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Cavitation by John D. Morris, Ph.D. "One glance at Grand Canyon evokes wonder at the extensive erosion that occurred—but the canyon is only the final whisper of a grand-scale event. The massive erosion episode leveled off and gouged out the Colorado Plateau, covering much of Arizona, Utah, New Mexico, and Colorado. The present-day Colorado River hardly seems capable. Something of a much larger scale accomplished this!...." more...

Much has been made of the precipitous decline in the level of discourse in the United States. Many attribute this to the coarsening of the language and the ever-widening gulf between the various factions in the political spectrum. However, these factors are a symptom of a current underlying and foundational dilemma: the inability of not only the general public, but nearly all of the so-called societal leaders and opinion-makers to generate an original thought, as well as a stubborn refusal to use reason and logic when confronted with irrefutable facts and arguments. These traits can be explained, insofar as the...

Beach in Portugal Click to see the original 10x larger.

This one might be really easy, because I imagine if you've seen this one you wouldn't forget where it is. But that would mean somebody actually saw this (or at least a picture of it indicating where it is). Anyway, it's one of the most picturesque sea arches I've ever seen. The other arch (bottom 2 pictures) is located nearby. Click all for full-size.

If an arch falls in the desert... Sorry about last week, I literally lost track of time. So here are several images from another of those amazing state parks in America, this one called the Valley of Fire State Park in Nevada, which is within driving distance of Las Vegas (and you can apparently drive through part of it). The reason for this particular posting is that one of the many arches in the park fell down very recently. Erosion happens. When you see the arch that fell down, you can understand why; this one was pretty precarious. Article: Valley...

Last week I tooled around the ice cap over Katla, adjacent to the ice cap over the erupting volcano -- I'm too lazy to look up the names right now -- using Panoramio. I compiled a collection of images that confirm I need to get there someday. I was going to post them this week. But anyway, time's pressing. I also discovered last week that National Geographic provides desktop quality images monthly. Great stuff. I found an example and I'll link to where they are if you're interested (the source link above). Covers the whole range of National Geographic subjects....

Israel's Timna Valley and Timna Valley Park appears to be an interesting place for arid scenery. (Wikipedia entry) Copper was mined here back to the Stone Age through the Middle Ages. It's just a bit north of Eilat, the city at the end of the Gulf of Eilat (also known as the Gulf of Aqaba), the eastern bunny ear of the Red Sea. These pictures are of the Arches and the aptly named Mushroom. Click for full-size. Arch in Timna Valley, Israel Timna Park "The Mushroom" Distant shot of the Mushroom Brightly lighted Mushroom

First, not totally exactly geology, but one of the more amazing iceberg pictures I've ever seen: Next, an offering from Patrick Smith Photography (I had one of these before): this one won some awards and was on the cover of a photography magazine: Finally, Marion Island from space: click for full-size

I've always said that there are likely hundreds of geological "gems" in the country's state parks. Here's one of them. Click for full-size. The source of this photograph has got a pretty amazing portfolio. I recommend checking it out on the header link. The Santa Cruz County "Bridge to Nowhere" is another winner. His Hawaii pictures are pretty phenomenal too. This photographer is a master of coastal seascapes. Explanation of the geology of the park (which it has a LOT of): Geology of Salt Point State Park, CA Here's a PDF map showing location and features. Salt Point State Park...

First picture comes from the link in the header. Others I found. Got inspired when I found an old National Geographic at the dentist's office. Click for larger size Speaking of NatGeo (half-size, click for full. Desktop download) Next two are the only size I could find; wow.

I was digging through some old calendars (I can never throw them away) and found a month with Delicate Arch. I figured that sometimes you have to just have a beautiful picture to look at. Click for FULL size. Also see note in first comment (from me). Just for fun, this is what Delicate Arch looks like from the other side:

Click the source link to see the article (and a link to a larger version) of this picture: Here's a ground-level view of a portion, looking a lot like a vegetated version of the Goosenecks of Utah (click for full-size):

I found this searching on the phrase "Grand Canyon of Europe". This isn't the only place that came up, but in my opinion, it probably qualifies. (Others were Goruppu Gorge on Sardinia and the Gorge d'Ardeche, France.) Canyon pictures are notoriously difficult to capture the scale of the place, so I'll try a couple. This is in northern Greece, up toward Albania. Building in front is a monastery. This last one is half-size; click for full size.

Found this in the Flickr collections. Black and white always is reminiscent of Ansel Adams. The building is a hiker/trekker "refugio" -- nice place to stay below the towers. There are lots and lots and lots of pictures of these features! (Click for full-size.)

OSBI agents went to gun dealers and pawnshops to create a list of .40-caliber Glock owners. WELEETKA — Authorities working to narrow their leads in the June 8 shooting deaths of two girls used old-fashioned legwork to come up with a list of area gun owners with .40-caliber pistols, one of two weapons used in the slayings. Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation agents knew the caliber of the guns used in the killings, so they merely checked with area gun dealers and pawnshops to determine who had bought or recently pawned .40-caliber Glocks. "It's a typical procedure of any investigation"...

