Fire and Ice

Map of Iceland showing locations of these volcanoes

Hekla

 Bardarbunga

 Grimsvotn

 Katla

Pall Einarsson, a geophysicist at the University of Iceland said that Katla, Hekla, Bardarbunga and Grimsvotn are restless.

Katla is the least recently-active volcano of the four, last erupting in 1918 but is now shaking with over magnitude three tremors. It averages about two eruptions each century. It's especially dangerous since it is partly covered by the glacier Myrdalsjokull which fills a caldera depression and covers the eruptive vents so when it does go off it releases hot molten mud flows called Lahars.  These are uber Lahars, the last eruption in 1918 extended the southern coast by 5km just with laharic deposits.

Hekla, otherwise know as the "Gateway to Hell" has been quiet for 16 years but data collected in June last year revealed it is building up magma, and it's internal pressure is currently higher than before its last two previous eruptions.  It's ready to go, erupting once every 10 years, from 1970 to 2000, it's been dormant until now. Professor Einarsson said that tourists should stay away but what do you do with the 20-30 planes full of passengers flying right over the top of Hekla every day.

Bardarbunga volcano had a red alert issued at the end of August 2014 to February 2015 when it experienced a small eruption but only because it lies underneath the Vatnajokull glacier. The volcano sits in a 700metre caldera beneath ice but the majority eruptions come out of the fissures in the side. Not small fissures either, the Veidivotn fissure extends for over 62 miles to the south west almost reaching Torfajokull volcano while the Trollagigar fissure extends 31 miles to the north east towards the Askja volcano.
The last eruption was the strongest of its kind in Europe in more than 240 years and with earthquakes starting up, it suggests that magma could be building below the surface.

Grimsvotn is a near neighbour to Bardarbunga and likely to be fuelled by the same source of magma.  It erupted in 2011, sent a huge plume of ash skywards leading to flights being grounded.  Seismic activity is steadily rising. 

These are only four of the volcanoes that dot the island of Iceland.  Between the lot of them you have just about every kind of volcanic activity documented.  All we need now is for the other side of the world to start rumbling, Yellowstone is already doing that but I mean rumbling in a really vicious Presidential kind of rumbling and then I might worry.

It seems like yesterday.

Mt St. Helens under a layer of snow, towering above  Spirit Lake, just the place for a holiday of camping and hiking.  35 years ago, just before it blew its top leaving a horseshoe-shaped crater and devastation for miles.  The top of the volcano was blocked by a plug of hardened magma so the mountain simply blew out of the side after an earthquake of 5.1.  It caused one of the largest known debris avalanches in recorded history.  The magma caused a massive pyroclastic flow of hot gas and wind down the side of the mountain flattening everything in its path over an area of 600 square kilometres.  The debris was then carried further by the melted snow combined with earth as huge lahars flowed.

Thirty-five years later and the scars have still not quite healed.  The horseshoe crater is still visible as is the new magma dome inside the crater.  Beautiful Spirit Lake is in the upper centre of the image. At centre right of the image is Castle Lake.  At right of Spirit Lake, debris avalanche deposits surround the tiny St. Helens Lake and the long line of Coldwater Lake.
Scientists estimate the eruption released over 1.5 million tonnes of sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere and recorded a Volcanic Explosivity Index of five.

This image was assembled from data acquired by the Operational Land Imager on Landsat 8 and the Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) on the Terra satellite.

Like I said, it just seems like yesterday. In geological terms, it's a blink which is why climate change deniers are going to be eating their words after another 35 years.  And please, could we possibly have a Minister for Science some time before then and preferably not Greg Hunt who can't see the coral for the reef and insists that all that coal mining and coal shipping won't hurt the Great Barrier Reef at all, not a bit. 

The right place, the right time.

The Sky from Mauna Kea
Image Credit & Copyright: Shane Black Photography; Rollover Annotation: Judy Schmidt

The volcano is the Hawaii's Mauna Kea, and the time was a clear night last summer.

