Night image of Eyjafjallajökull erupting on April 24, 2010. Image courtesy of James Ashworth.
A quick update on the Eyjafjallajökull eruption: Not a lot to report in terms of changes in the volcanic activity at the volcano. The update from the Icelandic Met Office last night sums it up nicely:
Overall activity similar as yesterday. Eruption seen from west in the morning - north crater still active. External water has not affected vent activity much since 18 April. Geologists' field observations (2-10 km from vents) show that explosivity is magmatic and that the tephra produced since 18 April is much coarser than during first four days. Explosions heard at FljótshlÃð, 10-15 km NW of vents. Meltwater discharge suggest similar lava activity. Processing of data obtained yesterday shows that lava had advanced 400-500 m northwards from crater, forming an ice depression extending some 700 m from vents.
Overall assessment: Magma flow rate has remained at similar level over the last few days while plume activity is slowly declining. Lava continues flowing towards north. No signs of melting or meltwater discharge towards south. No signs of termination of eruption.
This update is one of the first to mention lava flowing in the crater, almost half a kilometer at this point. The ash from the volcano is causing little disruption of air traffic today, with even the airports on Iceland reopening after closing over the weekend. Iceland continues to recover from the eruption as well. This is also a report of thermal imaging from space that suggests that the heat being emitted from the volcano is rising, which might make sense if more of the basaltic magma is filling the edifice and erupting in the strombolian explosions and lava flows.
Now, the political storm caused by the flight cancellations continues to rage as well. I still stand by my ascertion that EU officials made the right decision with the information on hand. Most of the articles criticizing the closure refer to information we know now but was unknown to the people making decisions during the eruption - so, remember, hindsight is always 20/20. The question I ask anyone who thinks the closure was wrong: based on the information on hand at the time (ash from a volcanic eruption was likely over Europe, potentially in significant amounts and we have little information of how much ash an airliner can ingest safely), would you have let your mother take a flight? I think, pretty clearly, the answer should be "no". What this all shows is that EU officials needed a better plan to deal with these exceedingly rare events for most of northern Europe and airlines needed to have ready access to information about how their planes would respond. The way the media and business has responded, by trying to scapegoat the government in being "overly cautious" (as they should be) will make the next ash disruption a lot harder to implement and we can only hope that it doesn't lead to a real disaster.
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UFOs and Swedish long-range bombers, sure! Did you hear the one about the real reason why Icelandic farmers are "cleaning up" all the "ash" too? Cos there's about 0,03% Au present in the ash (ie one ton of ash will yield about $5,000 in gold). There are also reports of diamond finds. Only lucky farmer reportedly picked up a 1.97ct rough pink diamond that will be worth about $295,000 when cut. Those were on MSNBC's "Breaking News" in response to Titter Group messages.
:strewth:
@Randall Nix (but really for all)
Ref: the link for the paper mentioned at [434]
"The Puzzle of the 1996 Bárdarbunga, Iceland, Earthquake: No Volumetric Component in the Source Mechanism"
www.rses.anu.edu.au/~hrvoje/Tkalcic_etal_BSSA2009.pdf
Clouds clearing just a bit on the cams and voda phone
Good Morning all.
Well, I missed the party. I am looking forward to seeing a time lapse of the flood. I did check out the Vodaphone pics and I got the idea.
When I was watching last night, I did see three different plumes coming out of the eruption site while I was watching the Vala cam. I saw white steam, black ash, and a brownish plume behind the Strombolian fountains. So there could be three areas of activity. It is possible that there are three vents in the crater itself, but I have no idea if that is accurate.
Last night I figured it was a plane. It just looked like it from the video. I hope they got some good pics and will make them available because that would be really neat, especially if they got a pic of the lava flow. That could be going under the ice, though, but I think you could still tell where it is from the steam.
I will be of and on line today so I will probably miss a lot :-( but I will catch up later. Have fun watching if you can see anything!
Heads up! It looks like a big white blob at the top of the glacier on the Thoro cam. Check it out and let me know what you think.
http://eldgos.mila.is/eyjafjallajokull-fra-fimmvorduhalsi/
Does the opening of the water fall or discharge area and river HAVE An official NAME?
There appears to be a steam (circle vent) open at the top of the discharge opening section people watch. (Circle is currently right in front of the cloud layer). I saw this circle last night before the event - missed it.
That white blob looks like a steam vent.
Please excuse my ignorance but is that a new crater on the Poro came or just a steam vent
Sure looks like a lot of steam coming out of that! What is going on there?
http://en.vedur.is/earthquakes-and-volcanism/earthquakes/myrdalsjokull/
NEW EQ on Kala glacier area - where is Kala in reference to this EQ.
I thought the plume looked whiter if it was just steam...this seems a bit darker to me.
Lurking after looking at that I still have to say the same thing as last night:
425 Lurking I think it's normal but what's normal when one half of your country is on one continental plate and the other half is on another plate.....with a hot spot/mantle plume in the middle;)
Boris or Erik can give you a better idea....I have been watching those quakes in that area for a couple of months now and they seem to ebb and flow....much like the lava in EJ. When you are looking and see that area go from a few quakes a day to 70+ in an hour like EJ did....then you can be pretty darn sure something is up;)
looks like one of the visible cavities from yesterday slumped more (set off hlaup?) and is gettig the steam-cleaning treatment
#513 Randal
Thanks on the EQ frequency note: during ealier EJ event EQs increased to 70 plus EQs within an hours time.
