The Eagles are come upon us

Something I noticed yesterday evening...

Here's a photograph from northern Europe of some of the Aurora Borealis resulting from the massive discharge of solar particles hitting the Earth this week:

Looks rather like a great big bird of prey, doesn't it?

Compare that to this painting by Ted Nasmith, titled The Eagles of Manwë:

"...And out of the west there would come at times a great cloud in the evening, shaped as it were an eagle, with pinions spread to the north and the south; and slowly it would loom up, blotting out the sunset, and then uttermost night would fall upon Númenor. And some of the eagles bore lightning beneath their wings, and thunder echoed between sea and cloud.

"Then men grew afraid. 'Behold the Eagles of the Lords of the West!' they cried. 'The Eagles of Manwë are come upon Númenor!' And they fell upon their faces."

-- from "Akallabêth",
The Silmarillion
by J.R.R. Tolkien

Nasmith's work is inspired by that section of The Silmarillion in which Tolkien shares the tale... and the proud and tragic fate... of the race of Númenor. The Númenoreans were about to break the Ban of the Valar: that they should not sail further west than they could see their own lands. The Ban was put in place so that mortal men would not be tempted to seek an immortality which only God Himself could grant.

It does not end well.

With that in mind, this week's natural phenomenon looks positivalutely Tolkien-ish, don't it?

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Massive coronal ejection en route to Earth

The largest ejection of charged particles from the Sun since 2005 is currently speeding toward Earth at 5 million miles per hour. It's due to hit us sometime tomorrow.

In recent months I have made it known that for the past number of years, I have been observing a correlation between this kind of solar activity and an increase in significant seismic activity. You can read about them here and here and here and most recently from October here. So in keeping with that, I am going to strongly suggest that this latest storm of energy which the Sun is throwing at us could possibly trigger severe earthquake activity.

Just something to maybe bear in mind these next few days and weeks...

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Remember my post last week about solar flares and earthquakes?

Here's the link if you wanna look at it. It was about the massive discharge of highly-energized particles that the Sun threw out at the Earth early last week. As a result there were some astonishingly brilliant aurora reported at the northern latitudes.

Well anyway, in my post I wondered aloud if there might be any earthquake activity that would happen as a result, 'cuz I've noticing for the past few years that whenever this planet gets hit by particles from a solar flare that it seems to agitate the inner workins enough to cause pretty good rumblin' soon afterward.

I wrote that last Monday, August 2nd. Today, August 12th, there have been two earthquakes reported in the past several hours. A 6.0 quake hitting the island nation of Vanuatu and then a short while ago a 6.9 quake striking just over a hundred miles away from Quito in Ecuador. No reports of injuries from either earthquake.

Not adding any further commentary. Just wanted to pass along the information for anyone interested in such things.

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Severe geological activity about to happen?

I may get called a "kook" from some quarters for writing about this. All I can really say in my own defense is that it's something I'm sincerely curious about and I was told a long time ago that the only wrong question to ask is one that isn't asked at all...

Slashdot is spreading the news this afternoon about a massive ejection of high-energy particles from the the sun. It's headed toward Earth and should reach us sometime tomorrow. Among other things it means that we should be enjoying some lovely aurora, if you're fortunate to live at a high-enough latitude.

Awright well, here's the thing: I've noticed in the past several years that most every time we get hit by a solar flare, that there's usually a massive earthquake that happens not very long afterward.

Considering that the inside of the Earth is a molten piezoelectric dynamo that generates this planet's magnetic field and that the plates of the planet's crust are floating on top of it, it doesn't seem that coincidental a correlation. I mean, if every now and then the sun ejects some highly electromagnetic particles toward us, seems only fitting that there'd be some agitation of the works beneath us.

So... will an earthquake be occurring in the near future? More than one, perhaps?

I decided awhile back that the next time there was a report of this kind of solar weather that I'd make a note of it on this blog, just to see if anything happens. And whether or not it does well, guess this'll be my own lil' contribution to the body of observable data on geological activity :-)

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