August 28, 2019

"First, we thought it was whale poop, but... there was way more of it than any normal sized pod of whales could come up with."



93 square miles of floating rock — pumice (from an underwater volcano).

From the NYT, "A Raft of Floating Rock Stuns Sailors. But Can It Save the Reef?"

20 comments:

tim maguire said...

But scientists say, so accept it, denier!

Chris said...

All that pumice must have really scratched up their boat's hull.

Dust Bunny Queen said...

Maybe if we all stop using plastic straws and carry our groceries in carbon neutral string bags loaded into our horse drawn wagons we can stop the volcanoes from doing ...Oh I don't know, whatever they have done for Billions of years.

Worth a try. Right Gang!!! Suffer for the greater good and all that.

Maillard Reactionary said...

"Corals only rarely settle on pumice. When they do, they can't get off."

Corals never get off anything they settle on. They're sessile, with prejudice.

I imagine they avoid pumice because it probably doesn't last very long in seawater.

Maillard Reactionary said...

I should have said, "evolution has designed corals to avoid pumice...", lest anyone be misled that corals engage in careful mineralogical studies before transitioning to the quiet life.

Just asking said...

Wasn't the Great Barrier Reef on the (apocryphal) list of things to possibly nuke?

Darrell said...

See?
Everything heals or it dies.
Great Barrier Reef II.

Wince said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Wince said...

Wouldn't it be easier to blame white, male gun-toting humans for using too much Lava Soap (with pumice)?

"These are the hands of Chuck Dorchester, weapons tester for the Armalite Corporation"

LOL. Chuck Dorchester reminds me of the porn names in Boogie Nights: "Those are great names!"

Coincidentally...

Mark Robert Michael Wahlberg. Born: June 5, 1971 (age 48 years), Dorchester, Boston, MA

Chris N said...

At Peace Pavilion West, we make pumice soap, pumice bulletin board and a pumice crown for our female high-achievers (yes, crown. EQUALITY).

The losers sell soap on the side of Rte 9.

iScience fact of the day: Pumice is not the ‘shit of the Earth’. However if we don’t regulate the economy and punish non-believers, the Earth will become shit.

Namaste

richlb said...

Lava soap uses the "power of pumice."

Fernandinande said...

"She's a witch!"

buwaya said...

Natural phenomena occur on a scale that humans still cannot compete with.
What happens in this world has very little to do with humanity.

Fernandinande said...

Good Sir Knight: "What also floats in water?"

"Bread. - Apples.
Very small rocks." (they meant pumice)

Ingachuck'stoothlessARM said...

they smiled with restrained glee as they said "whale poop"

... but it turned out to be volcano poop.

tcrosse said...

Traditionally whale shit is a thing there is nothing lower than, not something that floats.

Peter said...

The Great Barrier Reef may be saved? By pumice? This will come as a major blow to climate change scientists and activists. I imagine they are already working on proofs to the contrary or even on studies showing the pumice is a mortal threat that was caused by climate change and can only be stopped by massive carbon reductions.

Bilwick said...

Whatever it is, it's sure to know more about economics than your average Democratic presidential candidate.

The Godfather said...

Seriously, does whale poop float? And, if so, why haven't I been informed?

Fen said...

The pumice raft is 1/2,000th the size of the #GreatBarrierReef

Why is this stat relevant?