Earth does some interesting things when no one is watching. 400 square kilometer raft of floating rock (pumice), that no one noticed till somebody looked out the window of a plane flying into New Zealand.

Abstract
The 2012 submarine eruption of Havre volcano in the Kermadec arc, New Zealand, is the largest deep-ocean eruption in history and one of very few recorded submarine eruptions involving rhyolite magma. It was recognized from a gigantic 400-km2 pumice raft seen in satellite imagery, but the complexity of this event was concealed beneath the sea surface. Mapping, observations, and sampling by submersibles have provided an exceptionally high fidelity record of the seafloor products, which included lava sourced from 14 vents at water depths of 900 to 1220 m, and fragmental deposits including giant pumice clasts up to 9 m in diameter. Most (>75%) of the total erupted volume was partitioned into the pumice raft and transported far from the volcano. The geological record on submarine volcanic edifices in volcanic arcs does not faithfully archive eruption size or magma production.



http://advances.sciencemag.org...nt/4/1/e1701121.full

If we get lucky it'll overflow onto white island. Racists...

So, kidding aside, how do we NOT realize something like this has happened? We can count the polar bears, but the earth sprouts a zit covering that much ground and we're like "oh, a flight attendant noticed it the other day...."?

quote:

Originally posted by slabsides45:
So, kidding aside, how do we NOT realize something like this has happened? We can count the polar bears, but the earth sprouts a zit covering that much ground and we're like "oh, a flight attendant noticed it the other day...."?

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.
- Hamlet (1.5.167-8)

quote:

Originally posted by slabsides45:
So, kidding aside, how do we NOT realize something like this has happened? We can count the polar bears, but the earth sprouts a zit covering that much ground and we're like "oh, a flight attendant noticed it the other day...."?

I'm hoping it was detected but ruled out by many people looking for unpleasant surprises like, oh, nuke tests.

At the same time, I agree that such an event should have registered on a Richter scale somewhere in New Zealand and triggered a tsunami warning. Perhaps the event was far less violent than the article lets on.

Ask my neighbors, I am sure it is due to global warming, which is caused mostly by conservative white males.

I saw this on the TV Show "What on Earth". Fascinating!

For comparison's sake, the "pumice raft" mentioned is roughly the size of the city of Denver.

Wow!