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.
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