A Recapitulation of the NDVP this far

/ 06/11/2015
Indonesian army rescue workers. Photographer unknown.

Indonesian army rescue workers during the 2014 eruption. Photographer unknown.

It has taken a long time, far longer than originally intended, to bring the New Decade Volcano Program to a successful conclusion. Indeed, there was a point during the summer at which it seemed that it would be left unfinished as after writing two of the first four articles Carl found himself in a position where first other commitments, then ill health curtailed his participation. Thanks to the help of Albert in particular, the series is soon to be concluded and our choice for Number 1 revealed. But ahead of next week, now is a good time to recapitulate what has gone on before.

The NDVP is not an official list in any way as the only organisation with the authority to officially propose such a list is the IAVCEI, the International Association of Volcanology and Chemistry of the Earth’s Interior. It is the IAVCEI that decides if there will be a new Decade Volcano Program, and if so which volcanoes will be included. Our NDVP list is nothing more than a suggestion that a) there should be a new programme, and b) the criteria that should guide the choice of the ten most dangerous volcanic systems that should be prioritized. Even if a volcano that is well studied, well monitored and where adequate hazard mitigation and contingency plans are in place can still be dangerous, such a volcano is nowhere near as great a threat as one that is not well studied, not well monitored or even not monitored at all and where there are no adequate hazard mitigation and contingency plans. Such volcanoes located in or close to densely populated areas were our primary targets and our choice of the 1 MDE-criterion, “One Million Death Expectancy”, was our way to draw attention to the fact that there are such volcanic systems, plenty of them.

http://www.volcanocafe.org/the-top-10-most-dangerous-volcanic-systems-introducing-the-mde-concept/

http://www.volcanocafe.org/a-new-decade-volcano-program-an-introduction/

10. Kelut, Indonesia

This image shows the pure scale and brutality of the 2014 eruption. Photograph from Lembaran Tipis.

This image shows the pure scale and brutality of the 2014 eruption. Photograph from Lembaran Tipis.

Gunung Kelud is already one of the deadliest volcanoes in history with a confirmed death toll that has surpassed 10 000 dead, with half of those during a single eruption. The modes of lethality include pyroclastic flows, lahars, volcanic ash and widespread scattering of volcanic debris. Due to the form of its eruptions and way of operation it is likely to also be able to produce pyroclastic base surges and caldera forming events. Although this volcano is relatively well studied and monitored, the way the volcano works needs to be better understood since it is the archetype of its own class of volcanoes, artesian crater lake volcanoes. This type of volcanoes are among the deadliest known to mankind.

http://www.volcanocafe.org/the-water-volcano-the-new-decade-volcano-program/

9. Mayon, Philippines

Pyroclastic flows travelling down the flanks of Bulkang Mayon during its 2001 eruption (VEI 3, Strombolian-Vulcanian). Even if the small summit crater is breached to the southeast, this image clearly demonstrates one of the difficulties PHIVOLCS faces when assessing which areas are to be included in the danger zone as the almost perfect symmetry of the mountain makes it virtually certain that pyroclastic flows will travel down most if not all of its flanks. (Maslog City Photos, R. Madronero)

Pyroclastic flows travelling down the flanks of Bulkang Mayon during its 2001 eruption (VEI 3, Strombolian-Vulcanian). Even if the small summit crater is breached to the southeast, this image clearly demonstrates one of the difficulties PHIVOLCS faces when assessing which areas are to be included in the danger zone as the almost perfect symmetry of the mountain makes it virtually certain that pyroclastic flows will travel down most if not all of its flanks. (Maslog City Photos, R. Madronero)

Mayon is widely regarded as one of the most beautiful and perfect volcanic edifices. Unfortunately, there are several risk factors involved with such a huge edifice. The greatest and most immediate one of these being a flank collapse initiated by either a large tectonic earthquake or a volcanic eruption. Recent research has shown that the volcanic edifice is built on or near two major faults and there are incipient cracks on several of its flanks. The main problem with Mayon is that while it is relatively well-monitored it is far from adequately studied.

http://www.volcanocafe.org/perfect-symmetry-the-new-decade-volcano-program-9/

8. Taal, Philippines

There is little to recommend Taal visually and even less once one has familiarised oneself with this vicious brute. This image shows Volcano Island, located in the middle of the Taal caldera, formerly known as Lake Bombon or Lake Taal. (George Tapan)

The 1965 eruption led to the recognition of the base surge as a feature of volcanic eruptions. An American geologists who visited the volcano shortly after the 1965 eruption had also witnessed an atomic bomb explosion and made the comparison with an atomic base surge. This picture was taken by the geologist responsible for the seismograph on Volcano Island as he fled in a boat.

