eklemetti | May 29, 2008
This isn't really new activity, but a report on the ongoing activity at Soufriere Hills on Montserrat in the West Indies. Soufriere Hills is a composite volcano that has been erupting for almost 11 years now, producing pyroclastic flows and ash fall that have wiped out entire towns on the island of Montserrat. Most of the activity is caused by dome collapses, where the viscous dacite lavas will erupt to form domes that then become oversteepened and collapsed due to gravity. This material is still hot (usually) and forms the deadly pyroclastic flows. Sounds like there have been a few dome…
eklemetti | May 29, 2008
The Oregonian reports on the on-going desire to develop geothermal power in the Oregon and California Cascades and backarc. There have been attempted (or at least exploration) to develop geothermal power at Newberry Volcano, Crater Lake and Medicine Lake, but none have ever panned out. Well, it seems like this time it might happen, and I, for one, think it is a good idea. Of course, there are a lot of folks who don't want a geothermal plant anywhere near Newberry, especially with its National Monument designation, but one of these days we'll have to choose between that and higher energy…
eklemetti | May 28, 2008
Some news from the Chaiten eruption. Apparently, LanChile has cancelled some flights around the region of southern Chile due to the ash. They likely implies that the eruption column is bigger than reported by the SERNAGEOMIN on Monday, but the report has little in the way of details. Sounds like the volcano is still huffing and puffing away. Definitely one of the more important and interesting eruptions in the last few hundred years and it has the Cascades Volcano Observatory along with the USGS VDAP buzzing (based on some conversations I've had recently), even almost four weeks in.
eklemetti | May 27, 2008
If you're interested in the latest eruption at Mt. Etna (Italy), here are some great images posted at Stromboli Online. Nothing like some good spatter amongst friends.
eklemetti | May 27, 2008Although the mainstream media seems to have lost interest in the Chaiten eruption beyond the "human interest" (or should I say "salmon interest") aspect of the eruption, there is still a lot going on at the volcano. The SERNAGEOMIN recently released this excellent photo of the erupting caldera:
What is pretty clear here is thank a new rhyolite dome is erupting on top of the old dome. (On a side note, when I was visiting the Smithsonian last week, we were all lamenting the fact that no one has come out and said what composition this lava is? I'm 99% convinced it is rhyolite, e.g., high silica…
eklemetti | May 27, 2008Looks like a lot of you have found my (fairly new) Eruptions blog via the kind post over on another excellent volcano blog, the aptly titled Volcanism Blog. That blog is run by Dr. Ralph Harrington, a historian, and I have to admit, does a much more thorough job with some of the foreign language media reports (I can handle the Spanish news but that is about it). Thanks for the reference and anyone here who hasn't checked out the Volcanism Blog should.
eklemetti | May 26, 2008
I'm always amazed by the number of volcanic eruptions captured by satellites that we might not have ever even had known occurred otherwise. Case in point is Rabaul on the island of New Britain in Papua New Guinea. An Aqua satellite captured this shot of Rabaul erupting on May 20th, leaving a gorgeous plume heading off into the Pacific. Sure, most likely someone might have noticed the eruption, but its good to see that we can find eruptions going on even when we're not really looking.
Rabaul is a caldera volcano that is most famous for the simultaneous eruptions of Vulcan and Tavurvur in 1994…
eklemetti | May 26, 2008
Tungurahua, one of the most active (and harder to pronounce) volcanoes in the Andes, has been experiencing explosions over the last few days. Not much in the report beyond the 125 explosions, increased seismicity and ashfall around the volcano. This is fairly typical behavior of Tungurahua: Strombolian-style eruptions (see the picture above for a great example) with ash and blocks being ejected from the crater. The volcano has been continuously erupting since 1999.
eklemetti | May 26, 2008
People living around Semeru Volcano, Indonesia, have been put on alert for a potential eruption. Indonesia's Centre for Volcanology and Geological Hazard Mitigation has put the volcano on level 3 (of 4) alert and said "not to conduct activity at a radius of 4 kilometres from the crater, especially around the south-east of the volcano's slopes." There have also been reports of ash clouds (or steam) being vented from the crater.
