Mayon

Monday Musings: Russian activity, tremors at Ngauruhoe and Mayon climbers beware

eklemetti — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 00:20:18 +0000

Monday Musings: Russian activity, tremors at Ngauruhoe and Mayon climbers beware

News for Monday!

Ngauruhoe in New Zealand, showing the dark lava flows of basaltic andesite on the slopes of the young volcanic cone. Image by Erik Klemetti, taken January 2009.

A couple pieces of news from two Russian volcanoes on the Kamchatka Peninsula: (1) last week's report of activity at Gorely appears to be semi-substantiated with new photos on the KVERT website (Russian). The images from June 6 and 12 (2010) shows steam plumes coming from the volcano - one as tall as 500 meters. Now, this doesn't imply that an eruption occurred, but it might suggest activity on on the upswing. KVERT continues to list the Alert Status at Gorely as "Green". (2) An eruption over the weekend at Shiveluch produced an explosive plume that reached 4.5 km / 15,000 feet. Over the last few days, the volcano has experienced over 150 earthquakes, but the activity is no threat to nearby villages or aviation over the peninsula. The status at Shiveluch remains at "Orange".
On the other side of the Pacific Ocean, there are some interesting tremors (Updated 6/21/2010: Nope, likely these "tremors" are just wind in the area of the webicorder - see the comments below) going on near Ngauruhoe in New Zealand. This fairly active volcano is part of the Taupo Volcano Zone and is located next door to Ruapehu near the famous Tongariro Crossing. Now, there is no indication on the New Zealand GeoNet website and the status is still "green", but it could be something to watch. Ngauruhoe last erupted in 1977 and had frequent eruptions in the middle of the 20th century. Ngauruhoe is really the youngest cone of Tongariro volcano - a cone that started forming only 2,500 years ago. The volcano tends to have strombolian explosions with basaltic andesite lava flows (see image above) ... and be sure to check out the Ngauruhoe webcam.
Over in the Philippines, government officials now have the deal with tourists visiting Mayon instead of Taal after they were warned to stay away from the latter volcano. However, dangers still exist at Mayon, where there are frequent rockfalls and small explosions - yet tour guides still bring people into the 6-km exclusion zone. Although the Alert Status at Mayon is at Level 1, the crater still glows red at night, reminding us that magma is still near the surface.
Finally, last year there was a lot of talk about the oil storage tanks near Redoubt in Alaska. This week, the Cook Inlet Regional Citizens Advisory Council heard a report on the storage tanks and whether the CIRCA did an appropriate job in planning for a volcanic eruption from the Alaskan volcano in regards to the potential spill from the tanks. More or less, it appears that the Council may have been complacent in the oversight of the facility - a common problem when it comes to planning for disasters.

{Hat tip to Eruptions readers M. Randolph Kruger and Bruce Stout for information used in this post.}

eklemetti Sun, 06/20/2010 - 20:20

Which tremors for Ngauruhoe do you mean, it looks like it's only had two earthquakes in the last few months, is it the smaller tremours? http://www.geonet.org.nz/images/volcano/drums/ch/otvz/10/drum.png

http://www.geonet.org.nz/volcano/activity/ngauruhoe/index.html

This is great news, I've been waiting for this one to erupt for ages. Last year when I climbed it last year it only has steaming out a few fumaroles at the top at the side and inside the main crater nothing was steaming at all. NZ has been pretty boring of late, I wish something would happen there.

Greg: Be careful what you wish for, especially when talking about eruptions!

Thanks for the info about Mt. Ngauruhoe, Erik. I'll check the webcam when I'm not at work :-)
I did the Tongariro Crossing in 2000 and vividly remember the blue and green crater lakes up there.
As there are many tourists up there every day (at least in summer) I would not wish a sudden eruption or bursting crater lake rims...

I wonder if Ngauruhoe isn't just celebrating the "Victory" of the all whites against Italy yesterday. I guess a volcanic victory dance would be a bit tremorsome:)
And let me just say that for a swede Ngauruhoe is definitly on the list of un-pronouncable volcanic names. Give me something easy like EyjafjallajÃ¶kull any day!

Ngauruhoe is a very beautifull volcano, would look stunning with a nice strombolian eruption, especially since it dont have any ice-cap on top. Hope there are a lot of webcams around! One that up-dates every 30 minutes would be a bit disapointing. A live feed from a few angles and a FLIR for night-time would be good, microphones so one could put it on the speakers, and of course live helicorders so I could feed my finally finished actuating chair... Then it would just be to fire up the videoprojector and pop a beer:) Would beat the Football worldcup any day.

A question:
Is there anywhere one could get translations from the Indonesian volcanic centres updates? I've tried to look but haven't found any on their site. http://portal.vsi.esdm.go.id/joomla/

Would be nice to see if something is brewing there since they do have some of the nicer volcanos around.

Thank's in advance for the avalanche of help that I know will be coming from the knowledgeable pros here!

@Carl #5 Try using the Google Chrome web browser. You can get all sites translated to the language of your choice. It automatically detects the language and you may choose to which language you want the article translated. I would advise you to choose English - you know, as for Portuguese you may get very funny results. I tried the link you posted (thank you for that) in English and it worked fair enough. Of course it doesn't work for images.

On HvÃ³lsvÃ¶llur cam steam plume is visible now. Lady E is still giving signs of life.

#2 as long as lake Tapou or Auckland field doesn't erupt it will be ok. That Ngauruhoe climb really makes you fit lol. And the weather coming in and out and crampons at the top made it lots of fun too. Ruapehu's crater lake softly churning actually looked more creepy :P

not sure if intrested or not, but found this site not sure if its fake or not. National Association of radio-distress signalling and infocommunications,Emergency and Disaster information services {EDIS} havaria@rsoe.hu or zsolt.boszormenyi@rsoe.hu this site shows all the current volcanoes and earthquakes ect.

@ Greg (and all) - Ooops! I somehow forgot to add the link for the Ngauruhoe tremor. I've updated the post above and you can see the webicorder for Oturere (Ngauruhoe). Sorry about that.

Hi, what sort of tremors are they, harmonic?

Greg: well, I was thinking more about Taupo et al. Or Taranaki, which is statistically more likely to reawaken soon than either Taupo or Auckland. Re Ngaurohoe; I've got an interesting book ('Hot Water Country' by Ross Annabell) which has some lively anecdotes about it. Published in NZ, I think, so it's on your patch, I'd guess

Here's Thorvaldseyri's new website, the early 'farm under the volcano' - http://www.thorvaldseyri.is/ Wish there were an English version, but hey...

birdseyesUSA.comment13, It can be in english just click on union jack top left side of the page

Anyone else pondering what this cluster of eq's under Lady E might mean?

http://en.vedur.is/earthquakes-and-volcanism/earthquakes/myrdalsjokull/…

Though, admittedly they are very shallow.

@12 Would be nice if White Island fired up, apparently it's thrown rocks 50km to the mainland before lol

Greg 12: Is White Island still privately owned? (It certainly used to be). In which case lawyers would have a field day if it caused damage on the mainland LOL

Sorry, that should have been to Greg 16

@birdseye, #13, There is an english version of this page, and as far as I have seen, it contains all the info of the icelandic page.

@Laura from Canada [15]

Dunno, but here is how they look in profile. Quakes from 6/16 to 6/20.

http://i45.tinypic.com/34g3cow.png

Hi to all,

Birdseye @13,Hi I just checked out the Thorvaldseyri website.On the main page at top left there are Icelandic and English flags.Click on the English flag and it all becomes much clearer !
Laura @15.Curious little swarm that,and no real depth to any of them.Umm,we will see.

@14,19,21 ...and I just got new glasses ...sigh.....lol, thanks! ;

Not sure if it's anything, but a curious darker cloud is rising on the far left of the thoro cam... and someone just walked by snapping pictures.

And by far left, I of course me far right.... lol

Ngauruhoe is still fast asleep. Doesn'nt look like volcanic tremor at all. Climbed it last year, it could use a new eruption though, the slopes ar getting very eroded by all the people climbing it.

Guys,
I'm 99.9% certain that you're observing wind on the Ngauruhoe (...and other NZ volcano seismometers)! Remember it's winter now down there. If Nguaruhoe,..or any other volcano was producing the observed ground motion, bells and wistles would be ringing off their mounts. Seismometers don't just record volcano-genic stuff,...I've seen helicopter passes on the Ruapehu seismograph from time to time.

Rodger

@ Ber - Yeah, I'm not sure what to make of the noise on the webicorder. Any thoughts from the tremor-hounds out there?

Question: The last I looked Redoubt had been removed from the larger Holocene eruptions list, anyone know why? Here is a copy/paste from when it was there.

http://www.volcano.si.edu/world/largeeruptions.cfm

Name - Location - Date - Volcano Explosivity Index

CHAITEN Southern Chile 2008Â Â MayÂ 2Â VEI 4 OKMOK Aleutian Islands 2008Â Â JulÂ 12Â 4? KASATOCHI Aleutian Islands 2008Â Â AugÂ 7Â 4
REDOUBT Southwestern Alaska 2009Â Â MarÂ 22Â 4
SARYCHEV PEAK Kuril Islands 2009Â Â JunÂ 11Â 4

Didn't Redoubt erupt 16 times with plumes over 12 miles high, or am I mistaken?

Garry Hayes over at Geotripper has some lovely shots taken of Kiluea from the ocean-- empty lava tubes, pahoehoe and aa lava in unusual formations==

http://geotripper.blogspot.com/2010/06/where-i-wish-i-wasunique-view-of…

Hello Everyone,. :))

just wonderin if "EyafjatlajÃ¸kutl" has a new eruption, it seems like the plume has become a little darker and goes a little bit higher up than It has been the last days(weeks)??

btw a young customer at my store was just uber cute today and asked me if the volcano was still volcanoing on Iceland,. heheh. She was only 7 years.. aww I tought it was cute,.

