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Super Volcano In Yellowstone National Park
solcomhouse ^ | Unknown

Posted on 05/14/2002 8:35:23 AM PDT by Junior

It is little known that lying underneath one of America's areas of outstanding natural beauty - Yellowstone Park - is one of the largest super volcanoes in the world. Scientists have revealed that it has been on a regular eruption cycle of 600,000 years. The last eruption was 640,000 years ago…so the next is overdue. The next eruption could be 2,500 times the size of the 1980 Mount St. Helens eruption.

And the sleeping giant is breathing: volcanologists have been tracking the movement of magma under the park and have calculated that in parts of Yellowstone the ground has risen over seventy centimeters this century.

Normal volcanoes are formed by a column of magma - molten rock - rising from deep within the Earth, erupting on the surface, and hardening in layers down the sides. This forms the familiar cone shaped mountain we associate with volcanoes. 

Supervolcanoes, however, begin life when magma rises from the mantle to create a boiling reservoir in the Earth's crust. This chamber increases to an enormous size, building up colossal pressure until it finally erupts. The explosion would send ash, dust, and sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere, reflecting the sun's rays and creating a cold wave lasting several years. Crops in many areas would fail and many species of animals and plants would face extinction.

The most recent caldera-forming eruption about 650,000 years ago produced a caldera 53 x 28 miles (85 x 45 kilometers) across in what is now Yellowstone National Park (Figure 2). During that eruption, ground-hugging flows of hot volcanic ash, pumice, and gases swept across an area of more than 3,000 square miles. When these enormous pyroclastic flows finally stopped, they solidified to form a layer of rock called the Lava Creek Tuff. Its volume was about 240 cubic miles (1,000 cubic kilometers), enough material to cover Wyoming with a layer 13 feet thick or the entire conterminous United States with a layer 5 inches thick. The Lava Creek Tuff has been exposed by erosion at Tuff Cliff, a popular Yellowstone attraction along the lower Gibbon River.

The eruption also shot a column of volcanic ash and gases high into Earth's stratosphere. This volcanic cloud circled the globe many times and affected Earth's climate by reducing the intensity of solar radiation reaching the lower atmosphere and surface. Fine volcanic ash that fell downwind from the eruption site blanketed much of North America. This ash layer is still preserved in deposits as far away as Iowa, where it is a few inches thick, and the Gulf of Mexico, where it is recognizable in drill cores from the sea floor. Lava flows have since buried and obscured most of the caldera, but the underlying processes responsible for Yellowstone's tremendous volcanic eruptions are still at work.

 

TINY CRYSTALS PREDICT A HUGE VOLCANO IN WESTERN U.S.

Press Release

MADISON - Reading the geochemical fine print found in tiny crystals of the minerals zircon and quartz, scientists are forming a new picture of the life history - and a geologic timetable - of a type of volcano in the western United States capable of dramatically altering climate sometime within the next 100,000 years.

With insight gained from new analytical techniques to study crystals of zircon and quartz, minerals that serve as veritable time capsules of geologic events, a group of scientists from the University of Wisconsin-Madison has proposed a new model for the origin of volcanism in young calderas.

These are volcanoes that occur over "hot spots" in the Earth and they erupt every few hundred thousand years in catastrophic explosions, sending hundreds to thousands of cubic kilometers of ash into the atmosphere and wreaking climatic havoc on a global scale.

In a series of papers, UW-Madison geologists Ilya N. Bindeman and John W. Valley present a life history of the hot spot volcanism that has occurred in the Yellowstone basin of the western United States over the past 2 million years. Their findings suggest a dying, but still potent cycle of volcanism, and a high probability of a future catastrophic eruption sometime within the next million years, and possibly within the next hundred thousand years.

Today's Yellowstone landscape represents the last in a sequence of calderas - the broad crater-like basins created when volcanoes explode and their characteristic cones collapse - that formed in regular progression over the past 2 million years. The near-clockwork timing of eruptions there - 2 million years ago, 1.3 million years ago and 600,000 years ago - suggests a pattern that may foreshadow an eruption of catastrophic proportions, said Bindeman and Valley.

