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14 February 2013
Love (of fieldwork) hurts! Accretionary Wedge #55)
Maitri’s hosting this month’s Accretionary Wedge, and she’s asking us to share our battle scars (or “geo-injuries”). For some reason, this struck me as an excellent topic to talk about on Valentine’s day, so instead of showing you photos of heart-shaped lava fountains or volcanic bombs, I’m getting into the real bloody side of field work.
25 October 2010
Geological Frightfest: Tremors
Halloween is pretty much my favorite holiday – when else can I show up at school in costume? – and I’ve decided to resurrect the theme of geology in the movies for a Halloween series this week. To start us off, I’ll turn to that classic geologic monster movie: Tremors. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Tremorsposter.jpg Tremors often comes up when lists of geology-themed movies are mentioned. Not only does it feature hungry subterranean critters, …
13 June 2008
Everything I need to know in life, I learned on geo field trips
Can you tell I’d rather be in the field than at a desk right now? Maybe in a few weeks. But in the meantime, because it’s Friday and it’s fun to make lists, I thought I’d go through some of the useful things I’ve learned in the field – mostly through personal experience or helping bandage up someone else who didn’t learn them fast enough. (Fortunately none of them required …
12 May 2008
At least I won’t get attacked by monkeys
I just came across an article from a July 2007 Wired Magazine article about the “Best Dangerous Science Jobs”. Guess what #7 is? Volcanologist! (I love the little graphic.) And #6 is… Graduate student. Yep, I’m doomed. Happily doomed, though.
5 March 2008
Living dangerously…is totally fun
Geotripper managed to start a really cool little meme about dangerous pursuits in the name of geology, which has turned into a Carnival of Death-Defying Geologists. So I felt I had to contribute a few experiences… Okay, it’s not death-defying (like Kim’s water-related entry), but there were some death threats involved at the end of the day when we met back up with the prof who said, “Oh, you should …
Jessica Ball is a volcanologist at the U.S. Geological Survey, researching volcanic hydrothermal systems and stability, and doing science communication for the California Volcano Observatory. She previously worked at the Geological Society of America's Washington DC Policy Office, learning about the intersection of Earth science and legislative affairs. Her Mendenhall postdoc and PhD focused on how water affects the stability of volcanoes, and involved both field investigations and numerical modeling applications. Her blogging covers a range of topics, from her experiences in academic geosciences to science outreach and communication to her field and lab work in volcanology.