… Sergeant Pepper taught the band to play …
by Steve Goddard
I remember May 18, 1980 like it was yesterday. I was skiing behind Taos Ski Valley in ten foot deep snow, up to the base of Wheeler Peak.
Current view of Taos Ski Valley
At the time, I was working as a volcano researcher for the US Government, studying the nature of explosive volcanic eruptions. When we got back to Taos, we turned on the TV and saw amazing pictures of Mt. St. Helens, which had literally blown it’s top.
Eastern Illinois University photographs
Mt. St. Helens had previously been a dependable source of snow and ice all summer, and the K2 ski team (including Phil Mahre) used to train up there in the summer. It no longer is tall enough for summer skiing.
The mechanism of the eruption is well understood, thanks to an amazing video reconstruction.
As the magma chamber rose up in the volcano (magma is less dense than rock) it did several things. First, it melted the snow and ice and turned the soil into mud. Second, it made the north slope of the volcano steeper and less stable. Third, groundwater from melted snow and ice seeped down into the magma chamber and added to the steam pressure. At 8:32 am, a large earthquake further liquified the soil on the north slope, and caused a massive mud slide. The weight of the overburden quickly became less than the steam pressure inside, and the volcano blew it’s top. A massive amount of ash and trees poured down into the Toutle River wiping out everything in it’s path.
Bridge on the Toutle washing downstream
A reminder that explosive volcanic eruptions dump a lot of steam, ash and gas into the atmosphere.
In June 1783 the Laki volcano close to Katla erupted for several months with clouds of poisonous gas that killed 9,000 people in Iceland. But the eruption also created a cold fog that spread across much of Europe and North America, in some places causing the coldest summer for 500 years as the Sun’s warmth was blotted out.
“The summer of the year 1783 was an amazing and portentous one, and full of horrible phenomena,” wrote the naturalist Gilbert White in Hampshire. “The country people look with a kind of superstitious awe at the red louring aspect of the sun thro’ the fog.” The climate across the northern hemisphere was sent into upheaval, even weakening the monsoon rains in Africa and India, leading to famine in Egypt and India.
A few days ago, the Met Office forecast that the ash cloud would move to the northeast out of British airspace by May 19th. Their forecast for May 18th (today) appears to have been very accurate.
Below is their current forecast for the next five days.
Will Katla erupt? What do readers think?
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During the recent (2004-2006) eruption, I spent a lot of time at the web cams and photo archives for St. Helens, they’re still active. See:
http://www.fs.fed.us/gpnf/volcanocams/msh/ (the HD image looks trashed, WUWT?)
http://vulcan.wr.usgs.gov/Volcanoes/MSH/Eruption04/framework.html
I remember a few days after MSH blew up I was washing the ash off my car… in Dallas Texas!
AndrewsDad says:
May 18, 2010 at 3:15 pm
… We were talking last night about how the animal species, specifically the reptiles, have returned and changed in the area.
Chances are, if armageddon happends, some GREEN REPTILES will return too….
Central Atlantic Rift activity (it crosses Iceland):
M 5.2, Greenland Sea
Date: Sunday, May 16, 2010 16:39:33 UTC
Sunday, May 16, 2010 04:39:33 PM at epicenter
Depth: 10.00 km (6.21 mi)
M 5.0, Greenland Sea
Date: Sunday, May 16, 2010 15:29:02 UTC
Sunday, May 16, 2010 03:29:02 PM at epicenter
Depth: 10.00 km (6.21 mi)
M 4.8, Greenland Sea
Date: Sunday, May 16, 2010 20:23:04 UTC
Sunday, May 16, 2010 08:23:04 PM at epicenter
Depth: 29.80 km (18.52 mi)
M 4.9, Azores Islands, Portugal
Date: Friday, May 14, 2010 13:25:34 UTC
Friday, May 14, 2010 01:25:34 PM at epicenter
Depth: 22.30 km (13.86 mi)
Details from USGS web site
The Eruptions blog has a “Memories of Mount St. Helens” series:
http://scienceblogs.com/eruptions/2010/05/memories_of_mount_st_helens_on.php
Ulric Lyons says:
May 19, 2010 at 5:57 am
Yarmy says:
May 19, 2010 at 5:01 am
If you want to look for “strings”, as this a temperature forcing issue, try the 17yr cocronal hole cycle. Otherwise, notice how many large eruptions are preceded by very cold winters: http://www.volcano.si.edu/world/largeeruptions.cfm
So it’s solar max, solar min, 17 year coronal hole cycle, and cold winters that cause large eruptions. That’s narrowed it down. Or maybe, just maybe, it’s absolutely nothing to do with any of those things.