Beneath Yellowstone and its spectacular landscape of hot springs and geysers is a hot spot, an upwelling plume of melted rock from the Earth's mantle. As the plume of hot, liquid rock rises in the Earth, it melts the Earth's crust and creates large magma chambers.

"These magmas usually erupt in a very catastrophic way," said Bindeman. "By comparison, the eruption of Mount St. Helens sent about two cubic kilometers of ash into the atmosphere. These catastrophic types of eruptions send thousands of cubic kilometers of ash skyward."

The hot spot deep beneath Yellowstone acts like a burner, said Bindeman. "It's a constant source of heat that acts on the upper crust and forms magma chambers that contain tens of thousands of cubic kilometers" of molten rock.

One of the massive plates that helps make up the crust of the Earth, the North American plate, is slowly moving over the hot spot, said Bindeman. "The plate has been moving across the heat source which makes it seem like the volcanoes are moving across the continent. Moreover, we have a progression of explosive eruptions which seem to have some periodicity."

Bindeman and Valley studied rocks that span the entire 2-million-year long eruptive sequence at Yellowstone with a special emphasis on lavas that erupted the last time one of the massive volcanoes popped off creating what geologists call the Yellowstone Caldera. Their conclusion is that the volcanic cycle is waning, but that there is still a very real potential of an eruption of massive proportions sometime in the near geologic future.

A cross section of a quartz crystal obtained from rocks near Yellowstone. Crystals of quartz and zircon harbor geochemical clues to past -- and future -- volcanic eruptions in the Yellowstone caldera. In the past, eruptions over this "hot spot" in the Earth have been of a magnitude that would have severely altered Earth's climate.
Image credit: Ilya Bindeman and John Fournelle, remastered in Adobe Illustrator by Mary Diman

Such an eruption would disrupt global climate by injecting millions of tons of ash into the atmosphere. Some of the ash would remain in the atmosphere for years, reflect sunlight back into space and cool the planet, significantly affecting life. In addition, a blanket of ash over a meter thick would be deposited in nearby regions and effectively smother life there.

The most recent caldera is 600,000 years old and encompasses an area of more than 2,000 square kilometers. When it erupted, it blasted 1,000 cubic kilometers of volcanic rock into the atmosphere and it settled as ash over more than half of the United States.

After that last major eruption, volcanism in Yellowstone continued in a quieter fashion with another, much smaller eruption occurring 70,000 years ago.

Old Faithful Geyser Yellowstone National Park

http://www.nps.gov/yell/oldfaithfulcam.htm

Today's spectacular geysers and hot springs at Yellowstone are the most visible part of the volcanic system there. They contain heated snow and rainwater which leave a geochemical record that provides insight into the region's geologic activity. Prior to the last catastrophic eruption at Yellowstone 600,000 years ago, an even more spectacular geothermal landscape existed there, said Bindeman.

"The unique thing about Yellowstone is that the volcanic rocks that erupted following the collapse of the big calderas contain up to 50 percent oxygen which was ultimately derived from rain waters," Bindeman said. "The zircon and quartz tell us that rocks near the surface were altered by heated snow and rainwater. These rocks were then remelted to become magmas."

This scenario changes the view of magmatism at Yellowstone and other calderas as representing new magma coming from deep in the Earth. On the contrary, Bindeman and Valley make a case for the total remelting and recycling of previously erupted surface rocks.

Their findings have been published in a series of papers, the first in the August 2000 edition of the journal Geology. Another paper is to appear this month (July) in Earth and Planetary Science Letters, and another is scheduled for publication next month (August) in the Journal of Petrology.


TOPICS: Miscellaneous; US: Wyoming
KEYWORDS: catastrophism; crevolist; supervolcano; techindex; yellowstone
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To: Junior
Well now.... you have sure put a damper on my trip this summer to Wyoming's Jackson Hole! Jackson Hole is just an hour south of Yellowstone. Was married there in 1970 and return every few years to do more backpacking. As if I didn't already have enough to think about with Grizzley Bears roaming the paths, ice cravases lurking above the snow line... now a volcano due to erupt!

