that's immaterial to them, unimportant to them.

So say one day a couple of them board a Cessna aircraft--they of course would be consumed too, but these people don't think like we do--with a nuclear weapon, and drop it on Yellowstone.  Would it take something bigger, or smaller, than that big one of 48 years ago, to break the crust, causing the thing to blow?

[Rebel]

Europe will still be around, as will most of the United States. In that article, it said ash made it to Louisiana. In fact, ash and smoke will probably circle the globe and cause 1-2 years of cosmic winter. I don't know the radius of what will be directly affected by the blast, but judging from Mount St. Helens, where I've actually driven into the blast zone, it'll probably be about 4 states.

Oh, and Frank? It's 40,000 years overdue. I certainly wouldn't be sleeping tight at night if I was within 500 miles of it.

[djones520]

Frank, I don't think your gonna find to many on here who can answer that question with anything other then a guess.


My personal opinion?  I don't think any type of nuclear warhead that Sammy Jihad can get will do the job.  The types of nuclear weapons we'd most likely see from them will be of the destructive scale of the Fat Man and Little Boy, and in terms of nuclear weapons, those where pretty damn weak.

Any given thunderstorm will release more energy then they would.  Any volcanic eruption would release far more energy then they would.  A nuclear explosion would probably set off a small rumble, and nothing more.  Remember the N. Korean nuclear detonation?  If I recall correctly, that caused a .3 earthquake.  Stuff like that just ain't gonna do much to a region thats suffering hundreds of earthquakes in the 1 to 2 region.

[djones520]

Europe will still be around, as will most of the United States. In that article, it said ash made it to Louisiana. In fact, ash and smoke will probably circle the globe and cause 1-2 years of cosmic winter. I don't know the radius of what will be directly affected by the blast, but judging from Mount St. Helens, where I've actually driven into the blast zone, it'll probably be about 4 states.

Oh, and Frank? It's 40,000 years overdue. I certainly wouldn't be sleeping tight at night if I was within 500 miles of it.

Worrying about that thing going off is less productive then worrying whether or not tomorrow will be the End of Days.  There's not a damn thing you can do about it.  If it goes it goes, and you probably won't even realize what happened before your dead.

[franksolich]

Europe will still be around, as will most of the United States. In that article, it said ash made it to Louisiana. In fact, ash and smoke will probably circle the globe and cause 1-2 years of cosmic winter. I don't know the radius of what will be directly affected by the blast, but judging from Mount St. Helens, where I've actually driven into the blast zone, it'll probably be about 4 states.

Well now, that's not the impression I got, sir, when the primitives on Skins's island first brought the existence of the Yellowstone Caldera to my attention about a year and a half ago.

I recall reading from the links--not from Skins's island--that essentially all living things in the northern half of North America east of Idaho and Utah, clear up to the western fringe of Pennsylvania, would be extinguished.  No survivors, period.

And then from, say, Pittsburgh or Erie eastward, to the Atlantic Coast, maybe one out of a thousand could manage to survive, although in substantially weakened condition.

And then all that dust and rock, upon dumping down on Europe, would pretty much wipe out that continent, although more from "climate change" than from debris.

The damage would dissipate the further east it got, but as things look right at the moment, of everyone here on conservativecave, only LC EFA in Australia and Allosaurs in Idaho appear to have a chance.

There were maps and stuff.

[djones520]

Well now, that's not the impression I got, sir, when the primitives on Skins's island first brought the existence of the Yellowstone Caldera to my attention about a year and a half ago.

I recall reading from the links--not from Skins's island--that essentially all living things in the northern half of North America east of Idaho and Utah, clear up to the western fringe of Pennsylvania, would be extinguished.  No survivors, period.

And then from, say, Pittsburgh or Erie eastward, to the Atlantic Coast, maybe one out of a thousand could manage to survive, although in substantially weakened condition.

And then all that dust and rock, upon dumping down on Europe, would pretty much wipe out that continent, although more from "climate change" than from debris.

The damage would dissipate the further east it got, but as things look right at the moment, of everyone here on conservativecave, only LC EFA in Australia and Allosaurs in Idaho appear to have a chance.

There were maps and stuff.

If it erupted as badly as it did 2 million years ago, thats like.  It holds the record for the largest, and 3rd largest volcanic eruptions known to mankind so far.

Here's an image of the ash beds from the 3 eruptions it's had.

[Rebel]

Why would Idaho be saved? They're close as hell to Yellowstone, figuratively speaking. As for the cosmic winter, I think that we are technologically advanced enough that we could survive.

[Chris_]

Why would Idaho be saved? They're close as hell to Yellowstone, figuratively speaking. As for the cosmic winter, I think that we are technologically advanced enough that we could survive.

Everything I have read on the subject has said that if the caldera gives way it is the end of mankind.  The ash cloud will cover the earth and block the sun -- no sun, no crops.

