Explosive situation in Yellowstone

Very interesting, and potentially very dangerous developments in Yellowstone National Park. Yellowstone Lake, which sits atop a massive caldera, has risen in temperature almost 20 degrees above normal temperature.

This could well lead to a very explosive situation, as this is a classic indicator of a caldera detonation. Considering the size of the Yellowstone Caldera, this could have far reaching consequences.

Here is the article.

Bulge in lake worries YNP scientists

By CAROLE CLOUDWALKER

Beneath the serene surface of Yellowstone Lake, where death from hypothermia comes within 30 minutes, seethes a boiling underwater world.

And like a pot too long on the stove, it could boil over, says U.S. Geological Survey geologist Lisa Morgan, Ph.D., of Colorado.

She and others from the USGS have been studying the hottest hot spot in the 7,731-foot elevation lake, a spot which Morgan has termed an "inflated plain." It lies south-southwest of Storm Point near Mary Bay, in the northern end of the lake.

Morgan, representing both the USGS and Yellowstone Volcanic Observatory, is in the process of mapping the lake floor with seismic reflection images. She uses a sonar system that emits sound waves. Morgan has taken 240 million soundings in the last four years.

She has found that temperatures along the inflated plain have been recorded at about 85 degrees 60 feet down, where the plain bulges up about 100 feet above the lake floor. (Park spokesman Cheryl Matthews says the lake rarely reaches more than 66 degrees at the surface by late summer, and is much colder deeper down.) The inflated plain stretches 2,100 feet - about the length of seven football fields - across.

"We think this is very young," something that occurred in the last few years, Morgan said.

"We're thinking this structure could be a precursor to an hydrothermal explosive event," Morgan said last week. "But we don't think this is a volcano."

www.codyenterprise.com...

There's no question, DR, that Yellowstone is a bomb (a earth-changing bomb) waiting to explode. If (When?) this happens, there aint no life as we now know it anymore.

Oh, crap!

I saw a Natl Geo or Discovery special on this about a year ago or so, and it's really kind of scared me ever since.
They illustrated in a series of topographical maps how the landscape of Yellowstone has changed over the last 50 years or so, the land "swelling" much like a boil.
No one seemed to have a good estimation of when things could blow, but they sure showed a map of how far the devastation could spread.

Didn't say anything about the lake temp rising. Ick, I sure hope nothing happens with that in the anywhere-near future!

-B.

The magma chamber is believed to be about 40 by 80 kilometers across, similar in size to the overlying Yellowstone caldera. The top of the chamber is about 8 km deep and the bottom is around 16 km deep. However, the chamber is not completely filled with fluid magma. It contains a partial melt, meaning that only a portion of the rock is molten (about 10 to 30%); the rest of the material is solid but, of course, remains hot.


The extremely large eruptions that have occurred at Yellowstone released many orders of magnitude greater energy than any human endeavor, including H-bombs.

volcanoes.usgs.gov...

Originally posted by Banshee
Oh, crap!

I saw a Natl Geo or Discovery special on this about a year ago or so, and it's really kind of scared me ever since.
They illustrated in a series of topographical maps how the landscape of Yellowstone has changed over the last 50 years or so, the land "swelling" much like a boil.
No one seemed to have a good estimation of when things could blow, but they sure showed a map of how far the devastation could spread.

Didn't say anything about the lake temp rising. Ick, I sure hope nothing happens with that in the anywhere-near future!

-B.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


Volcanoes Building Towards Catastrophic Eruptions
Larry Park�s technology indicates pressure is accumulating in Northwest. --Yowusa.com

Only trouble is this site has gone the way of all Air Force sites they do not appear any more?

Larry Parks web site has also disappeared

Wonder when we will disappear, it has been good exchanging ideas with you'all, just in case

loltuttutlol

Well, I am certainly no expert on such things as this but I am not comforted Dr. Morgans comments "that we don't think this is a volcano."
Perhaps its not a volcano....perhaps a better wording would have been "castastrophic event" prechance....hmm?!?!

