Dear Friends,

British scientists have found a volcano under the West Antarctic ice sheet that may still be active. They state (ABC, Jan 21 2008) that it erupted around 2000 years ago. The explosion event was of the severe to cataclysmic category. It allegedly punched a hole in the ice sheet and shot out a plume some 12,000 metres in the air.

The report states “Most of Antarctica is seismically stable, but its western part lies on a rift in Earth's crust that gives rise to occasional volcanism and geothermal heat, occurring on the Antarctic coastal margins.”

This was reportedly the first evidence for an eruption under the ice sheet - the slab of frozen water, hundreds of metres thick in places, that holds most of the world's stock of fresh water.

Reporting in the journal Nature Geoscience, the investigators from the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) describe the finding as "unique". They say it extends the range of known volcanism in Antarctica by some 500 kilometres and raises the question whether this or other sub-glacial volcanoes may have melted so much ice that global sea levels were affected.

The volcano, located in the Hudson Mountains, blew around 207 BC, plus or minus 240 years, according to the study.

Evidence comes from a British-American airborne geophysical survey, in 2004-5, that used radar to delve deep under the ice sheet to map the terrain beneath.

The ABC report states that, “Professor David Vaughan's team spotted anomalous radar reflections over 23,000 square kilometres. They interpret this signal as being a thick layer of ash, rock and glass, formed from fused silica, that the volcano spewed out in its fury. The amount of material - 0.31 cubic kilometres - indicates an eruption of between three and four on a yardstick called the Volcanic Explosive Index (VEI). By comparison, the eruption of Mount St Helens in 1980, which was greater, rates a VEI of five, and that of Mount Pinatubo in 1991 is a VEI of six.”

The scientist, Hugh Corr of the BAS said: "We believe this was the biggest eruption in Antarctica during the last 10,000 years. It blew a substantial hole in the icesheet and generated a plume of ash and gas that rose around 12 kilometres into the air."

The eruption occurred close to the massive Pine Island Glacier, an area where movement of glacial ice towards the sea has been accelerating alarmingly in recent decades, causing increasing scientific concerns over Global Warming.

"It may be possible that heat from the volcano has caused some of that acceleration," says BAS Professor Vaughan, who stresses though that Global Warming is by far the more likelier cause.

Volcanic heat "cannot explain the more widespread thinning of West Antarctic glaciers that together are contributing nearly 0.2mm per year to sea-level rise," he adds. "This wider change most probably has its origin in warming ocean waters."

What is important to note here is that the eruption coincided with the commencement of the Roman Warm Period. We know that the West Antarctic Basin was ice-free in summer over the Roman Warm Period, and sea levels were some seven feet or 2+ metres higher than the present, as we have the ancient maps from the library at Alexandria that were preserved by the Turkish navy in their map of 1513 called the Piri Reis map. We also know from the port at Ephesus that the sea levels were that much higher, as Ephesus was the seaport – and it was not miles inland and some seven feet higher than the current port at Kusadasi.

The scientists may well have found the evidence for the destabilisation of the Antarctic land-mass when the ice began to melt. The effect would have been to reduce the weight constraining the volcanic ridge there, allowing the destabilisation of the fault and bringing on the eruption. That may well happen again in the near future as the Millennial Warm Period picks up speed, just as it did in the Roman Warm Period. It is interesting that they did not link the evidence to the Medieval Warm Period, which exhibited the same warming patterns. However, it may not have been as severe in the Medieval Warm Period as it was in the Roman Warm Period, and that further indicates a level of volatile unpredictability in the various thousand-year Warm Periods. Perhaps they miscalculated and the eruptions occurred in both Warm Periods, in which case we are more or less certain to get another eruption in the coming Millennial Warm Period that is now upon us.

Global Warming is not man-made. Man has simply contributed to this one and it will likely be greater in view of that fact.

We have ancient records of ships being sailed around Europe and Asia, which required higher sea levels and less ice. The Arctic must have been open in summer to have been able to do these things. That is just happening now, although we know the Medieval Warm Period allowed farming in Greenland and in Canada much further north than at present, and Britain grew wine in the Roman Warm Period. There is thus nothing new under the sun.

This Warm Period will be more severe and God will deal with mankind to go into the Millennium under Jesus Christ. Most of the world’s “Christians” will march against Christ as he will not do what they expect him to do, and he will not say what they expect him to say. The world will be brought to submission and it will be ruled from Jerusalem under God’s Laws.

Christ is very clear that the greatest earthquake the world has ever seen will occur at that time (Rev. 16:18) and the cataclysms we have seen so far from these volcanoes will be as nothing in comparison to that event. These earthquakes were said to precede that great event (Mat. 24:7; Mk. 13:8; Lk. 21:11). These events must occur and the Gospel must be preached in all nations, and then the end shall come. The sequence is that the Gospel is preached and then the end comes. The final witness is by Elijah after the Gospel has been preached. The irrational claims that the false prophet Herbert Armstrong was Elijah is an insult to the intelligence of the Churches of God (see the papers Elijah? (No. 233) and False Prophecy (No. 269)). Elijah will come and restore all things and the hearts of the fathers will be turned to the sons and sons to the fathers or the Earth will be mitten with a curse. These plagues and pestilence and the withholding of rain in due season and the calling down of lightning from the skies will occur as part of this process. These are the days of the Witnesses (see the paper The Witnesses (No. 135)). If any one proclaims he is a Witness ask him why he is not in Jerusalem clothed in sackcloth with the other Witness calling fire down from Heaven and punishing the Earth. Ask him who the other Witness is. Both Witnesses must preach together to fulfil prophecy. Anyone who says Armstrong, or Ellen G. White, or Rutherford or Joseph Smith or any of these false prophets, was Elijah, shows thereby he/she is not a prophet and is unable to discern the spirit of prophecy. They are to be avoided.

The great religious conflict that would deceive even the very elect is to come to a head soon.

Our job is to prepare for these Witnesses and to get this message into the major trade languages so that the whole world will have access to the Gospel of the Kingdom of God in clear terms that are easily understood.

This information will be used to again update the paper Global Warming and Bible Prophecy (No. 218).

Please do as much as you can to assist the work to be completed. The French is under way. Indo-Malay is almost up to date with the English. Chinese is well underway. KiSwahili, Russian and Spanish are underway but need more done, and so it goes for others.

When we are completed the world will be without excuse.

Wade Cox
Coordinator General