Posted on 04/01/2005 3:01:49 PM PST by DannyTN
"Super volcano" could dwarf Indonesia's earthquake catastrophes: expert
Fri Apr 1,12:21 AM ET Science - AFP
SYDNEY (AFP) - As Indonesians struggled to recover from the second deadly earthquake to strike them in three months, an Australian expert warned the country faced the prospect of a "super volcano" eruption that would dwarf all previous catastrophes.
AFP/File Photo
Professor Ray Cas of Monash University's School of Geosciences said the world's biggest super volcano was Lake Toba, on Indonesia's island of Sumatra, site of both the recent massive earthquakes.
Cas told Australian media Friday that Toba sits on a faultline running down the middle of Sumatra -- just where some seismologists say a third earthquake might strike following the 9.0 magnitude quake on December 26 and Monday's 8.7 temblor.
Those quakes occurred along faultlines running just off Sumatra's west coast and created seismological stresses which could hasten an eruption.
Cas said Toba last erupted 73,000 years ago in an event so massive that it altered the entire world's climate.
"The eruption released 1,000 cubic kilometers (240 cubic miles) of ash and rock debris into the atmosphere, much of it as fine ash which blocked out solar radiation, kicking the world back into an ice age," he said.
The scientist said super volcanos represented the greatest potential hazard on earth, "the only greater threat being an asteroid impact from space".
"A super volcano will definitely erupt," he said.
"It could be in a few, 50 or another 1000 years but sooner or later one is going to go off."
Other super volcanos are found in Italy, South America, the United States and New Zealand -- where Mount Taupo could be ready for eruption.
"It has a big eruption every 2,000 years, and it last erupted about 2,000 years ago," Cas said.
The potential death toll from a super volcano eruption "could reach the hundreds of thousands to millions and there are serious implications on climate, weather and viability of food production," Cas said.
"The big problem is a lot of the volcanoes that potentially could erupt are perhaps not monitored to the degree that they should be, and of course we learnt that lesson from the Boxing Day tsunami disaster," he said.
Why not? We'd all die of starvation. (or, maybe a gun shot if you try to take my food)
LMAO! Well, darkside caused lots of misunderstandings.
Although that would a euphamism for what it will be called by those honored with the chance to work there for a year.
There's a big difference between a local "BOOM" caused by water/magma interaction - which has happened thousands of times at Yellowstone - and wouldn't affect anyone outside the park.
There's no indication of any sort of imminent caldera blast at Yellowstone. It likely would take several thousand years minimum if there was going to be one for the chamber to become fully primed, based on what we've been able to divine about the magma in the chamber.
Overall there's such immense amounts of mythology and nonsense in this thread I don't know quite where to begin.
And on this Opie day I can spell and do grammar but have declined to submit corrections when anybody can clearly see the typos and there are three.
Has been a lifelong dream of mine to put a footprint on the Moon. Isn't going to happen (I might have if we had not killed the space program at the end of Apollo) however, I can still work to see that happen for future generations!
I was apart of a NASA Lunar Base study a few years back. :-)
Well ok then something will collide with the Earth.
And that was the point of my post.
Everything I post is done on dial-up.
You are absolutely correct. :-) FYI, both the Sun and Jupiter have a far greater effect on the Moon than Mars does.
BTW, I was trying to reply to multiple posts. If I implied jpsb was wrong, I apologize. He wasn't. He just happend to be the reply-to post. Sigh.
Jupiter? That surpises me, but Jupiter is big. I read about a star discovered what was Jupiter size the other day, very surpising, greater mass of couse but not a crazy dense thing drawf type star. Maybe some day we can ignite Jupter and move to Titan. LOL
These People are under continual Disquietudes, never enjoying a Minute's Peace of Mind; and their Disturbances proceed from Causes which very little affect the rest of Mortals. Their Apprehensions arise from several Changes they dread in the Celestial Bodies. For Instance; that the Earth by the continual Approaches of the Sun towards it, must in Course of Time be absorbed or swallowed up. That the Face of the Sun will by Degrees be encrusted with its own Effluvia, and give no more Light to the World. That, the Earth very narrowly escaped a Brush from the Tail of the last Comet, which would have infallibly reduced it to Ashes; and that the next, which they have calculated for One and Thirty Years hence, will probably destroy us.
- Gulliver's Travels
In the early days, we did consider calling the ping list Gods, Graves, Glyphs and Myths. We settled on GGG. (It's okay if a few myths slip in every now and again, ahem)
Jellystone Park'
That's where it's happen'.
Nice post
Volcanologists use two measures of eruption size: the magnitude of the eruption (the volume or mass of magma erupted)and the intensity (the rate of magma eruption). (Magma is the hot, molten, often gas-laden rock material stored under volcanoes.) In principle, these two parameters are independent, but there is good evidence that they are linked. Thus, super-eruptions are not only huge (high magnitude), but also very violent (high intensity).
To give some comparison, Mount St. Helens in 1980 erupted less than one cubic kilometre of magma. Vesuvius (AD 79) erupted about five cubic kilometres, and Krakatoa* (1883) about 12 cubic kilometres. The biggest eruption of the past few hundred, perhaps one thousand, years, that of Tambora volcano (Indonesia, 1815) released about 30 cubic kilometres of magma.
The biggest super-eruption recognised so far produced approximately 5000 cubic kilometres, creating the so-called “Fish Canyon Tuff event” in Colorado, USA.
Campi Phlegreia caldera volcano that produced a super-eruption about 35,000 years ago is across the bay from Naples from Vesuvius.
FYI, Fish Canyon Tuff is the San Juan Basin in the Four Corners area with >5,000 km3 of ash in a 35 X 75 kilometer area.
This is real.
What do we know about the Volcanoe that once occupied the area where Los Alamos now resides...it is my understanding that it was a 29,000 foot high mountain before it blew leaving an enormous caldera of at least 10 + miles.
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