@Thor,Hi,its a little hard to say at present;too much cloud,but there was quite a large plume earlier re Laura @23&24.

@Thor and Adrian, the recent eq swarms might point to something POTENTIALLY stirring, but alot of them were very shallow. I'm questioning though the lack thereof any real tremor movements. I'm pretty sure I saw a plume, but there was some cloud cover (and some very dark clouds) so it could have been that. Just thought that it was ironic that when I saw it, someone else ran by the camera snapping pictures. ;)

@Thor

I don't think anything is going on in the way of an eruption right now - but a flood might be in the program, and you can never bypass explosions as long as things are as hot as they are now. The greatest hazards now are, in my opinion;
1) renewed eruptive activity in the current crater with extremely violent interaction vith the water there
2) no eruption, but a breach of the crater rim releasing all the water trapped in the crater and the jÃ¶kullhlaup down GigjÃ¶kull following that

A nice approximation of the pronunciation of EyjafjallajÃ¶kull, btw - although the Norwegian/Danish version of 'Ã¶' (Ã¸) might throw some people.

Ed 28: I think the Redoubt eruption plumes reached 12km, rather than 12 miles, which is a big difference! Also the VEI rating is calculated on more than just plume height; it certainly includes the total volume of lava/tephra produced in the eruption, and the 2009 eruption was no bigger than (or maybe slightly smaller than) the 1989 eruption in terms of volume..and that was a VEI 3

Kultsi :))

Hi,..

I was just checking on the Metrolocial pages
http://en.vedur.is/earthquakes-and-volcanism/earthquakes/myrdalsjokull/
and there has been more activity,when it comes to shallow quakes then it has been for days/weeks,.
maybe its because of the ice/water melting and running into the crater and down the plumbings inside the mountain??

If you warm up mountain and then add cold water on it it cracks and breaks so maybe that makes the quakes??

anyways there is something going on up there,
and I agree with you

1) renewed eruptive activity in the current crater with extremely violent interaction vith the water there

2) no eruption, but a breach of the crater rim releasing all the water trapped in the crater and the jÃ¶kullhlaup down GigjÃ¶kull following that

These scenarios will both be diastrous, and extremely dangerous.

Remember that

EyjafjÃ¤ll, has had longtime eruptions that has had on /of breaks in between the eruptions, somtimes longer breaks and other where shorter..
if the water mixes with lava then things will sure become nasty for a while and quite explosive..

and Im sure the eruption on "EyjafjatlajÃ¶kutl" is not over,its just in another fase before starting up again..
and I wont be surpriced if another Volcano will erupt in the meantime, no im not sugesting Katla, that eruption might take some time before starting.. but will sure come with time..

birdseye @ 13, thanks for the link to farm photos. From that, I found a link to more Ejya. photos: http://www.nordicphotos.is/IS/search/Eyjafjallaj%C3%B6kull The April 14 distance shot of the farm with ash and steam plumes behind it is one I'd be tempted to buy, but I don't see how to find prices. [ http://www.thorvaldseyri.is/skrar/image/Gos_i_Eyjafjallajokli/DSC08496… ]

Oops, this is the purchase site, but it's only in Icelandic, as far as I can tell. http://www.nordicphotos.is/IS/Details/6710791

@ Roger, 26

wind noise was what I thought of first too so I checked nearby seismograms to see if there was anything unusual but they looked normal to me (I check the geonet seismograms out everday) and, knowing the volanic plateau, high winds are more the norm than the exception, so this would mean a really exceptional storm to generate such a localized signal. On top of that, I haven't seen the graph look like this before in over, at a guess, two years of following it. That's why I mentioned it here.

OTOH Geonet haven't mentioned anything at all on their site or bumped up the volcano alert, so I guess you're right. There must be some extraneous source for the signal. Maybe they moved it or some tourists are having a party or something.

@Thor, @Adrian @Laura: Definitely there's a darker plume. Clouds are coming and going, but keep checking on ÃÃ³rÃ³lsfell and MÃºlakot cams. A pity that I must leave now.

http://www.icenews.is/index.php/2010/06/20/glacial-flood-in-south-icela…

Flood in Iceland.

Where is the seismograph in NZ, since when we climbed Mnt Doom it was Novemberish and there heaps of ice on it, so now there must be a lot of ice on that mountain. The weather really came in and out all the time and we had a few white outs. Yeah it's overdue for an eruption since before the 1970s it erupted pretty regularly. There is an old worn out sign up from NZ Geo about "toxic gas" inside the crater and not to climb in, I think it was stirring a bit in the last 10 years but has been really quiet and boring lately. So hopefully it wakes up, since it's erupts differently to it's giant neighbor.

@17 Yeah I think White Island is still private. Arises from the sulphur mining that used to occur there, until one day all the miners were gone :P

As Rodger says, I don't see any tremor at Ngauruhoe, only the usual mid-winter weather. It often looks like that on windy days. Sorry to disappoint!

@41 nooooooooooooooooo I want NZ to go active, so I don't have to fly across the planet to see active volcanoes :P

@ 41 mfs.. Thanks for the feedback. Just by chance, mfs, it sounds like you and Rodger know what you are talking about. Personally I would love to hear more about NZ's volcanoes if you are, um, closer to the source (perhaps not a very apt thing to say when I think about it) e.g. do you have any info about the small swarm under haroharo ? etc.

BTW, I'd still dispute the claim that it often looks like that on windy days. Raoul often looks like that, but as I mentioned above, just about every other day IS a windy day on Ngauruhoe and I honestly haven't seen it look like that before. I am not saying it is tremor (as otherwise Geonet would have issued a statement) just... well I guess I am just trying to save face by tripping over backwards. ;-)

Hi Bruce,

The gain settings (amplification) on each of the NZ volcanoes appears to be different (perhaps according to their levels of activity and also according to their sensitivity to wind, cultural noise, etc). I've watched them for a while as well. Since Ngauruhoe was showing some seismic activity the past few years, I take the GNS seismologists have that station running alittle "hot" so they don't miss anything. If you watch activity at Tongariro vs Ngauruhoe (which is actually a parasitic vent of Tongariro) you'll see what I mean. A good test of their sensitivity is to find a regional earthquake on all the seismograms, and then find out where it occurred in relation to each station. Typically, the regional event will be well recorded on the Ngauruhoe station and rather weak on the nearby Tongariro station (If the amplification of both stations were identical, a regional event should appear nearly identical in size and with similar waveforms).
If you want to see what tremor looks like at a NZ volcano, keep an eye on White Island. There is usually low level tremor there which ebbs and flows over time, sometimes grading into discrete low-frequency earthquakes,...saw that last month in fact!

Rodger

Thank you to everyone who helped clear up this Ngauruhoe webicorder noise observation - I've updated the post to reflect the consensus that it reflects wind in the area. Good to keep us on our toes, eh?

Bruce @ 43,
I might be closer than you but still pretty far (Tasmania). I spend a couple of weeks working in NZ most years and have been keeping a regular eye on Ngauruhoe since the earthquake swarm that happened a couple of years ago. I remember seeing very thick traces quite often in the past and it's always been attributed to weather. Just like Taranaki seismometers used to be near the North Egmont park entrance and showed road traffic noise regularly during opening hours.
If any new activity occurs, the Geonet website is usually pretty much on the ball and issuing alert bulletins at short notice.

I wouldn't be too concerned about that Gorely volcano. It sounds like a girly volcano to me.

Profile View of Eyj/Kat quakes 19th to 21st.

http://i50.tinypic.com/ncicqu.png

Zoomed in Plan View, same color codes for depth, Eyj only. Shows a good layout of the shallow quakes.

http://i45.tinypic.com/mq2k3.png

Ref my last [48], the 2nd graphic has a "Kat" label, ignore it. I forgot to yank it out when I slewed the graph to the plan view.

@49: Thanks, Bud!
Deep pressure continues from below.

Eyjaf eruption rolls along at low throttle. Surficial EQ from peripheral icecap melting and steam flashing with gas bumping.

And.. since I'm doing a slight hiatus from the Oilcano...

15 Minute Quake energy (all quakes from en.vedur.is/earthquakes-and-volcanism/earthquakes/ site, updated to 22 June.

http://i47.tinypic.com/qoevrc.png

Mike @34 Hi, I'm big into the effect volcano eruptions have on weather intensity and cloud formation.

According to this write-up by Joe D'Aleo of http://icecap.us/ fame...

http://www.intellicast.com/Community/Content.aspx?a=223

Redoubt blew over a dozen times to 60-65,000 ft plus and that calculates to 12+ miles.

I keep seeing other climate related data being altered or even hidden by certain agencies, won't go into that, but I'm just plenty curious. For example, much of the past raw Zurich solar cycle data at NASA now cannot be retrieved. Redoubt is suddenly missing from the Smithsonian Holocene list... like what's going on? I want to know. Thx

Love this blog btw!

@Ed Murphy[52]

Have you tried SIDC as an alternate source of Solar Cycle data? It's the Royal Observatory of Belgium and is sort of responsible for keeping a tally of some of that data.

sidc.be/index.php

Kp and AP indexes can be found here : www.ngdc.noaa.gov/stp/geomag/kp_ap.html

And, if you want to see something really stupid...

http://i49.tinypic.com/i39wlt.jpg

This is a plot of the end of Cycle 23 and the start of Cycle 24. According to SIDC, the cycle began on 12/13/2007 when the first reversed polarity spot appeared. The red line is the monthly SSN of an average cycle (derived from the previous 23 cycles at that particular month in the cycle) and the yellow traces are 1 standard deviation above and below that value. Theoretically, 64% of the time whatever monthly SSN you happen to have should be between the two yellow curves. (standard deviation was also derived from previous 23 cycles)

Eh.. it's late. Sorry for the OT.

