by Bobby Akart
“Good, prepare yourself for tomorrow,” he said as he began to thumb through a report. “You can find your way out.”
Flabbergasted at the turn of events, she realized she’d forgotten to tell Younger about the lava discovery at Norris. She stopped and turned to speak, but Younger cut her off before she started.
“There’s one more—”
“Save it, Donovan,” he gruffed. “Tomorrow. Go.”
“Okay, I’ll be back tomorrow morning at ten,” Ashby said to him as she walked out.
As she slowly made her way through the cubicles, one woman made a point to make eye contact with her. What she said seemed harmless at first, but then Ashby wondered if the woman was trying to give her a signal of some kind.
“See you tomorrow, Dr. Donovan,” the woman said, and then she winked.
Chapter 48
Jake’s Cabin
Yellowstone
Dusty and Rita were tasked with preparing an organized set of notes together with corresponding graphics in the event Ashby had the ability to upload them onto the monitors or computers of the attendees. Jake was responsible for talking Ashby off the cliff as the reality of speaking directly with the President of the United States dawned on her.
Ashby was pacing the floor with a full beer in her hand. She’d been carrying it for ten minutes without taking a sip. Finally, she looked at it, dropped it on a side table by the couch, and flopped onto the deep cushions. Jake joined her and sat by the fire.
“You’re gonna do great.” Jake offered her words of encouragement.
“I know, you said that already,” she said with a forced smile. “I mean, here’s the problem. A lot of what I’m going to say to the president can easily be shot down by the usual response of Younger, or any scientist, for that matter. Not out of the ordinary. Doesn’t mean an eruption is imminent. Project Hydro is doing its job. Don’t need to panic the public unnecessarily.”
Jake chuckled, which drew a sharp look from Ashby. He stood and retrieved her beer and plopped on the couch next to her. He handed her the beer and she reluctantly took a sip.
After lifting up her feet and dropping them on his coffee table, he said with a grin, “Chill, dude.”
“Dude?”
“Okay, dudette. It’s the chill part that is important. Ashby, you’re the smartest woman I’ve ever met.”
“Shut up, Jake,” she said with a laugh as she took another sip.
“Seriously, you are. Let me also say this. I know when somebody thinks they’re all smart and, really, they’re faking it. You’re not faking it. I don’t know who else is going to be on that conference call, but is there any doubt you know more about this stuff than the rest of them?”
“Maybe,” she replied shyly.
“Listen, this may not be much of an analogy, but when I went on Survivor, I really knew how to survive. I mean all of it. We were dropped in a remote part of Thailand with nothing but a machete, a cast-iron pot and a bag of rice. I was amazed they gave us so much stuff.”
“Doesn’t sound like much,” Ashby added.
“It was a lot as far as I was concerned. Here’s the thing. Some of the members of my tribe pissed and moaned at the lack of survival items given to us by production. Others proclaimed themselves to be hard-core survivalists. They’re the ones that worried me the most because they were full of crap. Sure, they’d purchased a few survival guides on Amazon and could regurgitate a few buzz phrases. But when it came down to the nut-cuttin’, they had no idea how to make fire or purify water. I’m the one that built their shelter, made fire, and showed them how to purify water, not the know-it-alls.”
Ashby smiled and patted Jake’s leg. “I’m sure they appreciated it.”
His hearty laugh drew the attention of Rita and Dusty. “Oh yeah, until the food comps started, and their bellies got full. Then, because everybody loved me and appreciated me, they voted me off the island so I couldn’t win.”
“Ungrateful—” started Ashby with a laugh.
“Guys,” interrupted Rita, “Ella just posted another article. They’ve called out the National Guard to go into Minneapolis, Kansas City, and Chicago. I guess food shortages are occurring, which has caused rioting in the big Midwestern cities. The entire article is about societal collapse because people are unprepared for the coming eruption.”
“Nobody said anything about a coming eruption,” said Ashby.
“Well, apparently they moved the Doomsday Clock to one minute before midnight because of the threat here,” Rita continued. “People are freaking out.”
Ashby slammed her head back against the couch. “Well, great. One of two things will happen tomorrow. My theories will be accepted by the leader of the free world, and he’ll thank me for saving humanity. Or I’ll be blamed for contributing to the mass hysteria and get voted off the island like Jake was.”
Chapter 49
YVO
Yellowstone
Ashby arrived fifteen minutes early that morning, expecting to be briefed or at least have a conversation with Younger before the ten o’clock conference call. This could very well be one of the most important moments in her career, not to mention the information she was about to share with the president could result in mass evacuations across the country.
Jake, who insisted upon driving her into Grant Village this morning, left her with a final thought—you can lead the horse to water, etcetera, etcetera. Ashby understood. In the past, she’d been too forceful with her opinions. She was like a wild mustang within a corral of riding ponies. The government didn’t like grandstanders. Her prior approaches, although misconstrued by most, had been a little too forceful.
Today, she’d lay out the facts, as Jake suggested, and answer questions with her honest opinion. Nobody, especially her, could tell this president what to do. He was a successful businessman and an independent thinker. He took advice from many sources and then adopted a course of action. The lack of political interference in his decision making had served him well as he completed his fifth year in office.
