Redoubt Mini-update for 2/9/2009

Jury duty is done, so here is a little update.

Redoubt is puffing away, producing a more prominent steam plume than it has over the last week (but that may be more weather-related than magma-related.) Beyond that, the volcanic gases keep coming and the earthquakes keep coming.

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C'mon Mt Redoubt ...... it'd be really good to have a new case study for teaching!!

By Jo Conway (not verified) on 09 Feb 2009 #permalink

OK 1 question ... volcanoes male or female ??

lol Looks to me that it might be female ...she'll blow when she feels like it when nobody expected it

By Gerhardus (not verified) on 10 Feb 2009 #permalink

While it appears quite certain that magma is rising toward the surface within Redoubt, I wouldn't be all that surprised if this time it just started building a lava dome, without much explosive activity. Volcanoes do that sometimes. Remember Mount St. Helens in 2004, when there were just a few small hydrothermal (steam) explosions before a nearly purely effusive, dome-building activity started? Or Kelud in Indonesia in 2007, a volcano that in the past had always erupted violently explosively, but this time it quietly extruded viscous lava to build a big dome? Also Nevado de Huila in Colombia is not producing very much explosive activity (the deadly November eruption may have been largely due to interaction of hot dome lava with glacier ice) but rather building a dome.
Time will tell ...

Gerhardus,
that comment could be taken in such a wrong way lol. personally Volcanoes are like sleeping old men, poke them with a stick and they grumble and mutter, and occasionally they wake up and give you a full on shouting at.

Boris

Point taken (pardon to the ladies) your explanation sounds real fair. Just wondering how much is a major eruption going to influence the current somewhat hectic weather patterns in the northern half

What will the influence be if it's a minor one and what if it's a major eruption

How much 'polutants' normally being released in a eruption if it's compared to the human emissions eg. one eruption like st Helens compared to human daily emissions

By Gerhardus (not verified) on 11 Feb 2009 #permalink

Gerhardus, I wonder the same thing. I remember that in August, 1992, my area had snow around the middle of August. It stayed cold from that point right through winter. I have never seen this before or since. Experts later said it was caused by Pinataubo.

From what I have read, emissions from Alaskan volcanoes have great potential to disrupt human activity because the ash and emissions can travel further at that latitude.

As for H2S and other emissions, that is a good question. The 1912 eruption of Novarupta, AK, dissolved laundry on clotheslines in Vancouver, Canada, three days after the eruption. For 40 years, it was believed that Katmai was the source. Novarupta had apparently sucked out the magma chamber from Katmai, causing it to collapse. A Novarupta-style eruption today would disrupt air traffic all over North America, not to mention causing health problems. There's always that ominous line in history books: "This could happen again." I don't think anyone believes Redoubt is another Novarupta. Pinataubo was smaller than Novarupta.

Someone told me that the metallic content of the volcano is a factor in climate change. Each volcano has its own metallurgical signature. Dr. Klemetti?