Thanks for the links, DirkH, Yarmy, Ulric, Enneagram, some show correlation with minima and some with maxima.
The reduction in load of a continental glacier melting might contribute to or accelerate an eruption, or trigger movement on a fault to start an earthquake, less likely melting of an alpine glacier. Changes in atmospheric pressure? not impossible to find a correlation, but the events are still inevitable, not caused by a strong wind or deep low pressure, but by internal processes. Lunar tidal effects are constant and regular enough that they will probably not cause an eruption or earthquake that would happen anyway, though there might be a correlation between high or low tide and the onset of an earthquake or eruption. More distant objects like the sun or other planets will have that much less effect.
Correlation between solar minima or maxima seems like it has got to be coincidence, though magnetic perturbations could do something in the earth’s core, which might affect tectonism. It might be worth checking for increased volcanism at periods when the earth’s magnetic field reversed, earthquakes would be harder to date accurately enough.
Gravity is the important force in the workings of the earth, and interactions between gravity and energy from the sun run the oceans and atmosphere.
@Enneagram says:
May 19, 2010 at 6:07 am
January 1600 was very cold. Temperatures were raised strongly from around Feb 9th, and again more fiercely from around the 17th, the eruption was the 19th. A very similar astronomical configuration occurs in Jan/Feb 1779 and gives the same temperature profile.
Flask says:
May 19, 2010 at 9:07 am
I can assure you that there is overwelming evidence for activity to increase on a strong temperature uplift after a cold episode. Its probably in history somewhere, I can`t believe this has not been correlated before. Local temperature is also highly instrumental. So what is the mechanism? thermal expansion, air pressure+temp`s?
I live 34 miles west of MSH and watched it blow up that morning. Two days later on my day off from working at a grocery store I had the unique opportunity to fly on a rescue mission in a Huey H1D filled with national press corps. None of them knew I was just a “local yokel” with a 35mm Minolta. I beat out 300 press for one of only eighteen seats available for a ride of a lifetime up right next to the mountain and over Spirit Lake which was at that time covered up with logs and ash. I saw some pretty gruesome sights that day but luckily had run out of film. Of course the others in the chopper with me had lots of film and they later appeared on the pages of Life magazine etc.
Didn’t I read somewhere that it is likely that Eyjafjallayokull and Katla have magma chambers that are thought to be connected and that Katla usually goes off a few months after Eyja?
We are told that the ash plume will have no effect on British weather, but up until yesterday, the spring here has been pretty cold. I only turned the central heating off on Monday night, that’a bout a month later than usual. And a dark grey sand did fall on my car.
Our prevailing weather in the UK is from the SW but recently it has been from the NW, hence cold arctic air and volcanic ash coming over. The ash is not the cause of the cold weather, at least at this stage, but they are both coming this way together because of the wind direction.
Veronica says:
May 19, 2010 at 11:42 am
Funny, I could have sworn April was well warm before the cold snap at the start of May.
http://www.met.rdg.ac.uk/~brugge/diary2010.html#201004
Flask:
Don’t think there is a relationship per se between min/max solar cycles and volcanic eruptions though there is significant solar radiation pressure on the earth’s surface, when the huge suface area being affected is considered, that changes with radiation changes. Of course in any one smaller area this pressure would be minor. See: http://www.blazelabs.com/f-g-rpress.asp. More likely Earth’s orbital eccentricity, axial tilt and precession which would all cause changes in sun’s tidal forces upon the earth and its magma would have a more direct effect upon eruptions. Dr. Iben Browning of the New Madrid Fault fame spoke of some of these issues back in the 80’s.