How about bend over and kiss your lovely arse goodbye maybe?! Or pray -- become a better person -- die?!
Woozers....what an understatement if I have every heard one in a long while. How about we ask here just "what" would be here outlook and description of an explosion.....opppsss, she did tell us....."we think it would create a large crater." WHAT!?!? Large crater my arse....she says, "And Mary Bay is the world's largest hydrothermal explosion crater." Ahhhhh geez...thanks.....

All jesting aside though.......
This is like major stuff....kinda like Las Palmas!
Question: Just how much ash would be dumped and emitted by such an eruption? WOuld this not be comparable to perhaps a 'limited' super-volcano? In super-volcanoes, taking Yellowstone for example, the magma chamber below this one extends below the entire caldera, its probably around 40-50 km long, around 20 km wide and has a thickness of 10 km. (all approx. numbers.)

All this has been monitored by geologist, seismologists, and volcanologist for a while now. The lake in the park has been sinking and tipping to one side for awhile. The size of a volcanic eruption is put onto a scale like earthquakes. The scale for volcanoes is called VEI. It goes from 0-8 in "violence" meter terms. hehe....
Each 1 point means 10 times as powerful as the last point. Mount St. Helen's was a VEI 5 on the "violence" scale. Yellowstone would have to be about....say...what....VEI 8 or so!?!?

The last super-volcano eruption was about 640,000 years ago and the volcano has a regular eruption period of 600,000 years, meaning we are 40,000 +/- years overdue. Yellowstone will probably go in the next 500 years or less, maybe?

What choices do we have besides the obvious....praying.

1) Start doing serious underground habitats?

2) Start doing serious underwater habitats?

3) Migrate to the stars?

4) or grab a case of beer, a lounge chair, some peanuts, and obviously the remote, and wait happily......


regards
seekerof

[Edited on 1-8-2003 by Seekerof]

Seekerof,

In answer to your question about volume of ash displaced, it could well be into the thousands of cubic kilometers of material dispaced.

Geologists are particularly concerned about so-called "supervolcanoes", which can erupt with a force powerful enough to eject thousands of cubic kilometres of debris and hundreds of thousands of tons of sulphuric acid, which can form a reflective shield, cutting out sunlight.

Historical records of eruptions big enough to have a global effect show they are more common than many people imagine and have had a serious impact on human existence.

"For example, a powerful eruption of the Indonesian volcano Tambora in 1815 was followed by one to two years of unusually cold climate around the world," the society says. "In Europe, annual mean temperatures were 1�C to 2.5�C lower than normal, harvests were late or failed altogether, grain prices were at their highest and famine was widespread."

millennium-debate.org...

I cant help but wonder if this situation is being exacerbated by the transmission of gigwatts of energy for the past few years from HAARP?

**DR**

Great segue....

I knew you'd bring it round.

I wasn't finished guys.....hit 'post' button by mistake, but thanks for the answers DR.

regards
seekerof

Just so everyone knows, the USGS is EXTREMELY conservative in thier warnings, mainly due to the public thrashing and lawsuits they recieved from thier public eruption alert issued for Mammoth Lake Caldera in the 1980s.

I would suspect this is as close to a public warning as they want to get on this subject, even though they are VERY aware of the danger... mainly because they dont want to panic the millions that are in danger here (sort of like NASA not wanting to warn the public in the event of a planet killer asteroid? But then, they all work for the same people...)

However, I would say that since this IS making the news, THIS should be considered as close to a public warning as USGS is likely to post.....

In other words, I would personally consider this to be much more concerning than what these people are saying in words... (Read between the lines)

DR...whats the last computer models or whatever predicting for an "eruption event?" Are there any?


regards
seekerof

Originally posted by Seekerof
I wasn't finished guys.....hit 'post' button by mistake, but thanks for the answers DR.

regards
seekerof

here chew on this, got one more i wanna go get, i love this stuff!

