Many volcanoes have captured the attention of fanatics such as us, we often pick favorites depending on our internal biases. After all volcanoes provide varieties of intrigue to curious minds, from the mechanics of explosions surpassing the greatest of bombs, million years long eruptions that cover entire regions in magma, to simpler things such as island-building, rare rocks, weather influences, even failed eruptions provide so much excitement for us. For some itis the endlessly erupting shields of Hawaii, the glacier-clad beasts of Iceland, or the sillic soldiers of South America. Amongst the topics, there is one volcano that hardly gets mentioned. Beyond it’s mundane eruptions, Klyuchevskaya stands near the pinnacle of volcanism in most areas. Surface level analysis alone gives this volcano an impressive sheet but upon deeper inspection this volcano might stand at the very top of current volcanology.
Standing 4,750 meters tall and 15 km wide, Klyuchevskaya is the highest volcano of Eurasia, and is quite voluminous despite being 7,000 years old. With an edifice volume of around 420 km3, the volcano has erupted over 0.06 km3 of magma/year. This doesn’t account for the tephra that doesn’t get incorporated into the edifice, however it is unlikely that it would make anything more than a difference of 0.01 km3/year. This volcano is responsible for ¼ of total erupted magma at Kamchatka since in it’s inception. A preposterous amount of lava erupted! Shiveluch “only” has an eruption rate of 0.015 km3/year To put this in context, this is about the long term eruptive rate all of the volcanoes of Iceland combined! It would take 22.5 Eldjas for Iceland to match this. This is even exceed the total eruptive rate of Kilauea long-term eruptive rate. Only Mauna Loa beats Klyuchevskaya in this area. It should be noted though that these rates are subject to flux and don’t account internal supply. Icelandic volcanoes store most of their supply, Kilauea, has been accelerating in it’s received rate since it’s birth. Klyuchevskaya has the same fluctuation but it’s peak erupted rate hasn’t been calculated and it’s so young that it might as well be pointless.
Funnily enough this volcano hasn’t done a single big eruption as far as we know, nothing above a VEI 4 and no extremely large lava flows like the ones seen it’s rivals in Iceland or Hawaii. It has more than enough magma for a VEI 7 and is larger than Grimsvotn. Due to it’s youth, it hasn’t constructed a strong fissure system and due to it’s frequent activity, it slowly accumulates strain. Let’s not be mistaken, the volcano recieves much more magma than it erupts and as such it is building pressure and strain for a big eruption. It’s like Hekla but way stronger. The day will come when inevitably throws a large dike intrusion and/or does a VEI 5-6. Will that happen in our lifetimes? Probably not but it would quite fun if it did! (Please God)
The magma that Klyuchevskaya erupts is also unique, having the most high-d18 O value’ basalt in conjunction with a high alumina component. It also serves as one of the few subduction zone volcanoes to erupt picro-basalt. Despite having some of the highest quality basaltic magma on the planet. As you could guess by it’s structure, the magma is not very fluid for it’s quality. Within the shallow system, basalt is crystallized, through a complex process that basically boils down to decompression and H20 degassing of ascending magma. It’s because of it’s mineral content that this volcano isn’t a shield and does basaltic plinian eruptions from time to time. The most evolved magma that you will see erupt from this volcano is andesite and unlike some of it’s siblings, it hasn’t erupted any felsic products although it might have some small amounts of dacite within it’s chamber.
More impressive still is not just what has erupted but also what hasn’t erupted. Klyuchevskaya has 2 magma chambers the top magma chamber has around 100 km3 of magma and the deeper chamber has over 650 km3 of magma, making a pretty sizable volcano! With a simple assumption that the volcano first started to erupt after accumulating 100 km3 of magma. We find that the chamber has accumulated over 0.092 km3 of magma/year! Giving this thing a total supply of 0.15 km3/yr. Impressive to say the least. And yet we can get that number even higher! Klyuchevskaya gives it’s sibling a Beziymianny, a boost from time to time giving it some of it’s magma. I don’t know the exact number but this could give the volcano an additional 0.02-0.04 km3 of magma. Giving it a maximum supply of 0.17-0.2 km3/year. The deeper chamber that feeds Klyuchevskaya, is generous enough to also feed Beziymianny as well. In a fictional volcano world, Klyuchevskaya would either be the upstart chosen one or an emerging destroyer of order. After a mere 7,000 years it stands at or near the very top of modern volcanism crushing most hotspot and rift volcanoes. How does this volcano do it? How does this volcano maintain one of the highest, if not the highest long-term supply in the Holocene? And where is this volcano headed in the distant future?
