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Article: <5fmof7$gj3@sjx-ixn8.ix.netcom.com>
From: saquo@ix.netcom.com(Nancy )
Subject: Re: TUNGUSKA
Date: 6 Mar 1997 15:39:19 GMT
In article <5fi80o$4k4@news.ccit.arizona.edu> Jim Scotti
writes:
> So, what set off the methane gas explosion? According to
> eyewitnesses of the explosion, it occurred in clear skies at
> about 7:17 AM on the morning of June 30, 1908. And what
> about the fireball that was seen by many witnesses crossing
> from southeast to northwest just before the explosion?
> jscotti@LPL.Arizona.EDU (Jim Scotti)
(Begin ZetaTalk[TM])
Imagine a tightly capped landfill, not just capped with ground
that would allow seepage of the methane accumulating there, but
an air-tight seal such as a metal plate. A virtual dome of gas,
compressed against the top of the dome by the inability to move
upward as methane gas would naturally do. A slight crack occurs
in the metal plate over this landfill, this explosion waiting to
happen. The gas hisses out, pushing aside the normal atmosphere
and forming a large invisible cloud of methane gas as the rising
gas is closely followed by yet more gas hissing from the
compressed dome now venting.
The air is still, but as always there are prevailing
westerlies, which blow the methane a bit to the east. Now comes a
spark, which DOES occur in the atmosphere and not just when
lightning visible to humans occurs. On a smaller scale, these
sparks occur when air masses are on the move. The spark ignites
the methane that drifted east, and as would be expected the path
of the rapidly burning methane would travel BACK along the slowly
drifting cloud, back to the source. Whomp, then BLAM!
(End ZetaTalk[TM])
In article <5fi80o$4k4@news.ccit.arizona.edu> Jim Scotti
writes:
> Where is the exit point of this buried pocket of methane?
> Are you perhaps implying that a small opening would vent
> enough methane into presumably still air so that it would
not
> disburse - enough methane to generate an explosion as big
> as a 15-20 megaton nuclear explosion? And where is this
> "wet recently deposited volcanic ash" you mention?
The
> Tunguska region is covered in swampy peat bogs and
> permafrost, not by volcanic ash.
> jscotti@LPL.Arizona.EDU (Jim Scotti)
(Begin ZetaTalk[TM])
You answered your own question. Check out the permafrost, a
permanently frozen layer of earth. Where the few inches above the
permafrost, perhaps a foot or two, melt during the summer months
due to warmed air and increased sunlight, the permafrost layer,
as the name implies, is PERPETUALLY FROZEN. We described the
sequence of events, the same sequence that explains the thick ice
cap that rides atop Greenland. Greenland was formerly at the
north pole, and Tunguska at a far warmer latitude. A recent pole
shift, a few thousand years ago, moved the Earth's crust so that
Greenland moved south and simultaneously Tunguska moved north.
Thus the flash frozen mastodons, with green grass and buttercups
in their stomachs.
(End ZetaTalk[TM])