Also I want to go on record as saying the UFO was either Dr. Who or Tralfamadorians;)
Renee, I think the poor lighting is leading to the different shades in the steam. If it gets really dark, then we will know for sure what it is! Right now it is only steam and it could be a fumerol or just the ice up there steaming from the heat.
#514
Your right birdseye, The 'cavity' that is visible is the lowest one of 3 that you can easily see on the photo link that Janet posted earlier today.. scroll up for the link. lol
It was when the lava flow hit that sump that the steam event really started, and shortly after the water really started to flow, it is much less now though compared to a few hours ago..
A little off-topic.
The blog Geotripper has a little piece of film from the USGS. The USGS has a cam at the Death Valley site of an endangered species, the pupfish. It's got really good footage of the effects of the earthquake at the Mexico/USA border. Having experienced earthquakes, I've got to say, this is the best view of the Feeling of an earthquake. Garry Hayes at Geotripper has more information:
http://geotripper.blogspot.com/2010/04/guess-what-else-devils-hole-pupf…
Earthquake under Katla?
en.vedur.is/earthquakes-and-
volcanism/earthquakes/myrdalsjokull/
http://www.earthice.hi.is/page/jardvis_EYJOKULL_myndir
Link to photo's... It was Anna who posted it, apologies if I missinformed anyone. :)
beedragon Canada yep and in the caldera.
According to news there is a lot of gas smell following this flood. This is quite interesting I must say.
http://www.mbl.is/mm/frettir/innlent/2010/04/28/gas_fylgir_vatninu_ur_g…
Interesting little article about glaciovolcanoes (like Eyjafjallajökull, Katla, etc.) and what scientist can learn from studying their ashes.
www.laboratoryequipment.com/News-glaciovolcanoes-offer-climate-clues-04…
Apparently the US NSF is funding some research towards this end.
How significant is a 1.5m EQ 5.8km under Katla?? Is that normal activity for the Katla region?
It seems that the lava is burrowing its way underneath the glacier, and I would suppose that every now and then a portion of the glacier collapses onto the lava flow, causing the steaming in various spots higher upslope. This generates a lot of hot meltwater, which is the steaming stuff sometims appearing at the end of the glacier. There seems to be a lot of crumbling at the front of the glacier. The gas odor is most probably due to leaching of minerals from the lava by the hot water, or meltwater generated in the vent area, where there is a lot of gas escaping and possibly mixing with the water.
shelly Jon, Erk or Boris would know better but I would say an EQ here and there isn't anything but if you start seeing a bunch of them at a time....and in a short amount of time....then might be out of the norm....There hasn't really been all that many there in the past few months.
Help! In one of the previous threads, someone wrote an informative post about the interaction of lava and ice. They predicted the steam vents, using NY street vents as the analogy.
I've been thru the previous 3 threads looking for that post, but cannot find it. Does anyone remember where that is?
@Boris Behncke, There is definitely water flowing over lava. But there is also something else going on there. Too bad we can't see it because of the cloud cover. But earlier I did see some dark ash cloud come from Eyjafjallajökull.
New earthquake in myrdalsjokull
http://en.vedur.is/earthquakes-and-volcanism/earthquakes/myrdalsjokull/
It seams to me that the lava flow must be getting closer to the outlet. Since the temperature of the water from the floding earlyer today was 11,21°C when it passed the old bridge over Markafljót, close to road #1.
http://vmkerfi.vedur.is/vatn/VV_Frame.php?r=12406
When do you think the lava flow will show up on one of the cameras?
parclair 528 - see 229ff,
@parclair - New York steam vents mentioned in post 231 in this thread here.
Ãórólfsfelli cam has been showing what appears to be explosions at the base of the waterfall visible through the moving cloud cover I am watching at max zoom
The fall looks solid from top to bottom
@ marginata, thank you!:-)
Maybe something more significant happened, e.g. the long awaited opening of another rift that Jón FrÃmann predicted a while ago?
The tremors are clearly trending up:
hraun.vedur.is/ja/Katla2009/stodvaplott.html#googtrans/auto/en
but then could it be only the signal of the increased water flow?
*sigh*
Why does all the excitement happen when I'm working or asleep? The views are now somewhat obscured by poor weather, so yet again I have missed all the action. :(
I am not sure it could be shedding of ice or something more interesting, but it was incredibly fast and through the clouds it appeared as a ring radiating from the base of the falls towards the cam
FYI, new post:
http://scienceblogs.com/eruptions/2010/04/wednesday_whatzits_volcanoes_…
steam coming from the base of the falls now
getting so tense/can't see thu fog/ definately steaming;definately/ had to go and get my knitting
ps.... but Erik, we're not done with this volcano.;)
Best!motsfo
Vala cam currently showing glimpse of crater
Here comes the Fog
On Great Tiger paws
apologies to Whatshisname.
Best!motsfo
Fantastic views on this sunny day.
Pozdrawiam i powodzenia z nowymi wpisami na bloga!.
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