Like Mayon, Taal is relatively well-monitored but is far from adequately studied. Because it has such a small volcanic edifice, it is actually marketed on being the World’s smallest volcano, located in the middle of a scenic lake it is easy to miss that this lake is a huge caldera, 25-30 km in extent, that the volcano is capable of large VEI 6 eruptions and that Manilla, some 50 km away, is actually in part built upon the ignimbrites produced by several of these eruptions.

http://www.volcanocafe.org/the-tiger-in-the-smoke-taal-the-new-decade-volcano-program-8/

7. Mt Cameroon/Mt Fako, Cameroon

Mount Fako, old lava flows. Wikimedia Commons.

Mount Cameroon/Fako, old lava flows. Wikimedia Commons.

Few volcanoes on the planet represent such an awesome sight as the majestic Mount Cameroon. It stretches from the edge of the Atlantic at Bakingili Beach and reaches an astounding height of 4040 meters. It is located in what is known as the Cameroon Volcanic Line, a volcanic zone that includes several major volcanic centres and explosive calderas. Yet so little is known about it that even what drives the volcanism remains unknown. Monitoring of Mt Cameroon is a secondary task of the Park Rangers whose monitoring equipment is limited to the Mk1 Eyeball and telephone landlines that are regularly scavenged for their copper content.

http://www.volcanocafe.org/mountain-of-greatness-dvp-7/

6. Bali

Sunset from the 3,148 m high summit of Gunung Agung. The peak in the distance is G. Abang, a remnant of a far loftier peak, Ancestral Batur. (WikimediaCommons, photo by Mrllmrll).

Sunset from the 3,148 m high summit of Gunung Agung. The peak in the distance is G. Abang, a remnant of a far loftier peak, Ancestral Batur. (WikimediaCommons, photo by Mrllmrll).

The Sunda Arc is home to two of the three largest volcanic eruptions of the past 1,000 years; Rinjani (c. 1257 CE) and Tambora (1815 CE). It is also the location of the tourist paradise of Bali, but within 50 km of the tourist areas lie two medium-sized calderas; Bratan and Batur, and a gigantic stratovolcano, Mt Agung. While the easily accessible Batur caldera has been the subject of several studies, the less easily accessible Gunung Agung and in particular Bratan with several young volcanic edifices as great as or larger than Vesuvius remain virtually unstudied.

http://www.volcanocafe.org/romantic-paradise-destination-the-new-decade-volcano-program-6-bali/

5. Mexico City and the Trans-Mexico Volcanic Belt

The once glacier-covered peak of Popocatépetl stratovolcano rises above Tlamacas to its north in this photograph from 1968. The sharp peak at right is Ventorrillo, the summit of a predecessor to Popocatépetl, the eroded Nexpayantla volcano. (William Melson)

The once glacier-covered peak of Popocatépetl stratovolcano rises above Tlamacas to its north in this photograph from 1968. The sharp peak at right is Ventorrillo, the summit of a predecessor to Popocatépetl, the eroded Nexpayantla volcano. (William Melson)

The TMVB represents an unusual geological setting where three continental fragments are or were being subducted, resulting in a marked kink, 45 degrees or more, in the Central American subduction arc. The resulting volcanism is unusual too in that it is perpendicular to the subduction arc and has forged its way through the thickest part of the continental crust, up to 55 km in thickness. Even if an ancient, at least two million years old volcanic arc can be traced along the entire northern part of the TMVB, something unusual has happened here and with one of the greatest metropolitan areas of the world lying slap-bang in the middle, further study is imperative.

http://www.volcanocafe.org/mexico-city-and-the-trans-mexico-volcanic-belt-ndvp-5/

4. Aso, Japan

Explosion of Aso in April, exact date and time unknown, photograph courtesy of Adrian Rohnfelder who has very kindly offered to send us some more pictures from his April visit.

Explosion of Aso in April, exact date and time unknown, photograph courtesy of Adrian Rohnfelder who has very kindly offered to send us some more pictures from his April visit.

