Word: pinatubo
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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While the stories the studios are telling are mostly make-believe, the danger is real. Increasingly, however, scientists can do something about it. They did so most famously in 1991, when they took the pulse of Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines, predicted it was about to erupt and persuaded officials to evacuate 35,000 people two days before it did. Researchers now have at their disposal an arsenal of newly developed volcanology hardware, ranging from satellites to acoustical sensors to highly sensitive gas sniffers. Whether the technology is up to the task of monitoring not just one peak but hundreds...
Once the scientists factored in aerosols, their models began looking more like the real world. The improved performance of the simulations was demonstrated in 1991, when they successfully predicted temperature changes in the aftermath of the massive Mount Pinatubo eruption in the Philippines. A number of studies since have added to the scientists' confidence that they finally know what they're talking about--and can predict what may happen if greenhouse gases continue to be released into the atmosphere unchecked. Just last week, a report appeared in Nature that firmly ties an increase in the severity of U.S. rainstorms...
...made chemicals are destroying the ozone layer, but so are natural ones. The 1991 Mount Pinatubo eruption spewed ozone-unfriendly chlorine compounds into the air; researchers believe that these were partly responsible for the record-breaking ozone hole that opened up over Antarctica last year...
Noyes said that this eclipse was unusualbecause Mt. Pinatubo, which erupted last summerand sent gasses into the atmosphere, blocked outmuch of the sun's blue lights and, therefore, madethe moon's reflection appear redder...
...report in Nature suggests that nature can help the process along. Ozone depletion was expected to be reasonably mild in 1991; instead, it was severe. That year also saw major eruptions by Mount Hudson in Chile and Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines. Volcanoes release enormous amounts of dust. Dust, along with ice crystals, provides surfaces where ozone-destruction chemistry works most efficiently. Unfortunately, while the industrial world is phasing out CFCs before the turn of the century, other compounds are also ozone destroyers -- and volcano control is somewhat farther...