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How Melting Glaciers Alter Earth's Surface, Spur Quakes, Volcanoes
Wall Street Journal ^ | June 9, 2006 | Sharon Begley

Posted on 06/09/2006 3:16:04 PM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks

Imagine the surface of Earth as a giant trampoline that accumulated a slab of ice over the winter, and you can get a sense of what a growing number of scientists say is in store for the planet as glaciers keep melting.

Once the trampoline's ice turns to water that drips over the edges in the warm days of spring, the concave elastic slowly rebounds to its original flat shape. That's how Earth responds as glaciers retreat, and the consequences promise to be ... interesting.

The reason is that one cubic meter of ice weighs just over a ton, and glaciers can be hundreds of meters thick. When they melt and the water runs off, it is literally a weight off Earth's crust. The crust and mantle therefore bounce back, immediately as well as over thousands of years. That "isostatic rebound," according to studies of prehistoric and recent earthquakes and volcanoes, can make the planet's seismic plates slip catastrophically, and cause magma chambers that feed volcanoes to act like bottles of shaken seltzer.

"It's unavoidable that glacial retreat will induce tectonic activity," says geoscientist Allen Glazner of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.

The connection between melting glaciers and earthquakes isn't to be confused with a myth that zipped through cyberspace after the 2004 Asian tsunami. It claimed that global warming (which is not even two degrees above historical averages so far) heated magma, causing seismic plates to shift. No.

Instead, the world-wide melting of glaciers portends a seismically active future because of isostatic rebound and also because the meltwater from liquefying glaciers adds mass atop oceanic plates. That creates a teeter-totter effect, further destabilizing the planet's crust. "Recent findings reinforce the idea that the solid earth and the climate are inextricably linked," says Prof. Glazner.

(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...


TOPICS: Miscellaneous; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: climate; climatechange; earthquakes; eruptions; faults; glaciers; globalwarming; tectonicplates; volcanoes
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To: mountn man
My understanding is he signed it, but never had it before the Senate.

Clinton didn't even sign it, he had AlGore do it for him. As I recall, he presented either the treaty itself or asked the Senate for a resolution about the treaty. Whichever, it was overwhelmingly defeated, by something like 90 votes.

21 posted on 06/09/2006 5:29:02 PM PDT by jimtorr
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks

Oh geez, what tripe. The next thing they'll want me to believe is that war is peace and that we've ALWAYS been at war the Oceania.


22 posted on 06/09/2006 5:33:17 PM PDT by Fledermaus (If we are now supposed to be "compassionate conservatives", why aren't their any "smart liberals"?)
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks
The vast majority of glaciers are on Antarctica and Greenland. Should we expect increased earthquakes and volcanism in those places?
23 posted on 06/09/2006 9:31:31 PM PDT by Mike Darancette (Make them go home!!)
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks
Have the areas where the continental ice sheets covered North America and Eurasia suffered much volcanism and earthquakes since the ice retreated?
24 posted on 06/09/2006 9:35:14 PM PDT by Mike Darancette (Make them go home!!)
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks

And this is supposed to explain the seismic activity in the Charleston, SC area??????? I don't think so...


25 posted on 06/10/2006 12:10:36 AM PDT by dixie sass
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To: dixie sass

Charleston just rocks, I guess...


26 posted on 06/10/2006 2:40:33 PM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks (One flag--American. One language--English. One allegiance--to America!)
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To: Fledermaus

We are at war with Eastasia. We have always been at war with Eastasia.


27 posted on 06/10/2006 2:41:13 PM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks (One flag--American. One language--English. One allegiance--to America!)
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To: mountn man
The senate rejected debate on that piece of crap by a vote of 95 to 0 in 1997 or 1998, IIRC.
28 posted on 06/10/2006 2:46:19 PM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks (One flag--American. One language--English. One allegiance--to America!)
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks

So in other words, the Senate slapped it down real hard previously, but its still Bush's Fault.


29 posted on 06/10/2006 3:51:35 PM PDT by mountn man (Growing old is mandatory. Growing up is optional.)
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks
"It's unavoidable that glacial retreat will induce tectonic activity," says geoscientist Allen Glazner of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.

Huh? I'm sorry, I just can't swallow that, particularly when he uses the term "unavoidable". The science is nowhere that precise. How about everyone in North America jump at the same time and disrupt the earth's rotation?

Further, I consider the source to be suspect because UNC is very liberal.

30 posted on 06/10/2006 4:08:53 PM PDT by ChildOfThe60s (If you can remember the 60s...you weren't really there.)
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks

Lol, yes it does. In more ways than one!


31 posted on 06/10/2006 7:21:34 PM PDT by dixie sass
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To: Tolerance Sucks Rocks

Help the sky is falling,


32 posted on 06/12/2006 7:41:21 PM PDT by Coleus (Roe v. Wade and Endangered Species Act both passed in 1973, Murder Babies/save trees, birds, algae)
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To: mlstier

"No contest. (And only applicable to the south pole anyway.)"

That's my thought too. HOWEVER, parts of the earth that were covered in ice about 10,000 years ago (over a mile thick here in Seattle - but thank God for global warming) are still on the rebound. It's not much though. And it doesn't mean more earthquakes, etc.


33 posted on 06/12/2006 7:50:42 PM PDT by geopyg ("I would rather have a clean gov't than one where -quote- 1st Amend. rights are respected." J.McCain)
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