Coral off Tahiti shows a dramatic and rapid rise in sea level of around 14m at 14,600 years ago – at the onset of the Bolling warm period (following the end of the Oldest Dryas event or Heinrich event number One). A similar thing happened at the end of the Younger Dryas event, it is thought – or something very similar. It is being interpreted as evidence of a major mega-flood event, caused by the rapidly melting ice sheets thought to have existed across the top of the northern hemisphere – see www.physorg.com/print252305308.html.
Meanwhile, at www.physorg.com/print252311934.html … satellites are helping Saudi Arabia to drill for water. Fossil water aquifers, including underground lakes and rivers, actually exist beneath the desert – the relic of a wetter period during the Ice Age and early half of the Holocene.
At www.physorg.com/print252315166.html … the Zodiacal dust cloud is in the news, with an image from Chile of light scattered on the dust at the plane of the ecliptic. Cosmic dust is apparently everywhere in near space and beyond, the product of the passage of comets and asteroids etc. Dust particles greater than 2mm in size become shooting stars when they strike the atmosphere but smaller than 2mm they cannot be seen as they filter throught the atmosphere to the ground. Satellite observation indicates 100 to 300 tons of cosmic dust enter the atmosphere every day and this notion is strengthened by ice cores and deep sea sediments – but is it right? There might well be considerably less dust entering the atmosphere and the intention is to find out how much. It seems that cosmic dust is associated with the formation of noctilucent clouds – high in the atmosphere, and these appear to affect climate at the surface – so the scientists every reason to investigate (as well as the funding). In addition, cosmic dust fertilises the oceans, it is thought, by providing iron.