Recent methane leaks, sinkholes show more evidence Dangerous Gas Theory may be correct!

reply to post by Phage


Let's not forget methane eating bacteria (anerobic and aerobic), a lot of the methane released in the oceans never even makes it to the atmosphere.

Think i'll have another cup of tea and not worry about dying tonight.

reply to post by JonnyMnemonic

Look, I made some predictions. They are coming true.

Confirmation bias tends to make that easy to do.

those are two semi-common industrial chemicals that are exothermically reactive with hydrogen sulfide.

What concentrations of H2S are required for a combustive reaction to occur with either of those compounds and hydrogen sulfide? But it doesn't really matter since you assume (with no evidence) that there was enough.

Dreamliner grounding from battery fires, to go along with all the sickening passengers and 'strange odors' and emergency landings with planes.

Right. Atmospheric hydrogen sulfide at flight altitudes. Couldn't have anything to do with the lithium batteries themselves. Lithium batteries are known to be trouble free, right?

So, like Kurt Russell said in the remake of 'The Thing', why don't we just sit here, see what happens?

Ok. And while we're at it, let's get as many gullible people terrified of bursting into flames as we can. That'll be cool!

Dude, if I was trying to TERRIFY people, I could do a way way way better job. I keep my tone calm so as NOT to terrify people. I can't recall using even one WTF or OMG in, what, 400 event updates? Just speaking the truth.

The question you ask about the minimum flammable mix in normal air is 5%. So what? That obviously doesn't mean anything in relation to fires caused by chemical reactions with iron, copper, or a variety of chemicals. Nor does it factor in the possibility of other chemicals being present in the air mix, such as methane or gasoline (when cars are concerned) and so on, which obviously changes the equation entirely.

And I'm not trying to scare people with the stories about the Houston kids suddenly collapsing unconscious, or the 500+ marathon runners sickening, or the 30 people who suddenly sickened in a store in today's update. Those are simply facts. If they're SCARY facts, well, hey, sometimes the truth is actually scary. Ever heard a doctor tell someone they have cancer? I'm sure that's scary, but if it's the truth then it's the truth. Would it be better if the docs lied, so as not to scare people, and said, 'You're fine, go home, have a beer'?

People can overcome fear and still operate. I did it 2 years ago when I realized this problem was upon us. Took about a month to shake the fear out of my system. One thing people definitely cannot overcome, however, is being dead. And if people are kept oblivious to what's going on then they won't take even some basic steps that might protect them, even if only a little bit. But that little bit might buy at least some people a little extra life that they might not otherwise have.

So, let's see what happens, especially as regards explosions and fires. Those are hard to hide! Eventually one of those neighborhood-shaking thunderous explosions is gonna hit a populated area. It'll be interesting to see how they spin that. Teenagers with bottle-rockets? Or maybe...Al Qaeda!

reply to post by JonnyMnemonic

Dude, if I was trying to TERRIFY people, I could do a way way way better job. I keep my tone calm so as NOT to terrify people.

Dude, how do you think people might react to the idea that they might burst into flames and there's nothing they can do about it?

So what? That obviously doesn't mean anything in relation to fires caused by chemical reactions with iron, copper, or a variety of chemicals.

That's right, it doesn't. What is the concentration required for a combustion reaction with nitric acid, with all those other factors involved. You don't know and you don't know that hydrogen sulfide was even involved. But you assume that hydrogen sulfide was the cause, why do you assume that? Not because you have any evidence but because it fits nicely with your little idea. That is called "an argument to ignorance". It also is a case of circular reasoning.

And I'm not trying to scare people with the stories about the Houston kids suddenly collapsing unconscious, or the 500+ marathon runners sickening, or the 30 people who suddenly sickened in a store in today's update.

Really, then what are you trying to do when you "warn" people that events like this are going to increase and there is nothing anyone can do about it?

And if people are kept oblivious to what's going on then they won't take even some basic steps that might protect them, even if only a little bit.

What do you suggest people do? How, oh how, can we protect ourselves from roving bands of hydrogen sulfide gas?

Oh, yes. How do you relate hydrogen sulfide to methane releases?

reply to post by Phage


Well, I recall Michelle Obama once really suggesting - with an unexplainable amount of emotion in her voice - that people should seriously insulate their homes. The emotion seemed so out of place for the topic, so I filed that away to ponder over time. Now that I know what's going on, I see why - she was trying to help, but apparently the gubment isn't going to be telling us the truth until they have no choice (because people discover the truth themselves). So she did what she could.