Right in the middle of Kyushu lies the 18 x 25 km Aso Caldera which has been formed by four large, ignimbrite-emplacing explosive eruptions over the past 300,000 years dated at 270, 140, 120 and 90 thousand years ago. Recent studies indicate that just below the crust, at the top of the Astenosphere, lies a large, serpentinised wedge. The copious amounts of water locked up in serpentinites will be released as this wedge melts and large amounts of superheated water can both melt overlying rock to form large quantities of evolved magmas as well as drive very large, explosive eruptions.

http://www.volcanocafe.org/a-wedge-of-worry-aso-caldera-ndvp-4/

3. Campi Flegrei, Italy

Naples, formerly the capital of the “Kingdom of the Two Sicilies” before the unification of Italy in 1859-60, is a city with a rich cultural heritage that goes back more than 4,000 years. Today, it is the third largest city of Italy (after Rome and Milan) vibrant, carefree and, dare it be said, chaotic. 18 km from the vantage point of this photographer, Vesuvius looms over Naples, a constant reminder of danger. However, Vesuvius is perhaps the least dangerous of the three volcanic systems that threaten Naples. Behind the back of the photographer and 25 km away lies the volcanic island of Ischia. But between Ischia and the photographer, less than 5 km away, lies the potentially greatest threat of them all, Campi Flegrei. (city.samondeo.com)

Naples, formerly the capital of the “Kingdom of the Two Sicilies” before the unification of Italy in 1859-60, is a city with a rich cultural heritage that goes back more than 4,000 years. Today, it is the third largest city of Italy (after Rome and Milan) vibrant, carefree and, dare it be said, chaotic. 18 km from the vantage point of this photographer, Vesuvius looms over Naples, a constant reminder of danger. However, Vesuvius is perhaps the least dangerous of the three volcanic systems that threaten Naples. Behind the back of the photographer and 25 km away lies the volcanic island of Ischia. But between Ischia and the photographer, less than 5 km away, lies the potentially greatest threat of them all, Campi Flegrei. (city.samondeo.com)

While most people believe that Vesuvius poses the greatest risk to Naples, Campi Flegrei, “The Burning Fields”, poses a far greater danger. Not because it is a caldera volcano capable of VEI 7 eruptions, but because much of the Greater Naples area is built within the caldera where even a smaller eruption, by the standards of calderae, can prove a mega-killer. We know from both Campi Flegrei itself and from the similar Rabaul Caldera that the onset of such eruptions can be so rapid as to offset even the best monitoring and hazard mitigation schemes. Since the most recent full-scale caldera eruption ~14,900 years ago, there have been at least a further 65 eruptions of the Campi Flegrei.

http://www.volcanocafe.org/devil-may-care-campi-flegrei-ndvp-3/

2. Apoyeque, Nicaragua

Chiltepe Peninsula with Managua city to the right.

Chiltepe Peninsula with Managua city to the right.

Although Managua, capital of Nicaragua, lies uncomfortably close to two recent caldera-producing volcanic systems, Apoyo and Masaya, a far greater danger is posed by the Nejapa Volcanic Field on its Western city margin which runs all the way to the Apoyeque stratovolcano, as chillingly unassuming as Taal in the Philippines. There is evidence for eruptions up to and including VEI 6 and as several eruptions have occurred below the surface of Lake Managua/Xolotlán, there is a very real danger of a future eruption causing a 20+ m high tsunami with the capacity to strike Managua within minutes of the onset.

http://www.volcanocafe.org/lurking-in-plain-sight-apoyeke-ndvp-2/

Now is the time to get in you guess for which volcano is our choice for number 1!

Henrik

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101 thoughts on “A Recapitulation of the NDVP this far”

  1. I’ve really enjoyed this series a lot. Thanks to all the authors for the effort you put into it.

    Guessing Mt. Rainier for #1. Unless it’s Santorini. Or Tenerife.

  2. Yay!. I was in the process of prepping another contribution by Albert but saw you were busy editing, so I deferred my activity until you were done.

    As for the recap, definitely a plus for the series! 😀

    With regards to Aso, “…four large, ignimbrite-emplacing explosive eruptions over the past 300,000 years dated at 270, 140, 120 and 90 thousand years ago”

    I get an average repose between those events as 67.5 thousand years. The 1% conf interval I get comes out to 681 to 134318 years. (done with Excel) Aso definitely meritrs being watched. In all liklihood, it will give clear signs when it starts getting ready, but based on it’s history, that could really be any time… and we are already “in the window.” But, like most volcanoes, they don’t follow schedules very well. There are far too many variables that determine when they are gonna do their thing. (Fresh magma production rates, rock fracture and melt rates, etc…)

    Note to all. As you know, I tout the “Black Swan” idea quite a bit. But, consider this, a reverse Black Swan is a logical follow on. That would be when you have gone through all of the analysis and think that you have spotted an oncoming swan, only to have it not appear as expected. That is generally the thing that vexes doom sayers, and they apparently happen all the time. Due to their frequency, they are not “Swans” as defined by Nicholas Taleb, but they are statistical manifestations just the same.

