Browsing: Nature

A Brief History On February 13, 1961, while 3 Californians were looking for geodes, they picked up a rock believed to be 500,000 years old that was later found to contain a spark plug!  Understandably, this find, now known as the “Coso artifact,” sparked a lot of mystery and controversy.  Digging Deeper Wallace Lane, Virginia Maxey and Mike Mikesell (love that name), were poking around the geology of Olancha, California when they came across their amazing discovery. Upon cutting open the supposed geode, they expected it to be hollow inside and containing crystals.  Instead the trio’s diamond-bladed saw blade was ruined, and rather than find…

A Brief History On February 5, 2008, a date known as “Super Tuesday,” a series of powerful tornadoes hit the Southern United States, leaving 57 people dead.  An astounding 86 twisters hovered over Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, Arkansas and Mississippi, bringing with them terrific thunderstorms, winds peaking between 166 and 200 mph and hail that caused massive damage.  Even hail the size of softballs (4 inches) was reported! Digging Deeper The hardest hit areas were in the vicinities of Memphis, Tennessee and Jackson, Tennessee.  The 57 deaths and hundreds of injuries were the second worst human life toll from a February tornado…

This Just In! A couple of days ago, we reported on the mainstream media’s gloomy prediction of a potentially catastrophic snow storm striking North America on January 26-27, 2015. Yet, now such news reports as this one are slamming how Winter Storm Juno did not exactly live up to the “sky is falling” hype.  Even Wikipedia mentioned the “Forecasting controversy” in their article on the storm, with “A number of New York City residents criticized New York Governor Andrew Cuomo’s decision to shut down the city’s subway system for the first time ever due to snow.  The nor’easter dropped much less snow in…

A Brief History On January 28, 1887, Fort Keogh, Montana was the scene of what was probably the most bizarre snow storm in recorded history.  Established as an Army outpost in the wake of the Little Big Horn massacre of Lt. Col. Custer’s 7th Cavalry, the fort was named after Capt. Keogh who had died in that action. Digging Deeper On this remarkable snowy day in 1887, astonished soldiers witnessed the falling of perhaps the largest snowflake ever, measuring a massive 15 inches wide by 8 inches thick!  If you think that is impossible, then you can go argue with The Guinness Book of…

A Brief History To our North American readers, please be safe this week as we our currently being slammed by an historic winter storm. Digging Deeper In Ashland, Ohio, where I live, I woke to about half a foot of snow on my driveway and spent an hour or so working the snow blower as my father drove the tractor with the snow plow blade on trying to clear our country driveway.  My morning class at Kent State University at Stark was also cancelled.  In fact, some 165 closings and delays occurred in Northeast Ohio alone this morning due to Winter Storm Juno, part…