The birth of a new volcano
Unexpected Elements
BBC
4.4 • 570 Ratings
🗓️ 26 May 2019
⏱️ 64 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
A new undersea volcano has appeared off the coast of East Africa. The sea floor between Madagascar and Mozambique has become increasingly seismically active in the last year. As well as the appearance of this active volcano, local islands are now experiencing frequent earthquakes.
The causes of Indonesia’s Palu Bay tsunami last year are being examined thanks to social media. Videos taken as the tsunami hit have been analysed to determine wave heights and speeds and suggest possible causes.
Scientists at a massive underground physics research facility in Italy are to stand trial over safety risks. The facility uses poisonous chemicals. There are concerns these could leak into drinking water supplies in the event of an earthquake.
As scientists keep finding ever more fascinating facts about the invisible housemates that share our homes, we investigate what might be lurking in quiet household corners or under our beds.
We head out on a microbial safari with expert tour guide Dr Jamie Lorimer from the University of Oxford to find out what kind of creatures are living in our kitchens, bathrooms and gardens - from bacteria normally found in undersea vents popping up in a kettle, to microbes quietly producing tiny nuggets of gold. For so long this hidden world has been one that we’ve routinely exterminated - but should we be exploring it too?
(Image: Multibeam sonar waves, reflecting off the sea floor near the French island of Mayotte, reveal the outline of an 800-meter-tall volcano (red) and a rising gas-rich plume. Credit: MAYOBS team (CNRS / IPGP -Université de Paris / Ifremer / BRGM)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | In 2019, we began investigating the disappearance of Dr. Ruzha Ignatva. |
| 0:08.0 | I believe we are a very special network. |
| 0:10.0 | A scammer who stole billions from investors around the world. |
| 0:15.0 | She's on the FBI's 10 Most Wanted list. |
| 0:18.0 | And now, we have some unmissable updates. She has money and when you have |
| 0:23.0 | money you have power. Join me, Jamie Bartlett, as the hunt for the missing crypto queen continues. |
| 0:29.5 | Listen first on BBC Sounds. You've discovered the Science Hour from the BBC World Service with me, |
| 0:36.1 | Roland P's and later in the podcast, |
| 0:38.7 | the crowd science team is lifting the lid on the nasty bugs you may find in the smallest room |
| 0:43.6 | of your house. It's a very damp ecology, which has access to all sorts of rich, bodily |
| 0:50.3 | sources, if you like. So we just lifted off the system cover on the toilet. We're looking down |
| 0:53.7 | into the system. So we've got some mould. |
| 0:55.5 | Where you could really get excited as a microbiologist is probably underneath the loose seat. |
| 1:01.4 | Happily, that was Alan Jaggatier's errand and not mine. |
| 1:05.0 | But we are diving deep to On Science and Action to witness the birth of a volcano |
| 1:10.5 | and to learn why the tsunami that |
| 1:13.2 | killed 4,000 people in Indonesia last September was so deadly. Scientists have pulled clues |
| 1:19.6 | from cell phone videos that caught the unfolding tragedy. The deadly waves we've learned arrived less than two minutes after the earthquake that triggered them. |
| 1:39.1 | We also have news of a trial of Italian physicists on the horizon and a look at India's chaotic coal-fired power plants. |
| 1:47.7 | But first, it was on May the 10th the year ago that people on the French island of Mayotte in |
| 1:53.2 | the Indian Ocean off the coast of Africa felt a worrying earth tremor. Seismometers detected |
| 1:59.2 | many more that weren't felt, and in fact, the seismic |
... |
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