geology

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Mystery Crater Surfaces on Utah Farm

Theories include collapsed soil, earthquakes, or 'Martian art'

(Newser) - Gary Dalton was draining the irrigation pond on his farmland in Circleville, Utah, when he made a startling discovery: a giant crater staring back up at him from the bottom of the basin. "The sun was just right, so I saw this blasted thing that no one had ever...

Drought Lifts Western US —Literally

California mountains half an inch higher these days

(Newser) - If you're in the western US, the ground you're standing on may be a little higher than it was a few years ago. The drought that's been plaguing the West has resulted in an "uplift effect," scientists find. The "growing, broad-scale loss of water"...

Huge Crack Appears in the Earth

Underground stream may have caused fissure in Mexico

(Newser) - Scientists are scratching their heads over a crack in the Earth that's more than half a mile long, Sky News reports. A drone captured video footage of the 16-foot-wide, 26-foot-deep crack, which appeared last week in remote farmland and cuts across Highway 26 between the coast and Hermosillo in...

Why the Amazon River Reversed Its Flow

It's linked to erosion and the Andes, researcher finds

(Newser) - The Amazon River flows eastward toward the Atlantic, but researchers know that wasn't always the case, notes the Latin Times . Long ago, the region's water moved in the opposite direction. Just what was it, though, that caused the reversal? Earlier findings linked the shift to the movement of...

Yellowstone Closes Road Because It's Melting

Park hopes to have geyser route in operation again soon

(Newser) - You'll never guess why "Firehole Lake Drive" is temporarily off-limits to tourists in Yellowstone National Park. Yes, the popular 3.3-mile loop is closed for a while because the asphalt is melting, reports National Parks Traveler . "Extreme heat from surrounding thermal areas has caused thick oil to...

Mystery of West&#39;s Mammoth Ancient Lakes Solved

 Mystery of West's Mammoth 
 Ancient Lakes Solved 
in case you missed it
Jun 14, 2014 12:10 PM CDT

Mystery of West's Mammoth Ancient Lakes Solved

Study: Lower evaporation rates led to far larger lakes

(Newser) - During the period known as the Last Glacial Maximum some 21,000 years ago, mammoth lakes spread out across large swaths of the West, and scientists have long wondered why the now-dry lakes used to be so big. Mystery solved: A new study finds that the reason has nothing to...

Water 'Missing for Decades' Found 400 Miles Beneath US

But the water is neither liquid, ice, nor vapor: researchers

(Newser) - Four hundred miles beneath the United States, there appears to be enough water to fill all our oceans—almost three times. Researchers have for the first time discovered direct evidence of the water, which exists as a fourth form: not liquid, not ice, not vapor, but hydrogen and oxygen molecules...

Experts Warned of 'Catastrophic' Landslide in Wash.

'We’ve known it would happen at some point. We just didn’t know when.'

(Newser) - "This came out of nowhere," a county official said yesterday of the landslide that killed at least 14 and left 176 more missing in Washington. "This was a completely unforseen slide." But geologists have actually been making dire predictions about the hill that collapsed since the...

Blarney Stone Mystery Solved
 Blarney Stone Mystery Solved 
Mar 17, 2014 2:14 AM CDT

Blarney Stone Mystery Solved

It's not a chunk of Stonehenge, tests reveal

(Newser) - Ireland's famous Blarney Stone isn't a slice of Stonehenge, part of Robert the Bruce's "Stone of Destiny," or anything else more exotic than local limestone, researchers say. The stone reputed to give those who kiss it the "gift of the gab" has been revealed...

'Hell Diamond' Signals Vast, Deep Water Deposit

Earth's mantle may have as much water as the oceans

(Newser) - A huge "wet zone" hundreds of miles beneath the surface of the Earth could hold as much water as all the oceans put together, according to researchers analyzing a mineral from deep in the mantle. The water is "not a Jules Verne-style ocean you can sail a boat...

Earth&#39;s Oldest Rocks: 4.4B-Year-Old Crystals


 Earth's Oldest Rocks: 
 4.4B-Year-Old Crystals 
study says
Feb 24, 2014 9:46 AM CST

Earth's Oldest Rocks: 4.4B-Year-Old Crystals

They're not much younger than the planet itself

(Newser) - When scientists claimed more than a decade ago that tiny crystals in Australia were 4.4 billion years old, they faced skepticism. The Earth itself, after all, is 4.5 billion years old, the Sydney Morning Herald notes. "Nothing in science goes without being questioned," geochemist John Valley...

Yellowstone Blasts Incredibly Old Helium

The gas has been building for hundreds of millions of years

(Newser) - Yellowstone National Park has long been known as a gassy place, and its reputation as such just got more firmly established. That helium emanates from the ground in the park is an established fact, Smithsonian Magazine explains, but when researchers dug into the makeup of that helium, what they found...

70M Years Old? No, Grand Canyon Mostly Just a Kid

Much of it is just 5M years old, geologists find

(Newser) - The Grand Canyon is nowhere near the grand old age of 70 million years that earlier studies claimed, according to new research. "The Colorado River found a path and carved the entire canyon 5 (million) to 6 million years ago," says a geologist who used data measuring the...

New Zealand's Tallest Mountain Has Shrunk

Ice collapse decades ago knocks almost 100 feet off Mount Cook

(Newser) - The highest point in New Zealand is about 100 feet shorter than we thought. A new measurement of Aoraki/Mount Cook puts its height at roughly 12,217.8 feet, down from an official listed height of 12,316.3 feet, Stuff.co.nz reports. That discrepancy likely isn't due...

Scientist: Massive Quakes Hidden in History

Huge seismic events missing from the records

(Newser) - The Earth might have a more turbulent past—and hence a more turbulent future—than we thought. In a presentation yesterday, Dr. Susan Hough of the US Geological Survey argued that hidden throughout history are a glut of giant earthquakes that either went unrecorded or have been underestimated. "Seismometers...

New Zealand Quakes Made Earth's Crust Weaker

Geologists find weakening for 3 miles around crust

(Newser) - How nasty were the deadly quakes that hit New Zealand one after another in 2010 and 2011? So bad that they appear to have seriously weakened the Earth's crust, scientists reveal in a new study. Geologists had previously believed that the strength of the Earth's crust was more...

Scientists Accidentally Discover Even Grander Canyon

In Greenland, but no one's ever seen it

(Newser) - Scientists have—totally by accident—come across a hidden canyon that dwarfs the Grand one, the BBC reports. The researchers were using radar to map out Greenland's bedrock when they stumbled upon the 2,625-foot deep feature, which, at 500 miles, is longer than the Grand Canyon's 277...

Latest Search for Alien Life Taking Place on Earth

NASA turns to geologists for help

(Newser) - NASA's latest partner in the search for alien life: a group of about 50 geologists who are hunting for evidence of ancient life here on Earth. The University of Wisconsin's Astrobiology Research Consortium last month started a five-year, $7 million project funded by a NASA grant. It'll...

New Study Offers Proof: Asteroid Wiped Out Dinos

New study puts mass extinction within 32K years of meteor

(Newser) - Paleontologists and dinosaur nerds have long debated what killed off the "terrible lizards"— one meteor or many , volcanoes , or something else. Now one researcher says he has the answer: an asteroid believed to be about six miles wide that landed in the Caribbean about 66 million years ago....

Martian Rock Found in Sahara Thrills Experts

2B-year-old stone holds more water than others

(Newser) - After a rock from Mars was discovered in the Sahara desert, scientists investigated it for a year—and they're fascinated by what they've learned. At an estimated two billion years old, the rock is older than most Martian meteorites and holds more water, the AP reports. And it...

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