Oh, The Colors!

Looks like some nasty precipiation heading this way. I love watching storms like this slowly work their way west from Buffalo/Great Lakes to eventually lose power and totally disappoint me when they get to central NY...

Ice Core Delight

I was surfing geology.com about a month ago when I came across this article published by the National Geographic and subsequently posted on geology.com.

For those of you who are unfamiliar or inexperienced in glaciology, I posted a video interview with Penn State glaciologist Richard Alley to help you learn a little bit more about the science and history behind glaciers plus some impacts of glacial melting.

Enjoy!

5-17 Circumzenithal Arc

Always look at the sky.

If you're ever searching for something to catch your interest, or something rare to shoot, always know that the sky is always worth taking a glance at. In the middle of a "graduation" party just yesterday, I decided to take a glance at the sky, around 3:45 PM Eastern. What I saw was this:

The sky has been my best friend these past months where it has been hard trying to get out into the woods and explore. This is the second arc I've seen in the skies above my house in the past year - the first being on a completely clear day in June of last summer.

So my advise to everyone boils down to one thing: If you can't see anything in front of you, look up.

Update: I decided to add a few more shots to the post. Enjoy.

This on kind of offers a matchstick ignition illusion to the red pine tree without a top in the lower right.

Peaking out from behind clouds.

A Lacuna is NOT a pore of a "various inverebrate"

So, I'm going to start posting geology photos every few days that I have taken (and maybe Rock Doctor Aucoin will as well) with sometimes brief explanations to them. Today - we fly up to Bering Glacier, AK and take a look at a (glacial) Lacuna.

A lacuna is defined in the geologic dictionary as follows:

1. A chronological stratigraphic unit representing a gap in the record. Syn: unconformity.

2. A pore, opening or hole, or gap in various invertebrate organisms.

For those looking to fill a gap in the stratigraphic/evolutionary record, please be advised that a glacial lacuna is not a "various invertebrate organism"...

No. Far from it. A glacial lacuna is actually, through a rough translation, a lake. Now, when I was standing in this particular lacuna, on the Piedmont lobe of Bering, I can certainly say the only liquid water here was a small ephemeral stream running from the top of the ice into this very deep void. 

It is thought that these formations are due to rapid wasting of ice in certain locations, but not through typical phase change. What makes the most sense to this particular, amateur glaciologist is sublimation, when solid water transitions to gaseous water. Believe it or not, the temperature on the top of the ice sheet this day was a comfortable 55F or so, while within the lacuna, out of the Chugach Range's strong adiabatic wind, was over 75F.