 In the foreground of this south-facing panorama lies a rugged landscape dotted with rocks and hardy plants. Slightly above and further out, a white blanket of clouds spreads horizontally to the horizon, seemingly dividing heaven and Earth.

 City lights illuminate the clouds and sky on the far left, while orange lava in the volcanic caldera of Kilauea lights up the clouds just left of center.

 The summit of an even more distant Hawaiian volcano, Mauna Loa, is visible in dark silhouette near the central horizon.

 Green airglow is visible above the clouds, caused by air molecules excited by the Sun during the day. The Moon is the bright orb on the right.

 A diffuse band of light-colored zodiacal light extends up from the far right.
 Most distant, the dramatic central band of our Milky Way Galaxy appears to rise vertically from Mauna Loa.

The person who witnessed and captured this breathtaking panorama stands before you in the image center.

I just watched the auction of a Picasso painting in New York, it sold for $202 Million dollars AUD.
You couldn't buy this moment on earth for any amount.  As Hannibal Smith says, "I love it when a plan comes together." and it did for one lucky photographer.

And I blew my top as well

Cabulco volcano in Chile has erupted for the first time in nearly fifty years.  20 kilometres straight up and that is the dangerous part.  The column can become so heavy that before being dispersed by high level winds, it can collapse on itself and flow down the volcano's sides as a pyroclastic flow.  A red hot cloud of ash, water and rock debris, a lot of water and you have a Lahar, a red hot mud flow that destroys everything in its path.  This usually follows the gullies and crevices down the mountain side but it can go anywhere it wants to.

Reading this was quite timely for me since I went off like a volcano yesterday and if my sister speaks to me this side of Christmas it will be a miracle.  It was about time she copped a blast.  Mother just got the edge of the blast too.
But my main target wasn't around and hasn't rung either.  When I'm paying a woman who is supposed to be an expert in her field I expect her to be an expert.  Dansac have stopped making the colostomy bags the old girl's been using for the last 15 years and stopped without notice so no chance of stockpiling although I had just received an order that will last 2 months. The new bags are completely useless for what we need, so the need for a stomal therapist.  I've dealt with stomal therapists since l988 and all of them have an elevated belief in their own superiority and only one I met was that good. This one was the same bombastic bimbo and about as useful as a bucket with a hole in it.  I automatically assumed this professional would look at mother's medical files and discuss with the PCA who cares for her on a regular basis. Hah, what a joke, Joyce.  
For one thing she'd never seen a stoma like mother has. (TMI, I could give you more)
For another thing if she'd never seen one like that, why didn't she take notice of my mother who lives with it, the PCA who looks after mother or me who's looked after it since 1988.
She's too superior for that.  Didn't know how allergic mother is to sticky tapes of all kinds.  Decides that the stoma is bigger than the 80mm opening I've been cutting out and measures it as 110mm and orders larger baseplate bags and cuts out 110mm.  Rings me and says there's only 5 in the box and I'll have to order more and pay for fast delivery.  When I go down, stupid superior nitwit hadn't looked in the box properly and found the other 5 when it says in big letters on the box - 10 in box.  
And the way she'd cut them out was disgraceful and I had to re-do them and cut out the others.  Good thing I always have a small pair of scissors with me in case I need to open a vein.
By night time, mother was in pain, allergic reaction to sticky bits, allergic to baseplate and skin  burning and blistering.
Bitch goes back next morning and PANICS because she's never seen anything like it before in her career.  Isn't there a text book that has pictures?  Yes, it is unusual but only because the two ends of bowell were never re-connected which is why it's like it is.  I'm well aware that neat little round holes are the norm but if you are going to put yourself out as an expert then make sure you know you have learnt all you need to know to be an expert and obviously this dumb arse tart hasn't.
She rang Doc Marvin.  Brave that is, he hates incompetence from experts.  He has now taken over, she's back with the old bags, the small 80mm opening, antibiotics and a big notice about watching for cellulitis.  The expert is now trying to find replacement bags, good luck for that, fkning bimbo.

