Bearded Geology

"geology isn't a real science" ?! "geology is the kardashians of science" ??!!! I.....I don't know what to say. I've never felt so offended. What happened to you Google? You used to be cool.

Recent earthquake (orange dot) on Sept. 12, 2019 (via  USGS ) After a slow start with my research, I'm hoping that things will begin to move along much faster this fall. To help with the momentum, I've scheduled a meeting with my PhD committee, however, the best day to do so is tomorrow - Friday the 13th. Now, I'm not a superstitious person. After all, when has anything bad happened to me on Friday the 13th? I'll take my chances. However, early this morning - at 1:42am for those who are sticklers for precision - I had just woken up as I was rolling over in bed when suddenly an earthquake rumbled through. I heard my window blinds rattle and felt my bed vibrate, which brought me into a state of sleepy confusion unsure if it was an earthquake or just my neighbors on the other side of my wall. It was initially recorded as a 3.7 by the USGS with an epicenter 19 km (11.8 miles) south-southeast of Gassville, Arkansas just east of the Buffalo River in Baxter County. On...

While doing some research for a new blog post, I took a break from writing by taking a trip over to Facebook again , and unfortunately found something else to write about: I've seen this image before and apparently it's making the rounds again. Based on what you see here, with no additional text or context given, is there any way that you can arrive to the same conclusion as the one given? I find that there is an absurd amount of information that is neglected, which prevents me from making any conclusions whatsoever. But firstly, what is this an image of? Photograph of Fort Denison, circa 1880s. (credit: Wikimedia /National Archives of Australia) This is Fort Denison on delightfully named Pinchgut Island in the Sydney Harbour of Australia. Originally built as a prison, and later converted into a fort to protect the harbor, Fort Denison still stands today well within eyesight of the famous Sydney Opera House and Sydney Harbour Bridge. I was not able to find the...

Various types of micrometeorites (credit: ©  Jon Larsen ) In 1970, a machine was rigged onto a high-altitude atmospheric balloon and sent 21.7 miles (35 km) into the sky over Texas. The machine, lovingly named the Vacuum Monster after a creature in The Beatles' Yellow Submarine  movie, collected microscopic particles as small as two micrometers (microns) in diameter. Some of which were determined to be extraterrestrial, marking this as the first time "space dust", or more precisely, micrometeorites, were collected at altitude. Micrometeorites are a niche area of study within astrogeology (the study of the geology of extraterrestrial bodies), but has recently been expanding as it is now more accessible for researchers. On a large scale, international space agencies have devoted funding for missions to collect material directly from asteroids and comets, such as the ongoing  Hayabusa 2  mission to the asteroid  Ryugu , which has very recently completed its ...

On occasion, my home Internet router will reboot itself for reasons unknown to myself, and during one such instance recently, I was left realizing how much that I rely on the Internet these days and was unable to do much without it. However, since I use the Google Chrome browser, I was able to play the jumping T. rex game while waiting for my router to finish rebooting (press arrow keys on the "No Internet" screen to activate). While trying to beat my high score, I noticed that the dinosaur, some kind of tyrannosaurid (the T. rex family), was jumping over saguaro cacti. This got me wondering about the evolution of cactus plants and when they evolved. Cactus are flowering plants (aka angiosperms) and angiosperms evolved in the late Jurassic Period, and rapidly diversified during the Cretaceous Period. But, did the cactus (particularly saguaro) live at the same time as the dinosaurs? First, when did cacti evolve? Interestingly,“[t]here are no relevant fossil records...

Hidden in the woods of Union County, Arkansas, a large unassuming sinkhole housing a small pond called the Norphlet Crater was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2008. Although it's easy to overlook, this hole in the ground has quite a story to tell about the early days of the oil and gas industry in Arkansas and a gas well that could not be tamed. Topographic map view of Norphlet Crater In 1922, two years following the Hill No. 1 gas well drilled by Constantine Oil and Refining Company near El Dorado, Arkansas, oil and gas production in the area expanded dramatically and El Dorado became the hub for the petroleum industry in Arkansas. Small independent oil companies and major companies with internationally recognized names, such as Shell and Standard Oil, were all drilling in Union County, Arkansas. In the pine covered hills and farmland about eight miles northwest of El Dorado, near the small town of Norphlet, a cotton field [1] on a farm own...