“Good morning.” Younger announced his presence without making eye contact. He was followed by his assistant and two scientists that Ashby had seen in the old YVO but had never met. None of them gave her so much as a glance.
“Morning,” said Ashby in an equally insincere tone.
She sat there for several minutes, thumbing through her notes, while Younger’s aide set up the microphones on the conference table and powered up the monitors with built-in cameras that were mounted on the wall. Minutes later, the four screens were filled with faces that she recognized. The director of Homeland Security, the FEMA chief, the director of the USGS, and for the moment, the Presidential Seal appeared on the monitor directly across from Ashby’s seat. She would be face-to-face with the president.
Ashby was staring at the screen when the president suddenly appeared. He was sitting behind his desk in the Oval Office, flanked by his chief of staff to his right and an unidentified aide to his left. He kicked off the meeting.
“Good morning, everyone.”
“Good morning, Mr. President,” everyone responded except Younger’s assistants. He must’ve read them the riot act, Ashby surmised.
“I want to start this conversation with a letter that I was just hand delivered from the Senate Minority Leader from New York, my beloved home state,” said the president as he was handed a single piece of paper from his aide. “Let me read it for you.”
“Mr. President, New York is the leading fruit and vegetable producer in the eastern United States. Similarly, other states throughout America’s breadbasket generate food production for much of the world. I have constituents who are concerned for the well-being of their cash crops and livelihood in the event of a Yellowstone eruption. What are you planning to do about stopping the Yellowstone supervolcano from erupting?”
The president looked up at the camera and shook his head before slinging the letter across his desk onto the floor like it was a Frisbee.
He continued. “I’m not a scientist like most of you people, but I’m pretty sure there is nothing we can do to stop Yellowstone from erupting. Am I right, or has the science suddenly changed?”
Ashby glanced over at Younger, who wiggled in his seat and glanced down at a notepad in front of him. Apparently, he thought that was his cue to speak.
“Mr. President, my name is Rick Younger, and I am the scientist-in-charge at the Yellowstone Volcano Observatory. I’ve been told that my summary of Project Hydro has been delivered to the White House. If you’ve not been briefed already, I’d be glad to do so now.”
The president pursed his lips and responded, “I’ve been briefed. Will Project Hydro provide the Senate Minority Leader the extraordinary relief he seeks for his constituents?”
The president’s chief of staff stifled a laugh at his boss’s snide sense of humor. There was no love lost between the president and the minority party in Washington. They’d been at each other’s throats for many years.
“Mr. President,” Younger continued, “Project Hydro is still in its infancy, relatively speaking. Because of the efforts of my team, we’ve brought the drilling and energy extraction online much sooner than anticipated. By years, in fact. With that success, we gained authorization to expand the project to allow for additional drilling locations and deeper depths in order to extract clean, geothermal energy. As the summary I provided shows, Project Hydro has the ancillary benefit of releasing the pressure under Yellowstone’s magma chamber.”
Ashby’s eyes grew wide and she snapped her head in Younger’s direction, who was oblivious to her look. Are they out of their minds? No wonder Yellowstone’s pissed off!
“Will it stop an eruption?” asked the president, who was obviously unaware of the danger presented by Younger’s casual statement.
“Mr. President, in all honesty, nobody can answer that question with certainty. We do believe, however, that it could lessen the magnitude of an eruption to something akin to Mount St. Helens, sir.”
“Well, we need something good to come out of Project Hydro,” said the president. “It has become something of a financial boondoggle, one that I inherited, I might add. Frankly, I wouldn’t have pursued it, but now we have it.”
Younger began to defend the financial aspects of Project Hydro, but the president held up his right hand to stop him.
The president continued. “Let’s set that aside for a moment because I’m working under the assumption that the Yellowstone supervolcano is too much for man to tame. Tell me about your monitoring process.”
The head of the USGS took that question. He explained to the president the extensive monitoring activities associated with the Yellowstone Caldera. Any activity leading to a possible volcanic eruption, hydrothermal event, or large earthquake was monitored and evaluated by the scientists around the world using modern digital instrumentation and internet connectivity.
Then Younger addressed some of the newer methods employed by the YVO. “Mr. President, we have also devised a way to estimate how fast the molten rock, the magma, is recharging within Yellowstone’s magma chamber.”
“It’s the coal that heats the furnace, Mr. President,” the head of the USGS quickly added as Younger awkwardly paused to refer to his notes.
Ashby, who held nothing but contempt for Younger, especially after his earlier revelation, mused that someone who knows their job doesn’t need to refer to notes. To drive the point home, she slipped her own notes into a file folder and closed them up.
She wanted to add her own commentary regarding the new study to which Younger was referring, but, following Jake’s advice, she bit her tongue. The analogy to the coal and a furnace was only part of the story. A more appropriate analogy would be the fire that heats the boiler. The boiler can explode, but nobody can say with certainty how much heat is required to blow the boiler.
Younger was still fumbling through his notes, so the USGS director added another method of monitoring the caldera.
