TSUNAMI MEMORIAL, LONDON EarthCache
Ellie&Rudi Mentry: Building maintenance is making this too challenging for the time being
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THE COORDINATES GET YOU TO A STARTING POINT..
This earth cache has been placed raise awareness of the devastating effects of tectonic movement and to highlight a breathtaking outdoor, natural, public sculpture that relies on the qualities of the rock and simple design.
SOMETIMES the garden is closed off - I would advise you check BEFOREHAND. (Note "SEASONAL" and "NOT 24/7" are amongst the attributes
March2023
There seems to be limited access whilst the current "RENOVATION" is in progress. HINT: ask a member of staff for information. Look around the new entrance.
RATHER THAN DISABLE THIS FOR SPORADIC AND UNSPECIFIED DISRUPTION SEND YOUR BEST POSSIBLE ANSWERS TO THE LOGGING REQUIREMENTS. PLEASE ADD A PHOTO TAKEN IN CLOSE PROXIMITY TO THE SCULPTURE. OR IF POSSIBLE, JUST COMPLETE THE LOGGING REQUIREMENTS IN FULL.
Your patience and best endeavours will be appreciated. Thanks.
A memorial to the victims of the 2004 tsunami has been officially opened in the grounds of London’s Natural History Museum. This new memorial is intended to be a focal point to remember the thousands of people who died on Boxing Day.
The 120-tonne block is estimated to be between 3.7m3 and 4.1 m3, with a corner removed. According to Handy Shipping Guide was the "biggest transportation of a single piece of stone in the UK or France since the building of Stonehenge.
The rock chosen was a light-colored igneous rock. The memorial is composed mainly of quartz and feldspar with minor amounts of micas.
Crystals will form while the material is molten, insulated deep inside the Earth's crust, cooling relatively slowly, in huge intrusions between other rocks.
Molten rock or magma that would have formed a granite had it stayed deep in the Earth's crust, but instead managed to erupt onto the surface of the Earth, forms a rock called rhyolite.
The two rock types have the same chemistry. Rhyolite however does not generally have the same texture and crystals are generally too small to see.
Granite and rhyolite always consist of the minerals quartz and feldspar, with or without a wide variety of other minerals (accessory minerals). The quartz and feldspar generally give granite a light colour, ranging from pinkish to white. But that light background colour is punctuated by the darker accessory minerals.
A classic granite has a "salt-and-pepper" look. The most common accessory minerals are the black mica biotite and the black amphibole hornblende.
Granite is igneous (it solidified from a fluid state) and plutonic (it cools very slowly in a large, deeply buried mass or pluton). It is molten longer and larger crystal can grow. This also allows a random arrangement of grains in granite—its lack of fabric, layering or cracks—is evidence of its plutonic origin. ( HINT Q.4 why is this a good characteristic if you are about to carve something out of the rock? )
Rhylolite cools relatively quickly, close to the the surface. The rock is cold and solid before larger crystals can grow.
EARTHCACHES ARE DESIGNED AS AN OUTSIDE ACTIVITY, YOU DO NOT HAVE GO INSIDE OF THE MUSEUM BUT YOU DO HAVE TO GET OUT OF AN ARMCHAIR TO COMPLETE IT!
Getting to the earthcache site
The grounds are open to the public. Entry is FREE. The museum is open from 10 o’clock everyday until almost 6pm? Please note you may have get to the cache through the museum if the exterior gates are locked. On occasion, it is NOT possible to access the site. It would be prudent to check in advance.
The coordinates given are for the front entrance.The earthcache is around the side, west, towards Queensgate and through the wildlife garden.
- By tube The earthcache is within walking distance of South Kensington station on the District, Circle and Piccadilly lines.
- By bus Routes 14, 49, 70, 74, 345, 360, 414 and C1 stop nearby. The 360 stops in Exhibition Road.
- By bicycle There are cycle parking facilities by the Cromwell Road entrance and there are racks along Exhibition Road. The nearest hire cycle docking station is outside the Exhibition Road entrance. Other nearby locations include Queen's Gate and South Kensington tube station.
- By car Driving to the Museum may not be easy and parking is not available on Exhibition Road, which is exclusively for residents and a limited number of Blue Badge holders.
To log this cache you need to have visited the memorial and used or eloborated on the basic information contained in the text .
BE SENSITIVE TO THE FACT IT IS A MEMORIAL SITE.
Please EMAIL me the answers ~ From the guidelines: You do not need to wait for permission to log. Requiring someone to wait is not supported by the EarthCache guidelines. You should send your logging task answers , then log the EarthCache. When I review your logging task answers, if there is a problem, I will contact you to resolve it. If there is no problem, then your log simply stands."
1. Describe any grains in the rock in terms of colour and size.
2. Look at an area of 25mm square and estimate the proportion, as a %, of each type of grain in the sample.
3. From your observations is this a granite or a rhyolyte?
4.Why was this type of rock chosen for this massive monument ? (Hint – brief answer in the text)
5. What is the significance of the date of placement of the cache?
6. JUST TO CHECK THAT YOU DID GET OUT OF YOUR ARMCHAIR! There are 36 'bore holes' (vertical channels) on the right hand side as you face the front of the stone, is it the same on the left hand side? YES or NO required.
Do not include any answers in your log OR POST PHOTOS THAT WOULD GIVE OTHERS THE ANSWER.
SPOILER PHOTOS WILL BE DELETED WITHOUT WARNING
~~~~~~~~~~~~ Congratulations to mbtkz on a FTF in the rain! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
Qb purpx npprff orsberunaq. BPPNFVBANYYL VG ZNL OR PYBFRQ BSS!