@jim G says:
May 19, 2010 at 12:57 pm
Whatever the mechanisms, I can guarantee new activity at times of surface temperature rise. Nice site Blazelabs, I found it a while back reseaching triangular and tetrahedral numbers, as they are so common in planetary harmonies.
http://www.blazelabs.com/f-p-magic.asp
http://www.hermetic.ch/pns/restofdoc.htm#triangular
According to the Institute of Earth Sciences Katla seismicity discussion, Katla volcano under the Myrdalsjokull glacier (fills the caldera) does show seasonal seismic activity with activity concentrated in the latter part of the year and is attributed to deloading of the thin crust above the magma chamber due to summer melting of ice, and to high ground water pressure in the caldera roof. Perhaps this information coupled with the apparent affinity of Katla to erupt soon after an eruption at Eyjafjallayokull might cause a betting person to lay a wage that Katla might erupt in late summer.
BYW – the study of the geometry of the Katla magma chamber indicates a shallow magma reservoir with a bottom at a depth of 3 km , a thickness of 1 km , and a approximate volume around 10-12 km3. This geometry would indicate onset of a rapid eruption with the potential of significant volume of eruptives (the Solheimar eruption circa 12,000 ybp estimated at 6 to 7 km3). The 1918 eruption (most recent) was responsible for extending the Southern coast by 5 km with lahar flood deposits.
see http://www2.hi.is/page/ies_katla
Katla has now been quiet for the longest period in the last 500 years and this period is approaching twice the usual average at rest time , so the odds are probably rising that she will blow in a none to distant future. Of course I being a native of the island and living none to far from the beast , certainly hope she stays quiet , or if she blows , it will only be a slight demon fart and not a major eruption like that one almost a century ago, that I am told, added up to 5 klom’s to the shoreline at some places on the coast. However there what everybody seem to miss when the discussing the current eruption taking place at Eyjafjallajökul and it´s possibility as being a precursor to a Katla eruption , it´s estimated that there is evidence of there having been 21 eruptions from Katla, ( 10 of which there are verifiable written records of, the rest estimated some other way) but only 4 in Eyjafjallajökull (prior to the current one) , 3 of which have been followed by a Katla eruption 8-15 months later, and 1 where Katla stayed quiet for usual her pregancy period. There have therefore been 17 Katla eruptions (“childbirths” :-)”) she has managed on her own (plus some smaller farts not big enough to make it through the glacier last one in 1955) , and that therefore it’s is just as likely that the Eyjafjallajökull-Katla connection is just a high occurrence ( 3 out of 4 ) coincidence. I at least hope so and the geologists say the two of them have no direct underground connection that they know of so maybe we have few more years to wait for the old lady (Katla in my book translates to an english equivalent of “She-Kettle” or “She-Cauldron”, and is a female noun therefore I tend to speak of it as her) to blow her top. But then again we may not, but I am not betting on her blowing yet.
Also another thing Katla eruptions tend to be fairly big , spectaculary explosive, and short lived. The 1918 incident lasted only three weeks, it’s a caldera type volcano and the magma chamber is not particularly big so usually she runs out of ammo fairly fast,and though there is of course possibility of considerable destruction or damage from an eruption there, the one in Eyjafjallajökull is a of a different kind , and even if the material it is putting up in the air and piling up on the land is not that much on a daily basis, it might be a persistent and longlived bastard and f.x. keep on interfering with the air traffic flow for one thing for perhaps a year or two before its spent, and in the end have bigger impact , than a short but violent Katla explosion.
Ok, but before I wind down, understandably many people have trouble with trying to figure out how to pronounce or even spell the name of the glacier Eyjafjallajökull. The name is a composition of three words “Eyja” a plural form of the word “Ey” meaning an island, the word “fjalla” a plural form of the the word “fjall” which is the the icelandic version of what is called a mountain in english, and the word “jökull” which translates to “a glacier” in english.
The name Eyjafjallajökull therefore literally translates to “Islands-mountains-glacier” in english, and is of course the glacier in the a mountain range named “Eyjafjöll” ( = eng. “Islands mountains”) , how the name originated I do not know and am not going to attemt to guess at , but I am going to suggest that if you are one of them having trouble with the local name then why no use the equivalent english transliteration “Islands Mountain Glacier” . Simple! No?
Sorry, I somehow managed to leave out that the time period for those 21 Katla eruptions I was talking about in my last comment was from around 900 A.D. to present.
Ulric Lyons:
Of course the Milankovitch cycles to which I was referring regarding tidal forces on the earth’s magma are on geological time scales and would not necessarily have any short term predictive value. Where as if you are correct re heat and cooling cycles they being more immediate, seasonal phenominae could.
