Moomin

Misty here on the Welsh Borders this morning, no idea what temp is but now hazy with sun trying to get through, chilly breeze every now and again but once haze burns off will be a pleasantly mild day I suspect. Windows open birds singing refreshing change!

Yamkin this isn't very helpful at all, Yellowstone is not showing signs of activity anything above those observed over the last few decades. The earthquakes recorded are low magnitude ones and not in any way frequent. Yellowstone has always recorded such earthquakes from time to time, sometimes in a sort of 'flurry' of quakes all over the place, ground bulging and subsidence has also been observed regularly over the years none of which are a precursor to any sort of eruptive activity. I agree from the geological record Yellowstone os probably overdue on average assumptions, but the error margin could mean it may not erupt for another 20,000 years, what is being seen at the moment does not point to any eruption in the near future.

Almost right, the soil moisture defecit has to be overcome before groundwater is recharged i.e. the rainfall that has beaten evaopration and transpiration and has entered the ground and made its way to the ground water surface. The 'sponge' has to be completely saturated before groundwater will flow laterally, groundwater will always flow if it the aquifer is saturated and there is a gradient, the amount of recharge affects the levels and therefore the amount of water flowing and to a certain extent the speed at which it moves . It isn't too late for any meaningful recharge but it will take a lot of continual rainfall to replenish the aquifers to normal levels it also depends upon how much groundwater is taken out by abstraction, this is key in the south east where most of the public water comes from borehole supplies. One element that doens't get picked up on which also has a big effect is the incresing urbanisation, this can have a dramtic effect in reducing recharge to groundwater as our effcient drainage systems divert rainfall into surface water preventing it getting into the ground. I think a point that was made a few days ago is a very important one for the water companies down south, why have they not done more in the way of artificially augmenting the aquifer reserves? This process has been around for nearly 20 years, from university days I seem to remember Thames water made use of the Greensand quite effectively, using it as an underground reservoir in effect, they have had the opportunity with the desalination plant to do this over the last few months. I do believe this is going to be a big problem this year though and not just for the south east. Here in Shropshire it has been very dry, some of the rivers that dried out last summer have yet to start flowing again, the spring fed streams from the limestone hills behind our house have run dry in the last few weeks, they normally persist until july August time. Interesting year ahead! M

Come on SS they were 'Bad Neutrinos' that caused all the trouble in the film 2012! Currently reviewing the Planetry Alignment Theory and Earth Crust Displacement Theory to see how they relate to the 'Reality Displacement Theory'. Moomin

My understanding (which is very limited I admit!) was that Brane and Big Bang theory can co-exist, the idea being that there are a multitude of Branes upon/within which exist the universe and from time to time two Branes come into contact with one another, at which point they bang and a new universe starts. This does beg the question should the universe be called the universe, as if this theory is correct there are many universes, perhaps multiverse is a better name. What I'd love to hear is the explanation of what is between the Brane's or in effect what is outside the universe, I think it is referred to as the 'Bulk' but what does this comprise? Moomin

Pressure has been up at 1040 since the weekend peaking so far this morning at 1045, very interesting and looks good as my analogue barometer only goes up to 1050, would be good to see if it goes off the scale!

Over here on the Welsh borders we got nothing, just lots of snow grains mixed in with rain, it did freeze all over our track making it a bit dicey for most of this afternoon, all gone now though. We very rarely get anything here, mountains west and south of us do well and hopefully we will be able to see them all snow covered tomorrow but we don't get snow below about 300m here. Hopefully we might get something before winter's over! Moomin

Yes but Central does have the rather hot Becky Mantin pressenting from time to time!

Anyone noticed how close the icepack is to linking up with Iceland? Is this normal for the last few decades, I seem to remember people suggesting it used link up to Iceland in the 60s but hadn't done so since. Moomin

As a geologist I too am interested as to how this process works. Its a new one to me and as a scientist I like to keep an open mind but can't quite see the linkage. Straying into particle physics I thought protons were relatively large (for sub atomic particles) and were positively charged therefore would not be able to penetrate to the earth's crust as they'd hit something or stick to something. Neutrinos can and do go right through the planet as they are small and have no charge, they also do not interact with the material they pass through. M

I don't understand it either, the Met Office forcast for our bit of the area at risk is for rain and 10 degrees Thursday morning and light cloud or clear bright sunshine for Friday without sub zero temps??

Its a while since I did volcanology at uni but I was always under the impression that the canaries were classic sea mounts and therefore are positioned on the oceanic crust. The magma is definately 'Basic' as evidenced by the Basaltic lava floes. Moomin

Great photos love the one with the jet engine clearing snow from the railways, I had read about that before they had to stop using the jet engine after a very short time as it also blew out all the ballast from around the sleepers as well as the snow! M

Well it all seems very up in the air at the moment with no consensus on cold or mild. Whilst I love the cold and snow I can cope with a more 'normal' winter this time after last December. However, what is concernning is that there does seem to be a consensus in that rainfall totals will be below average. This is particularly concerning and hasn't really been picked up on, the concern is that we have had a dry 12 months, if not longer, with drought conditoins in the east earlier in the year. Another winter and spring with below avergae rainfall totals could cause some difficulties next year. M