“Of course, Mr. President, we’ve been conducting ground-based studies for years. We’ve deployed a group of helicopters that fly about two hundred feet above the ground. Using an electromagnetic monitor, we’re able to survey Yellowstone’s hydrothermal features, which enables us to visualize the geology and the subsurface water up to fifteen hundred feet belowground.
“This procedure came on the heels of the newly discovered reservoir in 2015, which lies below the shallow, already documented magma chamber.”
“With all due respect, that’s only part of the story, Mr. President.” Ashby shocked herself with the outburst, as well as every other attendee on the video conference call. She caught her breath and contemplated sinking under the table, but then she decided to roll with it. “Sir, if I may, please allow me to show a graphic of what I’m referring to.”
The president leaned over to his chief of staff and then looked directly at Ashby. “I take it you’re Dr. Donovan.”
“Um, yes, sir. I mean, Mr. President. I apologize for my outburst.”
The president laughed as he glanced at his chief of staff. “Reminds me of someone else I know who seems to shoot first and ask questions later. So, young lady, I take it you’re not one hundred percent on board with this.”
“That’s correct, Mr. President, for several reasons.”
Chapter 50
YVO
Yellowstone
Ashby avoided making eye contact with Younger’s death stare and spoke directly to his assistant. She requested he upload a graphic dealing with the new discovery referenced by the director of the USGS.
Ashby continued. “Mr. President, this newly discovered magma reservoir is four and a half times larger than the chamber located in the upper crust below the Earth’s surface. That’s enough magma to fill the Grand Canyon. Furthermore, it sits directly above Yellowstone’s hot spot plume, which acts as a conduit to continuously feed hot magma into the chambers. If enough of that magma forces its way toward the surface, another magma chamber could be created. In my opinion, this process has begun and has created a larger, continuous magma chamber to the northeast part of the caldera at Norris.”
The president leaned forward in his chair. “Are you saying this new study doesn’t help us predict the eruption?”
“No, sir, it does not. If anything, it’s an indicator that Yellowstone is even more potentially catastrophic than we once—”
Younger interrupted Ashby. “With all deference to Dr. Donovan’s alarmist opinions, we use many monitoring devices such as global positioning systems, tiltmeters, and borehole strainmeters to measure—”
“Please,” interrupted the president. “I want to continue hearing from this young lady. Go ahead, please.”
Ashby nodded and continued. “Mr. President, Yellowstone is under strain, in my opinion. In addition to the crustal deformation, which the YVO has accurately measured, we’ve measured unusually high surface water temperatures, increased geyser activity, and two very important discoveries that my team has uncovered in the last two days.”
“What are they?”
“Sir, I believe the two recent large earthquakes, coupled with the recent swarm of smaller quakes registered at Yellowstone, are foreshocks. Based upon a number of factors, it is my opinion that a much larger earthquake is imminent and could be of sufficient magnitude to trigger an eruption. It could be a magnitude seven or greater.”
Younger shook his head in disgust. Ashby assumed he’d be furious if she suggested this. Well, she thought to herself, he was about to turn apoplectic. She messaged three photos to his aide and asked her to make them available for everyone to see. She did so, and Ashby believed the assistant would draw Younger’s ire for it afterwards.
The president looked at a laptop, which sat in front of him on his desk, and then turned his attention back to Ashby. “What am I looking at here?”
“That’s lava, Mr. President. It was discovered by a ranger here at Yellowstone in the Norris Area, which I referred to prev
iously.”
Younger erupted, his face deep red in anger, much like a volcano. “Mr. President, this is outrageous. I must apologize for—”
“Mr. President,” began the director of the USGS, “I must assure you I had no knowledge of this, and it needs to be verified.”
“Oh, it’s been verified,” Ashby shot back. “And analyzed, too. Its silica content is off the chart at seventy-seven percent.”
“Does somebody want to explain why this is so significant?” asked the president.
Ashby spoke over Younger and answered the president. “Mr. President, this is the first time an ongoing lava flow has been discovered at Yellowstone since the supervolcano studies began. It is significant because it means lava is breaking through to the Earth’s surface and in an area that has not been on the YVO’s radar.”
“How did you discover it?”
“I spoke with a local ranger who assisted in fighting a major wildfire here two weeks ago. He said he’d seen an orangish glow coming out of a rock formation, and he took me to where it was located in the Norris Area of the park. Sir, the lava, although somewhat solidified by exposure to the cooler air and recent rains, was still hot with a recorded temperature of over three hundred degrees.”
“Why wasn’t I told about this?” demanded Younger.
“Mr. Younger, I attempted to report my findings yest—”
The president interrupted Ashby. “I’m still unclear on something. I get that this is unusual, but does it indicate an eruption?”
“The lava sample is more than seventy percent silica, indicating it is rhyolite, which is typically associated with an explosive eruption. The discovery of the larger magma chamber, as well as the surface lava, is an indication that the magma is bulging and swelling. Mr. President, it’s spreading its tentacles below the Earth’s surface.”
The president raised his hand for a moment and instructed his aide to mute the microphone on his end of the teleconference. He spoke with his chief of staff for a moment and then nodded. He waved his fingers at the speaker, indicating he was ready.