But maybe there is something new that I haven't seen...

[franksolich]

Why would Idaho be saved? They're close as hell to Yellowstone, figuratively speaking. As for the cosmic winter, I think that we are technologically advanced enough that we could survive.

The movement of air saves Idaho, in theory.

Air usually generally moves eastward.

[djones520]

The movement of air saves Idaho, in theory.

Air usually generally moves eastward.

The jet stream would blow the majority of the ash to the SE to E.  Just like in the image I posted.  Volcanoes in the southern hemisphere blow ash to the west.

[Rebel]

The jet stream would blow the majority of the ash to the SE to E.  Just like in the image I posted.  Volcanoes in the southern hemisphere blow ash to the west.

Well, we'll just get Tebow to blow it back west. 

[DumbAss Tanker]

It would be extremely bad on a worldwide level, there would be catastrophic climatic effects for several years; the less resilience agriculture had in a given area, and the denser the population, the worse it would be.  Southern Africa, South America, and Australia would be a lot better off than anyplace in the northern hemisphere, but hardly unaffected.  Global economic collapse and massive starvation in the northern hemisphere for both rich and poor nations would be very probable.

As far as initiating it intentionally, I think it would take something like a very large subsurface thermonuclear weapon detonation to do it.  If the dirtbags ever got one of those, I'm sure they would have much more expedient uses for it than trying to explain their way into Yellowstone with it and all the necessary drilling and support equipment necessary to emplace it.

[Wineslob]

Quite honestly we aren't sure if the caldara would "blow". As it stands it's pretty much letting off steam. (pun intended).  

[franksolich]

Okay, so back to the original purpose of the thread.

We all agree (a) the Yellowstone Caldera's massively big, and can do great damage, and (b) it's not likely to blow anytime soon.

That being agreed upon, does one suppose it's possible for a malicious human agency to cause it to blow, by blowing up the earthen crust that holds it down--like some sort of nuclear bomb?

[franksolich]

As far as initiating it intentionally, I think it would take something like a very large subsurface thermonuclear weapon detonation to do it.  If the dirtbags ever got one of those, I'm sure they would have much more expedient uses for it than trying to explain their way into Yellowstone with it and all the necessary drilling and support equipment necessary to emplace it.

Okay, perfect.

That answers my question.

Thank you!

[NHSparky]

The movement of air saves Idaho, in theory.

Air usually generally moves eastward.

I was at prototype in Idaho Falls (about 150 miles from Yellowstone) when the fires were there in 1988.  I remember waking up several mornings to significant (1/4-1/2") of ash on my car.

That being said, with the bad comes the good--at least you'd get rid of all the liberal idiots in Jackson Hole.

[JohnnyReb]

Don't worry about it, even as we speak, Al Gore has a plan.

[rich_t]

Don't worry about it, even as we speak, Al Gore has a plan.

Does it including cutting his own throat to reduce his CO2 emissions?

[hope springs eternal]

[mamacags]

Don't worry about it, even as we speak, Al Gore has a plan.

He is going to sit on the volcano to prevent the ash from leaving.  His ass is used to have millions of tons of hot air in it so a volcano wouldn't even phase it.

[LC EFA]

Okay, so back to the original purpose of the thread.

We all agree (a) the Yellowstone Caldera's massively big, and can do great damage, and (b) it's not likely to blow anytime soon.

That being agreed upon, does one suppose it's possible for a malicious human agency to cause it to blow, by blowing up the earthen crust that holds it down--like some sort of nuclear bomb?

I don't think humans have technology sufficient to trigger an eruption. The amount of force required to set it off, while trivial by natures standards is still beyond what we have available.

Even using multiple multi-stage nuclear warheads, the number and placement of them required would be disaster all by itself.

[asdf2231]

Why would Idaho be saved? They're close as hell to Yellowstone, figuratively speaking. As for the cosmic winter, I think that we are technologically advanced enough that we could survive.

Green houses and hydroponics. Not to mention humanitariam aide from other countries until things are up and running.

[dutch508]

Read the book "The Road".


it's by the guy who wrote 'No country for Old Men'.

[Mr Mannn]

I think they could do more damage if they exploded a nuke at sea, that way they could target major cities on our coast and survive to hoist a few cold ones.

scenario: They load the bombs on a tramp freighter. They park it out to sea a certain number of miles out from New York City. Drop a sea anchor, set the timer, and take a sea plane to safety. Utter devastation.

Now in Yellowstone you describe a nuclear air burst. Most of the shock wave will be above ground. If they had the expertise, they would be better off to drill and detonate their nuke underground within the caldera. again, they could set a timer and fly away to safety.

[Rebel]

Read the book "The Road".


it's by the guy who wrote 'No country for Old Men'.

I'll wait for the movie. 

[Thor]

I'll wait for the movie. 

Is that because you Army Doggies can't read ?!?!?!?!?