Thor's Hammer, Bryce Canyon, Utah.

You can see why it's called "The Wave".

Keeping on an erosion theme, I looked for pictures of the location used for the "Paths of the Dead" in the Lord of the Rings movie trilogy, specifically in "The Return of the King". They are called the Putangirua Pinnacles. They are located near Wellington on the southeastern North Island. I linked to the OneRing.net image above. There are some better, higher-resolution pictures on the Web, but not easily linkable.

I went back to an old reliable for this one, and the picture I found was somewhat amazing on background. The amazing thing about this place is that it didn't exist 150 years ago! It is called "Georgia's Little Grand Canyon", and it formed due to drastic erosion caused by non-soil-conserving agricultural practices. Supporting Links: Providence Canyon State Park Wikipedia entry Providence Canyon Photographs of Providence Canyon State Park by Bruce Gourley

Three Gorges dam causes downstream erosion--study 21 May 2007 08:48:29 GMT Source: Reuters HONG KONG, May 21 (Reuters) - China's Three Gorges Dam, the world's largest hydropower project, is retaining huge amounts of sediment and nutrients and causing significant erosion in the downstream reaches of the Yangtze River, researchers have found. In a paper published in the latest volume of the Geophysical Research Letters, Chinese scientists said the dam had retained 151 million tonnes of sediment each year since 2003. The researchers from the East China Normal University in Shanghai calculated supplies of water and sediment at places along the...

Grab bag; a rare picture of Kerguelen from space (usually cloud-covered) and a nice picture of Bryce Canyon. Sorry I missed last week. If you click the Kerguelen picture, you get a 250-meter resolution version. Even though there have been surveys, supposedly there are still places on Kerguelen that have never been visited by a human being in recorded history. Bryce Canyon from Bryce Point

I've probably seen lots of pictures of this place/area, but I finally learned its name. Spectacular coastal karst. This is a World Heritage Site -- deservedly.

For today's Halloween GPoW, I challenged myself. I have frequently posted pictures of volcanoes, waterfalls, caves, arches and bridges, canyons, and mountains; I've occasionally veered off that path with landslides, remote-sensing views, and a couple of crystals and minerals. So my challenge was to come up with something DIFFERENT; unusual, photo-worthy, and significant geologically. And also something a bit relevant to Halloween. See if you think I succeeded. All of these are in the United States.

The Sunday Times October 22, 2006 Kim tested by rise of armed resistance Michael Sheridan, Far East Correspondent AN underground resistance movement in North Korea, capable of smuggling out videos of executions and staging violent acts of defiance, has emerged as the Kim Jong-il dictatorship faces international sanctions for testing a nuclear bomb. The latest evidence of North Koreans willing to risk their lives to tell their story is a video showing the execution by firing squad of a woman convicted of murder committed in the course of stealing food last July. Captured by a bystander with a tiny camera,...

Accompanying text and location map: Mastodon Arch

"Grottoes" (grottos?) can be both natural, man-made, or man-modified. Searching for grotto images finds many of these categories. This one struck me as pretty impressive, on the island of Malta. I had to shrink the image a bit; click on it for the full-size image. The second shot is of the notable tourist attraction Blue Grotto of Capri, Italy. There are a lot of pictures on the Web of this place; I couldn't find what I felt was a great one. The glow of the underwater illumination is pretty good; it appears that there is a considerable photographic challenge in...

Today's two images are inspired by the "learn something new every day" phenomenon. In this case, the something that was learned was about the Northwest Angle in Minnesota, pictured here (click to go to article, with larger image link). I wanted to find other images of the Northwest Angle, but couldn't find much. However, I did find the interesting site below, with a virtual tour and smallish excerpts from a Landsat poster of Lake of the Woods. The image below was interesting, especially the circularity of the features in the lower part of the image. A Virtual Tour of Lake...

I read about Grand Gulf, Missouri in a recent "Natural History" magazine, and I admit to a minor fascination with small state-park size canyons and gulches and runs, typified by such places as Turkey Run in Indiana; Letchworth State Park (not so small) in New York; and the Flume in Franconia Notch State Park, New Hampshire -- places I've been to. This appears to be another interesting one that I've not been to. So here's a few pictures of Grand Gulf. I was away from my computer all last week and couldn't post my weekly "feature". The pictures are from...

Products based on NASA Earth observations and a new Internet-based decision tool are providing information to help land and water managers combat tamarisk (saltcedar), an invasive plant species damaging precious water supplies in the western United States. This decision tool, called the Invasive Species Forecasting System (ISFS), is being used at the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) National Institute of Invasive Species Science in Fort Collins, Colo. It is the result of combining USGS science and NASA Earth observations, software engineering and high- performance computing expertise. "The ISFS combines NASA satellite data with tens of thousands of field sampling measurements, which...