So, start there: insulate the hell out of your home. Not only will that keep gases from infiltrating your home so easily, but if you DO run a central AC or heat, you will run it LESS, which means less risk.

I listed some of the other steps I've tried in my FAQ. I guess if I had to pick one thing out of the list that seems plausibly the most effective, it would be: ozone generators. Not only will the ozone react away hydrogen sulfide (H2S + O3 --> H2O + O2 + S), but it should even help keep hydrogen sulfide from saturating absorbent materials like wood, carpet, etc.

Other steps: don't go outside unless you have to. Avoid low-lying areas. If you smell something weird, go 90-degrees right angle from whatever way the wind is blowing, especially if it's a sickly sweet or flowery smell and there's no apparent reason for it. Don't live in your grandma's basement. Yada yada.

This is one reason to wake people up: put the power of a million minds to work on solutions, or a billion minds. We waste so much time and so many resources on BS. What might we accomplish if people actually focused on the problem? Perhaps we should find out.

reply to post by JonnyMnemonic

that people should seriously insulate their homes.

Right, saving energy = hydrogen sulfide.

Not only will the ozone react away hydrogen sulfide (H2S + O3 --> H2O + O2 + S)

No you got it wrong. You are creating sulfur dioxide. Good stuff.

In the gas phase, ozone reacts with hydrogen sulfide to form sulfur dioxide: H2S + O3 → SO2 + H2O

en.wikipedia.org...

Other steps: don't go outside unless you have to.

Yup. No fear. Seal up your house! Dont' go outside!

What might we accomplish if people actually focused on the problem?

Better to focus on problems that actually exist.

The more Co2 oceans absorb the more acidic they get, the more acidic they get the more methane is released from the the ocean floor. These are coastal areas aren't they? Might want to check out exactly how acidic the sea water is in the areas where methane seems to be a problem or 'strange odors' are occuring. I dunno if that's what this is, but that's what my mind jumped to.

Phage, you lose all credibility with me when you knock "anecdotal" evidence as being useless.

Anecdotal evidence is one of the three pillars of scientific research and discovery.

The first is direct research aimed at a particular problem. We would not have modern MRI machines if not for pure research in quantum physics which gave us the S.Q.U.I.D. or superconducting quantum interference device. This amazingly sensitive device for detecting magnetic fields is at the heart of the MRI,or magnetic resonance imaging, machine. And it operates on principles of quantum mechanics found through pure directed research.

the second is pure accidental discovery. Both penicillin and vulcanized rubber were discovered this way. Louis Pasteur discovered penicillin when he accidentally contaminated one of his petri dishes with bread mold. Modern elastomers, like rubber, were discovered when Goodyear accidentally left a sulfur laced sample of raw latex rubber on a hot stove. Along with peroxide, sulfur is still one of the two curing agents used to make nearly all modern rubber, both natural and synthetic, that we have today.

Then you have one of the most important discoveries of modern medicine, vaccination. This one was brought about by observing the "anecdotal" evidence that milk maids seemed to almost never develop the deadly disease Smallpox. It was then found, through investigation of that anecdotal evidence, that milk maids almost always came down with a mild form of pox known as Cowpox. Since the two poxes were very similar the cow pox gave immunity to Smallpox to the milk maids. This then led to using weakened strains of viruses to immunize people against many diseases.

So don't be so quick to discount anecdotal evidence. It often leads to discoveries just as important as any found by accident or pure research.

And that is what we are collecting here; anecdotal evidence of many various types of problems that are popping up around the globe.

If you were 1/10 the scientist you would have us believe you are you would be looking for proof that we are either right or wrong instead of slinging insults at people who are honestly trying to investigate certain phenomenon.

And I find yet more evidence indicating a very big problem... Right now. The Clathrate Gun is firing. Runaway warming is about to begin and that means dangerous gases among a score of other very serious problems that I can't even begin to list. I know jonny has seen this because I saw his comment at the bottom. It is all linked together. Oh God, I think I'm gonna be sick.

Don't read this if you can't handle the truth.

Dramatic increase in methane in the Arctic in January 2013

Also, to the comment above about methane being absorbed into the water column before it reaches the surface, so not a big deal, I have news for you. This is not what is being witnessed over the past two years by the Russian scientists monitoring the Artic Sea. They are seeing hundreds of methane plumes over a kilometre in diameter that are NOT being dissolved in the water column and ARE venting methane directly into the atmosphere at a rate that is much higher than anyone predicted. Which can only mean they are coming from the clathrate hydrates deep in the seabed destabilizing. This will spread as ocean acidification increases and ocean circulation patterns change and high winds bring up even more of the deep water CO2 and release it into an atmosphere that is unable to absorb it. The feedback loop all of this causes is what has been shown to have caused previous extinction events.