    And a trivia note. David X. Li, mathematician responsible for the Gaussian Cupola “Recipe for Disaster: The Formula That Killed Wall Street“, now works at AIG… which make sense, considering that his cupola formula was based off of actuarial science. Yeah, it is pretty easy to hold him up as responsible for the mess, but he actually warned against relying on the thing.

    “In finance, you can never reduce risk outright; you can only try to set up a market in which people who don’t want risk sell it to those who do. But in the CDO market, people used the Gaussian copula model to convince themselves they didn’t have any risk at all, when in fact they just didn’t have any risk 99 percent of the time. The other 1 percent of the time they blew up. Those explosions may have been rare, but they could destroy all previous gains, and then some”

    “No one knew all of this better than David X. Li: “Very few people understand the essence of the model,” he told The Wall Street Journal way back in fall 2005.”

    And that “1% of the time” bit? That is out in 2+ Sigma land, in the tails of the Gaussian distribution curve. The part that Taleb rails against in his book “The Black Swan.” In the preps for my Ruminerian X article, I found that the hazard mitigation plan for the Fukishima plant weren’t even designed with a statistical model, but when you look at it from a stats point of view, the site was built to withstand 85% of the tsunami events. What they got was a 3.2 sigma event. (Something like 0.0687% chance of occuring)

    • Hehe! 😀

      Although as of the last census, there were not that many people living in the immediate vicinity of OM. :mrgreen:

    • I think they would have to extend the VEI scale to fit an volcanic eruption that could devastate a nearby planet. The first requirement would be that the ejecta exceeded the source planet’s escape velocity. That would be even larger than the hypothetical “Verneshot“. (Verneshots remain in the realm of fiction, through some have actually proposed that mechanism for some ancient events. For the most part, the idea of a Verneshot is not usually taken seriously)

    • I like that one. Obviously very dangerous to anyone on the planet. Needs detailed monitoring. We need geologists on site. Job for NASA. Of course the geologists need a support team, who need their support team, etc. Before you know it we have a million people on site and OM reaches the 1 MDE criterium. Point proven.

    • Hmm. Might be what happened to the planet between Mars and Jupiter. It erupted with such ferocity that it wiped out incipient life on Mars and destroyed the source planet, leaving the Asteroid belt…. 😛

      (Note: No, I am not being serious)

      • There actually is a work of SF that uses that scenario – James P. Hogan’s “Inherit the Stars”, book one of his “Giants” trilogy. Do read it! It is brilliant.

        • The classic science fiction story about volcanoes is Jules Verne’s Journey to the centre of the earth. It has everything, including Iceland. Nothing much since. The recent book The long war has Yellowstone eruption in it but it seems tangential to the plot. Gap in the market?

          • Would be interesting to find a definitive list of volcano-sf. Best I’ve found is a short story ‘Hot Planet’ by the late Hal Clement. His ideas about volcanism on Mercury didn’t pan out, but by a weird twist of fate they turn out now to be a good fit for the volcanism on Io (who says sf writers are science illiterates?). Pelee in 1902 was the setting for a time travel short by Kim Stanley Robinson, though I forget the title. A future eruption from the same volcano appeared at the beginning of Arthur C Clarke’s ‘Richter 10’…and one from Mt Hood had a walk-on part in Ursula LeGuin’s ‘Lathe of Heaven’ And then there are the purely fictional volcanoes, like Mt Garben in Anne mcCaffrey’s ‘Pern’ (Dragonsdawn)

          • That is just too much SF-porn for me. I need a lie-down. 😀

          • Thanks for that strange mental imagery.

            My first read of it was “tie-down”… which is typically used to secure a pallet to a rolling deck. Or to keep an aircraft secure to the flightdeck.

          • Careful about the wishes for an all encompassing list if sf that includes volcaoes… by definition, that would include Dantes Peak…

  4. Another interesting topic Henrik. Im sorry but I still don’t think No7 should be there ( lack of studying, monitoring, etc ) Earlier I chose Mount Fuji due to its close proximity to a heavily populated area and Santorini. I chose this one because I feel this might be able to do more damage via a tsunami rather than its explosive nature. There are so many to choose from. Tenerife sound good and the USA. ( Long Valley springs to my mind).Nope I am sticking with my first two. Let the drums roll maestro !

