historic eruption
eklemetti | August 27, 2010Sorry about the lack of posts - I've been not only frantically prepping for class and my Eyja talk, but also I'm somewhat under the weather with an ill-timed sickness, so even though there is stuff to talk about, I haven't really had time/wherewithal to deal with it.
However, expect big things from Eruptions next week!
Drawing of a ship washed inland by the tsunami generated by the August 27, 1883 eruption of Krakatau.
I'll throw a few quick links:
The alert status at Galeras has been dropped back down to "orange" after the non-explosive eruption earlier this week. However, INGEOMINAS warns…
eklemetti | August 4, 2010
Eyjafjallajökull erupting in the spring of 2010.
I have a request for all of you Eruptions readers! In a few weeks I will be giving a talk here at Denison on the Eyjafjallajökull eruption and especially the aspects of how the eruption unfolded on the web. I think the shared experience of the seismicity, fissure vent eruption and explosive eruption - along with all the ramifications of the air traffic stoppage over Europe - was a fascinating phenomenon. So, I ask you readers: How would you describe your experience on Eruptions during the Eyjafjallajökull events? By that I mean in terms of…
eklemetti | June 8, 2010
The steaming vent area at Taal in the Philippines in September 1965, when the volcano produced a VEI 4 eruption.
The Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (PHIVOLCS) has raised the alert status at Taal to Level 2 (of 4) and officials in the Philippines are getting ready if the volcano does come back to life for the first time since 1977. Taal is a mere 48 km (30 miles) from Manila - the capital of the Philippines and home to over 21,000,000 people in the metro area of the city. This location made Taal one of the UN/IAVCEI Decade Volcanoes as a large eruption from the volcano…
eklemetti | May 26, 2010Brief news!
Lava flows reaching the sea at Kilauea in Hawai`i. Image from November 2009, courtesy of HVO/USGS.
The Alert Status at Cleveland in the Alaskan Aleutian Islands was raised to Yellow (Advisory) by the Alaska Volcano Observatory after new signs of activity emerged. The latest report from AVO on the volcano says a thermal anomaly has been spotted at the summit, which typically is one of the first signs that the volcano is entering an eruption period. However, there is no real-time seismic monitoring for Cleveland, so that is the only clue (right now) that AVO has. Cleveland is a…
eklemetti | May 24, 2010
The small steam plume from Eyjafjallajökull on May 23, 2010, where explosive eruptive activity has ceased for now.
The big news over the weekend, at least volcanically, was that Eyjafjallajökull seems to have entered a period of relative quiet. The eruption has died down dramatically, with the last ash explosion occurring two days ago. Since then, the vent has still be producing a significant steam plume that reaches 3 km / 10,000 feet, but none of the ash-laden explosions that marked the earlier parts of the eruption have occurred (meaning the airspace over the North Atlantic and Europe…
eklemetti | May 18, 2010Part 2 of your recollections of the May 18, 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens.
You can read Part 1 here.
You can also check out an amazing set of satellite images spanning 1979-2010 at the NASA Earth Observatory. Great stuff!
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Eruption plume from Mount St. Helens on May 18, 1980. Image courtesy of the USGS/CVO.
Peter Carlton
My sister and I were playing in our backyard in West Seattle when we heard the boom. I was 6 years old. I remember lots of phone calls with our relatives in Yakima, watching…
eklemetti | May 17, 2010Some news for a sleepy Monday:
Mt. Hood in Oregon.
The ash from Eyjafjallajökull is, once again, causing significant airspace closure over northern Europe - close of 1,000 flights today. However, much of the closures are fairly short-lived, but that isn't keeping people happy. The eruption hasn't actually changed much, just that the winds are bringing ash towards Europe. The ash for the next few days will likely effect the England, Scotland, Ireland, Netherlands, France and possibly other parts of northern Europe (along with airspace over Greenland and the north Atlantic). The ash plume is…
eklemetti | May 17, 2010May 18, 2010 marks the 30th anniversary of the dramatic eruption of Mount St. Helens in Washington state. Now, rather than recount the event when the USGS and the Cascade Volcano Observatory have done such an excellent job, I turn it over to all the Eruptions readers and their memories of the eruption.
Now, as I've mentioned, I was all of three years old when St. Helens erupted in 1980, so I have no distinct memories of the eruption. My mother has mentioned that she watched the TV coverage with me and my sister, who had been born a two months earlier. However, the real memories of St. Helens…
eklemetti | May 14, 2010Time to play a little catch up ...
Eyjafjallajökull erupting in early May. Image by and courtesy of Martin Rietze.
A brief update on our friend Eyjafjallajökull - the eruption plume from the volcano was considerably taller yesterday, reaching 6-9 km (20,000-30,000 feet), but prevailing winds meant the ash hazard was confined to areas in the middle of the North Atlantic and northern parts of the British Isles. However, even as the ash hazard for Europe wanes (for now), you shouldn't forget the amount of ash being dumped on parts of Iceland. If you want to see some stunning images of the…
eklemetti | May 13, 2010
Mount St. Helens erupting in 1980.
Just a reminder ... please send them to me by May 15 so I can get them all ready for the post on the 18th!
As many of you might (or might not) now, we're heading towards the 30th anniversary of the dramatic eruption of Mount St. Helens in Washington state. Now, I could fill a book with the information out there on the volcano and the eruption, but instead, I think it would be more interesting to get your takes on the eruption. I have to admit, I was all of three when the eruption occurred, so my memories of the event are hazy at best, but if you have any…
eklemetti | May 3, 2010
Mt. Saint Helens erupting in 2004.