Has Mount Egmont had any tremours over recent time, that one is long overdue. Beautiful shape with the flat plane around it. And that volcano is out of line with all the others in the North island system

Thank you Erik for the kind words.....

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Tuesday Tidbits: Testing the volcano-earthquake connection in Chile ... and more!

eklemetti — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 09:14:01 +0000

Tuesday Tidbits: Testing the volcano-earthquake connection in Chile ... and more!

Some news for a busy Tuesday:

The crater at Poas volcano in Costa Rica, taken February 25, 2010. Image courtesy of OVSICORI by Federico Chavarria.

After the MSNBC debacle, it is nice to see some good articles on why the Chilean earthquake was overall less disastrous than the Haitian earthquake, why the tsunami wasn't as large as predicted and why these earthquakes are not abnormal. There are a lot of factors involved - the location, depth, preparedness, wealth - so the comparison can be very telling in terms of both geologic and societal issues.
The other scientific fallout from the Chilean earthquake will be a test of the volcano-earthquake connection suggested by Sebastian Watt in last year's EPSL article. According to Watt's (and others) research, we should expect to see an uptick in volcanic activity over the next year within 500 km of the epicenter of the earthquake - so watch places like Longavi, Descabezado Grande, Calabozos, Copahue, Chillan and Lonquimay amongst many others.
Remember the spiders on Mt. Saint Helens, used to monitor the volcano? Well, they will be spreading to Chile to help monitor Chaiten. Two spiders will be set up on the rhyolite dome system to monitor changes in the domes - looking at seismic activity, deformation and explosions in the caldera.
Dr. Boris Behncke has updated us on some of the volcanic activity in Costa Rica - including a phreatic eruption at Poas last week and increasing seismicity at Irazu. More on the earthquakes at Irazu can be read here. There is also a great set of aerial images of Poas and Arenal taken recently that were posted by OVSICORI.
Eruptions reader Thomas Wipf left a link to a great video of Sakurajima in Japan erupting on January 16, 2010. Definitely worth the four minutes to see an impressive explosive eruption.
It seems that activity at Mayon has settled down significantly as well, with PHIVOLCS lowering the alert status to Level 1 (of 3). Only about 5 volcanic earthquakes are occurring daily at Mayon and that the overall activity suggests a return to "normalcy". However, they do warn people to be careful in lahar-prone drainages near the volcano considering all the new, loose volcaniclastic material on the slopes of Mayon.

eklemetti Tue, 03/02/2010 - 04:14

I remember something about the spiders at Mt. St. Helens, but I have forgotten what they are. Will someone please let me know what they are? Yes, I know they are a monitoring device, I just don't know what kind. :-)

It will be an interesting watch to see what happens in the next few months with the volcanoes around the area of the quake. As John Seach said, there are 21 active volcanoes near the quake and aftershock areas which runs for 600km. A lot to watch. I just hope nothing big happens that will do a lot of damage. They have been hit pretty hard. But it would be nice if one erupted just enough to put on a show.

Diane - Oops! I meant to link to a post on the spiders and forgot. I've now added a link. Sorry!

Thanks Erik. I scanned the article and now I what they are doing. It is unfortunate that the quake has put off the placing of the "spiders". They need them.

Chilean Quake May Have Shortened Earth Days
ScienceDaily (Mar. 2, 2010) â
The Feb. 27 magnitude 8.8 earthquake in Chile may have shortened the length of each Earth day.

"the quake should have moved Earth's figure axis (the axis about which Earth's mass is balanced) by 2.7 milliarcseconds (about 8 centimeters, or 3 inches)."

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/03/100302084522.htm

Follow-up news story to the NPR link explaining the mis-read of tsunami severity, see: 'Scientists Defend Tsunami Warning', linked at the bottom of the webpage cited by Erik in his blog post. Salient points:

'Those models could be more accurate if scientists had more deep-water sensors and could build coastal inundation models for vast parts of the Pacific Rim where the topography hasn't yet been well-surveyed, Wang said.'

'Because complete data doesn't exist for every coastal area, scientists must play it safe in their wave predictions, he said.'

Ain't necessarily so. Coastal topology information (satellite and surveyed) is more than sufficient to model general inundation patterns over a stepped progression of wave and land elevations along high-value coastal segments. Deep water sensor network data capture can be boosted using relatively new network refining algorithm techniques like Compressed Sensing and Compressive Cooperative Sensing and Mapping in Mobile Networks.

These modeling and data enrichment exercises are important tools needed to forecast risk potential from large rogue waves and severe storm events.

OTOH, local officials should consider convening meetings to address what the issue a 'false alarm' on forecast wave-heights.

Emergency response management personnel should evaluate public response compliance to the evacuation order using a variety of data gathering instruments. The results provide important feedback to the ERM community because these severe wave events are sparse. Model refinement and validation by the forecast community is going to take time; meanwhile, Tsunami warning center officials will necessarily be conservative in their event forecasts.

By reinforcing understanding of the tsunami warning system limitations and briefing the public on success of local response, officials can underscore the importance of this learning and training exercise for forecasters and the affected public.

The broadcast warnings and large-scale evacuations in dozens of countries along the Pacific Rim on Saturday was *not a wasted effort* on the part of the public, thus avoiding the dangerous misconception that it was another 'science failure'.

Erik, I always see your blog and comment here... and I want to Inform you all the mess that there's here in Chile
I was Camping when the earthquake happened, when it stopped i called my parents and told them i was ok and that i had talked with some friends from far cities from me, and they felt it.... so it was really big!
I study Geology and When i felt the earthquake i knew there was a Tsunami Alert and all the troubles it will cause, so i called all the ppl i could and told'em RUN TO THE MOUNTAIN FOR SECURITY.
I was in the mountain near a lake, even the lake had a Tsunami and the water level is 60 cms less
This earthquake is CATASTROPHIC, I study in CONCEPCION, and was supposted i was going to star classes this 15th, now The city is a Jungle, People steals, kill , theres no light, water, gas, food. I dont know about my friends, and my apartment.
Afortunately I am with my family, but the situation of the Country is a mess.

Well i can write much more, but i have electricity and internet problems
The country will stand up!!! :)

Thanks for the update, Manuel. It is good to point out that although Chile did weather this larger earthquake much better than Haiti, it doesn't mean that there wasn't widespread devastation to the country. Don't forget that when it comes to supporting Chile and its recovery.

I am all for warnings being given for any possibility of widespread death and destruction. What were they supposed to do...ignore it until they actually saw the Tsunami? I think a lot of scientists are afraid to be the first to say anything when they see a threat, they don't want to look bad if the event doesn't materialize. I think the guys that made the call on the Tsunami did the only thing they could do and still be able to sleep at night.

Jon Stewart says it all:

http://www.thedailyshow.com/ check "the uninformant"

The papers report the same as Manuel, the city of Conception "is a jungle" so although the damage done by the quake is unimaginable, in the final analysis it may be that the greatest damage done will prove to be the one by humans. As if the natural disaster wasn't enough! :(

question for the community. Does it appear that the great quakes along the Nazca subduction zone are trending towards the north? If so, then the next big stress relief event might be much closer to Santiago, some number of decades from now.

Very nice Sakurajima movie! It's a pity Mt Pinatubo
didn't wait 19 more years. The media coverage is so
much better now :)

Scientists say tsunami models should be tested.
APNews, 01Mar.

Talking Points:
-The South American coast has few monitoring points than does the US Coast, particularly in the north, near Alaska.
- 'Had he been asked a week ago whether a magnitude 8.8 earthquake in Chile would cause a destructive tsunami in Hawaii, "I would have said, 'Unquestionably. It's going to be a bad scene,"' (Gerard Fryer, a geophysicist at the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Hawaii, former faculty UH)

- Two models in use at the NOAA Pacific Ocean Tsunami Center (http://nctr.pmel.noaa.gov/) underestimated wave strength. While the models over-estimated wave strength and dwell interval, scientists point to model data inputs error in estimated quake and overlying coastal waters depth, approx 100 km from shore.
- Modeling wave energy dissipation is computationally expensive and therefore, ignored at present. Modeling wave interval period is difficult if the model inputs are incorrect.

Pacific Ocean 'like a shaken bath', says tsunami expert.
AAP, 28February 28

Other national tsunami warning centers were also very cautious in their issues warnings for coastal seas and 'built' environments.

'Mr Hainsworth (scientist at JATWC) said Australia's distance from Chile would not matter when tsunami conditions arrived. "We're not expecting to see significant areas of land inundated (but) it could happen locally because of the shape of a bay or estuary or headland," he said.'

Australian Tsunami Warning System.
http://www.bom.gov.au/tsunami/about_atws.shtml

Australian Gov't/Geosciences Australia, tsunami model can be found by searching for the following web page:
ANUGA - hydrodynamic inundation modelling

The JATWC used estimated wave arrival times and descriptions of recreation/boating and 'rubbernecking' risks, avoiding wave height estimates in the series of warnings issues following the Chile 8.8 earthquake.

I live on the Gold Coast in Queensland Australia. We heard a tsunami warning that the tsunami would arrive around 815 a.m. By 930 nothing had happened so like a lot of other people around here I figured it was all over and went surfing. At about 1030 while out in the water I noticed a sudden surge in current activity which I later learned was the remains of the tsunami - the prediction of arrival time had been way off due to the effect of the outgoing tide which slowed it down. In the future I hope the predictions are more accurate.