    • A potential relative of Mt Cameroon, is Mount Nyiragongo. 2 million + people live within it’s reach. Though Nyiragongo closer to the Mid African Rift, Cameroon has placed flows as far as the Atlantic.

      But, the thing with Mt Cameroon, is that like Hekla, it appears to be an overgrown fissure cone-row. When a volcano like that goes, it can open as a long fissure down the middle of the axis, and it can go big when it does. Douala is only 54 km away, and has a population of 2,446,945. Oh, did I mention that Mt Cameroon is insanely massive?

      The video is about Nyiragongo.

      https://youtu.be/1B9p7wZAJVI

    • Ian, what drives the volcanism of the CVL? It is not subduction and “earthquake tomography” fails to find evidence of a hotspot. That alone justifies its inclusion, in mine and Carl’s opinions of course! 🙂

      • “It is not subduction and ‘earthquake tomography’ fails to find evidence of a hotspot.”

        Which seems to leave rifting…

        • And since it’s to the north of the southern African craton with the Great Rift Valley to the east of it, I’d say it’s pretty interesting.

  5. I’ll guess something in china – there are a lot of people and a bunch of volcanoes, and chinese languages are opaque to me, so I can’t find much about them, suggesting they need extra study, but that may just be my ignorance.

  6. My guess is:
    Laacher See.
    delayed because of :

    Fri, 6 Nov 12:07 UTC M 1.2 / 8 km 7 km Kruft/Lkrs. Mayen-Koblenz/RLP
    Fri, 6 Nov 09:12 UTC M 1.3 / 11 km 15 km Kobern-Gondorf/Lkrs.Mayen-Kobl./RLP
    Sat, 31 Oct
    Sat, 31 Oct 06:21 UTC M 0.8 / 10 km 15 km Kobern-Gondorf/Lkrs.Mayen-Kobl./RLP
    Tue, 27 Oct
    Tue, 27 Oct 15:00 UTC M 0.6 / 10 km 12 km Ochtendung/Lkrs. Mayen-Koblenz/RLP
    Tue, 27 Oct 12:30 UTC M 0.8 / 11 km 10 km Ochtendung/Lkrs. Mayen-Koblenz/RLP

  7. .. oh, yay, it’s that time of year again. The Blue Angels are having their homecoming show out at the beach. What strikes me as interesting, is that in the civilian air-show part of it, there will be a replica 1929 biplane out doing stunts. What is weird, is that in conjunction with the propeller engine, it has a General Electric CJ610 attached to it’s belly. This augments the 450 HP Pratt and Whitney prop engine.

    https://youtu.be/U91rAWbD2Wc

    • I’ve had some time in a WACO Taperwing plus a WACO ASO.
      which was built as a test bed for the Packard radial diesel engine. It was re-engined with a Wright 290 horse gas engine
      after the Packard proved a failure (this was 1933).Seems
      the Packard had a tendency to shed cylinders at odd times…
      Another WACO product I have flown was a WACO YKS-6
      a five seat cabin biplane. A unique feature was a rotating interplane strut that served as a spolier/drag brake. This is
      an aircraft that did not need anything like extra drag, and
      when airbrake was deployed it had a glide ratio of an ACME
      safe….

      • Reminds me of when my dad passed away. Some important documents were in his safe, a 4 x 3 x 3 chunk of iron and concrete. One thing he had mentioned about this massive monster was that it had no bottom. So, I spent the evening jacking and cribbing until I had it securely up off of the floor. Reach inside and manually align the tumblers and it was open. While I had the door open I then changed the combo so that it was accsesible to my mom and i. Despite the security issue, it still took 3 to 4 hours to get into it, even with appropriate tools… and a ready supply of cribbing to keep it stable so you don’t loose an arm if it slips.

      • … and another odd thing, GSA safes are rated in how long it takes someone to break into them with variable levels of tool kits. Even with the issue if no bottom, it probably could have still met some of their guidelines. My dad had picked it up second hand, and at some point in time someone had already tried to break into it. Parts of the hinges had been snapped from being beaten on. With the way the door bars activated, they never would have succeeded.

    • Just saw them, both Blue Angles and Sasquatch, perform in Newnan Ga. Must have been a redneck who thought this up….Hey lets hook this jet engine to this biplane!

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  9. I’m guessing to go closer to home, I think… the Icelandic rift zone. A large-scale Laki-type affair could easily cause very large problems across northwest Europe through poisonous gases, and crop failures and infrastructure breakdown could have all sorts of unpleasant knock-on effects. It won’t reach the target through direct effects, but indirect consequences could be disastrous. The critical thing, though – unlike most of the others, it’s very likely to happen within our lifetimes.