Jim
@jim G says:
May 20, 2010 at 10:01 am
This would fit, with why there was such a lot of volcanic activity, coming out of the last Ice Age too. I don`t actually subscibe to Milankovitch theory, not only because of the 41/100kyr, problem, but the record is saw tooth, that does not fit the nature of orbital changes too well. And because I know the Heinrich Events are astronomically forced,
(4627.33yr return of Superior and Inferior Planets)
its makes sense to me that the Glaciation cycle can be seen to be a descending series of these events, progressively falling into worse configurations, until the accumulated”slip”, over a relatively short period, falls back into the +ve mode, if you follow me.
U.
After two or three days the ash cloud reached the East Coast. There was ash detected over almost half the US. (See the quote below for an example.) This was a much larger eruption that from Eye…Kull. There must have been lots of flight cancellations, but nothing so “precautionary” as what has been seen in Europe.
In Seattle I heard what I thought was a 747 flying 100 feet over my house. I went out on the porch and saw several neighbors also looking around in a puzzled way. We were all aware of the volcano’s restlessness, but none of us realized that its blast would be so loud 100 miles away.
Incidentally, a scientist surveyed people in the area around the mountain about how loud the blast had been and discovered that the loudness didn’t drop off regularly with distance, but that there were irregular zones of relative loudness and quietness. The noise wave may have bounced off something in the sky, maybe.
Ulrick,
To me the Milankovich cylcles are only one part in the on-going geologic play and to my thinking they could indeed have an effect upon volcanism via tidal forces which would be a second part in the multiple variables that determine climate, though this second factor may have a different timing and not equal effects in each occurance. Add to these the many other potential factors such as large impacts, continental drift changing ocean conveyors over geologic time scales, periodic super volcanic eruptions, etc and you have your saw tooth effect. Consider also the different types of volcanic activities. Here in Wyoming the effects of these are readily visible in the different thicknesses of bentonite (volcanic ash) which is mined here. Some eruptions may spew more greenhouse gas while others may, indeed, cause nuclear winter such as that which a cataclysmic Yellowstone blow might be capable of producing and everything in between. This is a gigantic multivariate regression job for which we know what the causal variables might be but do not know their exact timing or intrinsic value in each event. In any event, it is doubtfull that my Ford F150 is having much impact.
Jim G says:
May 21, 2010 at 10:22 am
“Milankovich cylcles are only one part in the on-going geologic play and to my thinking they could indeed have an effect upon volcanism via tidal forces which would be a second part in the multiple variables that determine climate”
The correlation with spring tides (the largest tidal consideration) is weak, as is Earth perigee or apogee, so tidal considerations are unlikely from my studies. While many events are close to Lunar nodal crossings, which show up in effects on temperatures most strongly too. This is to do with modulations of the solar wind , and nothing gravitational.
“This is a gigantic multivariate regression job for which we know what the causal variables might be but do not know their exact timing or intrinsic value in each event”
I do not agree. I can see a clear temperature differential at every event (cold followed by hot), and can show the astronomical cause of each of them. The bigger and faster the change, the greater the severity of events.
@Jim Stevens G says:
May 21, 2010 at 10:22 am
“Add to these the many other potential factors such as large impacts, continental drift changing ocean conveyors over geologic time scales, periodic super volcanic eruptions, etc and you have your saw tooth effect”
No none of those will give the 41kyr or 100kyr sawtooth glaciation sequences.
Ulric,
Perhaps not, but my point was that they will cause the Milankovitch phenominae (orbital eccentricity, axial tilt and precession) to not correlate consistently with temperature variation. And all of the factors I mention above, as well as many others, are potential climate changers. Since they are not quantifiable in exact time or even more to the point, intensity, it simply proves the fool’s errand of climate change prediction.
Jim G says:
May 21, 2010 at 4:07 pm
“And all of the factors I mention above, as well as many others, are potential climate changers. Since they are not quantifiable in exact time or even more to the point, intensity,”
Continental drift and the raising of mountain ranges will affect climate, but that is longer term than glaciation cycles. The large increase in volcanic activty coming out of the last ice age obviously didn`t cool the globe. Was does matter in terms of Holocene temperature change, is highly quantifiable as regards timing and intensity, especially month to month, as this level of change is what will trigger new volcanic events. You see, if temperature change is dependant on solar wind speed, then anything based on TSI changes such as Milankovich, is completely redundant.