Archive
Pompeii of the Caribbean: Plymouth, Montserrat
For centuries, the Georgian-era town of Plymouth served as the main port for Montserrat, a part of the Lesser Antilles in the West Indies. An eruption from the Soufrière Hills volcano in 1995 would see the capital city decimated and two thirds of the island’s population would be forced to flee.
Today the remains of the now forbidden port town litter the landscape, the land now unusable due to pyroclastic lava flows which have destroyed everything in their path.
The Last House on Holland Island
Built in 1888, this Victorian home from a different era has braved the elements and fought shoreline erosion on Holland Island in Chesapeake Bay for well over a century. Despite former resident and owner Stephen White’s best efforts to save the house and protect the island, the waters would overcome both and erase them from the map.
So what happened to Holland Island, and why did one man try to save it?
Villa Epecuén: Underwater for 25 Years
About 570 kilometers southwest of Buenos Aires lies the remains of a deserted resort town on the coast of Laguna Epecuén in Argentina. Named Villa Epecuén, the town was founded in the early 1920s as a vacation resort for the well-heeled in Buenos Aires to get away from it all.
The town would prosper for over 50 years, eventually peaking in the 1970s. Villa Epecuén was a true paradise until a breach in the dam in 1985 would see it completely submerged. 25 years later the waters have finally receded, revealing what little is left of what was once a thriving vacation town.
Hurricane Sandy Aftermath: Storm Damage Vehicles
In late October 2012 the east coast of the United States was pummeled by Hurricane Sandy, the largest Atlantic hurricane ever recorded. Sandy swept through the entire eastern seaboard, killing over 250 people in seven countries. Financial losses were over $74 billion; Sandy was in fact the second-costliest natural disaster in United States history.
What happened to the flood-damaged vehicles? One company had the foresight to sign a lease on a seldom-used airport just before the storm hit the coast. Thanks to photographer Doug Kuntz, we have aerial photographs of their salvage progress. Read more…
What Happened to the Star Dust?
When it comes to airline crashes, few have posed as many unanswered questions as the Star Dust. Originally scheduled to fly from Buenos Aires, Argentina to Santiago, Chile, the Star Dust disappeared on August 2nd, 1947.
However the flight would never reach its destination and the fate of the British South American Airways (BSAA) Lancastrian 3 airliner would remain unknown for over 50 years. Read more…
Accidental Bodies of Water: The Salton Sea
In 1904, there was no Salton Sea. The Salton sink occupied the vast expanse of land 40 miles south of Palm Springs, California with an elevation 226 feet below sea level. The Salton trough was formed by the stretching and sinking of the San Andreas Fault, on which the Salton sink sits. A flood in 1905 saw the Colorado River pour into the sink, and by the time authorities managed to stop the flooding two years later, the largest lake in California had already formed.
Fifty years later the Salton Sea would be seen as the American Riviera, one of the more popular destinations in California. But today, the lakeside communities sit in ruin and most are largely abandoned. Boarded-up houses and beach clubs litter the landscape. Along the coast, what looks like sand is actually crushed and rounded bones from millions of fish skeletons.
So what happened? Read more…
The Largest Underground Lake in the World: Lake Vostok
There are more than 140 lakes underneath the glaciers in Antarctica. The largest is Lake Vostok, located 13,100 ft (4,000 m) beneath the Russian Vostok Weather Station in the central East Antarctic Ice Sheet.
The lake measures 160 miles (250 km) long by 30 miles (50 km) wide, covering over 6,060 square miles ( 15,690 km). What makes Lake Vostok so interesting is the unmolested habitat beneath the ice shelf; scientists believe the lake was sealed under an ice cap 15 million years ago. Read more…
The Ground is Smoking in Centralia, Pennsylvania
Centralia was incorporated as a borough in 1866 when coal was discovered in the area. Coal mining gave birth to the town and it would prosper for almost 100 years. When energy demands started to shift more toward petroleum, the coal mining industry saw a decline.
The coal companies closed operations in Centralia in the 1960s, but bootleg mining of the abandoned mines would continue until 1982. For decades an undetected underground mine fire slowly burned through a major vein of a large coal deposit. By the mid-1980s the Pennsylvania state government finally realized the severity of the issue, and by 1992 it had ordered the forceful permanent evacuation of residents. Read more…