And I must say this, The Peninsula Ostomy Association has been terrific over the years in helping people and even they were not told these bags were dumped.  They couldn't even get a letter out in time to warn us.  They're staffed by volunteers and are not lumped in with superior dumbkins.

It's about time we looked at something great.  This is Mt. Sangeang Api - Lesser Sunda Islands and it threw enough of a fit to ground flights out of Australia which made a lot of whingeing people hang about in airports.  Don't any of them watch those aircraft doco's that show what happens when volcanic ash is sucked into jet engines?  I'm addicted to Air Crash Investigations, it's like Cognitive Behaviour Therapy for me.  Never get on a plane, it will go down, this message will show behind my eyes every time I see some place I might like to travel to.

But the great thing about these photographs taken just as it went right off its rocker is in the middle of the right side ( your right side looking at the screen).  There are two beautifully formed Lenticular clouds. You know the ones that form over mountain tops and look like caps or flying saucers.  The second photo (your left side) shows the explosive hot gas  going right through the centre of those Lenticular clouds. 
It's one of those 'on the spot' shots that happen once and never again. 

I should have posted a waterfall.

This is Sakurajima volcano in southern Japan photographed by Martin Reitze early this year.

What's interesting about this volcano are the lightning bolts near the volcano's summit.
Scientists are still working out the cause of volcanic lightning from catapulting magma bubbles being electrically charged or charge inducing collisions in volcanic dust. Considering they haven't really worked out why lightning occurs in ordinary thunderstorms, it could be a while.

And for those who love lightning, it is usually occurring somewhere on Earth, typically over 40 times each second.

Time flies like like volcanic ash, fast.

Two years ago this month and Eyjafjallajokull, the unpronouncible Icelandic volcano, blew it's stack.



Scientists were worried then that neighbouring Katla caldera would also erupt and two years on, it's rumbling with erratic movements of the surface and bursts of earthquake activity beneath the caldera.
Katla's eruption in 1918 produced five times as much ash as the 2010 Eyjafjallajokull one. Last July, a flood of water burst from beneath the ice cap indicating that an extra pulse of heat from magma had reached the base of the ice.
Since Iceland was settled in the 9th Century, Katla has erupted nearly every 60 years but no significant event since 1918 and usually an eruption follows any eruption of Eyjafjallajokull within months. It seems it's well overdue.

A 4.4, pfft!

These new images of the Nabro volcano taken on June 29 finally provided a nearly unimpeded view of the summit,which had been hidden by steam and ash clouds.

Located in the East African nation of Eritrea, Nabro began its eruption explosively on June 12, 2011 and sent plumes of ash streaming over North Africa and the Middle East, killing seven people with thousands more affected both in Eritrea and Ethiopia.

The volcano has eased into a quieter, lava-oozing phase. The top image shows the volcano in visible and infrared light (shortwave infrared, near infrared, and green). The hot lava glows orange-red, fading to black as it cools. The long flow on the west side of the volcano is mottled with black, a sign that the surface is cooling. The lava to the east and south of the vent appears to be newer, since little of it has cooled. It is possible that the cooling lava in the western flow diverted the fresh lava to the south and east.

The lower image provides a natural color view of the volcano. A small, slightly brown plume rises from the vent, and ash blackens the ground to the west and south.

The Nabro volcano has not erupted in recorded human history, but lava flows near the volcano are relatively recent geologically. Nabro is part of the very active East Africa Rift where three tectonic plates are pulling away from each other.

As the Earth's crust thins in the region, volcanoes rise in the weak spots.

From Iceland to Chile

A Chilean volcano in the Puyehue-Cordon Caulle has erupted for the first time in 50 years. The volcanic chain is about 575 miles south of the capital, Santiago but because of the ash cloud and weather conditions, it's not yet clear which particular volcano of the four is erupting.

The ash cloud has been thrown 6 miles (10 kilometres) into to the sky with winds fanning the cloud towards Argentina as the Chaiten eruption did 3 years ago.

Authorities had been expecting the eruption after repeated earthquakes were reported in the area and the volcanic range then entered an explosive eruptive process. The air is full of the smell of sulphur and seismic activity is continuous.

