News

In the last issue of WAT ON EARTH I described ice-wedge polygons, - relict features left over from a short-lived regime of permafrost in southern Ontario in the period immediately after the ice retreat. As I explained, these features are virtually invisible at ground level but they can be clearly seen (under the right circumstances) from the air. The recent widespread media coverage of the floods affecting the southern part of Manitoba brought back some memories of traversing this region in the past, and it reminded me that other strange features can frequently be observed from the air.

Eric Reardon

Alan V. Morgan

The following is the first part of a four-part series covering some of the volcanic activity which has taken place on the south coast of Iceland during the past 25 years. This section will cover some aspects of the eruption of Surtsey. Three later articles will cover the activity of the volcano Eldfell on Heimaey, during the early stages of the eruption, as it appeared a decade later, and finally as it is in 1998.

Shane Wilkinson
2A Earth Sciences

Marcia Coueslan

Kathleen Kemp, Tucker Barrie, Marcia Charles, Janet Parkin, Denise Payne and Michael Perkins

A report on the Joint National Science Teachers Association, Science Teachers Association of Ontario meeting, Toronto, November 22, 1996.

Alan V. Morgan.

Paul B. Downing

Reprinted from and article in Rock and Gem Magazine, 1991. 
Reprinted with permission.

Precious opal from British Columbia? Impossible! Except that, as I write this, I hold a specimen in my hand which shows bright flashes of red, green and orange fire. This is the first recorded find of precious opal in British Columbia - or anywhere in Canada. It is beautiful.

Alan V. Morgan

Ontario Science Centre, North York, Metropolitan Toronto.

Richard B. Wells National Drillers Buyers Guide, March 1997.

One of the advantages of being a geologist is that you often get to travel to places and see things being done in ways that are vastly different from back home. One example, that might be of interest to some of our readers, is the oil-mining operations of South Sumatra, Indonesia.