Kliuchevskoi

Lots of little pieces of news I've run across ... time to play a little catch up. Stromboli: A volcano after Don Ho's heart. Every once in a while, my RSS feeds will dredge up some articles from years gone by ... and this week there were two New York Times pieces that are a few years old, but interesting nevertheless. The first is about research conducted by Dr. Robert Sohn at WHOI on explosive undersea eruptions. The second is work by Corr and Vaughan about finding subglacial volcanism in Antarctica. Both are interesting reads if you missed them (like I did) the first time around.…

So, I'm a little late with this thanks to a little hiatus, but I thought I would post the latest GVP Weekly Volcanic Activity Report. Thanks again to the Smithsonian, USGS and especially Sally Kuhn Sennert! Some highlights include: There were more ash explosions spotted at Ebeko in Kamchatka, producing ~1.8 km (5,900 foot) ash columns. This activity prompted KVERT to raise the Alert Status to Yellow. This goes along with news from a pile of other Kamchatka/Kuril Island volcanoes: Gorely, Tiatia, Karymsky, Kliuchevskoi and Shiveluch. More activity at Arenal in Costa Rica - its almost always…

Just a reminder, if you any questions for Sally Kuhn Sennert of the Smithsonian/USGS Global Volcanism Program - about the Weekly Report, about life at the GVP, about volcanoes - be sure to send them to me soon at . Now, on to this week's update! Some highlights (not including Gorely): Lahars from Tungurahua in Ecuador moved blocks upwards of 2 m in diameter downstream over the last week and ash fall was reported over 20 km from the volcano's vent. For some reason, FoxNews decided to use an image of Tungurahua for an article on stats of natural disasters in 2009 - nice image, but the volcano…

This week went fast, didn't it? The Baekdu caldera along the North Korean/Chinese border. The NASA Earth Observatory have been giving us a steady diet of volcanic plumes over the last week, including PNG's Ulawun, Russia's Sarychev Peak (a very faint plume), both an ASTER and Terra image of the summit region at Kliuchevskoi and finally a mix of plume and clouds over PNG's Manam volcano. I wanted to also mention a brief article I ran into on the Changbaishan/Baekdu caldera along the Chinese and North Korean border. Although short on specifics, this article mentions a number of interesting (…

On advice of Eruptions reader Ekoh, I thought it would be fun to try to come up with a list of the most tongue-twisting and bizarre volcano names out there. I know there are a few out there that I've only typed once (the rest of the time I cut-and-paste), so lets review some recent fun ones: Eyjafjallajökull (Iceland) - everyone's favorite tongue twister. Eyjafjallajökull erupting in mid-May, 2010. And people are still talking about the how the ash crisis was handled. Kliuchevskoi (Russia) - It doesn't help that it has like ten names to boot (from the Smithsonian GVP): KAMCHATSKAIA GORA…

The latest update from the Smithsonian/USGS Global Volcanism Program! Highlights (not including Taal, Eyjafjallajökull and Bezymianny) include: Another thermal anomaly was spotted on an Kuril Island volcano - this one being Tiatia. The volcano has no seismic monitoring network, so the thermal anomaly is all that has been observed. Lava flows and strombolian explosions continue at Guatemala's Pacaya. Some of the explosions have launched bombs hundreds of meters into the air. Kliuchevskoi was another busy Russian volcano, with a large thermal anomaly and ash explosions that produced a plume…

Grading grading grading! A webcam capture of the eruptive plume from Eyjafjallajökull on the morning of May 6, 2010. News: A quick update on the Eyjafjallajökull eruption: The volcano has been producing an impressive ash plume over the last day (see image above). The current ash plume is reaching 5.8-6 km height (19-20,000 ft) - and causing some trouble over Ireland and Scotland. However, much of airspace closed yesterday has reopened (for now). You can see two new images of the ash plume over at the NASA Earth Observatory. As for the continued fallout from the ash plume from April,…

Actually, no the volcanoes aren't from space, but pictures of the volcanoes were taken from space. The NASA Earth Observatory has posted three more gems of volcanic activity taken by one of the fleet of earth imagers in orbit: A recent image of Chaiten taken by EO-1. Image courtesy of the NASA Earth Observatory. There is a great image of the busy Kamchatkan Peninsula, where four volcanoes are seen erupting in a single image - Kliuchevskoi, Bezymianny, Shiveluch and Karymsky. The plume from Karymsky is especially prominent as a grey streak above the white snow of the Russian winter (albeit…

Leaving for Death Valley tomorrow - I'll be sure to take some pictures of Ubehebe Crater and the volcano at the Mirage. This will likely be the last new post until about a week from now, but look for the Erta'Ale Volcano Profile, maybe a new Mystery Volcano Photo and I'll leave a thread open for any new volcano news. Colima in Mexico. Eruptions reader Tim Stone sent me this image from Japanese astronaut Soichi Noguchi's Twitpic feed - it is a stunner of the caldera on Jebel Marra in Sudan. The only known historical eruption for this volcano was ~2000 BC within the Deriba Caldera, but it has…

The flu has retreated and I'm getting back on track. Huzzah! I'll get back to the blog by posting this week's new USGS / Smithsonian Institution Global Volcanism Program Weekly Volcano Report. Looks like some interesting stuff in it ... Looks like there were some small eruptions from Oldoinyo Lengai in Tanzania. The volcano is one of the few (only active?) carbonatite volcanoes in the world, erupting a lava composed primarily of calcium carbonate and sodium minerals with very little silica. It leads to the odd lava that erupt black (and cool ~ 500C) and cool to white, making it one of the…