The outgoing tide wouldn't have delayed tsunami waves, but it would have changed shallow water depth and hence available water mass along coastal shelves, harbors and bays. Guessing that you may not have been aware of the initial wave due to tidal effects and saw the second, larger wave arrive, instead.

I briefly considered (a) earth-moon distance (b) spring tide and (c) full moon effects, all present at the end of February. However, models would account for these effects.

Energy dissipation over distance must have been a factor, perhaps caused by poor early energy propagation that could not be sustained over distance. Large, short-lived tsunami waves are reported to have wiped out small coastal villages in Chile; there would have been little time for residents to respond to warnings. Buildings in these small coastal towns were not built to withstand major wave inundation. Photos posted on the net showed beached larger wooden fishing vessels and piled vehicles against apartment buildings, indicators of local tsunami wave energy.

Many tsunami models are rather new; we presume they are still undergoing factor adjustments (or learning-algorithm refinement) as event history catalog grows since model inception.

Question: Did this quake make the recurrence of
http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1868_Arica_earthquake more or less likely, more or less destructive, or did the seismic gap mentioned in the article vanish in Southern Peru earthquake in 2000s? Imho, a thing to look into.

@Passerby: Coastal areas are not necessarily well mapped and no satellite instrument I know of can measure the depth of the water - no, you do the mapping by a variety of techniques including towing sonar fish. For deeper water some areas have been mapped by submarines using their sonar. The vast majority of the oceans remains unmapped though. As for deep sea gauges, there really aren't all that many of them considering the size of the ocean and such remote gauges tend to report fairly sparsely since they tend to use a public and generally very low bandwith channel on certain satellites (so communication is essentially free for the user).

The CALIPSO instrument may be able to map very shallow waters if the atmospheric conditions are good, but the coverage is not sufficient to provide good topographical maps.

At any rate, unless the models have a long history of being correct, the best thing to do is move away if there is a possibility of a tsunami. Very frequently there is barely a rise in the water level, but you sure don't want to be there if you get a big wave. It may be possible to refine these models using empirical data rather than through more detailed topography - but that would take many decades since the vast majority of quakes do not cause a noticeable tsunami. As for the "need more sensors, need better topography" - that may very well be something in the "not practical" box. Climate predictors always claim they need more of this and that data (and that if they only had more good data they'd get better results - a claim I simply do not believe) but it's such a huge task to raise the money for any large instrumentation project.

A potential confounding factor in forecasting estimated water depth over the EQ epicenter is proximity to the Chile-Peru Trench, 165km off the coast.

See: Wikipedia, Peru-Chile Trench

Example of a bathymetric map resource, Chile (one of many bath map repositories with archived bath maps holdings, offshore South America/Chile and Argentina_)
See: USGS CMG InfoBank Atlas, Chile bathymetry

Number of tsunami events per year.
'During the 101-year period from 1900 to 2001, 796 tsunamis were observed or recorded in the Pacific Ocean according to the Tsunami Laboratory in Novosibirsk. 117 caused casualties and damage most near the source only; at least nine caused widespread destruction throughout the Pacific. The greatest number of tsunamis during any 1 year was 19 in 1938, but all were minor and caused no damage. There was no single year of the period that was free of tsunamis.

The distribution of tsunami generation is as follows: 17% of the total tsunamis were generated in or near Japan, South America, 15%: New Guinea Solomon Islands, 13%; Indonesia, 11%; Kuril Islands and Kamchatka, 10%; Mexico and Central America, 10%; Philippines, 9%; New Zealand and Tonga, 7%; Alaska and West Coasts of Canada and the United States, 7%; and Hawaii, 3%.'

Searchable on-line tsunami database, 2000-2008.
NOAA/WDC Tsunami Event Database

A casual Google check, using the search term 'Seismic Imaging and Bathymetry of The Central Chile Margin', yields a useful list of recent and relevant publications.

We've been speculating about some possible volcanic activity following the great Chile earthquake, but now it seems the action is returning to Iceland.

There is something serious happening under Icelandâs EyjafjallajÃ¶kull, a small, glacier-covered volcano immedately to the west of Katla volcano. I donât know enough Icelandic to understand what the following newspaper bit says, but it contains words like âgosiÃ°â, which means âvolcanic eruptionâ, not referring only to the most recent eruption of this volcano, in 1821-1823.

http://www.mbl.is/mm/frettir/innlent/2010/03/03/stodugir_smaskjalftar/

Plus, the Icelandic Meteorological Officeâs seismicity map shows intense seismic activity in the area of the volcano:

http://en.vedur.is/earthquakes-and-volcanism/earthquakes/

http://en.vedur.is/earthquakes-and-volcanism/earthquakes/myrdalsjokull/

Boris I also found this:
http://hraun.vedur.is/ja/skyrslur/contgps/node19.html

I also found this:
Magma ascent at coupled volcanoes: Episodic magma injection at Katla and EyjafjallajÃ¶kull ice-covered volcanoes in Iceland and the onset of a new unrest episode in 2009
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2009AGUFM.V32B..03S

Katla and EyjafjallajÃ¶kull "are coupled"?

@Boris, thanks for those links. They are having some serious activity. Seems that they are having several swarms that go from one area to another. I don't know enough about Iceland to know if they are connected (my guess is they could be just because the way the island is)or not, but it is interesting to follow.

I noticed, too, that Brevard College is planning their Iceland tour which is a camping and hiking tour and it lasts for about two weeks or so. Wish I was 20 again so I could go. I would love to do that, but out of the question. Some of you who can may be interested in it as you can get college credits for going.

I have seen some of the damage the tsunami did to Chile and I really feel for those people. They are having to arm themselves against looters and are having a real problem with that. Let's think good thoughts towards the people who have to deal with the all the difficulties and are doing the best they can.

Did I misunderstand something or are Katla and EyjafjallajÃ¶kull part of an approximately 10-km wide and 700 m deep caldera under the MyrdalsjÃ¶kull ice cap?
http://www.acsys.it/volume/php/home.php?&id=8

First, comment on a slightly misguided viewpoint on earthquake engineering, building codes and building materials written by DB Marron, finance professional and visiting professor, Georgetown U Public Policy Institute, published in the Christian Science Monitor.

The Chilean earthquake, at 8.8, is an example of the upper bounds of earthquake engineering protection capacity. Mr Marron's observation that building material quality is just as likely to be a factor as building code enforcement in the relatively low loss of life and urban damage, is valid.

A quick Google check reveals that, not surprisingly, Chile's population has more than doubled since the 1960 earthquake (following global population trends). There has also been rapid growth in Chilean urban centers as more people have moved to cities seeking employment and better living conditions with increasing national wealth since the mid-1980s that saw Chile substantially outperforming it's continental neighbors in economic development.

Strong economic expansion, mostly in natural resources exports, fueled an upward trend in GDP through 1999, with a slightly reduced growth rate in recent years, driving infrastructure development - mostly in urban centers - and accentuating a growing gap in wealth between rich and poor, and ethnic/cultural divisions in income and social supports.

Most of the nearly 800 deaths reported to date occurred in economically disadvantaged communities with substandard housing and Federal investment. The majority of damage was reported for older homes built before building code adoption, but more frequently, newer homes not built 'to code', of cheap materials, perhaps not due to corruption as the difficulty in broadly supplying and administering governmental services and oversight across a diverse economic and cultural spectrum of communities.

Mr Marron can bet that the global civil/structural, mechanical and geotechnical engineering community will be studying the effects of this earthquake on the Built Environment in Chile for lessons learnt. But there is also a strong likelihood that the power and communications engineering disciplines will also be peering at the aftermath, because there also important lessons on communication and power grid structures base that must be addressed in the rebuilding effort.

Boris: the Google translation points to elevated seismic activity associated with minor clustered tremors and not 'volcanic noise', perhaps associated with glacier movement. A similar activity pattern was evaluated at Katla and determined to be glacier-related, in a study published last year.

It is interesting to follow the Iceland earthquake activity. There has been a lot of small earthquakes under EyjafjallajÃ¶kull during the past weeks. As I understand it EyjafjallajÃ¶kull and Katla might have a coupling. According to Swedish wikipedia it was noticed that during the most recent eruptions of EyjafjallajÃ¶kull 1612 and 1821-1823, Katla erupted simultaneously (1612 and 1823). Well, almost at least.... According to Global volcanism program EyjafjallajÃ¶kull stopped erupting 1 jan 1823 and Katla started erupting June 26, 1823.

Sources:
http://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eyjafjallaj%C3%B6kull
http://www.volcano.si.edu/world/volcano.cfm?vnum=1702-02=
http://www.volcano.si.edu/world/volcano.cfm?vnum=1702-03=
http://iceland.vefur.is/iceland_nature/Volcanoes_in_Iceland/katla.htm

I'm looking forward to the papers that will posted on this topic, on the Volcanism blog tomorrow.

I found the webpage of a postdoc (Elske de Zeeuw-van Dalfsen) who had studied the EyjafjallajÃ¶kull volcano seismic swarm and uplift data from the 90s at this volcano (also data gathered from Katla), read through several of her references. Several studies suggest magma intrusion as a plausible explanation, but with reservations due to seismic signal migration southward and differing centroids for seismic signal and GPS uplift horizontal component.

DEFORMATION DUE TO MAGMA MOVEMENT AND ICE UNLOADING AT KATLA
VOLCANO, ICELAND, DETECTED BY PERSISTENT SCATTERER INSAR. (2007).