Last week's search on "chasm" discovered the Amazing Link below the image. The image is also of Elves Chasm on the Colorado River. The image is from this part of the Web site (the author holds landscape photography workshops -- and he appears to be quite good) The 25-Year Dream And here is the Amazing Link. It's a full 360-degree panorama of Elves Chasm. It's one of the most remarkable images I've ever seen. BEFORE YOU CLICK: the panorama expands the browser to full screen and requires Quicktime. And it's a big image. Panorama of Elves Canyon

Click on the small picture above for a 265 kB JPEG image.

Sometimes I don't know how these things happen. I was wondering what I should post as the picture this week, and the phrase "needle's eye" occurred to me. I visualized a vague image of a formation called the Needle's Eye from my youth on a family trip. So I searched, and I found the "Needle's Eye" in the Black Hills. This is probably the one I'm remembering, since we took a trip to the Black Hills when I was a kid, and it seems to match my vague memory. (See the first comment for the challenge.) For a different perspective,...

ONE of Great Ocean Road's iconic Twelve Apostles collapsed spectacularly yesterday morning, leaving only eight of the giant rock formations still standing. The Twelve Apostles are the major attraction along the Great Ocean Road, bringing world fame to the rugged southwest Victorian coastline. Only a handful of tourists were at the site when the 50-metre tall sea stack collapsed at 9.18am. )Earlier article - Move over Lex Luthor, it's the ... 12 Apostles Saturday, July 3 Rebecca Tucker THE 12 Apostles will become Kryptonite as Superman returns to Earth. The Great Ocean Road's internationally iconic rocks will feature in the...

According to the text of the page, this feature can be seen on a hike to Lexington Arch in Great Basin National Park. I actually was looking for pictures of Lexington Arch, and there are a few, but this one seemed more interesting. The site is nice if you like arches (I do).

Link post, for the purpose of alerting interested FR denizens to the post in the General/Chat section, where discussion and comments should be posted: Geology Picture of the Week, June 12-18, 2005: Finger Klippe

Far too few among the Christian community are willing to remain steadfast in their beliefs, in the face of the enormous pressures of liberal social change. Fortunately, Bruce N. Shortt exemplifies the meaning of such worthy resolve. Last year Shortt, along with T.C. Pinckney, made waves at the 2004 Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) by stating the obvious. America’s educational system has, over the past several decades, completely degenerated from any pretense of promoting academics. Instead, it is primarily focused on a program of indoctrinating students towards countercultural social transformation. Relentlessly working to eradicate any references to God or traditional morality,...

NEW ORLEANS - New measurements of Hurricane Ivan's erosion of beaches, dunes and barrier islands along the Gulf of Mexico underscore how vulnerable the American shoreline is to such storms, a U.S. Geological Survey (news - web sites) oceanographer says. Ivan's center made landfall Sept. 16 at Gulf Shores, Ala., with 115 mph wind and a storm surge estimated at 10 to 13 feet high. Ivan washed away as much as 164 feet of beach in places, according to Abby Sallenger, an oceanographer for the Geological Survey's Center for Coastal & Watershed Studies in St. Petersburg, Fla. He presented his...

Link post: to alert interested readers to the post in the FR "chat" section, where any commentary should be posted: Geology Pictures of the Two Weeks, July 18-31, 2004: Great Falls Deux

www.wingettphotography.com (this guy has good photos!) Potomac Flow-by Studies Link to aerial photograph of Great Falls

Link post, to allow interested Free Republic readers to access the thread in the FR "chat" section, where all discussion posts should be located: Geology Picture of the Week, July 4-10, 2004: Blowing Rocks Preserve, Florida

The site (linked above) includes some 360-degree panoramas of this area, but you have to download the viewer. I didn't do that.

Despite extending the unprecedented 30-hour talkathon on the Senate floor by more than nine hours, Republicans failed to force a vote on President Bush's three judicial nominees deemed too conservative for the American mainstream by Democrats. Republicans launched the round-the-clock debate Wednesday night to counter Democratic filibusters on the nominations of Texas judge Priscilla Owen and California judges Carolyn Kuhl and Janice Rogers Brown. At the outset, Democrats warned the Republican tactic wouldn't work. "I'm terribly disappointed that we are spending the time of this institution on something like this when we need to be spending what little time...

Link post: Geology Picture of the Week, April 13-19, 2003 (an easy WhereIsIt? challenge)

OK, so WhereIsIt? (Hint given in first comment)

Astronomy Picture of the Day Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2003 February 21 Melting Snow and the Gullies of Mars Credit: P. Christensen (ASU), THEMIS, Mars Odyssey, NASA Explanation: Tantalizing images of gullies on Mars have offered striking evidence for recent flows of liquid water. But Mars is too cold and its atmosphere too thin for liquid water to exist on the surface. Still a new and compelling explanation for gullies carved by liquid water was inspired by...

Link post: Geology Picture of the Week, February 9-15, 2003 (WhereIsIt challenge)

"Adam Sandler invites you to share some holiday cheer in the new, no-holds-barred musical comedy Adam Sandler's 8 Crazy Nights.. MPAA Rating: G-13 for frequent crude and sexual humor, drinking and brief drug references "