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Help!
I'm a little underwhelmed by the nanowrimo help forum this year. I'm looking for some ideas on how you could theoretically 'trigger' a volcano. It can be either actually scientifically based, or magically based as long as it has a solid theory behind it. From what I understand explosives wouldn't be at all helpful.
When I asked on the nano forum I got the scintillating information that volcanoes blow when the pressure is too high, and a link to the wikipedia site. Because, gee, I didn't think to look there already. I'm trying to come up with an idea on how to artificially increase pressure in a fairly short amount of time. (few months?)
So does anyone have any possible ideas, even silly ones that could help trigger an idea? That way I won't have to go back to my useless little thread that's been buried under threads like 'vile cheeses' and 'name my character!'
Thank you!
When I asked on the nano forum I got the scintillating information that volcanoes blow when the pressure is too high, and a link to the wikipedia site. Because, gee, I didn't think to look there already. I'm trying to come up with an idea on how to artificially increase pressure in a fairly short amount of time. (few months?)
So does anyone have any possible ideas, even silly ones that could help trigger an idea? That way I won't have to go back to my useless little thread that's been buried under threads like 'vile cheeses' and 'name my character!'
Thank you!
no subject
Since not many people ever want to trigger volcanic eruptions (outside James Bond movies), I'm going kind of out on a limb here. It's true that pressure built up in the magma chambers causes volcano to erupt. For some volcanoes this pressure comes from rising hot magma pushing up until the chamber can't hold it anymore. Then it comes oozing out. See Hawaiian volcanoes.
These volcanoes are very boring. Pretty, but boring.
Gases and water vapor either in the lava itself or in the rocks of the volcano cause explosive eruptions. You can't do anything with adding gases/water to the boiling lava. It comes premixed by nature. You can pipe water into the sides of the volcano. The water will percolate through cracks in the volcano and when it touches the hot magma, it will turn into steam. Steam expands and will crack the rocks further, creating even more places for magma and incoming water to go. Eventually, you'll get an eruption. Not only that, you'll get pyroclastic flows (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyroclastic_flow), which most times are more dangerous that the flowing lava.
Other ways of triggering a volcano include triggering earthquakes underneath or near the volcano. This would cause underground shifting of magma reservoirs and can "prime the pump" so to speak when it comes to getting magma moving. You can make this step one in the evil process and pumping water into the volcano step two.
If you need any more scientific reasoning or justification on this topic, let me know. I'm always happy when I can put my geologic knowledge to ridiculous uses. XD
no subject
Ok, for a little more background. This is meant to be a 'doomsday weapon.' Really, I want to trigger a suprevolcano. Dooooooom to the world. Dooooom.
I would give more information, but I don't want to ruin the plot.
no subject
If you're making a Doomsday device out of a volcano, you're best bet is to use a pre-existing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_volcano#Known_eruptions) supervolcano (or, you know, a made up one). All supervolcanos are now dormant so triggering earthquakes with explosives to get the magma flowing, stoppering up vents (like others suggested), and filling underground magma chambers with water/gas mixtures would be a good start. The water/gas in a empty magma chamber would be really good because once the magma starts to move up and encounters said chamber, it's going to mix with it and really build the pressure up inside the volcano. It's also easier to do this way because if you put gas/water in a chamber before there's magma, you don't have to worry about coming up with complex and expensive ways to keep your pipes from melting. Even evil scientists need to save money
You want this eruptions to be big but also explosive. The more explosive the eruption, the more debris it will send up into the atmosphere. The crap in the atmosphere, the more destruction you'll get. Even better if you can get a volcano out in the ocean. Once it explode, the walls of the volcano can collapse inward trigger tsunamis as the water rushed in and then rushed back out. Nothing says destruction like 100ft walls of water!
A couple of more links to get you going:
Toba Catastrophe (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toba_catastrophe_theory): Wiped out 60% of the human population (which granted wasn't big at the time).
Volcano winter (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volcanic_winter): Triggering this would be your best bet for global destruction
Year without a Summer (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Year_Without_a_Summer): And it's happened before.
no subject
Would the earthquakes have to be big ones to have any impact on the volcano?
no subject
Seismic instruments would record the explosion first (which has a different seismic signal than earthquakes). Then you should get the earthquake signal (or just the earthquake signal if you're using lube). Then you'd want to wait a while because what you want to see next is an earthquake swarm. This is a series of very small, deep earthquakes that are closely spaced (sometimes within a few minutes of each other). It's what you get when magma is moving around under a volcano. It basically lets you know things are working.