"All you have to do is ask AI", sometimes

 Let's follow on this post here about more intriguing geomorphology (land forms underpinned by geology), with a little help from AI in the first instance.

Hungary 

LinkedIn @markku-ylisirniö posted here a cool map of Hungary:

screen grab from original post, click to enlarge 

I commented on his post: 

This is fascinating! I wonder what those striations / lineaments are in the W part of the country? Glacial followed by river erosion along the edge of Quaternary ice sheets, or structural features from underlying strata (tho I don't recall any mountain-building nearby). Must look up geomorphology & geology. Thx!

My late Hungarian geologist dad could have answered this RIP. He had a relief map in my bro's old room I'm currently using (long story):

author photo, click to enlarge

Hence my answer to my comment on LinkedIn:

The geological map shows strata lying EW, so those are likely geomorphology as in glacial or fluvial erosion, to be continued...

 So I ask Perplexity AI (prompt in AI-speak):

reason for geomorphology NS striations in West of green topo map, when geology formations in coloured map run EW

And it obligingly answers before I can blink here, and summarized it:

The north–south stripes on the western topographic map reflect young erosional and structural lineaments—valleys, ridges, and scarps—controlled by neotectonic faults and drainage patterns. In contrast, the coloured geological map shows older, predominantly east–west–trending stratigraphy inherited from the Alpine–Carpathian structural grain.

In Transdanubia, much of the relief is carved into Neogene–Quaternary sediments whose incision does not necessarily follow the strike of the underlying bedrock. Numerous ENE–WSW and NNW–SSE faults have tilted blocks and guided valley orientations, producing the meridional valleys and parallel ridges characteristic of the western Transdanubian Hills.

Rivers and tributaries commonly align with these active or reactivated faults, reinforcing north–south to NNE–SSW drainage. Over time, fluvial incision along these structural lines creates elongated valleys that appear as N–S striations in shaded relief.

Thus, the mismatch between the two maps arises because the geological map highlights older lithostratigraphic boundaries, while the topography expresses younger fault‑controlled and erosion‑driven geomorphology.

Great Lakes 

Likewise @heididaulton posted here an intriguing story about perils of shipping iron ore in the Great Lakes exactly 50 yrs. ago. It had a map of the bottom of Lake Superior, also with NS submarine erosion to the EW geologic fabric of the Canadian Shield it sits on. 

screen grab from original video, click to enlarge

I posted here my thesis area to the E of this. You can see below that the submarine erosion guillies coincide roughly with the arc of the Great Lakes Tectonic zone. It's a pre-Cambrian intra-cratonic volcanic rift system more prone to erosion that the granitic Archean... that's called a shield for a reason! Indeed the Great Lakes were formed after the retreat of the N American inlandsis (continental ice sheet) by a combination of that erosional weak point, as well as the edge of the post-Cambrian limestones laying flat on top southward and ending northward along the Niagara Escarpment (Wikipedia). I combined below the basement map in pastels from a previous blog post here, with the Niagara Escarpment in red from Wikipedia.

Having found no cross-border GIS data, I overlaid them graphically (they were in similar projections)... In fact that's what launched me into GIS exactly 40 yrs. ago (2nd paragraph here):  the geophysics of the Manitoulin Island Discontinuity from Ontario to Wisconsin wasn't traceable for lack cross-border mappable geodata; paper maps didn't match & digital data weren't available then.

QGIS map by author, click to enlarge

You see clearly that not only do the submarine canyons, but also the significant relief below Lake Superior pointed out by @heididaulton, coincide with the arc of the Great Lakes Tectonic Zone in olive: it separates relatively less rugged areas of the Canadian Shield (pre-Cambrian) in grey to the N, inside the other arc of the Niagara Escarpment (post-Cambrian) in red to the S & E, and the Penokean Orogen in purple to the S & W.

Note that the latter includes the Iron Ranges, not only of mining importance opening this section, but also the start of life as we know it per edX MITx on early Paleobiology here.

Another intriguing wrinkle: enlarge the map and see the EW lineament left of the word Mazatzal Terrane at lower right; that may reflect the Manitoulin Island Dicontinuity referred to earlier here.

 ... Same as Bay of Biscay canyons explained here, no AI is needed to sort this one out!

from original post, click to enlarge

East Anglia environment in a global context

 This follows on blogposts about East Anglia in general here. The last post on infrastructure affected by sea level rise is here. Contrast below Environment England's Risk of flooding from river and from sea at left for waters coming naturalls from onshore & offsore, and my Seal level rise model by simply intersecting various sea level elevations and Ordnance Survey topogaphy (intro here and workshop here). Think of it below as fresh water largely going NE to the North Sea at left, and at right as sea water encroaching largely SW onto the land:

A Roman Holiday

This follows on a map story here.

