Geology, ecosystems, land systems, and the forces shaping our planet.
South Dakota is the usual answer, with an important geographic footnote. Southwest of the state lies North America’s continental pole of inaccessibility, the land point calculated as farthest from a chosen ocean coastline. It sits on the Pine Ridge Reservation region, near the communities of Kyle and Allen. Under this coastline definition, South Dakota contains…
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By lowering a weighted line into a remote underground lake, explorers from the Perovo-Speleo Team extended the measured depth of Veryovkina Cave to 2,212 meters in March 2018. Their expedition report described a vast system of shafts and flooded passages hidden beneath the Arabika Massif in the western Caucasus. The measurement placed Veryovkina Cave among…
Researchers with World Weather Attribution have found that human-caused climate change sharply intensified Europe’s record-breaking June 2026 heat wave. Their rapid analysis concluded that the extreme daytime and nighttime heat would have been virtually impossible in June just 50 years ago. The finding puts hard numbers behind an event that has stretched across much of…
Researchers at the IGGCAS announcement have traced Yellowstone’s vast magma system to a surprising driver deep beneath western North America. Their three-dimensional geodynamic model points to an eastward flow of hot mantle material, described as a mantle wind, that helps generate magma beneath one of Earth’s most famous volcanic regions. The work, published in Science…