"We use both persistent scatterer and combined multi-
ple acquisition InSAR techniques to analyse ENVISAT
ASAR data acquired from September 2003 to July 2006,
and ERS data acquired between 1995 and 2003, to deter-
mine line-of-sight displacements for the area surrounding
Katla. The signal we see is consistent with a response to
ice unloading, and intrusion of magma or fluids is not re-
quired to explain the data. We donât, however, rule out
shallow intrusion beneath the caldera causing local de-
formation that is not visible on the volcano flanks. We
also identify possible local landsliding occurring on the
volcano flank"

A 2009 abstract (Earthquakes and Pre-Earthquake Processes
Conference, OrkugarÃ°ur, ReykjavÃk, October 2009) discusses these seismic episodes in terms of periodic E-W trending, 'pipe-like feeder channel' magmetic intrusion events.

See: INTERPRETING SEISMIC SIGNALS FROM ICELANDIC VOLCANOES.
KristÃn S. VogfjÃ¶rÃ°, Sigurlaug HjaltadÃ³ttir, Einar Kjartansson, Matthew J. Roberts, and Ragnar Slunga.

hraun.vedur.is/ja/jsr_2009/abstracts/pdf/kristin_vogfjord.pdf

speaking of glaciers and ice, I recall reading long ago that increased volcanism on Mt. Garibaldi (in B.C.) is associated with withdrawal of ice cover as the end of several ice ages. The implication being that reducing the mass on top of the volcano allowed it to erupt more easily and/or frequently. I'm not sure if this agrees with current theories, but it does make me curious about the effect that the current rapid retreat of glaciers on Mt. Rainier might have on its future behavior. But at least I was able to climb Mt. Rainier a couple of times in my distant youth, something that I am still kicking myself for not doing with Mt. St. Helens while it still had its symetrical summit.

Ice & Volcanoes. While there are a few interestingly deformed volcanoes born under ice such as Hoodoo Mtn and on Iceland, what would happen underneath a really thick cover such as those that occured during the Ice Ages? How large would an eruption have to be if it was to break through an ice cover ~1Â½ km thick? How would a really large eruption (VEI 6 or 7) "fare"? Are there any places on Earth where such a site has been exposed by the retreating ice?

Nice views into Kilauea Pit this am.. The lava surface fairly active with low level fountaining. Worth a look..

I found some information on the recent activity that I tryed to translate online. http://www.visir.is/article/20100304/FRETTIR01/578489653
The translator did not succes in translating all words, but it resulted in the following:

The minnstakosti six earthquakes urÃ°u under EyjafjallajÃ¶kull night, but all three on the Richter. Significantly has been smÃ¡skjÃ¡lfta on these grounds recently, but jarÃ°vÃsindamenn consider it not be gosÃ³rÃ³a, though jarÃ°skorpan seems to be something that Ã¾enjast. Source earthquake are all down to a depth of ten kilometers.

When I did linguistics for my MA, we did some Olde English and I've since had a bit of ditto Swedish, so I can make an (educated?) guess at a few of the words, Mattias:

"Smaskjalfta" = smÃ¥skalv = small quakes, "jarÃ°vÃsindamenn" ~Earth wisdom men = geophysisicists?, "jarÃ°skorpan" = jordskorpan = the (Earth's) crust, "Ã¾enjast" = tÃ¤njs = is stretched.

For future reference, it might be useful to know that "Ã°" is pronounced the same way as "th" in "this", whereas "Ã¾" is the "th" of thin. In Olde English, "EorÃ°an" was the name for the world and it is easy to see how this has developed into the modern Earth of English), jarÃ° of Icelandic & Jorden in Swedish.

Monday Musings: Ash from Soufriere Hills and lingering danger at Mayon

eklemetti — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 07:44:30 +0000

Monday Musings: Ash from Soufriere Hills and lingering danger at Mayon

A couple bits of news:

The ash plume from the February 11, 2010 eruption of Soufriere Hills taken by theAqua MODIS camera. Image courtesy of the NASA Earth Observatory.

Flights have been disrupted in the West Indies since last week with the large dome-collapse eruptions of Soufriere Hills on Montserrat. The 10 km / ~35,000 foot ash plume is apparently lingering in the air at commercial flight levels, meaning delays, cancellations or long detours for many flights in the area. Flights in and out of Dominica, Guadelope, Montserrat, Anguilla, St. Kitts and Nevis have all been effected by the ash from the volcano. The ash has also been a big problem, not surprisingly, on Montserrat itself, mostly making daily activities more difficult from breathing in the fine ash. The folks over at NASA caught a nice Aqua MODIS image of the erupting volcano on February 11 (see above).
It seems like only yesterday we were talking about the dangers of Mayon in the Philippines and now they are already worrying about opening the volcano back up to hikers. However, PHIVOLCS has made it clear that it is still not safe to enter the 6-km exclusion zone around the volcano as sulfur dioxide emissions from Mayon still remain elevated. This suggests that there is still degassing magma within the upper parts of the magmatic system.

eklemetti Mon, 02/15/2010 - 02:44

Awesome picture! That one really gives the scope of the eruption and just how big it was.

Erik, can you explain that big signal that the Yellowstone instruments picked up the other night? I did check to see if they had listed the magnitude and I couldn't find anything unusual.

BTW, in case you didn't see my post below, I got the book Volcanoes, Earthquakes and Tsunamis and I am enjoying the read. It's a very good book. Thanks for listing it.

Finally a clear day at Chaiten. It is still steaming away.
http://www.aipchile.cl/camara/location.php?locationID=34&cameraID=116

Yes, also SERNAGEOMIN's ChaitÃ©n caldera rim web cam shows a pretty clear view:
http://www2.sernageomin.cl/ovdas/ovdas7/webcam_chaiten.html

Wow, Boris, you have amazing sources. I didn't know about that webcam at all and have been following the shifting cloudscapes on the airport cam for nearly two years now! Thanks! What a view!

@Bruce, this close-up ChaitÃ©n webcam was actually installed very recently, but not much advertized. If you go to the Sernageomin website
http://www2.sernageomin.cl/ovdas/ovdas7/ovdas66.php
you'll find to the left a whole bunch of new webcams also for the volcanoes Llaima and Villarrica. Villarrica is nice to see at night because its lava lake is again producing quite a glow, which is strongly reflected in the gas plume.

oh I forgot to mention this - the lava lake in Kilauea's Halema'uma'u is back in action, if you check out the Overlook webcam you'll see a nice show
http://volcanoes.usgs.gov/hvo/cams/HMcam/

oh no! .. now I am going to need TWO new big monitors. cheers!

Boris, Thank you for the GREAT Chaiten link.
I visit the Kiluea cam several times a week and the view is great when the lava is flowing. I am hoping the hole fills and overflows.
Also, I find your Etna information very interesting. 14,000 tons of gas a day, WOW !! Be safe when she goes.

Re: Volcanoes, Earthquakes and Tsunamis - assume you're talking about Earthquakes, Volcanoes, and Tsunamis: Projects and Principles for Beginning Geologists by Levy and Salvadori. From the index, getting the impression it's pretty highlevel. Personally, I really like Volcanism by Schmincke and Volcanoes by Oppenheimer. Less known is Fundamentals of physical volcanology by Parfitt and Wilson, but a must for volcanomaniacs :) Pretty serious books, though, and be prepared you'll need your physics books from highschool again...

Guert - I think Diane is talking about this book:

http://www.amazon.com/Teach-Yourself-Volcanoes-Earthquakes-Tsunamis/dp/…

I recommend it for anyone who wants a straight forward book on volcanoes for the non-specialist/scientist.

@Erik, you are right. That is the book I got, the one by David A. Rothery. I like it.

@Guert: I didn't take highschool physics, but I did take two sememsters of physics as part of my course study when I got my two year degree in electron microscopy. The first part was physics 51, which did not transfer and the second semester was electron optics whic hdid transfer. One of the students who also took the course went to UC Berkeley and took physics 1A and 1B and it was identical to what we had.

So, I do have some scientific background so that helps me understand some of what is going on. A couple of things I had to do was 1)be able to look at an electron micrograph and tell you what I was looking at and what the function was and 2) be able to explain what an electron is doing when it is traveling down the column of a transmission electron microscope from the electron gun to the screen you are looking at. Another thing we did was do a quantitative analysis of Hexcel hip joint material. That was fun...NOT!

That course of study was not easy. It took me four years to do what was supposed to be a two year course! But I had a couple of things I wished I could do: look through an electron microscope and look at the stars from Mt Palomar. I did one. The other, well, that one is off the table. That's ok, though. I can just go to APOD and see what they have and that is good enough.

Hey Erik or Boris, I was adding to my list of megavolcanoes and I wondered do you have any info on Pastos Grandes and Cerro Guacha? I knew the Pastos Grandes was a megavolcano but wouldn't Cerro Guacha with 7000 cubic km be considered one too?

R Nix - very interested to see what your list looks like. Are you putting it together with an aim to publish something?

All - seen the great footage of the Italian "landslide" yet? Its a slide all right, and not at all like what the movies would have you think.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8517378.stm

I trust Boris's house was not in the path...

Fitz...who me publish something? Oh no...not me I will leave that to someone else;) Wow very cool video...talk about a mass wasting event!

@Fitz: yes, my house is still standing - it's on Etna's flank, which consists of vey permeable lavas and pyroclastics, so we don't have the same problems as in those areas where there's a lot of sedimentary rock, mainly clays and the likes. The spectacular movie that you refer to actually snows a landslide in Calabria, on the Italian mainland on the other side of the Messina Strait. But also here on the island of Sicily there's been quite impressive mass movement, well featured in this video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8rv91WTkL3E
Just to add an update, after one day of fine weather it's again raining in Sicily today. And the Italian government is still thinking of wasting incredible amounts of money to build a bridge over the Messina Strait, money that would be necessary to solve a hilarious number of burning issues first. But that's another story.
@Randall, a volume of 7000 cubic km certainly would classify Cerro Guacha as one of those gigantic systems, or megavolcanoes as you call it (actually a much better term than "supervolcanoes" because "mega" means "BIG"). Didn't find too much info about it and Pastos Grandes - some short info is here
http://volcano.oregonstate.edu/CVZ/guacha/index.html
http://volcano.oregonstate.edu/CVZ/pastosgrandes/index.html

Thanks Boris! There really isn't a lot out there about Guacha, Pasto Grandes, La Pacana, Coruto, Vilama or Capina and they all seem to qualify as megavolcanoes. I noticed they seem to have all went off around 5 - .6 million years ago but there isn't a lot of info out there on them. It must have truly resembled something like Tartarus during this time. I wonder if the eruptions of these megavolcanoes could have had a big enough influence on the weather to have had some influence on the accent of early hominids.

