State of the Planet

News from the Columbia Climate School

Earthquakes11

  • Field School: The Brahmaputra River

    Field School: The Brahmaputra River

    The first day was very light for the jet-lagged students, just a short introduction to the field school and some background, and then introductions all around as we started to get to know each other. The final group of nine students finally arrived around 9 p.m. They were the most worn-out, bedraggled bunch of travelers…

  • Tangail and the Start of the Field School

    Tangail and the Start of the Field School

    Feb. 21 is Language Day in Bangladesh. It is a holiday, now adopted by the UN as International Mother Language Day. It commemorates a day in 1952 when a crowd of Bengali students protesting Pakistan’s adoption of “Urdu and only Urdu as the official language of Pakistan” were fired upon by the police. It marks…

  • GPS in Khulna and the Hidden Temple

    GPS in Khulna and the Hidden Temple

    Rushing around SW Bangladesh by boat and car, we managed to install or repair four GPS sites in record time. We caught up our lost day and managed to get to the ruins of the Shakher Temple in the Sundarban mangrove forest.

  • Back to Bangladesh, changing plans as we go

    Back to Bangladesh, changing plans as we go

    Back to Bangladesh for some fieldwork and then a two-week Field School. However, this time we had problems starting before we even left NY. Working in Bangladesh you have to be flexible. Nothing goes as planned, but usually everything works out in the end.

  • Seismology as Performance Art

    Seismology as Performance Art

    Ideally, seismic stations are sited in remote, quiet locations. But other considerations are important for a good station, particularly security. As a result, we placed most of our stations in towns near schools, hospitals or town halls, where people could keep an eye on them.

  • Surface Views of the Southern East Africa Rift Inspire a Look Underground

    Surface Views of the Southern East Africa Rift Inspire a Look Underground

    Driving around the Rungwe volcanic province in the southern East Africa Rift installing seismometers, we have the chance to observe first hand how geological processes in action create the most dramatic forms at Earth’s surface.

  • Imaging beneath the southernmost volcanoes in the East Africa Rift

    Imaging beneath the southernmost volcanoes in the East Africa Rift

    The last time we visited the southern part of the East Africa Rift, we were responding to an unusual series of earthquakes in December 2009 that shook northern Malawi. This time, we return to this part of the rift system as a part of a more comprehensive effort to understand the underpinnings of this continental…

  • Distant Quakes Trigger Tremors at U.S. Waste-Injection Sites, Says Study

    Finding Could Help Identify Critically Stressed Faults

  • In Ethiopian Desert, a Window into Rifting of Africa

    In Ethiopian Desert, a Window into Rifting of Africa

    A new study in the journal Nature provides fresh insight into deep-earth processes driving apart huge sections of the earth’s crust. This rifting mostly takes place on seabeds, but can be seen in a few places on land—nowhere more visibly than in the Afar region of northern Ethiopia.

Colorful banner with city: "MR 2025: Mobility, Adaptation, and Wellbeing in a Changing Climate."
  • Field School: The Brahmaputra River

    Field School: The Brahmaputra River

    The first day was very light for the jet-lagged students, just a short introduction to the field school and some background, and then introductions all around as we started to get to know each other. The final group of nine students finally arrived around 9 p.m. They were the most worn-out, bedraggled bunch of travelers…

  • Tangail and the Start of the Field School

    Tangail and the Start of the Field School

    Feb. 21 is Language Day in Bangladesh. It is a holiday, now adopted by the UN as International Mother Language Day. It commemorates a day in 1952 when a crowd of Bengali students protesting Pakistan’s adoption of “Urdu and only Urdu as the official language of Pakistan” were fired upon by the police. It marks…

  • GPS in Khulna and the Hidden Temple

    GPS in Khulna and the Hidden Temple

    Rushing around SW Bangladesh by boat and car, we managed to install or repair four GPS sites in record time. We caught up our lost day and managed to get to the ruins of the Shakher Temple in the Sundarban mangrove forest.

  • Back to Bangladesh, changing plans as we go

    Back to Bangladesh, changing plans as we go

    Back to Bangladesh for some fieldwork and then a two-week Field School. However, this time we had problems starting before we even left NY. Working in Bangladesh you have to be flexible. Nothing goes as planned, but usually everything works out in the end.

  • Seismology as Performance Art

    Seismology as Performance Art

    Ideally, seismic stations are sited in remote, quiet locations. But other considerations are important for a good station, particularly security. As a result, we placed most of our stations in towns near schools, hospitals or town halls, where people could keep an eye on them.

  • Surface Views of the Southern East Africa Rift Inspire a Look Underground

    Surface Views of the Southern East Africa Rift Inspire a Look Underground

    Driving around the Rungwe volcanic province in the southern East Africa Rift installing seismometers, we have the chance to observe first hand how geological processes in action create the most dramatic forms at Earth’s surface.

  • Imaging beneath the southernmost volcanoes in the East Africa Rift

    Imaging beneath the southernmost volcanoes in the East Africa Rift

    The last time we visited the southern part of the East Africa Rift, we were responding to an unusual series of earthquakes in December 2009 that shook northern Malawi. This time, we return to this part of the rift system as a part of a more comprehensive effort to understand the underpinnings of this continental…

  • Distant Quakes Trigger Tremors at U.S. Waste-Injection Sites, Says Study

    Finding Could Help Identify Critically Stressed Faults

  • In Ethiopian Desert, a Window into Rifting of Africa

    In Ethiopian Desert, a Window into Rifting of Africa

    A new study in the journal Nature provides fresh insight into deep-earth processes driving apart huge sections of the earth’s crust. This rifting mostly takes place on seabeds, but can be seen in a few places on land—nowhere more visibly than in the Afar region of northern Ethiopia.