Latest Volcanology Stories
Scientists from British Antarctic Survey (BAS) have discovered previously unknown volcanoes in the ocean waters around the remote South Sandwich Islands. Using ship-borne sea-floor mapping technology during research cruises onboard the RRS James Clark Ross, the scientists found 12 volcanoes beneath the sea surface "“ some up to 3km high. They found 5km diameter craters left by collapsing volcanoes and 7 active volcanoes visible above the sea as a chain of islands.The research is important...
'Hot spots' of plume from deep Earth could propel plate motions around globeBringing fresh insight into long-standing debates about how powerful geological forces shape the planet, from earthquake ruptures to mountain formations, scientists at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego have identified a new mechanism driving Earth's massive tectonic plates.Scientists who study tectonic motions have known for decades that the ongoing "pull" and "push" movements of...
One of Iceland's most active and most feared volcanoes looks like is getting ready to erupt, with measurements indicating magma movement, according to Icelandic experts on Wednesday, raising fears of a new ash cloud disrupting air traffic in Europe and abroad. The Hekla volcano, dubbed by Icelanders in the Middle Ages as the "Gateway to Hell," has erupted some 20 times over the past 1000 years, with the most recent eruption occurring on February 26, 2000. Hekla is close to the ash-spewing...
Latest research into the age of volcanos in Western Victoria and South Australia has confirmed that the regions are overdue for an eruption, potentially affecting thousands of local residents.Using the latest dating techniques, scientists from the University of Melbourne's School of Earth Sciences and the Melbourne School of Engineering have calculated the ages of the small volcanoes in the regions and established the recurrence rate for eruptions as 2,000 years.With the last volcano eruption...
Heavy Metal Meets Hard Rock: Battling through the Ocean Crust's Hardest Rocks to Capture the Boundary Between Magma and WaterScientists and drillers recovered a remarkable suite of heat-tempered basalts that provide a detailed picture of the rarely seen boundary between magma and seawater. These samples were collected during a return to ODP Hole 1256D, one of the deepest "hard rock" penetration sites of scientific ocean drilling. ODP Hole 1256D has been stabilized, cleared to its full depth,...
The Puyehu volcano in southern Chile continues to erupt for a second day, spewing pumice and an ash cloud six miles high and three miles wide. Airline flights have been canceled in the region and more than 3,500 people stayed away from their homes near the volcano.Most of the residents in 22 settlements near the Puyehue-Cordon Caulle volcanic complex evacuated when the eruption began Saturday afternoon and were staying in government shelters or friends' homes. One group of 122 people was...
A 3-D model of a volcanic explosion, based on the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens in Washington state, may enhance our understanding of how some volcanic explosions occur and help identify of blast zones for potentially dangerous locations, according to an international team of volcanologists."We took on the modeling of enormously complicated pyroclastic density currents, notably the classic, notorious May 1980 lateral blast that destroyed 500 square kilometers of forested terrain at...
About 500 flights were grounded on Tuesday after ash from an Icelandic volcano moved its way through Britain and towards northern Europe. The clouds caused flights in and out of Scotland, northern England and Northern Ireland to be cancelled. British Airways led the way in canceling flights as the ash-cloud from the Grimsvötn volcano spread eastwards. "Approximately 500 flights were cancelled from the approximately 29,000 that would have been expected today across Europe," said a...
As Iceland's GrÃmsvötn volcano spews ash high into the atmosphere, satellite observations are providing essential information to advisory centers assessing the possible hazards to aviation.The GrÃmsvötn volcano in southeast Iceland, which had been dormant since 2004, started erupting in the evening of 21 May. As a consequence, the country's airspace has been closed.Memories are still fresh of the chaos caused by the Eyjafjallajoekull eruption just over a year ago. European air...
VANCOUVER, May 13 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ - Magma Energy Corp. ("Magma") (TSX: MXY) and Plutonic Power Corporation ("Plutonic") (TSX: PCC) today announced the completion of the merger of Magma and Plutonic pursuant to a plan of arrangement (the "Arrangement"). As previously announced, the Arrangement was approved by the Supreme Court of British Columbia on May 9, 2011. Pursuant to the Arrangement, Magma has acquired all of the outstanding shares of Plutonic on the basis of 2.38...
Latest Volcanology Reference Libraries
Wrangell- St. Elias National Park and Preserve is located in the southeastern portion of the American state of Alaska. The park holds 13,175,799 acres of land, divided between the park and preserve, which was once inhabited by Native Americans like the Ahtna and Tlingit peoples. Although Alaska was purchased by the United States in 1867, American citizens did not move into the area until the 1880’s, when gold was discovered in the Yukon Territory. It is thought that George Holt was the...
Lassen Volcanic National Park is located in the northeastern portion of the state of California in the United States. The park contains 106,452 acres of land that was once inhabited by Native Americans, who knew that the park’s main feature, the Lassen Peak volcano, was full of fire and would erupt at some point. Explorers of European ancestry used this peak in the nineteenth century as a landmark while traveling to Sacramento Valley. One of the guides that accompanied the explorers was...
The Amsterdam and Saint-Paul Islands temperate grasslands is an ecoregion including two volcanic islands in the southern Indian Ocean. The French research vessel Marion Dufresne II, which services the Martin-de-Vivies research station on Amsterdam Island, is the only way to visit the islands. There are two volcanoes that lie 83 kilometers from each other in the center of a triangle between Australia, Antarctica and southern Africa called Ile Amsterdam and Ile Saint-Paul. The islands are...
Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park is located in the United States on the island of Hawaiʻi. The park contains 323,431 acres of land, of which half is designated as Hawaii Volcanoes Wilderness, and the distinctive Mauna Loa and Kīlauea volcanoes. Mauna Loa is the world’s largest volcano and Kīlauea is among the world’s most active. The first American visitor to the park was Asa Thurston and the first English visitor was a missionary named William Ellis, both of whom traveled to the...
Haleakalā National Park is located in Hawaii in the United States, on the island of Maui. The park contains 33,265 acres of protected land, with 19,270 acres of designated wilderness. The area was initially added to Hawaii National Park in 1916, alongside the Kilauea and Mauna Loa volcanoes on the island of Hawaii. The creation of Hawaii Volcanoes National Park in 1961 helped established Haleakalā National Park and in 2000, the name of the park was altered to its Hawaiian spelling by the...
