NOVA: Deadliest Earthquakes - Tuesday Jan 11, 8 p.m. on PBS

This week on NOVA:

Deadliest Earthquakes

Airing Tuesday
January 11 at 8 pm on PBS
(Check local listings)

In 2010, several epic earthquakes delivered one of the worst annual death tolls ever recorded. The deadliest strike, in Haiti, killed more than 200,000 people and reduced homes, hospitals, schools, and the presidential palace to rubble. In exclusive coverage, a NOVA camera crew follows a team of U.S. geologists as they enter Haiti in the immediate aftermath of the tragedy. The team hunts for crucial evidence that will help them determine exactly what happened deep underground and what the risks are of a new killer quake. Barely a month after the Haiti quake, Chile was struck by a quake 100 times more powerful, unleashing a tsunami that put the entire Pacific coast on high alert. In a coastal town devastated by the rushing wave, NOVA follows a team of geologists as they battle aftershocks to measure the displacement caused by the earthquake. Could their work, and the work of geologists at earthquake hot spots around the U.S., one day lead to a breakthrough in predicting quakes before they happen? NOVA investigates compelling new leads in this profound scientific conundrum.

Find the Tectonic Fault
In this seismic image, see if you can locate an unsettling new fault just discovered beneath the Mississippi River.

Earthquakes in the Midwest
Three massive earthquakes struck the American Midwest in 1811-12. Could it happen again?

Watch a Preview
Watch a preview of the program online now.

Remember, most NOVA programs stream on our website the day after our premiere, so if you missed any broadcast, you can catch it at:http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/schedule.html

Tsunami!

• (Best Resource) Tsunami information from the Woods Hole Institute - Interactive presentation covering the science of tsunamis, preparedness, research, and historical tsunamis.
• FEMA Information about Tsunamis - how to prepare, what to do
• Pacific Tsunami Warning Center (PTWC) - Current and past Tsunami warnings
• USGS Tsunami Resources/Links
  
  

Seasons Greetings (and Explanations)

Click on the image to visit a helpful website explaining Earth's Tilt and the Seasons and more.

https://fretzreview.wikispaces.com/Seasons-Causes+Group+1

Astronomy Exam Videos

The following YouTube videos should be helpful as you prepare for the 2nd Astronomy exam, scheduled for the week of Monday, December 13, 2010.

* NEW *

• NASAKids: Time Zones
• NASA Connect: Ancient Observations

• Simple video: tilt of the Earth and Seasons.
• Old Video explaining Latitude, Longitude and Time Zones
• Helpful Sing-Along: "Longitude and Latitude are easy if..."
• Why do we have Time Zones?

• Latitude and Polaris, using a paper plate
• The height (attitude) of the noon Sun, using a paper plate

How does Foucault's Pendulum show earth's rotation?

• Earth's Rotation: Focault's Pendulum (Coreolis Effect) Explained and demonstrated
• Focault's Pendulum at the South Pole
• Why does the Earth Spin?
• NOAA Video showing tilt of the Earth and Temperatures
• Boring but helpful video about the tilt of the Earth, The length of the day Solstices, Equinoxes, the Topics of Capricorn and Cancer, the Arctic and Antarctic Circles and how this is all related to the Seasons
• Amazingly slow but interesting story of longitude and logszzzzzzzZZZZZZZ...

* * How the Earth Formed==> Heat from the Core drives Plate Tectonics ==> Volcanoes * *

Origin of the Universe / The Big Bang

Formation of the Solar System (Neil deGrasse Tyson) (includes How Earth Got its Moon)
Size and Structure of the Solar System

Why does the Sun shine? (The Sun is a Mass of Incandescent Gas)

Phases of the Moon, a kids funky version

Bill Nye the Science Guy: Moon Phases and Baseball
Phases of the Moon, from New to Full to New (No descriptions)

Eclipses

July 1969: Apollo 11 Astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin Land on the Moon

To Infinity, and Beyond!

Links for your Astronomy projects

Basic Info on the Planets, comets, asteroids, the sun, Pluto, Moons, Galaxies and more from NASA.gov

Happy B-Earthday!
This is the year of the Solar System, and this month we look at the Birth of Worlds

Individual Project Links: (More links coming)

• NASA's Solar System Exploration site: Most projects can find everything here, including Jupiter's Moon Europa, Saturn's moon Titan,
• Astronomy vs. Astrology:
  - Basic Astrology, Constellations and The Plane of the Ecliptic
  - PseudoScience
• Asteroids and other things that might hit the Earth
  - NASA's NEO (Near Earth Object) Program
  - Apophis - Scary Video (Dark Side of the Moon - HD), with pop-up notes,
  - Another Scary Video
  - Comet Shoemaker-Levy
  - Impact Craters - Chicxulub (Yucatan Peninsula) - NASA analysis
  - Is this related to the Extinction of the Dinosaurs? - BBC Article - K-T Extinction
• Black Holes
• Polaris & How to Use It - Make a sextant! - Youtube: How to Find Polaris
• Constellations
• Kepler
• Hubble
• 2012: NASA Q&A, Sky & Telescope,
  - Neil deGrasse Tyson on 2012
  - debunking Dec 21, 2012
• NOVA: Pluto Files - Why Pluto isn't a Planet
• NASA's Exoplanets site: 490 and counting
• Project Mogul (July 7, 1947, Roswell, New Mexico)

Not so "Rare Earth" elements

Currently, there is great demand for certain minerals known as "Rare Earths". While the elements are not actually that rare, and most are actually metals, the majority of them that we use are currently mined in China.

Why are these important? without them, you would not have the current variety of mobile phones (including i-phones), flat-screen TV's and most of the electronic devices that we have come to rely on.

Similar to the Chocolate Chip Cookie Lab we worked on last week, the most efficient way of getting these minerals is through strip mining and dangerous factory work that leaves the soil, air and water polluted with acids, toxic metals and even radioactive waste (the radioactive element Thorium is often found with the iron ore that also holds the rare earth minerals.

According to a recent New York Times article, "The refineries and the iron ore processing mill pump their waste into an artificial lake here. The reservoir, four square miles and surrounded by an earthen embankment four stories high, holds a dark gray, slightly radioactive sludge laced with toxic chemical compounds.

The deadly lake is not far from the Yellow River watershed that supplies drinking water to much of northern China. The reservoir covers an area 100 times the size of the alumina factory waste pond that collapsed this month in Hungary, inundating villages there and killing at least nine people."

Minerals Study Guide Resources

websites that can help you prepare your minerals exam study guide:

• geology.com/minerals
  
  
• regentsprep.org