  10. Going back and thinking, I’ve really enjoyed reading about all of the volcanoes. My favorite though was the Taal article. Many beautiful pictures yet each volcano has deadly potential waiting to happen again. The Kelut photo is wicked. What it would have been like to be with the person taking that picture. Then there are those volcanoes that have people living on top of them. All I can say is, can’t wait til we see #1. As the song goes, Anticipation is making me wait. 🙂

      • I would hope not! This series is a warning, not a prediction

          • mr green??

            What I meant is that all these volcanoes represent real danger. They are ones that should be intensely monitored so that adequate warning can be given in case of an event. But if nothing big happens, so much the better.

          • Sorry, just being my jocose self. You are absolutely correct Albert, my apologies. The purpose of this series is indeed to highlight that there is no room for complacency just because the original DVP claims to have identified the 16 most dangerous volcanoes (which they are not by a long chalk). Of those 16 originally chosen, only one – Taal – meets our criteria. Most of the others don’t even come close.

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    • I know very little, but from what I’ve heard, it’s hard for me to imagine anything with a greater appetite for destruction than Cumbre Vieja. Not just blast, flank collapse and tsunami, but the knock on effects of putting so much infrastructure out of commission on such a (potentially ) massive scale.

  14. I’ve seen the selection, and the choice is quite valid by my way of thinking. The mechanics of it reaching the MDE level are pretty straight forward. Unfortunately, the non-disclosure aspect of it prevent me from saying more until the article is ready.

  16. My gut feeling is that we haven’t finished with Indonesia yet even though we’ve had 2 from there already, perhaps Merapi (Java)? I believe Merapi is well monitored but still, it’s close to some high populations

  18. Throwing out some other guesses as potentials in no particular order.

    Alban Hills – http://volcano.si.edu/volcano.cfm?vn=211004

    Why? Large bimodal caldera system that sits in one of the areas of highest population density in the entire world (Rome metropolitan area). With that said, Alban Hills may be somewhat dead already, as it hasnt had any particularly notable eruptions in a long geological time (although it still emits quite a bit of gas).

    San Salvador – http://volcano.si.edu/volcano.cfm?vn=343050

    Why? Large volcano that sits right next to the city of San Salvador of over 1 million residents in El Salvador. IT has had large eruptions in the past as evidenced by the two calderas that it owns, and its neighbor, Llopango is responsible for one of the largest eruptions in the last 5000 years. Even without a large eruption, San Salvador can cause phreatic blasts in populated areas, or lava flows into the city itself.

    El Misti – http://volcano.si.edu/volcano.cfm?vn=354010

    Why? Big traditional stratovolcano with a history of explosive eruptions that sits just north of Arequipa, a major metropolitan city in Peru. A flank collapse would hypothetically send the entire mountain barreling down onto the city of Arequipa, but even a somewhat large eruption would have the possibility of sending pyroclastic flows into the city center.

    Tatun Group – http://volcano.si.edu/volcano.cfm?vn=281032

    Why? This is likely the volcano with the highest population density within an extremely close distance. Tatun group is a grouping of lava domes in Taiwan that has shown evidence for fairly explosive eruptions in the past. Fortunately, eruptions are sparse here, although there hasn’t been that much research performed to really understand this volcano.

    • Good motivations but please, no more than TWO links per reply or your comment automatically gets sin-binned. 😀

        • The way the filtering works is automatically via an algorithm. The moderation process occurs when one of us stumbles through the control panel and notice that a comment is hung up… or we get a notification via e-mail. In my case, it is then a matter of whether my phone has looked at the mail spool recently, and whether or not I am near a PC. As a matter of protocol, I can’t do anything about hung comments if I am on site doing work since that would require me to breach the security protocols for whatever establishment I am at. And that isn’t gonna happen. I like my job. Do it from the phone? Nah, java scripting is already a pain to deal with on a PC, in a phone it can turn into a nightmare quite fast. That’s why I have the “Guy with a torch” alternate personality. One night WordPress up and puked on my login and kicked me to the curb.

    • Funny that, several of these were on a list I worked on of possibilities for No.1. In no parttcular order of probability, I listed Eifel (Germany), Alban Hills,, Nyiragongo, Rainier (the hazard coming from flank collapse, not necessarily even from eruption), Ilopango/San Salvador, Aira, and a clutch of monsters in Guatemala – Atitlan, Amatitlan, and Agua.