Sorry I don't post very often but watch many discussion on the forum, however I feel I have to reply to this one to defend Karyo and most of the people writing and watching this thread. No body wants people to die but we are all fascinated by the humbling power of volcanic eruptions and the larger they are the more fascinating and frightening. I am a geologist and still interested to see larger eruptions. The more interest people show, the more people watch and analyse the data and discuss them (Scientist and non scientist alike) the more we are likely to understand these things and the closer we get to being able to predict an eruption more reliably and so avoid more deaths and inconvenience. As ever with these discussions if you are offended by the discussion either respond in a measured professional and polite manner expressing your diagreement or don't read the posts. M

I have a 130mm Sky Watcher telescope which is brilliant for looking at the moon and Jupiter, the bright planet is definately Jupiter as I was looking at it the other day. With my telescope I can see four moons and the bands on jupiter once I get my 'eye in', not seen the red dot yet though. The mount I have is manual but has two twisty knobs which allow very fine adjustment so once something like jupiter is in view I can quite easily keep looking at it without looking awway from the lens. When I first got the telescope last year I was amazed how quickly things move across the field of view. Fascinated new world though. Moomin

No chance yet, we're on oil which does the hot water as well. Just filled up with 500 litres which cost £300!! Was £88 when we moved here in 2003, so the jumpers will be coming out when the time comes. mind it has felt a bit chilly and damp the last few days, will be chopping moreof the log pile this weekend I think to be ready.

It would be ionteresting to know if a faraday cage would be effective protection, if so all our cars should continue to work as the ECUs would be protected inside, if not I'll just have to drive the old Daimler which has carburettors - not really a hardship! Joking aside it would be intersting to know what we could sensibly use to proetct equipment and how much warning we would have. M

Yes exactly right, from where I am it is visible from around 11pm

we were very lucky last night, total cloud cover was forcast but the skies cleared and remained clear until around 11:30, we saw about 20 meteors, we even got my son out of bed to watch. There were some very bright ones and ones with tails that took some time to fade, my son even saw some colours in the tails of one or two. Well worthwaiting up for, last few years ahve been disappointing this year redressed that. M BTW Jupiter has been looking fantastic over the last few days also, managed to see 5 or 6 moons the other day.

No no not sad just an earth scientist with an interest in this - on reflection, maybe sad is an accurate description! Anyway I've been married 10 years and have two kids now so I've forgotten how to kiss the missus. Thanks for the link M

Ah yes I'd forgotten the Jan and Feb 2007 events. The Jan event I drove from Oswestry to mansfield in and it didn't seem too bad to be honest, it was windy though. The Feb event I had borrowed a friends Landrover Defender after my Discovery destroyed its engine. Just before the heavy snow came we had a dusting, I was driving this defender down a country lane very slowly and as I turned out of a junction and down a slight hill I could feel the back end start to slide, despite the slow speed it did a full 360 spin, clipped the grass bank at the side and tottered on two wheels before landing back on all fours, how it didn't go over is a mystery to me. As it was happening all I could think of was how was I going to explain to my mate that I'd squashed his landrover!

Its difficult to pin down specific events as there's been a fweover the years and the memory fades with time. HOwever, I do remeber the October 87 storms - we got the tail end in Manchester which wasn't too bad but it was still incredibly windy, my bus route home from school took an exposed bridge over the Mersey, I can remember the driver fighting with the thing to keep it going in the right direction - hairy stuff. Snow for me has to be the jan 87 event not because iot was the worst but because it was bad and I can remember it better than 8. I can clearly remember the day before when th ewind was biting and dried out all the salt on the roads. The snow came in the early hours the following morning I still went to school and got there and well remember the snow being shin deep walking through Alexandra Park and even deeper in the drifts that had started to accumulate. We got sent home mid morning and it took the rest of the day to get home as the bus timetable had gone out the window, buses were still running though - obviously some of teh journey time was taken up with lobbing snow balls at each other and the buses. - very good fun Going back to 81 though I can remember my mum driving us to the bus stop and the car sliding all over the place as the road was sheet ice, we also managed to break the school bus that day as well by shoving snow up the exhaust I think it stalled the engine and it was so cold the snow only partially melted and then foze solid after the engine stopped so it would start again! That was great I was 9 at the time and the cane was still allowed so I was very glad we never got found out The more I write the more I remember and I could go on all day but I'm at work so I'd better go - happy days though!

We didn't really get that much snow in the oswestry area, not far into the Welsh mountains did though. HOwever, it was the temps that I'll remember for some time - seeing -12C on the car temp at daybreak was pretty impressive. We went away to Mull of Kintyre over New Year, there was no snow but the temperature did not get above freezing almost all the time we were there, the kids were skating on the streams that flowed over the beach and tha sand was as hard as concrete - I'd never experienced that before!

Well clearly you are going to have to have more children - can you make it triplets next time as we didn't get much snow round our way but came close to it:blink:. I have no idea what this winter will bring as my knowledge just isn't suffucent to make informed judgemnts - however this summer feels very similar to many of the summer I remeber in the 80s, not particularly warm bit on the wet side but with some nicer spells in between al be it short lived. On this basis I wouldn't be suprised if we got more proper winter weather than we've been used to over the last 20 years but not as impressive as last winter. Moomin