Comments on: The eye of Mordor

The eye of Mordor

CheeseDigestsAll — Thu, 08 May 2008 06:53:23 -0800

Six days ago, the Chaitén volcano in Chile began a surprise eruption. So far, more than 8000 people have been evacuated, and NASA has tracked the results from space. Even more stunning however, are the images that occurred when a thunderstorm collided with the volcanic plume.

By: kuujjuarapik

kuujjuarapik — Thu, 08 May 2008 06:58:25 -0800

This is what happens when the sky-god gets jealous of the fire-god's sacrificial virgins.

By: oddman

oddman — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:01:16 -0800

Mordor!

By: danb

danb — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:13:38 -0800

Whoa! Does anyone know where I can find hi-res photos of that storm?

By: steef

steef — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:15:25 -0800

That's not a thunderstorm colliding with a volcanic plume! It's a volcanic plume generating a 'dirty thunderstorm'!

By: Busithoth

Busithoth — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:15:33 -0800

the alternate ending of Joe vs. the volcano is more spectacular than the one they left in the film. (seconds hi-rez requests)

By: geeky

geeky — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:16:29 -0800

These are by far the most amazing weather / volcano photos I have ever seen.

By: rongorongo

rongorongo — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:17:20 -0800

Here is a pretty amazing picture of the eruption. I remember passing this volcano on my travels.

By: seanmpuckett

seanmpuckett — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:24:57 -0800

Flagged as holy shit.

By: darkripper

darkripper — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:28:28 -0800

is it catnarok already?

By: Jody Tresidder

Jody Tresidder — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:28:42 -0800

Wowsers.

By: mediareport

mediareport — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:28:55 -0800

Wow. Photos 7 and 12 in that thunderstorm-meets-volcano link are just. wow.

By: Kronos_to_Earth

Kronos_to_Earth — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:30:26 -0800

I ran into a melange of these photos last night. Good lord. I didn't know what I had stumbled on. Here it is.

By: echo target

echo target — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:31:21 -0800

Fantastic. I saw #11 elsewhere, but it's great to see a more complete collection. Here's a slightly more hi-res image from Flickr, but it's also got more noise, unfortunately.

By: HuronBob

HuronBob — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:31:26 -0800

great find...thanks!

By: CheeseDigestsAll

CheeseDigestsAll — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:33:01 -0800

darkripper, that link would be perfect if only the kitties where hacking flaming hairballs at one another.

By: Pollomacho

Pollomacho — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:39:23 -0800

And you wonder what made ancient civilizations believe in all-powerful gods?

By: Baby_Balrog

Baby_Balrog — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:46:20 -0800

Mom!

By: Pastabagel

Pastabagel — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:54:49 -0800

Same pictures as Kronos_to_Earth's, but with discussion of the processes at work. More here.

By: Sys Rq

Sys Rq — Thu, 08 May 2008 07:57:43 -0800

What is clear is that volcanic lightning is dangerous. You don't say!

By: concreteforest

concreteforest — Thu, 08 May 2008 08:12:01 -0800

fist in the air metal bear

By: jamjam

jamjam — Thu, 08 May 2008 08:27:38 -0800

Note the clear presence of a vast demonic face in number 8.

By: Eideteker

Eideteker — Thu, 08 May 2008 08:32:47 -0800

"It's a volcanic plume generating a 'dirty thunderstorm'!" Isn't it ionic? Don'tcha think? A little too ionic, and yeah I really do think...

By: LordSludge

LordSludge — Thu, 08 May 2008 08:37:17 -0800

If only there were a 60 foot T-rex in frame -- that would be awesome!!

By: klangklangston

klangklangston — Thu, 08 May 2008 08:37:32 -0800

I know what I'm having airbrushed on my conversion van.

By: Pantengliopoli

Pantengliopoli — Thu, 08 May 2008 08:50:12 -0800

Jesus... fantastic, thanks for posting. Beautiful.

By: Nick Verstayne

Nick Verstayne — Thu, 08 May 2008 08:54:18 -0800

Sackcloth and ashes folks. It's the Seventh Seal. I'm hearing Dan Aykroyd in Ghost Busters qupting from the Book of Revelations in my head right now...

By: Nick Verstayne

Nick Verstayne — Thu, 08 May 2008 08:54:32 -0800

quoting, even.

By: Extopalopaketle

Extopalopaketle — Thu, 08 May 2008 09:01:21 -0800

Johnson: "You can't evacuate people. I mean, you can if you want but that's not what you want to say here. Copy Editor: "A building can be evacuated. To evacuate a person is to give that person an enema. Sorry, I just started watching Season 5 of The Wire and now "evacuated" stands out. Great links here, though.

By: Ber

Ber — Thu, 08 May 2008 09:14:36 -0800

We need hi-res photos right now. My desktop screams for this Götterdämmerung. Thanks for the appropriate LOTR headline submitter.

By: caddis

caddis — Thu, 08 May 2008 09:16:08 -0800

Very interesting Very cool pictures I definitely does look like the eruption is at least providing a pathway for the lightening.

By: Maias

Maias — Thu, 08 May 2008 09:28:18 -0800

Any idea why there is blue lightning in some of the photos? They are extraordinary.