GSA release 03-19: August Geology and GSA Today

There is some controversy regarding the controls of magma chamber formation, and the general shape and depth extent of magma conduits. Mineral compositions can be used to probe the depths at which magma chambers form, and thereby test models of magma transport. In the Springerville volcanic field, mineral compositions indicate that most magmas stall at depths of 0�30 km--well above the crust/mantle boundary (39�45 km). This observation contradicts the commonly held view that magma chambers form at the base of the crust and supports the view of Bruce Marsh, that the conduit is a "magma mush column," or a plexus of dikes and sills. However, the distribution of dikes and sills beneath the Springerville volcanic field is not entirely random. Low crystallization temperatures and evolved lava compositions derive exclusively from two depth intervals: 0�12 and 23�30 km. Both of these intervals coincide with regional depth intervals that are seismically reflective. Mineral compositions thus suggest that seismic reflectors at the margins of the Colorado Plateau are magmatic sills, related to recent volcanic activity. Density and rock strength relationships also suggest that the 0�12 km stagnation level is a level of neutral buoyancy for Springerville magmas, while a weak layer at the base of the middle crust controls ponding within the 23�30 km interval. It thus appears that liquid evolution and wall rock partial melting occur where density or rheology contrasts impede the upward movement of magma. etc...........

Contact: Ann Cairns
[email protected]
303-357-1056
Geological Society of America

To review the abstracts for these articles, go to www.gsajournals.org.... To review the complete table of contents for the August issue of GEOLOGY, go to www.gsajournals.org... Representatives of the media may obtain a complimentary copy of any GEOLOGY article by contacting Ann Cairns at [email protected].

Thats very chewable info Tut...thanks....I was merely making conjecture but would certainly be interested in reading more.

regards
seekerof

General simulation of a caldera eruption...

www.ruf.rice.edu...

Good general site about volcanism

www.ruf.rice.edu...

An online study plan for hotspot volcanos

volcano.und.nodak.edu...

What type of eruption will occur if Yellowstone erupts again?

Yellowstone's volcanic and hydrothermal history suggests the potential for various kinds of eruptions in the future. The likelihood of a certain type of eruption occurring in the future can be judged by how often eruptions have occurred in the past.

The most likely type of eruption would not be volcanic but, rather, hydrothermal. This type of small, but still explosive eruption can occur from shallow reservoirs of steam or hot water rather than molten rock. These reservoirs are the sources of Yellowstone's famous geysers, hot springs, and fumaroles. Such explosions could blast out shallow craters more than a kilometer wide; as has occurred in the northern Yellowstone Lake Basin, including Mary Bay and nearby Turbid Lake and Indian Pond, and in western Yellowstone National Park north of Old Faithful. Each of these craters was produced by steam blasts within the past few thousand years.

The most likely type of volcanic eruption at Yellowstone would produce lava flows of either rhyolite or basalt; rhyolitic lava eruptions could also include explosive phases that might produce significant volumes of volcanic ash and pumice. Such eruptions could range in size from smaller than the 1980 eruption of Mt. St. Helens through much larger than the 1991 Mount Pinatubo eruption.

The least likely but worst-case volcanic eruption at Yellowstone would be another explosive caldera-forming eruption such as those that occurred 2.1 million, 1.3 million, and 640,000 years ago. However, the probability of such an eruption in any given century or millennium is exceedingly low- much lower than the smaller eruptions mentioned above.

volcanoes.usgs.gov...

*NOTE* On the last post, I do not disagree with the USGS that a smaller eruption could well occur... but I believe they are deliberatly downplaying the potential danger of a catastrophic eruption.

Originally posted by Seekerof
Thats very chewable info Tut...thanks....I was merely making conjecture but would certainly be interested in reading more.

regards
seekerof

=======================================

thank you
after further research, it is a burp of little potential, but interesting in the geological evolution of Planet Homeland.

well if worst comes to worst one of our favorite national parks is going to become a national distaster area.

thats an understatement to say the least.


very insightful thread!!

If the dome blows, 10-foot waves could wash the lake shore, rocks and pieces of lake floor could be tossed into the air, and "chemicals containing toxic materials" could be discharged into the lake.

"There would be lots of water," Morgan said. Not the blue serenity of the present lake surface, but roiling, spewed-out hot water.

I concur a very insightful thread, a situaton I was unaware of but should be concerned with as it is just a couple of states away. Thanks for all the info and I will stay tuned to this thread. Not good news tho.

I herd about the caldera on the Discovery channel a while ago. I have told many people about it since I saw it on TV

[Edited on 2-8-2003 by jetsetter]