Note: This post is part of our series, "Netflix Academy: The best educational videos available for streaming." Be sure to check out our previous Netflix Academy posts on Ancient Asian Cultures; early American civilizations; Ancient Greece; Ancient Rome; Native American cultures; Christopher Columbus and the Age of Discovery; Colonial America and the Revolutionary War; the American founders; movie adaptations of classic children’s books; American folk heroes; dinosaurs; aquatic life; insects; frogs and other amphibians; reptiles; birds; mammals; and human evolution.
OK folks, we’ve wrapped up our posts on biology, and we’re on to earth science. As with science topics writ large, Netflix and Amazon have a wealth of educational resources that won’t bore you or your kids. Not that it would be easy to make earthquakes and volcanoes boring, what with their massive power and pyrotechnics. Why just read about them when you and watch and hear earthquakes and volcanoes in action? As always, please let me know what you think and if we’ve missed any great selections.
Special thanks to research interns Andrew McDonnell, Elisabeth Hoyson, and Liz McInerney for helping to compile these lists.
Best videos on earthquakes and volcanoes
1. Ring of Fire
One of nature's most spectacular and perilous wonders, volcanoes—with a danger radius of twenty miles, temperatures that can exceed 2,000 degrees, and lava traveling up to 150 miles per hour—are capable of consuming entire forests or towns and triggering tsunamis, flash floods, and earthquakes. Of hundreds of active volcanoes in the world, over three-quarters are part of the explosive Ring of Fire.
Length: 38 minutes
Rating: NR
Provider: Amazon Instant
2. Deadliest Volcanoes: Nova
Follow along as scientists probe the world's most powerful volcanoes, including the super volcano that slumbers beneath Yellowstone National Park.
Length: 53 minutes
Rating: TV-PG
Provider: Netflix
3. Life on Fire: Phoenix Temple
Around the Masaya Volcano in Nicaragua, life has struggled for thousands of years to reemerge from the ashes.
Length: 53 minutes
Rating: NR
Provider: PBS
4. Life on Fire: Icelandic Volcanoes
Through spectacular aerial footage of this country, which is an accumulation of lava and ash, a maze of craters and faults, the episode tries to discern which volcano will awaken next.
Length: 53 minutes
Rating: NR
Provider: PBS
5. Kilauea: Mountain of Fire
Kilauea, on Hawaii's Big Island, is the world's most active volcano. Its latest eruption began in 1983, and it hasn't stopped since. Kilauea is also the driving force in a spectacular process of creation—the cataclysmic meeting of 2,000-degree lava and seventy-five-degree ocean water.
Length: 50 minutes
Rating: TV-PG
Provider: PBS
6. National Geographic: Volcano: Nature's Inferno
Two legendary summits—Mount Unzen in Japan and Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines—are the focus of this documentary about volcanoes.
Length: 55 minutes
Rating: TV-PG
Provider: Netflix
7. Megaquake: Hour That Shook Japan
Experience Japan's earthquake and tsunami through first-person accounts, as scientists explore whether the U.S. Pacific Northwest could be next.
Length: 38 minutes
Rating: TV-PG
Provider: Netflix