By: rtha

rtha — Thu, 08 May 2008 09:45:01 -0800

Thank you for posting this. I considered posting something about the eruption, but I couldn't seem to stop looking for YET MORE AMAZING PICTURES and the post would have had 10 million links. You found the perfect links and knew when to stop!

By: quin

quin — Thu, 08 May 2008 09:46:19 -0800

See, these are the kinds of things that make me aspire to doing more with my photography hobby. I would love to take a picture like this, which people can stare at in wonder and be awed at the majesty of what our world can produce. On the other hand, that would mean that I had to be somewhere near this kind of event. And let's be honest: Fuck that shit.

By: boo_radley

boo_radley — Thu, 08 May 2008 09:53:23 -0800

From one of the links: "What is clear is that volcanic lightning is dangerous." Well, that's all I needed.

By: thanotopsis

thanotopsis — Thu, 08 May 2008 10:40:00 -0800

Another vote for "please let me know when this hits widescreen desktop wallpaper size", as I yearn.

By: MrMoonPie

MrMoonPie — Thu, 08 May 2008 10:53:01 -0800

Volcanoes are cool. My desktop background (self link, natch) is a shot I took in Hawaii, a trip hugely enhanced by the helpful folks in AskMetafilter. I recently blogged about Kilauea's most recent (and ongoing) activity.

By: cmyk

cmyk — Thu, 08 May 2008 11:54:29 -0800

Stuff like this is how mythology happens, isn't it? The earth groaned beneath him, and the heat and blaze from both of them was on the dark-faced sea, from the thunder and lightning of Zeus and from the flame of the monster, from his blazing bolts and from the scorch and breath of his stormwinds, and all the ground and the sky and the sea boiled, and towering waves were tossing and beating all up and down the promontories in the wind of these immortals, and a great shaking of the earth came on, and Haides, lord over the perished dead, trembled... (from here)

By: crapmatic

crapmatic — Thu, 08 May 2008 11:58:19 -0800

I'm starting to think that Chile has the lowest number of megapixel cameras per capita in the world. The greatest eruption in years, and the pictures are shite.

By: anthill

anthill — Thu, 08 May 2008 12:10:57 -0800

If I took any of those lightning/volcano pictures, I'd be damn sure to hand out nothing but thumbnails until I got a big-ass cheque.

By: Joey Michaels

Joey Michaels — Thu, 08 May 2008 12:12:16 -0800

When I look at these, I see the beginning of the world for some reason. I feel like we'll be reading reports of giant walking lava monsters born from fire and electricity.

By: kcds

kcds — Thu, 08 May 2008 12:47:47 -0800

Dude, those are totally 'shopped.

By: Skorgu

Skorgu — Thu, 08 May 2008 13:11:00 -0800

Yeah, shopped. I can tell by the pixels

By: Araucaria

Araucaria — Thu, 08 May 2008 13:16:58 -0800

Does anyone else hear Stravinski's Monster Dance from The Firebird when looking at these pics? How about Night on Bald Mountain?

By: EndsOfInvention

EndsOfInvention — Thu, 08 May 2008 13:27:08 -0800

In the words of Bob Fossil: Holy shit sauce!

By: bowmaniac

bowmaniac — Thu, 08 May 2008 13:55:03 -0800

In picture #8 of the gallery it kind of looks like Satan is coming out of the ash to kick some ass.

By: TheCoug

TheCoug — Thu, 08 May 2008 14:00:09 -0800

cue Eddie Van Halen for maximum awesomeness

By: Artw

Artw — Thu, 08 May 2008 15:01:34 -0800

Wow.

By: Wavelet

Wavelet — Thu, 08 May 2008 15:20:54 -0800

It's just so awesome when the gods are angry.

By: ClarissaWAM

ClarissaWAM — Thu, 08 May 2008 15:30:34 -0800

Love it. We are nothing really.

By: Faze

Faze — Thu, 08 May 2008 15:53:24 -0800

Let's get back to these guys who're saying it's all shopped. Is it really?

By: BrotherCaine

BrotherCaine — Thu, 08 May 2008 16:44:21 -0800

Don't care if it is 'shopped, I still want it as my desktop background.

By: caddis

caddis — Thu, 08 May 2008 18:18:42 -0800

The guys who say it is shopped are hosers.

By: Unicorn on the cob

Unicorn on the cob — Thu, 08 May 2008 20:26:56 -0800

This post is too much metal for one hand! \mm/

By: dirigibleman

dirigibleman — Thu, 08 May 2008 21:29:40 -0800

I WANT A BURRITO BURRITO WILL SATISFY ME DON'T PUT RICE IN IT WTF IS THAT SHIT

By: msaleem

msaleem — Fri, 09 May 2008 02:12:02 -0800

In case you haven't seen it yet, Reuters has video footage of the eruption as well as the aftermath.

By: hellslinger

hellslinger — Fri, 09 May 2008 15:09:06 -0800

anyone find any larger images of this?

By: deborah

deborah — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 20:46:05 -0800

Truly stunning.

By: anthill

anthill — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 15:15:57 -0800

anyone find any larger images of this? YES