Update : check out below how a new map, itiner-e, updated the Roman Roads view.

Update 2: speaking of malaria in second map, appended maps on trade routes that triggered the Black Plague in the 14th c. Mediterranean.

Not William Wilder's 1953 Gregory Peck & Audrey Hepburn flick (Wikipedia)! When drawing up a map of Apostolic Palestine for local Catholics, I ran across Ancient World Mapping Center (AWMC) at UNC-Chapel Hill. While their web app (ArcGIS Online) is a cool one-stop-shop for their rich data set - for ex. I cannot do point clustering (Comet Assistant) with my standard Argis Pro desktop license -  I loaded, picked apart an re-sorted some of their data for some interesting insights. 

AI to recreate a lost picture

This follows on AI "lessons-learned, lessons shared", last post here and master post here.

Here is another use of Google Gemini AI. A LinkedIn discussion here described fog/cloud banks in Cen. & Nor. Cal. against nearby ridges.  I commented on same viz. Yucaipa Valley & Ridge in So. Cal. Here is my comment:

How to build AI Agents

This follows on my AI "lessons-learned,  lessons-shared" mainly on my Ongoing Crash Course here, that links all items on my various socials.

Maryam Maradi (LinkedIn) shared on-going how-to's I pay-forward here to the rest of the world. I posted the texts on the links below her excellent posters also in-text (click to enlarge). My (liked) comment on her second post was:

This is so excellent! I'm a geologist & GIS-er of 40-odd yrs., w interest in geophysics in general & seismic in particular. I have never seen such a comprehensive review and sign of hope for disaster response... Thanks!

... Samurais in early 1600s Spain!

This follows on from a map story here. A follow-on is here.

Update: fascinating twist in failed outreach by Elizabeth I to China at the bottom.

I thought that So. Cal. Spanish missions were early (mid-18th c.)... well here's an earlier story of intrepid early diplomats & missionaries - not seasoned sailors as Longest tall ships routes here - after long-distance missionaries of the Apostolic Levant here. Perplexity opens here as:

More map art, Part II

This follows on a map story here. The next one is here. 

The original "More map art" is  here: a world map in Natural Earth projection with Mean Annual Climate Temperatures and Natural Earth countries.

Equal Earth vs. Spilhaus projection, masking onshore areas

The original post starts as "a few years ago I used Charlie Frye's online lesson Explore future climate projections to learn how to use NetCDF and map temperature regimes - it's shown below in Patterson & Savaric's Equal Earth Projection..."

2050 Scenario? Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC)

This follows on a map story here.  The next one is here.

After revisiting a number of topics for just over a year here, let's address an item of some urgency: stalling the Gulf Stream may end Western Europe's historic privilege; to be a warm enclave between two 'normal' bands at its latitudes. It's not an Ice Age but think how much colder New York and Montreal are than London or Paris. 

It may be hard to wrap our minds around cooling at a time where climate warming hits the headlines - and rightfully so -  and before climate deniers jump on this, please consult the scientific consensus behind all this under two Microsoft Copilot headings at the bottom: AMOC update, a political declaration of Nordic countries affected and estimated timeline of its collapse.

Update: AMOC collapse effect presented at the National Emergency Briefing last week in London here HT YouTube @JustHaveaThink

Longest haul flights, longest rivers, longest tall ships routes & bonus map

This follows on a map story here. The next one is here.

A series of maps are posted here; they're in desktop and map or poster but not web format as explained here & here; sit back folks, relax & enjoy the map story time...

I repost a cool map on long haul flights: I grew up taking earlier ones over 50 yrs. ago; one of the carriers I used, Qantas just announced here jets that can fly Sydney to New York or London direct! Next is a new map of the longest rivers from a website priding itself of its visualisations: I used previous techniques and cannot decide which works best; perhaps you the reader can help?

Update: added a long section on longest sailing routes by 18-19 c. tall ships (think Cutty Sark here).

Update 2: this post here follows on this series of offline maps

Exhuming my thesis, part III

Update 1: follow-on post here on the series revisiting maps or posting off-web.

Update 2: added an intriguing speculation on the adjacent Sudbury Nickel Irruptive

Following on Parts I & II here & here, here is an article on the breakup of Nuna Province in current N China: it gives new impetus to plate tectonics around 1.5GA - see Part II for another example -  such dynamic processes were proposed in my thesis paper over 40 yrs. ago here, where I applied recent plate dynamics to the Proterozoic of Southern Province of N Ontario Canada of similar age and make-up of Nuna Province. I looked at it from a structural geologic perspective, using intrusives cross-cutting relationships as date markers. The new paper actually dated similar intrusives in present day N China.