Oh well, as Thornton Wilder once said, "The test of an adventure is that when you're in the middle of it, you say to yourself, "Oh, now I've got myself into an awful mess; I wish I were sitting quietly at home." And the sign that something's wrong with you is when you sit quietly at home wishing you were out having lots of adventure."


church where I was married... can see mountains beyond


camp site on 1995 trip... way up in the mountains... hubby having cup of tea... we called it having "high tea".. truely GOD'S COUNTRY!

81 posted on 06/14/2002 6:04:22 AM PDT by Apple Pan Dowdy
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To: Junior
Exactly. This volcano doesn't seem to be described in "Gilgamesh Revisited."
82 posted on 06/14/2002 6:20:48 AM PDT by Doctor Stochastic
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To: junior
Thanks for posting the article; it's fascinating. Bumping for Hub to read, later. ;-D
83 posted on 06/14/2002 6:26:04 AM PDT by Judith Anne
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To: rwfromkansas
I heard about this....the last time it erupted it buried animals as far away as Nebraska I think.....this is a bit worrisome. Oh well....

From what I read, It wasn't so much them being buried but more them breathing in the silicate dust. A hundred times worse than what you would find in a 1920's coal mine. Just tore their lungs to pieces.

Oh, and the obligatory: "What did George Bush Know, and When Did He Know it?"

84 posted on 06/14/2002 6:30:46 AM PDT by avg_freeper
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To: det dweller too
What does ITEOTWAWKI mean?
Since no one seems to have helped you out so far...
It's the end of the world as we know it. ITEOTWAWKI
Popularized in a song by REM. (And I Feel Fine)
85 posted on 06/14/2002 6:54:04 AM PDT by philman_36
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To: Junior
Quick, somebody get Nessy out of there.
86 posted on 06/14/2002 7:06:33 AM PDT by MissAmericanPie
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To: philman_36
You hadn't gotten as far as reply #14...
87 posted on 06/14/2002 7:40:10 AM PDT by Junior
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To: Junior
My bad.
88 posted on 06/14/2002 7:52:33 AM PDT by philman_36
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To: Junior
The problem is, Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming are all red states. Couldn't we get something to blow in California instead?
89 posted on 06/14/2002 7:53:14 AM PDT by sphinx
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To: Junior
I sure did miss it didn't I. If it were a snake I'd be bit.
90 posted on 06/14/2002 7:55:26 AM PDT by philman_36
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach
While there was little loss in human life, it devasted hundreds of square miles of old-growth forest, probably killing thousands of spotted owls at the same time.

Go ahead conserve, tree hug, whatever. How do you regulate the Earth causing mass extinction?

91 posted on 06/14/2002 8:33:32 AM PDT by Rev DMV
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To: Blam
Ping.
92 posted on 06/14/2002 10:25:18 AM PDT by Vigilantcitizen
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To: Jerrybob
And doing without crops.

Very few people grow crops. The rest of us'll just go to the store. :)

93 posted on 06/14/2002 10:47:17 AM PDT by lepton
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To: dead
They might be total jerks for all I know.

So you're not sure about the genetic component? :)

94 posted on 06/14/2002 10:48:49 AM PDT by lepton
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To: Salgak
Exactly. It's happened before, will happen again, and sounds roughly equivalent to another Krakatoa explosion.

Much more ash, and flying rocks. Much bigger overall.

95 posted on 06/14/2002 10:50:34 AM PDT by lepton
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To: rwfromkansas
I heard about this....the last time it erupted it buried animals as far away as Nebraska

As I understand, those Rhinosceri were a big clue in figuring this thing out.

96 posted on 06/14/2002 10:58:54 AM PDT by lepton
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To: Junior
bump for big natural explosions
97 posted on 06/14/2002 3:36:35 PM PDT by Pagey
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To: Pagey
Yes, bump for nature!
98 posted on 06/14/2002 10:38:32 PM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach
Bump for one of my favorite places in the US!
99 posted on 06/15/2002 10:39:34 AM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach
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To: MissAmericanPie; Ernest_at_the_Beach; 2sheep; Thinkin' Gal; dennisw
Quick, somebody get Nessy out of there.

Maybe the sea monsters can find a safe underwater cave to hide in. Even Bloop!

100 posted on 06/15/2002 11:47:59 AM PDT by Prodigal Daughter
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