Sally Sennert from the Smithsonian Institution sent me an email to say that this week's USGS/Smithsonian Institute Weekly Volcanic Report will be delayed due to the inclement weather in the Washington DC area. She can't connect with the server, so the report can't be updated on the Smithsonian website ... so here it is! Look for it to show up on the Smithsonian site with all the bells and whistles as soon as DC thaws out. And a big thanks to Sally for sending me the Report to post. ***PLEASE NOTE: Website posting of the SI/USGS Weekly Volcanic Activity Report for 3-9 February 2010 will be…

Bezymianny in Kamchatka, one of the many volcanoes in eastern Russia that will no longer be monitored by KVERT. In some bad news for volcano watchers (and the general public, too), Russia has decided to stop funding KVERT (the Russian equivalent of the Alaska Volcano Observatory), the institute that monitors and researches volcanic eruptions on the Kamchatka Peninsula and the Kuril Islands in the western Pacific. Here is the news release from KVERT: Due to a loss of government funding beginning February 01, 2010, KVERT will no longer distribute information regarding volcanic activity in…

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…

It's the last week of classes and it's also AGU (which I will be missing for the first time in 5 years). If you happen to be at the big meeting in SF and hear something you think we'd like to hear, feel free to drop me a line or leave a comment so we can live vicariously through you. Pyroclastic flows at Sourfriere Hills, December 2009. Image courtesy of MVO. Some news: UPDATE 12:40PM 12/14/2009: Just to update the Mayon news from earlier today, PHIVOLC is reporting that lava has been spotting flowing from the main crater on Mayon. Sounds like the eruption we've been waiting for is…

A new Weekly Volcano Report from the Smithsonian GVP/USGS ... enjoy! Highlights include: There has been a number of reports of new activity at Llaima in Chile (hat tip to Eruptions reader Manuel Humeres for bringing them to us). Most of the current activity is steam-and-gas plumes along with long-period seismicity, suggesting we could be headed towards a new eruption. Lava flows continue to erupt from Kliuchevskoi in Kamchatka, along with strombolian activity throwing ejecta up to 300 m / ~1000 feet above the crater. Rabaul is busy shaking windows 20 km / 12 miles from the Tavurvur crater,…

Before we get to the latest SI/USGS Weekly Volcanic Activity Report (WVAR), I wanted to draw your attention to some nifty NASA Earth Observatory images from the current activity at Soufriere Hills in Montserrat. After a few puffs last week, the volcano is now releasing a relatively constant stream of ash and steam, this after ~10 months of quiescence. The two images, one on October 12 and one on the 13th, suggest there is a lot of a variability, day to day, in the plume. See the latest WVAR for more info on Soufriere Hills. On to the Report! Highlights this week (not including Soufriere Hills…

Two volcanoes that have been rumbling and rocking for a while now made some noise today: Kliuchevskoi Volcano in Russia. Soufriere Hills on Montserrat had a relatively impressive explosive event, producing a ~3 km / ~11,000 foot ash plume - its first eruption in 10 months. This was after a sharp increase in seismicity at the West Indies volcanoes since Sunday. This is a bit of a surprise as the eruptive period at Soufriere Hills was seen to be coming to an end - however, this eruption isn't really anything out of the ordinary according to James White Jr., the acting director of the…

Koryaksky (Koryak) in Russia Yesterday in the USGS/SI update, I mentioned the current eruption going on at Koryaksky (a.k.a. Koryak). Today, the NASA Earth Observatory has some images of the plume from the Russian volcano heading out to the east over the Peninsula. The plume itself looks fairly diffuse and mostly whitish steam rather than laden with grey/brown ash. The last significant eruption from Koryaksky was a VEI 3 eruption in 1956-57 that produced ash fall and pyroclastic flows from the volcano. One thing that is noted on the EO page is this snippet: MODIS captured this plume days…

Busy today with scouting out some field location for the class I'll be teaching this fall. Here's this week's USGS/SI Weekly Volcano Report. The report is a little more eventful than last week's, so enjoy! Kliuchevskoi Volcano in Kamchatka, taken summer of 2009 by Theresa Kayzar. Highlights include: Three volcanoes on the Kamchatka Peninsula are currently producing ash plumes: Kliuchevskoi, Koryaksky and Shiveluch. Shiveluch has been having the most intense eruptions, but the former two are both producing ash-and-steam plumes that reach over 3 km / 10,000 feet. Talang in Indonesia saws its…

We've made it to Ohio! Tomorrow I'll hopefully be returning to regularly scheduled updates, but until then, enjoy this week's SI/USGS Weekly Volcano Report. Highlights include: KVERT mentions that seismicity has increased recently at both Kizimen and Kliuchevskoi on the Kamchatka Peninsula. ~4 km / ~13,500 foot steam-and-ash plumes spotted at Colima in Mexico. Rumbling noises, incandescent ejecta and ~4.3 km / 14,000 foot ash plumes at Fuego in Guatemala. Explosions were increasing as the August began. It was a busy week in Guatemala, as ash/gas plumes were spotted at Santiaguito and Pacaya…