Fact Book

Why the Northern and Southern Lights Glow, Shift, and Change Color A ribbon of light crosses the night sky, brightens, twists and then fades...

The Thermocline: The Invisible Temperature Boundary Hidden in the Ocean The ocean can look like one connected body of water from a boat, but...

Life Without Sunlight: The Secret World of Black Smokers What happens when the ocean has no sunrise? At the bottom of the sea, black smoker...

The Ocean's Sound Highway: How a Whale Call Can Travel Vast Distances Underwater sound behaves differently from sound moving through air...

How a Solar Storm Can Make GPS Less Accurate Without Damaging Your Phone Your phone may be sitting perfectly still while its GPS position se...

Sinkholes Explained: What Happens Underground Before the Surface Collapses A street can look ordinary until a section of ground suddenly giv...

San Francisco 1906: The Earthquake Was Only the Beginning How can a devastating earthquake last less than a minute, yet leave a city burn...

Volcanic Ash and Aircraft: Why a Cloud of Rock Can Threaten Jet Engines At cruising altitude, an airborne ash cloud may look deceptively sim...

Rogue Waves: Why the Ocean Can Suddenly Build a Wall of Water A ship can be surrounded by ordinary-looking swells and then meet one towering...

Editorial illustration: the opening artwork is AI-generated and is not a photograph of the actual 2015 flight. On February 4, 2015, TransA...