And, no, I'm not going to cite everything I've just claimed. It's all out there. At this stage of the game citing all the scientific proof would be akin to me saying 2+2=4 and some "flat earther reincarnated as a denier" type coming in here and telling me to back up that claim with scientific studies proving that math actually works. It's common knowledge to anyone with half a brain who has read the scientific research over the past decade and the only people who require proof are the deniers with their heads stuck up their ***** who would rather be fed a lie than deal with the consequences of the truth. I have no intention of trying to prove anything to people like that, they aren't worth the effort. (Yes, that was a Wizard's First Rule reference for anyone who knows what that means... ).

Originally posted by Kali74
The more Co2 oceans absorb the more acidic they get, the more acidic they get the more methane is released from the the ocean floor. These are coastal areas aren't they? Might want to check out exactly how acidic the sea water is in the areas where methane seems to be a problem or 'strange odors' are occuring. I dunno if that's what this is, but that's what my mind jumped to.

Hi Kali, see my post on page 2, it touches on this.

reply to post by Phage


Wow, you are correct! At least for the gas form. In water form, ozone does help with H2S. But since that library incident where H2S was getting into the library in Ohio via contaminated water supply and causing the library to close, I have worried about that, so even if the ozone only helps with contaminated water, that's something. And SO2 is still better than H2S too. (All things considered. Ideally, that's not a choice you'd wanna make.)

But most importantly, I think you have solved a mystery that has puzzled me for at least a year. There have been a number of stories where people have gotten acid burns on their skin from the rain. One I recall specifically was in Washington State, near the coast. I was never able to figure out why that would be, how that would fit in. But you just did it! If you follow the SO2 reactions in the atmosphere, it ends up being acid, which can cause skin burns. So as the H2S reacts away our ozone layer, we're getting some acid rain here and there, and so people IN that rain sometimes get burned. Of course, maybe there was an unknown and invisible volcano off the coast too, but nobody ever mentioned it, so your explanation now seems like the most plausible. Didn't expect you to solve any mysteries like that, Phage! You da man!

Gonna go look at some of those stories again, with new eyes.

reply to post by Vexatious Vex


You are right, anyone can go online and find information about arctic methane release. Finding out how common that's been in the past and the time scale involved in the consequences of large scale methane release is a whole different story.

reply to post by Vexatious Vex


Good stuff.

Here is a possibility that could create siesmic activity.

journals.ametsoc.org...

1) compute warming rates with uncertainties along 28 full-depth, high-quality hydrographic sections that have been occupied two or more times between 1980 and 2010; 2) divide the global ocean into 32 basins, defined by the topography and climatological ocean bottom temperatures; and then 3) estimate temperature trends in the 24 sampled basins. The three southernmost basins show a strong statistically significant abyssal warming trend, with that warming signal weakening to the north in the central Pacific, western Atlantic, and eastern Indian Oceans.

How much force does deep water expansion put on the deep ocean basins that contain this incredibly dense, and extremely high pressures. 6,000 PSI at 4,000 meters, applied against the walls of these basins, increasing.

reply to post by Vexatious Vex


I like you! Heh, that's right, not much point in trying to convince the unconvinceable. There is no amount of evidence or data that you could produce to convince some people. It's almost like some people are here to work hard to make sure that nobody follows this line of inquiry, and if that is so then you sure aren't going to convince them. That major ramp-up in atmospheric methane in January should be a wakeup call to everyone that we are witnessing dire events and that the situation is spiraling out of control, if it's not completely out of control right now, which I think it is.

That means we have to come up with Plan B scenarios. But no single person - no small group of people even - can do that. Well, maybe the super-rich, building bunkers in the Himalayas. But not normal folks. We will HAVE to work together, but you can't have an alert team working on solutions if everyone is totally asleep. And if we wait to wake up until the explosions and fires are destroying a city a day or something - and it very well may get to that point - then it may be too late to act at all, at least effectively.

Waking people up won't be any kind of dreamland of wonderfulness either. I realize that. It will suck in many ways, I'm sure. But it would be more honest, and at least then we could try to forge a better destiny for more people, and that'd be better than just laying down and dying. Surely working together we could save more people than we could by sleeping until we die. At least I have to hope that is the case.

Here's a promising-looking site for air and water decontamination stuff:

www.spartanwatertreatment.com...
www.spartanwatertreatment.com...
www.spartanwatertreatment.com...