At 2:10 pm on Thursday, April 22, 1920, the small town of El Dorado, in Union County, Arkansas was busily going about its day. Over a dozen miles northwest, a drilling rig had just finished drilling the first productive oil well in Arkansas six days prior, the Hunter No. 1. However, just two miles [1]  southwest of town was another well being drilled that was going to make headlines as the first productive gas well in southern Arkansas.  Top left: land owners, Mr. and Mrs. Frank Hill. Center: the Hill No. 1 well blowing water, gas, and mud into the air. Bottom right: Constantine Oil and Refining geologist, J. J. Victor. [2] The Hill No. 1 well (Sec. 1, T.18S., R.16W.) operated by Constantine Oil and Refining Company of Tulsa, Oklahoma drilled to 2,226 feet, when it became an "unexpected 'gusher'" and a "great 'gasser'" [3] . The Monroe News-Star newspaper of Monroe, Louisiana reported that it received a kick (i.e. anomalous influx of...

The MOOOOOOOOON!!! (image: Wikimedia ) 50 years ago today, Apollo 11 accomplished the bold feat of landing on the Moon and not only did they walk on the Moon, they brought back some of it with them on their return for study. Some bits of lunar rock found their way to becoming thin sections, which you can view here , and occasionally get loaned out to researchers outside of NASA. I was lucky enough to handle and view some of these thin sections in my undergrad Igneous and Metamorphic Petrology class, as well as a thin section of a Martian meteorite (the closest I'll ever get to being on Mars). The lunar rocks have been well-studied by geologists over the years and Mindat.org has curated a list of minerals found on the moon, almost all of which are also found on Earth. The Moon can, in a broad sense, been generalized into two types of igneous rocks: basalt and anorthosite. The bright, white-grey parts of the Moon are the anorthosite dominated areas. These are feldspar-rich ro...

Measuring section and bagging samples in Marion County, Arkansas looking for clues from the Ordovician in some cherty dolostones. When you can't find a Jacob's staff in the office, you grab a broom stick and make your own...with black, semi-goth duck tape! Now to figure out how to cut slabs, make thin sections, and make sense of these weird tan lines.

Of all of the many types of maps that have been made for one purpose or another, I find one of the most enjoyable kind to look at are the old USGS topographic maps. These types have been made since 1879  (which also was the year that USGS was established) and thus, depict the human world that once was. This is particularly interesting since many localities have been mapped three or more times and we can see the evolution of human geography. For this reason and because I grew up within two miles of two towns that were abandoned during the 1960s as a dam was constructed and flooded the town sites, I'm easily fascinated by old maps that show towns and other old settlements and structures that have been abandoned. Old topo maps from across the country can be viewed and downloaded for free (in JPEG, TIFF, or PDF formats) from the USGS ( click here for more ). Admittedly, this USGS site is a huge rabbit hole for me to fall into and I've downloaded several topo maps from it, inc...

On a rare occasion when I visit Facebook, I'll run across a post on my feed from someone who, for good humor or not, has shared an image, video, or link related to geoscience. Naturally, that makes me very happy and almost willing to comment on social media (I don't usually partake in many social media platforms and I try to keep my opinions on various matters personal). However, I have seen a few posts that are misleading or outright false that I will call out. One such is this image does raise an interesting question: No doubt that this image or variations of this image have been spread around on the Internet, and of course this is all in good humor. But, this is nevertheless poorly worded. Statement #1: "Those [countries] who use the Metric System" Firstly, "Metric System" doesn't need to be capitalized. Yeah, sure it's nitpicking, but I had to say it. Secondly, the US adopted the British system of measurements and altered them a bit to...