Semeru is a very active volcano in a country full of active volcanoes. It has been erupting since 1967, quite a long span for any stratovolcano to be constantly…
eklemetti | May 26, 2008
I think we know who wins this battle. At Ruapehu (New Zealand), it isn't really the lava that is the problem, but the lahars produced by mixing snow, crater lake water and volcanic debris. However, that is not stopping people from wanting to ski on the volcano. Never ceases to amaze me how people assess the riskiness of activities.
eklemetti | May 26, 2008
Everyone loves a "supervolcano"*. According to a recent report, Los Angeles will be erupting from underneath Yellowstone Caldera (Wyoming). OK, not really, but apparently there has been 7 cm of uplift underneath the footprint of the Yellowstone Caldera since 2004, which is a pretty good amount of uplift. Whether this uplift is caused by new magma intruding, volcanic gases collecting or hydrothermally spawned (however, in the article, we are to believe these unnamed "researchers" that it is magma). I'll keep an eye out for more on this, but it sounds like this is just another "more uplift!"…
eklemetti | May 26, 2008
I've made it back from my trip to Washington DC. The Smithsonian Institution is quite a fun place to visit, especially if rocks are your ilk. Be sure to check out the wonderful mineral collection at the Natural History Museum. I only wish the Global Volcanism Program would have a more interactive (and visible) spot in the museum itself.
eklemetti | May 19, 2008
It has been rather quiet on the volcano news front over the weekend. A couple tidbits:
- There are some new data showing the sulfur dioxide flux from Mt. Etna (Italy). The image above is an eruption of Etna from 2001 (and it makes a great wallpaper).
- I've heard very little about Chaiten lately, mostly because I don't think much has changed. The last update provided by the SERNAGEOMIN was on 5.16 (in spanish) and pretty much that is exactly what it says: the volcano continues to erupt. Apparently some USGS folks will be arriving on the scene soon as well. Most of the town of Chaiten has…
eklemetti | May 17, 2008
Happy 28th anniversary of the 1980 Mt. Saint Helens eruption. The volcano had a catastrophic collapse of one side of the edifice that triggered the climatic eruption. Enjoy this clip from the CBS News from 3 days after the eruption.
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eklemetti | May 16, 2008
The latest eruption at Kilauea has increased the amount of vog on the big island of Hawai'i. Vog is more or less the same as the anthropogenic "smog" produced by car/industrial exhaust, but produced by volcanic gases (carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide, hydrogen sulfide amongst others). It definitely doesn't make for good air quality, especially with the current lack of strong tradewinds in Hawai'i right now.
eklemetti | May 15, 2008
At first it seemed like the new eruptions at Mt. Etna (Italy) were petering out rather quickly. Instead, now it seems that there are fears that a new rift might be opening on Etna, which might mean more vents for lava to erupt. Apparently there has also been some seismic activity to go along with the new eruption and rifting, which shouldn't be too surprising.
It is also noted that Stromboli, another one of the Aeolian volcanoes, is erupting now as well. Busy time for Italian volcanoes!
eklemetti | May 15, 2008
To keep us up to date on the goings-on at Chaiten in southern Chile, well, the volcano is still erupting! Yes, two weeks in and heavy ash is still being erupted from vent. The latest reports are vague, but Chilean officials are saying things like "There's been additional volcanic activity that we're really worried about..." Now, I can only speculate what this means, but this might be an indicate that the SERNAGEOMIN are really beginning to seriously consider that the whole volcano may collapse.
The town of Chaiten, even without a collapse, is pretty much been wiped off the map. 90% of the…
eklemetti | May 15, 2008
If Chaiten, Llaima and Puyehue weren't enough, the Chilean Regional Emergency Office is placing seismometers on Peteroa volcano after its shown signs of increasing activity. The volcano is located out on the border with Chile and Argentina and has a number of glaciers that start from the edifice. Looking at the eruptive history of Peteroa, it seems that it has spasms every 30 years or so, although the last known eruption was ~10 years ago. The eruptions are mostly phreatic explosions (related to magma-water interaction) and the last known eruption that produced significant lava, ash and…
eklemetti | May 14, 2008
A bit busy today, so to borrow from the newest USGS/SI Volcanism Report:
On 12 May, the plume rose to an altitude of 8 km (26,200 ft) a.s.l.
During an overflight conducted by SERNAGEOMIN, four more plumes of a
similar altitude were generated by explosions and drifted NE. Several
hectares of burned vegetation, likely from pyroclastic flows or
lateral explosions, were noted on the N flank of the dome. Small
pyroclastic flows may also have been responsible for completely burned
forest to areas in the NE, and on the W and NW dome flanks. A lahar
caused the banks of the Chaitén River to overflow…
eklemetti | May 13, 2008
I just read a report that the ash column at Chaiten is beginning to collapse. The SERNAGEOMIN says that the ash column is only 4.5 km tall now, as opposed to the 20 km it had reached earlier. Still, there are not reports of pyroclastic flows, but that could be a matter of hours or days at this point. We'll be keeping a close watch on the eruption to see if this is the beginning of the end, or just a lull in eruptive activity, here a full 12 days into the eruption.
UPDATE 12:20 PM (Pacific Time): According to this new article, the SERNAGEOMIN is reporting the first of the column-collapse…