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Show POINT BLANK Moab Is Going To ‘SNAP!’ By Chinle Miller I've been over your way recently and something keeps bothering me, and I've now decided I should probably go ahead and write this letter, although I really don't want to get people too riled up. But this is important stuff and could affect everyone in the valley—-and I mean every single person! expanding water table where the river spreads out underground. A long time ago, the original salt dome collapsed, leaving the present-day Spanish Valley. The real Old Moab stood about 3000 feet higher than present-day Moab. During this collapse, the Navajo and Wingate Formations pulled apart, leaving a gap in the I've caprock. This gap now allows human habitation, but it also allows water to trickle down spent time in the Paradox Valley, Salt Valley, Castle Valley, and Spanish Valley, kicking around and tasting things (salt). I've carried around my taste kit (shovel, distilled water, old City Market milk jugs) and performed extensive analysis. I was at first skeptical and couldn't believe what I was coming up with. Science can be a disturbing business. into the underlying salt, adding even more water to the already saturated water table. This As a free-lance scientist, I've been doing some extensive research on salt domes. is primarily from stands of bluegrass (e.g., Swanney Park), where inordinate amounts of water are pumped down through the sand. Scientific Fact #4: Watering bluegrass will hasten the collapse. And finally, to make a long and detailed scientific analysis (complete with charts) brief, the result of all this is that at any moment (geologically speaking), the salt underneath Moab will melt, leaving the city on a spongy surface which will not be capable of supporting the vertical forces of jeep jamborees, speeding trucks, chair lifts, and rotating ‘bicycle wheels. The canyon walls will be unsupported and thus collapse laterally into the But the truth is, Moab is going to snap! And it could be very soon. I'll try to present the scientific facts here in brief. I'm sure you're aware that Moab sits on a thin crust of unconsolidated sediments or alluvium, underneath with is a 6,000 foot layer of salt. Pure salt (NaCl)! And what do we have running right through all that salt? A big river. And as we all know, salt dissolves in water. If you don't believe (which, by the way, may be So, Scientific Fact #1: We Now, as an experiment, me, ask Bob contributing have salt at put a stock Norman, who helped get that Potash thing going to this problem). a river. salt block into a stock tank. What happens? It ..At any moment (geologically), the salt underneath Moab will melt. Ieaving the city on a spongy surface which will not be capable of supporting the vertical forces of jeep jamborees, speeding trucks, chair lifts, and rotating bicycle wheels. begins to dissolve. The salt binds with the H,0. It doesn't care what you think, it just binds. But at a certain point, the salt block stops dissolving. This is called the “brine point” and occurs where there are no more H,0 molecules to bind with the NaCl. What's left of the block now just sits there, static (H,0 + NaCl = H,0NaCl). But when fresh water is introduced, the salt again begins to melt. In the old days, the salt and water under Spanish Valley were in the brine state and valley (a motion called a “snap” by geologists), which will then have the consistency of mush. The shock waves will be felt as far as California, maybe Japan. After it's all over, a ghostly brine lake will sit where Moab once stood in all its weirdness. Given the Atlas tailings, it will probably also have a ghostly glow. Scientific Conclusion (and note that this is not a hypothesis, but a fact): there wasn't much to worry about as the whole thing was in stasis. This was before drillers like Beaman and Balsley punched all those holes through the crust, holes that now let water go down into the salt. Therefore, Scientific Fact #2: Salt dissolves in water then stops, unless fresh water is added, then the system loses stasis. We will now examine the classical definition of a river: “A river exists where the water table maxes out, where the ground cannot accept any more water, so the water now flows on through.” The Colorado is, of course, a river. But what's important here is the water table. Spanish Valley is exposed to a laterally-expanding water table. If you stand at the Portal and look downstream, you'll easily note that there's less water going down the river from that point on. This fact is also easily verifiable, just go look. Moab's gonna snap. People of Moab, awaken! Editor's Note: This is the most optimistic submission to The Zephyr in years. POINT BLANK SUBMISSIONS: Essays should be less than 1000 words and have a theme that is at Ieast remotely connected to life on the Colorado Plateau. Winners are chosen at the whim of the publisher and receive a five : year subscription to The Zephyr. Thus, Scientific Fact #3: The salt dome under Spanish Valley is fully exposed to an ever- My old lady and | are sick of all these silly hypocrits, Man. | mean, like, all these people are clueless, you know? Sundropping and | believe in our Earth Mother and we just want to live off the land. ow MoO Yeah...you SMELL like it. oville’s : ndorg Tsuru & sun dropP ig GorP Really, Ed. These people are just HEY MAN. BACK OFFI trying to be true to themselves. But then you Oh why don't you shut up, you little i whiny yuppie weasel! Nl \ And then...all HELL breaks loose... : And couldn't possibly understand. You're calling You're BOTH losers, Man! ME a loser??? | own three homes! you sort ain't _ potty-trained in none of them Another voice breaks through chaos... Please, ‘ Our diversity is our strength. Like the tangle of rock and light and home-grown apricots that turns inward in reflection on an autumn afternoon, only to find we are not alone, after all. That we are an integral part of each other. Who Is this voice of wisdom? Can she bring us ALL together? stikg 6 FIND OUT NEXT MONTH. |