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My x-boyfriend thinks it shouldn't be done that way?. I think he's wrong.;)

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What is the purpose of this page if you don't mind me asking?

SI/USGS Weekly Volcano Report for 1/6-1/12/2010

eklemetti — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 08:11:18 +0000

SI/USGS Weekly Volcano Report for 1/6-1/12/2010

The weekly volcano report, brought to you by our friends at the Smithsonian Global Volcanism Program and the U.S. Geological Survey.

Highlights (not including Mayon, Nyamuragira and Turrialba):

Eruptions continue at Piton de la Fournaise on Reunion Island - heck, this would be the volcano news if it wasn't for all these other, more explosive systems getting in the way. Lava fountains, flows and pools were the order of the day in the SW Dolomieu crater until the 12th of January.
Chaiten in Chile continues to chug along - block-and-ash flows were seen and ash plumes continue to emanate from the three new domes growing in the caldera.
Strombolian activity and lava flows march on at Kliuchevskoi in Russia's Kamchatka Peninsula.
Pyroclastic flows continued along the N and NW flanks of Soufriere Hills on Montserrat, along with a 150-m lobe of new lava that was spotted at the summit dome.
Finally, Santa MarÃa's Santiaguito dome in Guatemala produced incandescent avalanches and ~3.2 km / 10,500 foot ash plumes.

eklemetti Thu, 01/14/2010 - 03:11

Something interesting is happening at Halema'uma'u (Kilauea volcano, Hawai'i) - the lava lake returned triumphantly to the active pit last night, and now it is filling virtually the entire field of the Halema'uma'u Overlook webcam:
http://volcanoes.usgs.gov/hvo/cams/HMcam/
This may indicate that the lava lake has risen higher than it has - if I remember correctly - at any time since activity came back to Halema'uma'u in 2008.
In any case, check it out while you can, it's quite impressive.

Following the tiltmeter and gps information it seems that an eruption is building. Did i read the info correctly?
Is the tilt increasing and the gps readings just begining to draw apart?
Thanks,
Best!motsfo

Just a quick question - per the Discovery Channel program on Vesuvius this past month - can the earthquakes at Yellowstone produce the same type of compression on the magma to produce an eruption? The program stated that they theorize that seismic waves compress the magma and force it to the "top" and out of the volcano. Could this happen at Yellowstone?

Was kliuchevoskoi's last eruption on October 16, 2008? I have a project on Kliuchevoskoi and I have to make a model of it. Details and general information would be very much appreciated. I'll continue to research the matter.

Thanks!

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Wednesday Whatzits: Haiti, Tungurahua erupts, Martian lava flows and a pile of updates

eklemetti — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 09:42:39 +0000

Wednesday Whatzits: Haiti, Tungurahua erupts, Martian lava flows and a pile of updates

Somehow I haven't posted a bunch of interesting items collected over the last few weeks, so I need to catch up. A pre-emptive hat tip to everyone who has sent me links or notes that might seem familiar in this post.

Tungurahua in Ecuador erupting in 2000.

First off, those of you looking for information on the Haitian earthquake that devastated the capitol Port Au Prince, Highly Allochthonous has post on the tectonics of the quake. Right now, it is hard for me to come up with a worse location in terms of devastation for a quake to have hit in the Caribbean Basin.
Back in volcano news, a lot of the eruptions that were in the news last week have settled down - or at least stayed the same. PHIVOLCS lowered the alert at Mayon to Level 2 (from 3) based on the reduced seismicity and volcanic gas emissions - but they offered the usual caveat that the volcano may go back up to 3 at any moment. Meanwhile, Turrialba in Costa Rica continues to give off copious gas emissions but no repeat of the explosions from last week. There is a report by OVSICORI on the changes in the crater (albeit as a PDF in Spanish). Nyamuragira also continues to erupt, but the eruption is diminishing, with lava flows reaching down the slopes but still within the Virunga National Park.
We had been hearing rumblings that Tungurahua in Ecuador was coming back to life and overnight the volcano erupted. The volcano had already been experiencing explosions and earthquakes, but this eruption produced a 3 km / ~10,000 foot ash column along with reports of lava at the summit. No one was injured in the eruption.
The NASA Earth Observatory has posted a number of great images over the last couple of weeks, including the plume (and tephra deposits) of the Gaua eruption in Vanuatu and a stunner of a shot taken above Soufriere Hills, showing all the new pyroclastic deposits formed since the volcano made a comeback this fall.
If you're looking for extraterrestrial volcanism, NASA Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter team posted an image of lava flows in the Athabasca Valles. The shot shows evidence of phreatic cones (eruptions with a large water component) along with 100 meter deep lava flows.

eklemetti Wed, 01/13/2010 - 04:42

Once more, the tragedy within the tragedy is that the Haiti earthquake does not really come as a surprise for geologists: less than 2 years ago, at the 18th Caribbean Geological Conference, a group led by University of Texas geologist Paul Mann warned of an earthquake of up to M 7.2 right in the area now stricken by disaster:
http://www.ig.utexas.edu/jsg/18_cgg/Mann3.htm

No further comment

That is quite the report, Boris. It is sad to think that Haitian officials might have known that an event like this could very likely happen, but lack any resources to mitigate against it.

Reasonably strong SO2 signal coming off of Mount Nyamuragira

Aver. long. : 24.6 deg.
Aver. latit. : -0.9 deg.
Aver. sza : 37.5 deg.
Max. SO2 vcd : 15.3 DU

http://sacs.aeronomie.be/alert/?alert=20100113_153001_001

Geologists may have warned about the possibility of a quake like this, but now it is a moot point. Thing is, they need help and need it now and it is going to take some time to get the help there. Fortunately, there are several nations who are rising to the occassion to get the help there and that is the bright spot. Since they had very little infrastructure, not much could have been done to prepare for something like this.

Let's all remember them in our thoughts and prayers.

Can anyone else see the Easter Island face carving in that eruption plume (complete with the round stone on top)? :) Obviously the pagan gods are angry about something again...

Yep. I see it now that you mention it, MadScientist. As for pagan gods? I don't believe in them. Cool pic, though.

MadScientist: Maybe they're telling us that old Thor Heyerdahl was right all along in his theory that the Polynesian Islanders came from South America :o)

So Doc, What is the eruption looking thing north and east of of Port-au-Prince/ it sure looks like a lava flow at night.

We noticed what looks like lava NE of Port-au-Prince tonight as well. We are stationed at the airport and had a good view. Big debate among the Soldiers here is whether it is actually lava or not. Don't believe there is an active volcano in Haiti- could it be coming up from cracks that were formed by the earthquake? We would love your insight.

I saw something about this topic on TV last night. Good article.

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Thursday Throwdown: Turrialba, Mayon and the latest USGS/GVP Weekly Report

eklemetti — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 07:07:45 +0000

Thursday Throwdown: Turrialba, Mayon and the latest USGS/GVP Weekly Report

The steam plume from Turrialba on December 26, 2009. Image by Eruptions reader Sahrye Cohen.

Turrialba
Costa Rican officials extended the evacuation zone around Turrialba from 3 to 6 km, raising the alert status at the volcano to Yellow. Vanessa Rosales of the National Emergency Commission described the seismicity as "intense but low," but says the country is prepared to deal with the emergency. As always, the news chooses oddly what is the "news" of an event, and many article on Turrialba focus on Costa Rica's coffee - yes, it is safe, so far. A news report from the Tico Times quotes Raul Mora of the University of Costa Rica as saying that lava isn't likely from Turrialba - I'm guessing he was trying to say it will be explosive - but the article takes it as a comfort that this won't be like Hawai`i. It seems the steam plume from Turrialba was prominent in the weeks before this week's ash explosion. Eruptions reader Sahrye Cohen sent a picture of Turrialba taken on 12/26 (above) showing the steam plume coming from the volcano.

Mayon
Mayon seems to be following the tried-and-true pattern of up-and-down for signs of an eruption (is this surprising? Not in the least.) Activity spiked at the volcano in the last day - it appears that the seismicity has increased again, but PHIVOLCS is keeping the alert status at "3" (down from "4".) The steam plume from the volcano has caused alarm in the Albay region, but likely, even if the volcano does not erupt again, the plume will remain. However, even the "small" eruption of Mayon can have a significant effect on the local economy, with fears that this activity at Mayon will stop people from investing in project at Lezpagi City.

Finally, we have a new USGS/GVP Weekly Volcano Report. We've been hearing a lot about Mayon, Turrialba, Nyamuragira and Galeras, but the last week also saw continued eruptions at Piton de la Fournaise, Indonesia's Rinjani, Ecuador's Tungurahua and pyroclastic flows at Soufriere Hills. A lot to keep track of if you're scoring at home.

eklemetti Thu, 01/07/2010 - 02:07

Wednesday Whatzits: Mayon and Redoubt Quieten, Nyamuragira news and more on Turrialba

eklemetti — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 09:33:22 +0000

Wednesday Whatzits: Mayon and Redoubt Quieten, Nyamuragira news and more on Turrialba

Two volcanoes down, two volcanoes up!