Chile's chain of about 2,000 volcanoes is the world's second largest after Indonesia. Some 50 to 60 are on record as having erupted, and 500 are potentially active.

The photo above is a time lapse image of the lightning strikes in the ash cloud.

The ash cloud after the initial eruption.


The ash cloud reflecting the sun's rays.

Lightning strikes as the ash cloud continues to rise.

The ash cloud rising but winds are now blowing it towards Argentina.

More to Come

I said there'd be more.

Grimsvotn's eruption produced an intense lightning storm. It doesn't look as impressive as Eyjafjallajokull's lightning but Grimsvotn produced 1,000 times more lightning strikes per hour.

The initial plume of ash from Grimsvotn was also higher than Eyjafjallajokull, 20 kilometres as against 8 kilometres but has now dropped to about 15 kilometres. The ash content of the cloud is much coarser and less likely to remain airbourne and be blown as far as the lighter ash of Eyjafjallajokull.

That's not to say it hasn't affected Iceland already. People have been told to stay inside, farmers are also rounding up their animals and flights have been stopped.

Let's visit Iceland again.

Remember Eyjafjallajokull, the small erupting volcano in Iceland that brought air travel to a standstill over England and Europe? The one that gave us haunting beautiful photographs and a tongue twister of a name.

The heat from the lava was so intense that it melted several glaciers nearby. This is a bit like "Where's Wally" but he's there in front of this enormous chunk of glacial debris sitting on the bedrock of where its icy surround used to be.

So the Grimsvotn volcano, under the Vatnajokull glacier in south-east Iceland, has begun to erupt, throwing a plume of white smoke about 15 kilometres into the air. It last exploded in 2004 but even though it's one of Iceland's most active volcanoes, its effects are expected to be only local.

It just melted through several tens of metres of ice and sent a large volume of course-grained ash into the atmosphere.

Just another day in Iceland, move along folks, nothing to see here......yet.

Dare I risk another Kaboom

If you thought one volcanic eruption was bad, try for three and at night. On June 10, 1886, New Zealand saw Mount Wahanga erupt which was then followed by Mount Tarawera and the mountain's twin cone Ruawahia.

This event destroyed the North Island's biggest tourist attraction. Tourists came from all over the world, by ship, to look at the beautiful travertine terraces which were formed by geothermally heated water cascading down the hill slope leaving the pink and white silica deposits. These terraces enclosed pools of water with the White Terraces being the larger of the two formations. The Pink Terraces were where the visitors would go to bathe.

The White Terrace

After the eruption, a crater over 100 metres deep was all that was left of the Terraces. This crater gradually filled with water to form a new Lake Rotomahana, 30 metres higher and larger than the old lake but on February 3, 2011, scientists found what was left of one of the Terraces.

Only part of the Pink Terraces were left seen in sonar images scanned by underwater vehicles as a pinky, sediment-covered staircase rising one to two metres from the lake-bed and running for a length of about 70 metres.

The Pink Terrace

The original sets of terraces were at different locations on Lake Rotomahana - pink on the western bank and white on the northern end. Scientists will now try for seismic mapping of the lake floor, penetrating the deep sediments to see if any more of the terraces still exist.

The village of Wairoa was also buried but was excavated and the area is now ringed in poplar trees that have grown from fence posts buried in the eruption.

The White Terrace

While there was little notice of the eruptions to come, earthquakes only a few hours before the event there was another sign. Tourists were ferried across the lake visit the Terraces. On one journey the guide, Sophia Hinerangi, saw a mysterious phantom war canoe appear out of the mist.

The high priest of the Tuhourangi tribe interpreted this as a warning. He feared the terraces were being exploited as a tourist attraction without due regard to the ancestral values.

The priest, Tuhoto Ariki, survived, dug from his buried house four days after the eruption. Sophia's house which did not collapse, sheltered many survivors.

The Pink Terrace

The domed mountains split apart and the fissure extended down the mountain, through the Terraces, from Rotomahana to Waimangu 10 kilometres away. The roar of the eruption was heard as far away as Christchurch and Auckland.