I had a chance to watch a new NOVA special that airs May 5 (PBS) on the 1980-1986 and 2004-2008 eruption cycles at Mt. Saint Helens, along with the recovery of the blast zone from the 1980 eruption. It is a fitting episode as we approach the 30th anniversary of the eruption that took out the north side of the volcano and devastated a vast swath of Cascade wilderness in Washington on May 18, 1980. Many of you have already sent me your Mt. Saint Helens memories (keep them coming!) for my tribute to the eruption, but if you want to get started on remembering…
eklemetti | April 30, 2010
Mt. Saint Helens erupting in 1980.
As many of you might (or might not) now, we're heading towards the 30th anniversary of the dramatic eruption of Mt. Saint Helens in Washington state. Now, I could fill a book with the information out there on the volcano and the eruption, but instead, I think it would be more interesting to get your takes on the eruption. I have to admit, I was all of three when the eruption occurred, so my memories of the event are hazy at best, but if you have any memories, reactions or thoughts you want to share on the events leading up to the eruption, the eruption…
eklemetti | February 26, 2010Catching up with some news:
Anatahan erupting in the northern Mariana Islands in 2003.
I ran across this article right before I got sick, but its been popping up around the interwebs (and is pretty interesting). It details a study in Molecular Ecology that suggests that populations of caribou in Canada's Yukon Territory were strongly effected by the White River Tephra. The White River Tephra is supposedly the largest Holocene plinian tephra (from a ash cloud fallout), with two components dating from ~1900 years ago and ~1250 years ago. The vent for the WRT is likely from a vent beneath the…
eklemetti | February 7, 2010We've been discussing calderas recently on Eruptions (I wonder why) and the Laacher See in Germany came up. I've actually been to the Laacher See on a field trip lead by one of the world's experts on the caldera, Dr. Gerhard Worner. So, I thought I'd post some pictures and talk a little about this feature that up until maybe 5 years ago, I didn't even know existed.
Laacher See, Germany
The Laacher See is a caldera in the Rhine Valley of Germany (see below). It is only ~30 km south of Bonn and ~60 km south of Koln (Cologne), just to the west of the Rhine River. It is part of the East Eiffel…
eklemetti | January 21, 2010
Sakurajima in Japan, erupting in December 2009. Image courtesy of Photovolcanica.com
Richard Roscoe at Photovolcanica.com has just posted two great sites focusing on two of the most active volcanoes in Japan: Sakurajima and Suwanosejima. These volcanoes are almost constantly erupting with small strombolian events punctuated by occasional plinian eruptions.
Sakurajima is on the island of Kyushu (well, technically Kagoshima, but right off the coast of Kyushu) less than 10 miles / 20 km from the city of Kagoshima. The volcano has been erupting since 1955 with both explosive and effusive…
eklemetti | December 4, 2009Its already Friday!
News!
Print of the Temple of Jupiter at Pompeii with a steaming Vesuvius in the background.
You can now wander down the streets of ancient Pompeii from the comfort of your own home or office. Google Streetview now cover the streets of the city wiped out by the 79 A.D. eruption of Vesuvius in Italy. Now, some of the articles on the Pompeii streetview give lipservice to the current threat of Vesuvius to the modern city of Naples, my favorite being:
The authorities continually monitor Vesuvius these days, and estimate they'll be able to give adequate warning if it's ever in…
eklemetti | November 26, 2009Here is Part 2 of the Q&A with Dr. Boris Behncke. You can also check out Part 1.
Undated image of Stromboli in eruption.
(Shirakawa Akira) 1. Would a large scale eruption (VEI 5 or greater) of Mt. Etna like the ones occurred in 122 BC and 1500 BC (disputed) be possible again in the foreseeable future? Or is the volcano slowly "dying" although the last eruption ended in July 2009 has been one of the longest ever recorded?
2. Not really related to volcanism, but close: does INGV plan to distribute seismic data from seismic stations of its Rete Sismica Nazionale, including stations from…
eklemetti | October 30, 2009There has been news over the last few days of a number of volcanoes in Colombia, so I thought I'd try to gather it up here:
The steaming summit of Nevado del Huila in Colombia
Nevado del Huila has been ramping up its ash emissions, potentially pointing towards new eruptions from the crater dome. The NASA Earth Observatory posted a new image of the grey ash plume from the volcano poking its way up through the clouds. This plume made it all the way to ~11 km / 36,000 feet, so it definitely isn't insignificant. This comes after an increase in seismicity (up to 1,000 earthquakes in the last…
eklemetti | October 26, 2009A few weeks ago I asked you to submit questions on the 2008-present Chaiten eruption in Chile to pose to Dr. Jonathan Castro. Dr. Castro recently had a paper on the ascent rates of Chaiten rhyolite published in Nature and he kindly volunteered to answer your questions. Here are the answers to selected questions ... enjoy!
Chaiten in Chile erupting in 2009. Image by Dr. Jonathan Castro.
Dr. Jonathan Castro
Biography:
B.S. from Humboldt State University
Ph.D. from University of Oregon*
Currently a Research Geologist at CNRS-Institut for Sciences de la Terre, Oreans, France
Soon moving on to…
eklemetti | October 23, 2009I finally remembered to bring my GSA notes with me to the office, so I can finally post a wrap up of what I saw/heard at the big 2009 meeting in Portland. I'll have a specific post on Kasatochi - too much to say here. However, a great time was had by all!
The crater of Collier Cone in Oregon. The scoria cone likely experienced years of explosive strombolian eruptions when it formed.
Some interesting volcano-related notes:
Clive Oppenheimer pointed out that the Toba eruption 74,000 years ago covered >1% of the Earth's surface with >10 cm (~4 in) ash. To put that in perspective, the…