Fire fountain on Nyamuragira in the Congo, January 2010.

Down
Mayon
Activity at Mayon has continues to drop - although PHIVOLCS warns that an eruption could happen at any moment and without much warning. About a quarter of the evacuated families have no returned home since PHIVOLCS gave the OK to return home on January 2 - but Philippine officials are still on alert in case evacuations have to be reinstated.

Redoubt
The resurgent Redoubt is no long ... er ... resurging? AVO lowered the alert status to Green - meaning normal/background levels of activity. Seismicity and degassing have both returned to typical background states for the volcano. So much for Redoubt.

Up
Nyamuragira
The eruption of Nyamuragira in the Congo is still going strong. The AP posted some video of the sheet of fire fountaining coming from the fissure vent on the southern flank of the volcano while ITN captured video of a small cone building around one of the vents. It appears that multiple areas on the volcano are issuing lava and gases, so it seems like a significant event. Two days ago the lava flows had already travelled over 4 km. And in a bit of a "huh?" moment, UN troops are being used to protect the endangered chimpanzee in the area from the eruption. If you want some context for Virunga National Park and the significance of the area, you can check out a couple articles written by other ScienceBloggers on Nyamuragira and the Congo.

Turrialba
Finally, to follow up on yesterday's news that Turrialba is erupting for the first time in over 100 years, the ComisiÃ³n Nacional de Emergencias in Costa Rica has put the volcano on a "medium level" alert after the ash explosion on Tuesday. Fifty people have so far been evacuated from the slopes of the volcano as a precaution.

eklemetti Wed, 01/06/2010 - 04:33

Eruption update for 1/4/2009: Mayon, Nyamuragira, Galeras, Kilauea and Redoubt

eklemetti — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 21:07:02 +0000

Eruption update for 1/4/2009: Mayon, Nyamuragira, Galeras, Kilauea and Redoubt

A pile of news for the new week!

The glow of new lava flows from Nyamuragira in the Congo, taken from the Virunga Park Headquarters, January 2, 2010.

Mayon
PHIVOLCS may lower the alert status at Mayon to Level 2 after almost a week of lower seismicity and no ash explosions since December 29th. Schools that were being used as evacuation centers were also returned to teachers and students for the start of classes after the Christmas holiday. However, the Albay provincial government is now considering a plan to permanently move everyone who lives within the 6-km danger zone around Mayon, even if the volcano no longer shows signs of eruption.

Nyamuragira
Over in the Congo, Nyamuragira continues to erupt. The United Nations has been called in to help monitor the situation from the air - mostly to make sure officials in the Congo know where the lava is going in the Virunga National Park and whether it might become a threat to the city of Goma. Some villages near the volcano are now coming under threat from the lava flows, but thus far, no injuries have been reported. Kenyan TV has posted some great video of the rift eruption that is producing tall fire fountains of the especially low viscosity (unlike what the video says) high-potassium basalts erupted from Nyamuragira. These high K lavas are so low in viscosity thanks to the potassium breaking the bonds in the silica network that makes up most magmas that erupt on Earth - so even though basalts are usually quite runny, the basalts from Nyamuragira are especially so - thus, the ability to flow tens of kilometers from the vent.

Galeras
Jumping across the Atlantic, Galeras has settled down after its impressive explosive eruption over the weekend. INGEOMINAS lowered the alert level at Galeras on Sunday after signs of more explosions dissipated. However, considering how unexpected Saturday's eruption was, people should stay on alert for more activity. Some more video of the eruption clearly shows lightning as well as the eruption plume during Saturday's big boom.

Redoubt
One more continent! Redoubt in Alaska seems to also be coming down from its late 2009 signs of life. Currently, AVO reports that "seismic activity at Redoubt Volcano remains low" and only a faint steam plume is visible when not obscured by clouds. Seems like Redoubt was just teasing us for attention.

Kilauea
Say, did you know that January is Volcano Awareness Month? It is ... at least in Hawai`i. Not that anyone who lives in the big island wouldn't be aware of the volcanoes of the state, but rather HVO is holding a month's worth of educational features to help educate the public on the wonders and hazards of the world's most closely watched volcano. This month also marks the 27th anniversary of the start of the current eruption of Kilauea - you can also see video of the current activity at the Haleuma`uma`u crater, including the draining of the lava lake that occurred last week.

eklemetti Sun, 01/03/2010 - 16:07

Nyamuragira is also ejecting an interesting amount of SO2: http://satepsanone.nesdis.noaa.gov/pub/OMI/OMISO2/blowup_drag_ME.html

Hmm... Tungurahua shows a little SO2 cloud today as well. Washington VAAC concurs with this.

I have a question about SO2 and CO2. It seems SO2 is the one measured most of the time. Is CO2 released along with the SO2? I thought it was as well as other gases. My DH and I think that a lot of the "global warming" talk takes what humans are releasing as the main "cause" when volcanoes, erupting or not, release far more than any of the industrial activity going on. Are there any reports of how much CO2 volcanoes are emitting? I know SO2 is one of the most dangerous because of the acid rain and other things it causes, but the CO2 shouldn't be ignored because there is a tree kill zone in Long Valley because of the CO2 coming out of the ground there. Then there is the Norris Basin in Yellowstone. So I am just wondering about the amounts of CO2 being released.

Thanks for any info.

Any info that disproves something about global warming is ignoring by those who beleive in it and thrown under the rug. Tell Al Gore about that and see what nonsense he spews out. And they call that science when you disregard some facts and tell other people lies. That is a Psedoscience like Astrology! As for Co2 they know volcanoes produce way more CO2 then humans do but they just ignore that fact or try to tell you it does not matter.

Actually, I am more interested in how much volcanoes produce than what the "global warming" people say. And what other kinds of gases are produced by them. I mean you can be killed by some of those gases if you don't wear a gas mask if you are near them.

I know the Al Gores etal are telling a lot of nonsense. That came out recently and I think it was really funny that it snowed in Copenhagen during the conference. Yeah, it was warm. Yeah, right! I could say more about it, but this is not the place.

So any info about the amount of gases some of the volcanoes are releasing would be interesting to me. I could compare SO2 with CO2 emissions and learn something.

It's a lot more then humans produce by burning fossil fuels I can tell you that.

Redoubt now lowered to green.

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The 2009 Pliny for Volcanic Event of the Year goes to ...

eklemetti — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 02:46:45 +0000

The 2009 Pliny for Volcanic Event of the Year goes to ...

2009 is over! If you missed the Volcanic Year in Review, check out my summary of the volcanic events that captivated many of us over the past year. However, only one event will get the coveted 2009 Pliny for Volcanic Event of the Year. A lot of you wrote in with votes and comments - I thank you - and a number of events stood out in your mind. Here we go:

Honorable mention
A few volcanic events got multiple votes:
- Soufriere Hills on Montserrat.
- Mando Hararo in Ethiopia.
- Chaiten, Chile and the new research on the eruption.
- The earthquakes in western Saudi Arabia under the Harrat Lunayyir volcanic field.

The Top 5
4 (tied): West Mata and Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai

Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai erupting in March 2009.
It seems oddly fitting that two submarine volcanic eruptions tied for 4th. Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai eventually became subaerial, but West Mata showed us the first real explosive volcanism caught on camera in deep ocean conditions.

3: Mayon, Philippines

Mayon erupting with lava flows from the summit dome, December 2009.
Possibly the last year activity helped boost its placing, but a large Mayon eruption would be a significant event no matter what. While that hasn't happened just yet, over 50,000 people have been evacuated and lava flows are cascading down the sides of the picturesque Philippine volcano. Look for Mayon to make news well into 2010.

2: Redoubt, Alaska

Redoubt erupting on March 28, 2009. Image courtesy of AVO/USGS, taken by Tricia Joy Sadler.
The eruption of Redoubt got our attention in January and didn't let go for months - will it erupt? When will it erupt? How big will it be? When all was said and done (?), the eruption was relatively minor - the Anchorage airports were only briefly closed and the oil production in the area has resumed (albeit with the Drift River Oil Terminal closed for good). However, the lasting legacy of Redoubt might be how closely this event was monitored from start to finish by the Alaska Volcano Observatory - and how much information they put out for public consumption (via Twitter no less). Redoubt was the first 21st century, digital age volcanic eruption ... and it might not be over.

The 2009 Pliny winner for Volcanic Event of the Year

Sarychev Peak, Russia

Sarychev Peak erupting in June 2009, taken from the ISS.
It might have come out of the blue - it might not have even lasted as long as other eruptions in 2009, but it was the images of the Sarychev Peak eruption that captured out imagination. The sequence of pictures taken of the plume from the International Space Station might be the most stunning images of a volcanic eruption ever taken and the plethora of satellite images of the eruption collected by the NASA Earth Observatory let us see the mammoth eruption in all its splendor. The eruption wreaked havoc on transpacific flights over the Kuril Islands for weeks - but it is fascinating that an eruption that took place near almost no one has ended up being seen by almost everyone.

Happy 2010 to all my Eruptions readers ... !

eklemetti Thu, 12/31/2009 - 21:46

Happy new 2010 to everybody and Congratulations to Sarychev, a volcano that I am sure fully deserved being "the volcano of the year". Not only because it featured spectacularly in one of the most spectacular volcano photos ever taken, but also because it was a BIG eruption - a far cry maybe from ChaitÃ©n or Pinatubo, but probably among the most voluminous eruptions of the year.
Now let's see what volcanic events the new year will bring ... Mayon seems to be dropping out of sight for the moment (but I remember during its 1984 eruption it came back spectacularly after about one week of very low level activity, and also in 1993 and 2001 there were significant pauses in the activity).

i appreciate Your considering Redoubt as the Volcano of the Year. i live across Cook Inlet and my little grandson lives 70 miles south of me and had a clear view of one of the more spectacular eruptions and happened to be out in his yard talking to me on a cell phone. He was quite concerned and was telling me all about it......"Mots, Mots..... it's scary scary!" as the hugh black cloud exploded upward. i couldn't see a thing; being too close and having a cloudy sky. It's alright, It's Ok, It's going to be ok, i tried to console the little guy...... He turned to the rest of the crowd and announced releaved...."Mots says it's going to be ok." with total relief. ........