Mount Tarawera today.

Tarawera still stands on part of the series of fault lines, with 10 craters along the line of the rift that split the mountain.

Holiday in Hawaii

This is the Pu'u O'o crater on Kilauea where a fissure eruption started when the floor of the crater collapsed. The fissure is approximately 1,605 feet long. There were 150 small earth quakes recorded within Kilauea in the last 24 hours.



Along with the lava fountains 65 feet in the air, there is the danger of lethal sulphar dioxide gas around the eruption area. The best way to see the eruption is from someone else's photographs.

The holidays might be cheap but...

They don't call the Pacific Ocean the ring of fire for nothing but next time you're looking at all those cheap packages to Bali, keep this map in the front of your mind.
Volcanoes, Indonesia has every kind and they all erupt sooner or later.

The plates are moving.

An earthquake struck near Wananui, North Island, New Zealand. 4.3 on the Richter Scale.
It's depth was only 90kms.

Christchurch's earthquake on September 4 is still rumbling with aftershocks. 11 quakes hit the city on Friday night, ranging from 2.5 to 4.3 on the Richter Scale.

Another place I'll be staying away from especially since bits started falling off Qantas planes.
I mean how unlucky can you be to avoid one crash, get on another plane to have that turn around and land safely after problems.

The ring of fire

That's the latest photo of Indonesia's Mount Merapi as it continues to erupt. So far 120 people have died from the incandescent ash raining down from the sky but it's also being blamed for the tsunami that killed more 400 people on October 25, after a 7.7 magnitude earthquake.

Lurking under the clouds in this image is Anak Krakatau, 'Child of Krakatau'. Anak rose from the caldera left by the explosion of Krakatau and is now beginning to spew an ash cloud high into the atmosphere. In 2009, an eruption started and you'll find some spectacular images here .

Sumatra is the site of Lake Toba, the largest volcanic lake in the world. It was formed when a supervolcanic eruption occurred and is considered the largest explosive event in the last 25 million years leading to a volcanic winter with temperatures declining 5 to 15 degrees at the highter latitudes.

The tectonic plates seem to be shifting under the Indonesian Islands.

ERUPTION AND THE NORTHERN LIGHTS

Meanwhile back at the volcano which was joined by a brilliant display of the Northern Lights.
Already the papers are reporting that the ash cloud wasn't as bad and that flights should have continued and/or re-commenced much earlier.

If you want to know what happens when a jet flies through an ash cloud then go here
and decide whether it was better to be safe than sorry. This was only one jet but if flights had gone ahead regardless, think of how many planes would have been in the air and calculate the odds on how many would have been downed.

NIGHT LIGHT

For Robbert because he just can't get enough of this volcano.

LIGHTNING NOW

I keep finding the most fantastic photographs but
Marco Fulle definitely has the best of the lot. So go over there and stop me posting more.
That lightning display is even better than the Chaiten photos of last year.

ASH RULES

The Finnish Air Force has released images showing the effects of volcanic dust ingestion from inside the engines of a Boeing F-18 Hornet fighter, while it prepares to make inspections on several additional aircraft.

Five of the air force’s Hornets were involved in a training exercise on the morning of 15 April, just hours before the imposition of airspace restrictions due to the ash cloud spreading from a major volcanic eruption in Iceland.

One aircraft’s engines have been inspected so far using a boroscope, with melted ash clearly visible on its inside surface. The air force decided to release the images to show the potentially damaging effects of current flight activities, says chief information officer Joni Malkamäki

Now along with rock particles in the ash clouds, volcanic glass droplets are also forming. The airlines are asking why they can't fly beneath the ash cloud, well probably because the sky is falling. As usual it comes down to money. How much are they loosing by staying on the ground against how much extra in fuel costs to fly lower altitudes. I think I'll be like Jane and park the broom in the shed and walk.

If you want to know how big that glacier is just look at the planes going past. That blue at the top is cascading melt water from the eruption. There have been amazing photographs taken of this eruption and it hasn't stopped yet.