Nature's Fury

4.0 credits

We live on a dynamic planet. The seemingly tranquil, unchanging landscape of the Earth's surface is often interrupted by abrupt, catastrophic events. Earthquakes, landslides, and tsunamis lay waste to buildings, towns and sometimes entire cities. Dormant volcanoes come to life in explosions of lava and large volumes of aerosols and greenhouse gases, with implications for global climate change. In this course, we learn how these geological hazards are a violent manifestation of plate tectonics, the movement of the relatively rigid plates forming Earth's outer shell. The first third of the class focuses on the causative mechanisms of earthquakes, volcanoes, tsunamis, volcanic-eruption induced climate change. The second third outlines the consequent hazards and forecasting efforts, and feedbacks between these processes. The final third of the course examines mitigation programs, with numerous case studies