07-11-2014, 01:16 AM
(07-10-2014, 11:52 PM)xsampa Wrote: Could undersea seismic activity trigger seabed fragmentation leading to all the subsurface water being released over a few decades, as in Baxter's "Flood" ? Is that likely?Short answer: No.
Long answer the water is in the mantle yes. But not in a form of lakes, rivers, streams or any other kind you are familiar with on surface.
The water in mantle is locked in minerals, just like for example hydrocarbons can be locked in shales.
In order to get the water out you would have to process the minerals in question. No simple cave-in or fracture of seabed could do that. Only industrial scale process could allow any meaningful amount of water to be gained from mantle for our uses.
Of course the is another problem with the whole: "AHHH! The world is flooding!" scenario.
Even if there are large lakes filled with water inside Terras mantle. Their collapse in our lifetime would be extremely unlikely.
There is this analogy with rope-walking acrobat I once read that sums it pretty well.
Assume you are in a dark room then suddenly you turn the lights on and you see an acrobat falling down from the rope he was walking on just a fraction of second before. Now it is extremely improbable that he would fall now. He could fall before or after you turned on the light.
It is much more probable that you turning on the light made him fall. Of course for the analogy to be more fitting the acrobat would have to wear blind fold and the room would have to be shaking, even before you turned on the light.
Making probability that he would fall in the very moment you turned on the lights even smaller.