natural phenomena

Thanks to green algae, there's such a thing as red snow. And we've recently found it can accelerate global warming. Look out!

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Catatumbo lightning is one of nature's most amazing displays of showiness, with strikes occurring 28 times per minute for nine hours a day, 300 days a year. So take cover and take a listen.

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In this special interview episode of Stuff to Blow Your Mind, Robert and Joe chat with legendary filmmaker Werner Herzog and volcanologist Clive Oppenheimer about their new documentary "Fireball: Visitors from Darker Worlds," which deals with meteors and comets and their influence on ancient religions and other cultural and physical impacts they've had on Earth.

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We’ve all heard about crop circles, and the entirely terrestrial reason they pop up in the occasional wheat field. But what about strange circles on the bottom of the sea? In this episode of Stuff to Blow Your Mind, Robert Lamb and Joe McCormick discuss the mystery of these ephemeral patterns and what scientists discovered about their origin. 

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Science has a handle on fireflies and glowworms, but most bioluminescent animals live in the ocean and are tough to study. Today, researchers are still figuring out why some animals produce light. Dive with Josh and Chuck into this illuminating topic.

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Neil Tyson and Eugene Mirman turn a speculative, scientific eye towards Unidentified Flying Objects. Featuring UFO investigator James McGaha and SETI Senior Astronomer Seth Shostak. Now extended with Neil and Eugene answering Cosmic Queries about UFOs.
NOTE: StarTalk All-Access subscribers can listen to this entire episode commercial-free. Find out more at https://www.startalkradio.net/startalk-all-access/

There was a time when strange lights appeared in the marshlands. Commoners might have known the eerie luminescence as "Will-o'-the-Wisp" or "Hinky Punk," while the learned pondered the mysteries of "Ignis Fatuus." Superstitions aside, what natural phenomenon was at work here, before accounts of false fires in the night largely vanished from history? In this episode of Stuff to Blow Your Mind, Robert and Joe search for answers.

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For a while in the 1980s, people were fascinated and confused about what exactly crop circles were. Now we know that they aren't signs left from aliens, but art made by humans. Learn all about these stunning, large form art installations in today's episode.

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A listener wrote us with a frightening dogman encounter that happened in 1972 while camping. The creature(s) entered the campsite late at night growling, throwing rocks and surrounded their campsite. The experience still haunts this listener today. She has heard of Bigfoot/Sasquatch but the description of those creatures did not match until years later when she came across information about the dogman.

Our Halloween special investigates the science of ghosts and other haunting phenomena.

Have you ever seen mysterious lights in the sky, or glimpsed an alien spacecraft? This show provides a probing yet playful discussion about Unidentified Flying Objects.

If you've seen the movie Magnolia, you've seen what it looks like to rain frogs. While there are reports of frogs, fish and even squid raining down that are questionable, science has figured out how it can - and does - rain frogs sometimes.

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Stretching from Miami to Bermuda and Puerto Rico, the notorious Bermuda Triangle has a bad reputation for wrecking ships and planes. But how much of this legend is based on science? Tune in and learn more in this episode.

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