On October 11, I started telling a story about doing a documentary on our recent California earthquakes and the science behind it, and how I heard about some leading edge scientists. I learned about these researchers while cooling off at the Lazy Lizard bar in Ocotillo one hotter than hell evening. Well, here's the rest of the story:
Indeed Desert Dude told me about these scientists that were placing magnetometers and other instruments in the ground. Desert Dude is a nickname I give to a heavy equipment operator that had helped the scientists by digging holes and trenches for them.
Desert Dude gave me the website for these scientists, and I read the material on the website, including some white papers. I then contacted them, and got in invite to go up to Palo Alto and film them. That was exciting for me! Many other scientists, especially those working for the government are not as easy to get an invite from. Government types tend to steer clear of media and film makers. I felt lucky to have the chance to interview a top leading edge scientist.
Planning the trip that far north had some glitches for my car was in the shop, and I had to fire my assistant, who had a reliable car. The guy I fired was a ivy league snob that displayed his prejudice at me for having flown jets, and because I'm a woman that had done so. He was also rude to rednecks and local Mexican farmhands I was interviewing. He's an idiot.
Anyways, during the delay, I got into contact with some key guys at NASA Aimes, and learned a lot about what these researchers are really doing. They are measuring EM emissions and other emissions in rocks that are put under pressure. The instruments placed out in the desert are placed on faults, which behave much the same way as the lab rocks when under pressure. The NASA team is squeezing various rocks and finding all kinds of cool results! When under immense pressure, rocks act as batteries, among other interesting things. I tried to get clearance and permission to film these rock squeezing experiments, but failed to gain permission. I'm not a big fat rich Hollywood producer, that's mainly why. The government prefers the big boys to do business with.
But what is cooler than just filming busting rocks, was that I actually helped one experiment indirectly, and from the sidelines! I ordered some special cameras, some super bright lights, and even a Helmut Hero Go Pro for the science team, and they used the equipment to image the rock like never before. One camera caught an image every 71 seconds over a ten hour period of time. One scientist then brought me the images, and I taught him how to do a stop motion 'film'. We turned ten hours into a minute in i Movie, and man are these researchers happy with the result!
Next time we're going to see what the squeezed rock looks like with a FLIR camera. Hopefully we'll catch some IR and escaping photons.
So I helped some scientists in a big project that may someday be history, that is, if indeed their theory and results are indeed accepted. Someday, there's a good chance that'll happen.
It's all about earthquake forecasting and developing a warning system.
Next I'll tell about a conference I went to on this very topic, EM in and around earthquakes and volcanos, and earthquake forecasting. I did post some photos of the meeting, and they are a few posts back.
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
Thursday, October 21, 2010
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Monday, October 11, 2010
BLOGGING ABOUT FLYING AS WELL AS EARTHQUAKES. FEELING QUAKES!
I'm sure anyone that is a regular reader of this blog of mine has noticed a lot of posts that are about earthquakes and less about aviation. Well, I have always had a great interest in science, being a techie type, but that's not the entire story. I live in a region that has had a lot of recent quakes the past half year or so, including an unusual 40 second 7.2 magnitude (grad) shaker I rode through. I decided then and there to record what I see and experience via my numerous blogs, websites, and now a full blown documentary on earthquakes.
Right after the 7.2 mag (grad) Easter Sunday quake down near Mexicali, Mexico, the one I felt for about 40 seconds - I immediately picked up my camera and started taping what ever I bumped into concerning the quake. To add to all this, I also felt a few moderate to strong quakes over the next few months, and caught some on tape.
All this led me to head into the area where these recent and frequent quakes have been happening, and caught what was going on in the towns and agriculture areas there. There are some seriously failed crops in the Mexicali valley due to broken irrigation ditches, and that will indeed impact the local economy of that part of Mexico. This is one of Mexico's key bread baskets.
I also went into a tiny desert hamlet, Ocotillo, on the USA side of the border, and I caught the locals telling of their earthquake experience. Around April to July, the locals were telling me that they felt a light to moderate quake every 30 seconds or so, and a pretty good vibration about 3 times a day! This town is parked right over an area of earthquake swarms that's a few miles wide, and is said to be related to the Mexicali quake. But these little quakes are far from the epicenter of the bigger quake, and behave in a way that has gotten a lot of geologists and other scientists interested!
And one thing led to another in a wonderful way! While filming Ocotillo and it's locals, I happened to be cooling off with a beer at the Lazy Lizard bar, a small and interesting desert hole in the wall. It was 117 F degrees outside, and a beer and plenty of water was called for after hauling cameras around out in the Yuha desert. That Yuha is our local version of Saudi Arabia's Rub al Khali! The Empty Quarter! Stark blazing white rugged desert with volcanic rocks and fossils.
Anyways, while recovering from my Rub al Khali kinda' day, with an ice cold Bud - a big dusty desert dude walked in. My cameraman was a total sissy and was scared of these rough looking desert dwellers. I'm used to them and get along fine. I'm from cowboy country and am pretty much a cowgirl anyways. But Harvard grad sissy cameraman wanted out of there, as was always the case. He prefers the Volvo littered landscape of snooty-ville. You know, Cambridge.
Myself, the least snobbish of the two person crew, and the dusty desert dude struck up some talk. Desert Dude and I started talking about the present earthquake swarm, and he mentioned that the ground seemed to be rising over the last two years, until it dropped two feet during the 7.2 Mexicali earthquake. Wow. Really...
Now that can have a few meanings in geology. It can simply be ground water changing in the aquifer below, or a shift in magma if there is magma underfoot. It could also mean a fault had shifted back and forth under immense tectonic stresses.
Will Desert Dude told me more. A bridge had been torn apart by the rifting forces. I went out there to look and sure enough it was a torn up bridge, it's planks pulled apart indeed. It's supporting columns displayed signs of side to side motion, too. I filmed it, as you can imagine. We experienced a small quake while filming and Scared Cameraman freaked out. I caught that on my own camera. Oh yes. Funny.
Back at the Lazy Lizard Bar, Desert Dude then told me about a team of scientists that were in town a few days ago. Desert Dude had dug ditches and holes for these men, and then the visitors placed instruments into the holes. They were magnetometers. They measure emissions from the stressed fault rocks.
That conversation in the bar let me to eventually meet these scientists! And in my next post, I will tell you about how all this ended up with me helping a key experiment and 'saving the day" for some leading edge scientists.
I did that with my aerospace and camera know how.
Point I'm making: Opportunities pop up from adversities, and your skills as a pilot or otherwise can translate into other tech things. Don't miss those opportunities.
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