Help!

[kaitou]

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!

Comments

[tsaiko.livejournal.com]

Ah! I realized once I posted I forgot to ask why the volcano needed to erupt. I was going for "make big KA-BOOM!" Because really, that's what I'd do if I were an evil scientist. XD

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.

[kaitou1412.livejournal.com]

I'm thinking 'Yellowstone Caldera' actually. The nano isn't 'earth' so it's not a real life caldera, but it will be a pre-existing one in the book.

Would the earthquakes have to be big ones to have any impact on the volcano?

[tsaiko.livejournal.com]

Not really. They'd have to be deep earthquakes (which is why I thought explosives). You might need to drill really, really deep holes, send some explosives down, and then let it rip. This would have the added effect of cracking rock, which might allow magma from deep down to move upward. Sending some sort of lubricant down as well to reduce friction between rocks would also work. That would be a series of smaller earthquake though it could trigger a big one. Really, large or small, your goal is get crack something and create a weak spot that makes it easier for magma to flow upward.

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.