Kind of industrial-looking, maybe too expensive for a single home.

reply to post by Vexatious Vex


I agree with you here. This is the number one cause and the beginning of the chain reaction. The tectonic plate movement came after from Permafrost melt. I add tectonic plate movement in though because I also think it is a cause in the fact that earthquakes have increased and so have sinkholes and land slips. And sure, when there is plate movement below the seas, there may indeed be gas release. The permafrost melt causes relieved pressure on the earth's crust when the ice retreats, but I also think it adds pressure on the weak continental shelf around the ocean's when water rises from the permafrost melt. Both of these cause more and more tectonic plate movement. So Vex, you're right about the causes that began this chain reaction, but now I think that the earth's crust displacement is adding to the methane amounts in our atmosphere.

reply to post by happykat39

Anecdotal evidence is one of the three pillars of scientific research and discovery.

Sure, but it can't be used for statistical purposes. You can't claim there are more sinkholes occuring just because you happen to hear about it more often. You need statistical evidence, not random news reporting.

If you were 1/10 the scientist you would have us believe you are you would be looking for proof that we are either right or wrong instead of slinging insults at people who are honestly trying to investigate certain phenomenon.

What insults? The trouble is, the people that are looking for "proof" are convinced that everything they see is related to hydrogen sulfide and methane. That bias makes them ignore evidence that contradicts them and resort to the argument to ignorance to support them; "there's no evidence that the explosion wasn't caused by hydrogen sulfide, therefore it was!" That ain't science.

How would you suggest I prove it wrong? You know that is the ultimate cop out of someone with no real evidence, right?

Originally posted by Rezlooper
reply to post by Vexatious Vex

 

I agree with you here. This is the number one cause and the beginning of the chain reaction. The tectonic plate movement came after from Permafrost melt. I add tectonic plate movement in though because I also think it is a cause in the fact that earthquakes have increased and so have sinkholes and land slips. And sure, when there is plate movement below the seas, there may indeed be gas release. The permafrost melt causes relieved pressure on the earth's crust when the ice retreats, but I also think it adds pressure on the weak continental shelf around the ocean's when water rises from the permafrost melt. Both of these cause more and more tectonic plate movement. So Vex, you're right about the causes that began this chain reaction, but now I think that the earth's crust displacement is adding to the methane amounts in our atmosphere.

There is also this: (bolding mine)

During the formation of gas hydrates, methane and water become immobilized within the sediment pore spaces. Because of the presence of these solids (instead of pore waters and gas), the sediment can not become consolidated because the water can not be expulsed with increasing overburden as more sedimentation occurs. Cementation of the sediments does not occur when pore spaces are filled with hydrates (solid ice) rather than with water, from which minerals such as calcite can be precipitated. Gas hydrate rich sediments are thus cemented by the hydrateice, which may occupy much of the sedimentary section, but which are not stable when the temperature rises or the pressure falls (sea level falls). In general, rising temperatures have more effect than falling pressure. If temperatures of ocean waters rise, hydrates will no longer be stable, and will disintegrate into a liquid water and gas. This could lead to the development massive underseas landslides. With the landslides, more gas could escape. Several examples of possibly gas-hydrate linked extremely large slumps have been described, e.g., on the Norwegian continental margin, where debris from the giant, three-part Storegga slide, over 450 m thick, is spread over a distance of 800 km. One of the Storegga slides caused a tsunami to deposit sediment up to 4 m above the high water line in Scotland. There are more of these mega slides in the same region. We think that these slides were triggered when the ocean waters warmed by a few degrees at the end of the last ice age.

But in your comment as to increasing quake activity, I posted this back in 2010 so I agree there could be a connection: (and check out the one comment for a chuckle)

Rising sea levels linked to increased earthquakes

reply to post by Vexatious Vex

Don't read this if you can't handle the truth.

I'd rather read what a scientist has to say about it. An links to Leonid Yurganov's comments? Who is "Dr. Malcolm Light"?

Maybe you can explain the connecton between methane and hydrogen sulfide for me. JonnyMnemonic doesn't seem to be able to. I've asked a couple of times now. Any ideas about why the OP sees fit to include gasoline and freon leaks?

reply to post by JonnyMnemonic

There have been a number of stories where people have gotten acid burns on their skin from the rain. One I recall specifically was in Washington State, near the coast.

Really? How many people. Rains a lot on the Washington coast seems that it would happen to a lot of people.

So as the H2S reacts away our ozone layer, we're getting some acid rain here and there, and so people IN that rain sometimes get burned.

Didn't you say H2S is heavier than air? How does it get up to the upper stratosphere in significant quantities?