The Age of Aquarius

NASA got a needed shot in the arm Friday morning at 7:20 AM Pacific time when a Delta II rocket carrying the Aquarius spacecraft was successfully launched into orbit from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.  The recent failures of two Earth science missions due to launch vehicle defects added to the tension before the launch, but the Delta II performed nominally and we now have a satellite that will spend the next three years measuring the surface salinity of the world’s oceans.  Ocean salinity is affected by rainfall, evaporation, freezing or melting ice, river discharge, currents, and a host of other parameters.  Aquarius will provide a complete map of the salinity variation in the Earth’s oceans each month and enable better understanding of the world’s fresh water cycle.

Fresh water, the most essential ingredient for human life, is often taken for granted, but shouldn’t be.  Did you ever think about where our water comes from and how much control we have over the source?  People in drought prone areas do.  It can be discomforting to realize that our source of fresh water, mountain snow melt and rain that moves downhill filling rivers, is completely dependent on relatively consistent weather patterns.  As for control, we have none.  The Earth giveth and can also taketh away.

We’ve certainly experienced a wild weather year so far and debate continues as to how our energy consumption habits may or may not affect the world’s weather.  Are we damaging the Earth by continuing to burn hydrocarbons at current rates?  The late comedian George Carlin used to say in one of his routines that “the planet will be just fine” and “when the planet is done with us, it will flick us off like a dog shakes off a flea”.  George was right.  The Earth has experienced trauma in its 4.5 billion year history that makes whatever damage we may be doing now look insignificant.  Consider the asteroid that hit the Earth around 60 million years ago and wiped out the dinosaurs by changing the weather and killing off their vegetative food sources.  Hiroshima’s and Nagasaki’s explosions were no more than a firecracker compared to the bang caused by the asteroid.

Current theory suggests that the moon was created by a glancing asteroid blow that caused Earthen material to be ejected into space.  Gravity caused the material to collapse on itself and formed the moon.  Do you think our best bomb shelters would protect us from an event like that?  However neither of these events killed the Earth.  Our planet recovered after a few million years, but things were not the same as they were before.  The Earth evolved and so did species that were able to adapt.  Good thing for us since we may have never arrived if the dinosaurs had remained on the top of the food chain. 

So while we don’t need to worry about destroying the planet, we do have to worry about destroying the delicate balance of conditions that enable us to live on it.  If the Earth heats up too much and it quits raining and snowing where we expect it, all the political arguments that get us so stirred up will seem like tempests in teapots compared to the calamity that will ensue.  Here’s hoping that Aquarius will help us understand our precious water cycle better and provide solid science to guide future public policy.