Posted on 10/28/2006 11:42:19 PM PDT by Dallas59
The rise of the Appalachian Mountains seems to have triggered an ice age 450 million years ago by sucking CO2 from the atmosphere. Researchers report evidence that minerals from the mountain range washed into the oceans just before the cold snap, carrying atmospheric carbon dioxide with them. The result clarifies a long standing paradox in the historical relationship between CO2 and climate, experts say.
At the start of the so-called Ordovician ice age, about 450 million years ago, the planet went from a state of greenhouse warmth to one of glacial cold, culminating in mass extinctions of ocean life. This period has always posed a problem for climate modelers, notes geologist Matthew Saltzman of Ohio State University. "The models for CO2 that span that interval have always shown levels that are much too high to have an ice age," he explains. "That was a real paradox." Researchers believe that the last ice age, which began 40 million years ago, was kicked off by the rise of the Himalayas during the collision of tectonic plates and a corresponding plunge in atmospheric carbon dioxide. Ocean deposits of calcium carbonate, or limestone, indicate that CO2-rich rainwater stripped calcium and strontium from the Himalayan rock; these elements fused with the carbon dioxide and spilled into the sea, effectively pulling carbon from the atmosphere.
The same chemical weathering commenced before the Ordovician ice age, Saltzman and his student Seth Young reported today at a meeting of the Geological Society of America. The pair analyzed the ratio of strontium isotopes in rocks from Nevada and Europe that date to the Ordovician climate reversal. Right before the ice age begins the ratio becomes low in strontium 87, which accumulates as rock ages, suggesting weathering of relatively young rock. And indeed at that time the Appalachians would have been forming from a Japan-like arc of islands smashing onto what is now North America. "We have pretty good evidence that in fact there was a weathering event that had to involve a significant removal of carbon dioxide," Saltzman says. "If you include the strontium data [in CO2 models] then you can very easily force the drop in CO2 that hadn't been there."
The result helps clear up a "particularly enigmatic" ice age, says geoscientist Lee Kump of Pennsylvania State University. "Solving the enigma is an important step forward" in building confidence in the relationship between CO2 and climate change, he says. --
Please, we all know the ancient Ice Age is Bush's fault.
I hope Al doesn't have them "removed"...
If true...and to avoid a repeat...the Appalachians MUST be leveled. Yes...I know its drastic but I think a government directive is in order. It'll cost $80 Trillion dollars but we can level the Appalachians and ensure we never repeat this episode. The hard part, will be relocation. All of the Appalachian folk will be relocated to the region north of Palm Springs, with a special political district created...and their own two personal senators. They will be known as the displaced Appalachian folk...at least on Wolf Blitzers show.
The plan will take approximately 22 years and require at least 35,000 union employees (preferably the fellows from the Boston Big Dig). We'll need every bulldozer that CAT can manufacturer (24-hour operation to build required).
As for the dirt...I propose that we move it south to New Orleans and proceed to build the 51st and 52nd state....just south of the Mississippi Delta. Once completed...both states will be declared RED states, and we will open the new territory up to folks to move...provided they voice RED feelings.
As for the Appalachian area left after the hills have all been removed...it would make a fine national park and we could just sanction it as the 53rd state which only Park Rangers would be full-time residents.
Doesn't this imply that deforestation would cause CO2 levels to go up, increasing global temperatures?
Is this from the same folks who told us about how terrible this year's Hurricane season was going to be?
The Appalachians WERE levelled. When they were formed they were like the Himalayas. The "weathering" event referred to is presumably the erosion over millions of years that finally left the "nubs" we have today.
These "nubs" are actually the pattern left by the differential erosion in the folds at the roots of the mountains. That is, the peaks we see are not eroded versions of the former peaks.
Oprah to hold show there next week demanding all stupid white women with too much times on their hands donate as much of their husbands money as possible to new book, "Dr. Phil: How to repair moutains that cause global warming and save your marriage" book. Al Gore, Barbara Streisand, Pierce Brosnan, TomKat, and Gwenyth Paltrow to be guest stars on the couch.
Heck, those are just the worn nubs. I bet they were really something when they were new...
Now, 450 million years later the "giant sucking sound" is resurrected.
Just let us know when they open the contract up for bids, we're just about done with the mountain removal project here in North Dakota...(8^D)
Paging Al Gore. Cleanup on aisle 3.
Correct. The Massanutten Mountain, for instance is the bottom of a downfold (syncline). The 'up' portions of that fold are long gone.
Would this post about ancient ice ages be a good GGG ping list item?
This article has some confusing information. It says the ice age occurred at the beginning of the Ordovician Period at 450 mya, however, my books are saying the OP started 500 mya and ended around 440 mya. Also the article says the last ice age was 40 mya. In fact the last five ice ages started around 1 million years ago, with the most recent starting a little over 100,000 years ago.
There are those who wonder if the Ordovician extinction even may have been caused by an asteroid/comet/meteor strike. Are there any large craters identified from that period? Below are what two books have to say about that extinction.
"Chesapeake Invader" by Wylie Poag (book about the Chesapeake Meteor, which struck 34 mya leaving a crater 50 miles in diameter stretching north from Norfolk, VA to Exmore on the Delmarva Peninsula) - "The oldest and second-largest Big Five mass extinction took place at the end of the Ordovician Period. This event is noted for drastic reductions in the brachiopod and trilobite populations. Altogether, around 70 percent of all species disappeared. Late Ordivician environments were stressed by the buildup of continental ice sheets during the last few millions of years of the period. Sea level droped as a consequence, and the vast shallow, Ordovician seas dried up, devestating their biota. The ice sheets melted by the end of Ordovician time, however, allowing shallow maring waters once again to flood the continents. Life renewed itself in the early Silurian Period."
"When Life Nearly Died: The Greatest Mass Extinction of all Time" by Michael J. Benton (a detailed account of the great Permian extinction) - "In the Late Ordovician, about 440 mya, further substantial turnovers occurred among marine faunas. This extinction event is the first of the 'big five' mass extinctions. all reef-building animals, as well as many families of brachiopods, echinoderms (sea urchins, sea lilies and starfishes), ostracods (microscopic crustaceans, distantly related to crabs and shrimps) and trilobites died out. These extinctions are associated with evidence for major climatic changes. Tropical-type reefs and their rich faunas lived around the shores of North America and other land masses that then lay around the Equator. Southern continents had, however, drifted over the south pole, and a vast phase of glaciation begon. The ice spread north in all directions, cooling the southern oceans, locking water into the ice and lowering sea levels globally. Polar faunas moved towards the tropics, and warmwater faunas died out as the whole tropical belt disappeared."
This second quote seems to blame the glaciation on the movement of the southern continents over the south pole. I am not sure how the Appalacian could have "triggered" the ice age if it was around the tropics. If it started around the south pole, then perhaps the Appalacians were a secondary contributor. Ah, the fun of science, so many arguments, so little time.
Would this fall under Evolution or Intelligent Design? If you don't answer me, I won't know how to vote!
now THAT is funny!
Pity so few here have a sense of ha-ha.
I thought it was 451,200,329 years ago. How could have been so far off.
This suggests another approach to fixing global warming. Strip-mine vast areas down to calcium-rich bedrock, which will then absorb CO2 from falling rain.
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