      • Yeah, I like these. My issue with Nyiragongo is that it just isn’t explosive enough to warrant inclusion on the list. Yes, the big lava flows ARE a major risk, but we’ve already had a large lava outbreak from it in the early 90s without much fatality. Even in the worst case scenario, I can’t see it being a MDE event, especially not #1 on the list here.

        Eifel is too much of a one-shot wonder in my opinion. Its also not all that close to major populated areas despite being close to the Rhine in Germany.

        Rainier is definitely a good candidate, but you would need something truly catastrophic (almost IE, caldera or large flank collapse) to get close to 1 million people. The areas at risk just don’t have a high enough overall population here despite being fairly well populated. Rainier’s major risk factor is that even a somewhat mid-sized eruption will cause some big lahars into very populated areas. Mega disaster? No doubt, but definitely not a million death event.

        Agua is definitely an interesting candidate. It strikes me as somewhat of a spooky volcano in that its a huge and somewhat youthful strato, but hasn’t had any known historical eruptions. You just wonder if the magma supply has waned, or if it has just been super blocked and building up pressure.

        Merapi is hard to argue against either, would probably by my Indonesia pick, although there are a lot of volcanoes there that could cause major issues if they went big.

        • Nyiragongo was always an outside choice; based on the possibility of a flank collapse (its a steep stratocone, not a shield -why???) with debris avalanche, lava flood on a scale to make the last two fissure eruptions look like dribbles, and if it went the ‘wrong’ way, a CO2 overturn in Lake Kivu.. I didn’t include Merapi because (a) it’s a pretty consistent performer and (b) is closely monitored. I would have put the hazard level as similar to Mayon, but it’s suspicious that it hasn’t appeared on the list so far, right enough. Agua was included because, like you, I find its quiet “It’s quiet…too quiet”. Keep thinking of the similarly quiet Santa Maria, over 400 years of nothing before the biggest eruption by DRE in the 20th Century. If I was a betting man I’d rate one of the Guatemala calderas as a good tip, but what do I know?

  19. OT, but I thought that the AVO fixed Aniakchak. What is going on with the Webicorder now? It has not been THAT windy lately….

    • A nearby station, AZAC, picked something up at the same time, so it probably wasn’t equipment.

  20. The Myst novel Book of Atrus has a volcano in it. Atrus tries fitting a steam generator to one of the fumaroles to generate electricity. Also tried using the ash as fertilizer. Also one of the lava tubes was the entrance to a tunnel leading to a lost civilization.

  23. Volcan Fuego (Guatemala) is at Alert Level Orange (Alerta Anaranjada) This is somewhat hard to explain as strombolian activity has gone on for some time and today, there was a larger pyroclastic flow:

    https://www.facebook.com/jtezenmoreno/videos/916497121720761/

    Information updates and photographs/videos can be found at CONRED’s FB page:

    https://www.facebook.com/jtezenmoreno/videos/916497121720761/

    INSiVUMEH webcam link: http://ovfuego-norte.geo.mtu.edu/

    • Strombolian activity from last night:

      A photograph of today’s pyroclastic flow:

  24. Aden in Yemen is under threat from a cyclone, the second one in a week. Yemen only had three over the past 60 years! The local sea temperatures are unusually high, and the report also mentions the effect of increasing air pollution making it easier for cyclones to form.

    • My friends already are doing exactly that, although it’ll need deep sheltered spots to be worthwhile, as the wind looks likely to blow it all to pieces. I’ll miss it because I’m working all hours building new areas of my shop in time for the Christmas feeding frenzy.
      I’ve noticed an unusual number of days this year with a pretty straight southerly wind, and the temperature here (in Worcestershire UK) is still in the mid to high teens (Centigrade). I was even climbing Snowdon a couple of weeks back with my kids…in tee shirts on the high ridges…in October?
      Very unusual weather this year.

      • Having an atlantic hurricane in November is pretty unusual too. It may not survive long enough to reach the UK. The UK has just begun a scheme to name storms. I wonder what they’ll do with this one: give it a UK name (second storm, so would be a ‘B’) and force the storm to rename itself, or to adopt the hurricane name? The scheme may not have foreseen named hurricanes this late in the season,

          • Abigail is not that hurricane. There is another one on the way which should get near the UK perhaps by Sunday or Monday, if it survives. The hurricane is called Kate. If it hits the UK, there will be a nominative conflict.