Later i caught a film of that particular explosion........
it WAS SCARRY SCARRY! i don't think my grandmother could have convinced me that it was going to be all right!

What undeserved power we have.
Happy New Year, Everyone!
Try to deserve the trust of our grandchildren.
Best!motsfo

Well, obviously this one had my vote; timing is everything. If the ISS had been 15 minutes earlier or an hour later, this growing eruption column would have been either missed or spread out. They caught in ascent; lucky and spectacular.

First new eruption of the year 2010: Piton de la Fournaise (RÃ©union Island, Indian Ocean). This event is announced on the web site of the RÃ©union island newspaper "Journal de l'Ã®le" (http://www.jir.fr/index.php?id_article=232698&page=article) and at http://www.fournaise.info/, whereas no news has yet been posted at the web site of the volcanological observatory of Piton de la Fournaise: http://www.ipgp.fr/pages/03030807.php

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2009: The Volcanic Year in Review

eklemetti — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 09:45:45 +0000

2009: The Volcanic Year in Review

Here it is, my attempt to recap a year's worth of volcanic events. By no means is this supposed to capture every event, but rather the highlight/lowlights and what most captivated me during 2009. I'll be announcing the winner of the 2009 Pliny for Volcanic Event of the Year tomorrow.

Waimangu Geothermal Valley in New Zealand, taken in January 2009 by Erik Klemetti.

January
The year started out with a trip to New Zealand (well, for me at least) and vistas of the Waimangu Valley, formed in the 1886 eruption of Tarawera on the North Island. We were also still thinking about the late 2008 earthquake swarm at Yellowstone, which didn't lead to anything in 2009. British scientists suggested that Antarctica has been experiencing subglacial eruption, which might account for some of the melting of the ice on the southern continent. However, what really got our attention in January was the Mt. Redoubt in Alaska, with the volcano being put on alert by AVO on January 26th - leading to months of speculation about what might happen. By the end of the month (4 days later), the volcano was all over the news and concern about the Drift River Oil Terminal was high.

February
It was the Redoubt wait that dominated the volcano news during February. Earthquakes, steam and speculation were the order of the day. We also got news of recent eruptions at NW-Rota 1 from Dr. Ed Kohut off on a research cruise in the Pacific. Chaiten was still going strong, but the social fallout from the relocation of the town of Chaiten was proving to be a major problem was well. Finally, volcano monitoring made a surprise splash at the end of the month when Louisiana governor Bobby Jindal suggested that monitoring volcanoes was "wasteful" - he learned quickly that badmouthing volcanologists is not a good idea.

March
We had to wait most of the month, but right after AVO thought things were winding down at Redoubt, the volcano goes and erupts anyway on March 23rd. It wasn't a little eruption either, throwing ash to over 50,000 ft / 15 km and eventually closing the international airport in Anchorage. March ended up being a double feature, with the surprise - and very impressive - eruption of Hunga Tonga - Hunga Ha'apai in the island nation of Tonga. This eruption started as an undersea eruption noticed by commercial pilots in the area and quickly became a classic island-building event. We also had a lot of noise about the earthquake swarms in the Bombay Beach area long the San Andreas fault in southern California. March also marked my move from Wordpress to ScienceBlogs - so I send a special thanks to all the readers who came with me and all my new readers - if you can believe it, Eruptions will be just short of half a million visits in the 10 months since coming to ScienceBlogs!

Llaima in Chile erupting in April 2009.

April
April ended up being my busiest month - with over 50 posts in the month alone. A lot of that was, again, dominated by Redoubt's activity that continued throughout the month. We also saw impressive eruptions of Llaima in Chile and new fissure eruptions at Fernandina in the Galapagos Islands. I addressed some concerns people have on the dangers of geothermal drilling causing an eruption (short answer: probably not). We also got an inside look at the USGS Volcano Hazards Program and I got all worked up about some questionable volcano journalism (what a surprise).

May
May marked two anniversaries: one was for Eruptions, the other, more important one marked one year of eruptions at Chaiten in Chile. The eruption that got me on this blogging track was still going strong after a year, with at least three domes growing inside the Chaiten caldera. Of course, we were also still waiting for the big dome collapse at Redoubt as well, but little came of that. We also got the first glimpse of West Mata erupting in the Lau Basin of the Pacific - the media would really get fired up about this in December when video was released. However, the most exciting event of the month was the earthquake swarm and potential threat of volcanic eruption in the Harrat Lunayyir region of Saudi Arabia. At times, I felt like I was the only person covering the event, getting reports from people on the ground in Saudi Arabia - but when all was said-and-done, no eruption came.

June
We had two volcanoes headed in opposite directions in June. First, Redoubt settled down for the summer. Second, Sarychev Peak in Russia blew its top in a spectacular fashion - disrupting air traffic all across the Pacific. The eruption was a major sulfur dioxide event and provided one of the most stunning volcano images - well, ever. The eruption did a number to the small island of Matau. Sarychev Peak wasn't the only volcano on the Kamchatka Peninsula making noise: Shiveluch also had a major eruption. In June, we also got the first taste of the "Mt. Saint Helens: Supervolcano" controversy and media disaster that would come back later in the year. Finally, my colleagues at UC Davis, Naomi Marks, Peter Schiffman and Robert Zeirenberg, made the news by drilling into an active rhyolite magma in Iceland - nice way to end the month!

Sarychev Peak erupting in June 2009.

July
Volcanically speaking, things quieted down during summer after a very busy spring. The biggest news for July was likely eruption at Mando Hararo in Ethiopia - adding more fissure volcanism in the East African Rift. Of course, it might have been most fascinating to Eruptions readers because one of your own might have been the first to notice the eruption actually occurred. Over in Hawai`i, a rockfall captured on camera temporarily "snuffed out" the Halema`uma`u vent, but it didn't take long for lava to retake the crater. Mayon offered foreshadowing of things to come with evacuations prompted by the beginning of the current eruption.

August
August was especially quite around these parts - thanks partially to my move from California to Ohio, but also to the fact that, well, not much happened (so much for 2009 being an "anomalously volcanic" year). We started the month with some news that there might have been a volcanic eruption on Venus. I've since lost track of the research on this event - anybody have any new theories in what happened on our sister planet? Kamchatka was in the news, mostly because it was such a volcanically active area in 2009 - 5 volcanoes were erupting at once during August - and a new geyser was found as well. And if you need something to read in the long winter months, check out my favorite volcano books.

September
Things picked back up once the fall began. I dabbled in the world of "manmade volcanoes" (short answer: bad idea unless they erupt a dinosaur). In what now seems premature, the eruption at Soufriere Hills on Montserrat was declared "over" after 6 months of quiet at the volcano. We all know what came two weeks later. The international media was all over the proclamation that Australia was "overdue" for a volcanic eruption - a notion that most people think is fear-mongering at its best. There was some suggestion of something happening at Mt. Rainier - but what exactly is still a mystery. Finally, after 6 months of eruptions and noise, AVO lowered the warning level at Redoubt to green (normal). The eruption was over ... or is it?

Nevado del Huila in Colombia steaming from the summit in 2009.

October
With Redoubt out of the picture (for now), a couple of new volcanoes took to the streets. Gaua in Vanuatu erupted, prompting evacuations of people living near the island volcano. We also saw more activity at Huila in Colombia - it was a busy year for volcanic eruptions in Colombia, with eruptions at Huila and Galeras, along with signs of life from the slumbering volcano of Machin (enough to prompt the Colombian government to ponder diverting a major highway to avoid it getting cut by a Machin eruption). A study in Nature was published showing that the magma erupted during 2008-09 at Chaiten shot through the crust - and then you got to ask Dr. Jonathan Castro, coauthor of the study - all about Chaiten. I also attended the GSA Annual Meeting in Portland, Oregon, where I found out some fun information on Toba, New York kimberlites and Mackenzie Pass.

November
Two non-events dominated a lot of the discussion during November. First was the attention paid to the idea that geologists could "destroy Naples" through exploratory drilling into the Campei Flegrei. Second was the non-eruption of Karkar in Papau New Guinea - we all thought a major eruption occurred, but now it looks like the satellites might have been a bit confused, thanks to reports from the ground. Dr. Boris Behncke answered your questions about Italian volcanoes. Both Gaua and Soufriere Hills were full-steam-ahead when it came to their respective eruptions.

Mayon erupting in December 2009.

December
As 2009 closed out, all eyes turned to the Philippines and the eruption of Mayon. The volcano produced some impressive lava flows and avalanches, but as of December 30, the big explosive event that PHIVOLCS is thinking is in the cards has yet to arrive. Large-scale evacuations have occurred, but keeping people out of the danger zone has been problematic. Piton de la Fournaise on Reunion Island actually erupted first in November, but the December eruption was captured in time-lapse video, showing the growth of the fissure vent eruption on the basaltic shield volcano. Soufriere Hills stayed in the news, causing power problems on Montserrat and ash from the volcano cancelled flights as far away as Puerto Rico. And in a bit of a surprise, as 2009 closed out, Redoubt was put back on Yellow Alert status after new signs of potential activity.

So there is 2009 in a nutshell ... any predictions for 2010 (volcanically speaking)?

eklemetti Thu, 12/31/2009 - 04:45