        • Hi Albert . In the UK we do not get hurricanes by naming classification (If we have hurricane force winds then the system becomes labelled a tropical storm). In that if it does meet the requirements for the UK Met office to name it then it will be called tropical storm Abigail (although we all know its the arist formaly known as Hurricane Kate lol)

          • The name ‘Abigail’ is now taken by today’s storm. ‘Kate has become extra-tropical. It is predicted to get near the UK on Sunday but seems to miss. So the conflict may be avoided.

        • The UK Met Office has started naming storms, which is in my view a rather childish way to make UK weather look like it is something more than ten days drizzle with a gust of wind thrown in. Abigail has been and is leaving, with a few stiff breezes in the north. We’ve had winter storms a plenty over the last 50 years without any need to name them. The so-called St.Jude’s Day storm started this idiocy a year or more back – and that was a damp squib. We had no need to name the infamous 1987 (or was it 86) “hurricane” which was the worst we had. And if we did – we were too late because it passed through before the Met Office even managed to spot it anyway. I remember that one clearly and have yet to see its match.

          I’m sorry if I sound negative about this, but to be frank to my mind no UK weather ever approaches the international concept of “severe” whilst our Met Office loves to squander taxpayers money on all sorts of fancy schemes. I used to admire the Met Office, but under current administration it is more like a SpongeBob Squarepants cartoon. Yes, I am cynical and yes, I am tired of the ‘Nanny Knows Best’ approach of this organisation. I apologise in advance to those who think otherwise. But I know of no other organisation that spends hours looking at computer simulations and at the same time ignores its own Atlantic charts and satellite photos.

          Sorry – rant over!

          • Psst… it’s called “Marketing”

            And for anyone curious about the term…

            “While most modern squibs used by professionals are insulated from moisture, older uninsulated squibs needed to be kept dry in order to ignite, thus a “damp squib” was literally one that failed to perform because it got wet. Often misheard as “damp squid”, the phrase “damp squib” has since come into general use to mean anything that fails to meet expectations.”

            And, in keeping with the alarmism of people who want to keep you alarmed so that you don’t mind shoveling money at them, everything has horrible expectations.

            “You never let a serious crisis go to waste. And what I mean by that it’s an opportunity to do things you think you could not do before.” – Rahm Emanuel, Mayor of Chicago.

          • Maybe down where the larger cities are it’s rare for weather to be actually severe, for instance October 1987 in London. However today’s storm is bringing sustained wind speeds of well over 50mph with gusts over 90mph (both numbers will be way higher in the mountains), with heavy rain and lightning thrown in – followed by very heavy showers, falling as snow over 400m driven by those same winds. Some coasts will get waves of over 11m (30+ feet) too.

            According to the Beaufort Scale, that’s storm force, and “Trees are broken off or uprooted, structural damage likely.”

            Nasty stuff, thankfully away from the larger populations but easily bad enough to warrant warnings.

  26. I am trying to learn the tremor charts. The tremor chart at Grimsfjall is very blue. Would someone mind taking a look and explain what it is showing?

    Takk

  28. It seems the list is complete:

    EDIT: Please do not post the link just yet… /Hobbes

        • Sorry I have read the link and yes its not what I would have had expected but I do now understand your logic why you chose this volcano.

  29. Magnitude 2.7 earthquake, CANARY ISLANDS, SPAIN REGION

    UTC Date / Time
    Nov 12 12:47 PM

    Depth
    13 km

    GEO: Longitude
    -18.010

    GEO: Latitude
    27.690

    Source
    EMSC

    EARTHQUAKE-REPORT.COM

    El Hierro keeps shaking 😀

    • Oh lookie, it didn’t go away after all… 13 km is just above the keel of the island. Probably up inside the Jurassic era sediment layers deposited when the Atlantic was just a forming basin. The pressure there is enough to make the sediment layers about the consistency of Phyllite.

      Now the real question… is this a fresh intrusion into an already emplaced sill structure? If so, will it re mobilize the stagnant mush? And an even more pressing question is will the officials actually warn anyone if they are in danger? The last time they made light of the problem and kept every one in the dark, even though there was ample evidence that the small town of Sabinosa was sitting directly on top of a swelling emplacement. The fact that the town is built directly on top of an ancient scoria cone makes that a bit more problematic.

      I’m guessing no. You can’t go scaring off the investors who are funding your “green” energy plans.

      For anyone living there, the highest likelihood for renewed activity, will be via already established pathways. That would be from the source of the restolingas south of the island, (Bob), and from the vent that occurred to the west of the island that was kept secret until it was beneficial for one of the gov officials so that he could get his name on a paper.

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