Klyuchevskaya lies in the Central Kamtchatka Depression, being the main character of the Klyuchevskaya Volcanic Group. The volcanoes of which include the aforementioned Beziymianny, Tolbachik, Bolshaya Udina, Ushovsky, Kamen, and Zimina. Despite being part of the depression Shiveluch is not part of the group. All these volcanoes share a common source but not in the form of a traditional magma chamber. The subduction of the Pacific plate beneath Okhotsk plate planted the seed of this system but the roots of this activity is far more complicated. The Okohotsk Plate is actually the remnant of a massive oceanic flood basalt event that was born from the Kula plate all the way from the jurassic period, relatively quickly after it’s formation, it would soon meet the Pacific plate. The Kula Plate is no longer with us it has been complete subducted, the very name Kula is the indigenous Tlingit Word for “All Gone”. The Sea of Okohotsk is actually the top of an ancient volcanic plateau. With this we might consider the Okohotsk plate to be psuedo-plate as flood basalts don’t make them. This is a unique volcanic setup as far as I am aware of, there isn’t similar process happening anywhere on the planet. As a psuedo-plate, the Okohotsk plate could be composed of far weaker stuff than it’s proper siblings
which might in fact lead to enhanced geological activity. As the Pacific plate goes under it, it could be more subject to breaks, which could lead to enhanced hydration, more deep quakes,and a more effective transfer of heat. All of which would lead to enhanced volcanism.
Currently the most potent volcanic group on the planet in the past 100 yrs
The Kamtchatka Peninsula lies on a Triple Junction between the Pacific, Okohotsk, and Komandorsky plates. The Pacific plate isn’t uniform in it’s subduction, as it has different speeds, angles and depth from north-south. The crust at Central Kamchatka is only 30-40 thick but the pacific plate has a depth of 170 km at the same location leading to mantle wedge. Usually massive amounts of pressure under these circumstances would limit the formation of magma but crustal pressure is bound to be low in this area due to the setup. Carl has suggested that this void is filled with magma, this I personally doubt but I am certainly in no position to contend.(gut feelings strike again). With this notion, if the void is the size of the CKD, there could be up to 512,000 km3 of magma. This magma chooses the path of least resistance and heads north, feeding the KVG. There is a large Low Velocity Layer in the area, which could be this magma body but it’s not confirmed. In any case, this setup promotes a lot of melt on top of a plate not built for this. As the Okohotsk plate breaks, and the void expands, the KVG and other volcanoes in the region grow and become beasts over time.
Klyuchevskaya is a rapidly growing volcano in a volcanic region that is also expanding, it stands to reason that the volcano might gobble up it’s siblings, Beziymianny is already becoming adirect understudy to the system. If this supply rate is not just a quick pulse of high activity but a long-term norm for the volcano then this system will become a completely different beast. The emergence of this volcano could mark the beginning of a new extreme phase in this massive complex. This process has likely already begun. The Kamen volcano has already had it’s supply cutoff thanks to the new Beziymianny cycle and is dead unless Klyuchevskaya graciously decides to send some magma their way. The massive Ushovsky compound would be the next volcano on the chopping block,unfortunately, there is no information on how expansive the magma system beneath Ushovsky is. The real juicy merger would be with Tolbachik to the south. By the time Klyuchevskaya and Tolbachik would become big enough to merge, the resulting chamber would easily exceed 10,000 km3 and would be the most productive volcano on the planet. Capable of massive mafic deluges and felsic explosions, a true supervolcano, in all categories.
If Klyuchevskaya can maintain these growth rates, it would take 50,000-100,000years before it merges with Tolbachik. Of course, the setting could change and Klyuchevskaya could wain and new volcano could receive bulk of the supply but it already has a large magma system within it and the whole system could still merge as new developing chambers absorb old, existing complexes. With the direction this complex is going, it could be one of the biggest volcanic flare ups in the current geological era. The subduction shall not end any time soon and the area is already on track tos urpass every volcanic region on the planet with only Hawaii holding firm against it. That is more than likely going to change as this complex rapidly expands and continues to intensify and with potentially over 100,000 km3 of deep magma to access. this is looking to be the biggest non-rift,non-mantle plume, zelch-hotspot volcanic region on the planet. Perhaps in the very distant future it will be the source of the next VEI 9 but that would be a story that we’ll never witness…
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0377027312003216#:~:text=We%20interpret%20this%20feature%20as,pulse%20rapidly%20through%20the%20system.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/238681861_The_evolution_of_high-alumina_basalts_of_the_Klyuchevskoy_volcano_Kamch
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S037702732300149X
I’ve always been fascinated by this group and have commented on it a lot over the years. In part due to how unique this volcanic system is.
I’ve wondered in part whether the klyuchevskaya volcanic group is what a pre-caldera Lake Toba would have looked like. The magmatic input is there for this to build a supervolcanic-sized chamber. After all, when you spend years of reading about large caldera systems and trying to understand what causes them to be made, you start to notice some key similarities in them. And this region does in fact have a LOT of the common characteristics you see in regions where you get huge calderas (both past and present).
– We have enormous magmatic input (possibly due to slab gap / slab rollback).
– We have evidence of volcanoes increasing in explosivity and magmatic evolution into more evolved magmas (specifically looking at the older members of the group and Shiveluch).
– We know that the tectonic region that this sits in is a zone of decompression, which is a very common component in these regions where large scale caldera volcanism occurs.
With all that said, in more recent years, I’ve come to the opinion that this isn’t likely ( at least in any geologically recent timeframe) due to some key differences in the crust environment. The main difference is that the CKD crust is oceanic, and not particularly strong due to that fact. Large-scale caldera volcanism requires both a strong lid for a large singular chamber to form, and then a mechanism for that lid to eventually get destroyed. In other regions such as the Taupo Volcanic Zone, the crust is very different being made up of hard felsic rock (greywhacke) which both forms a hard and brittle lid, but also melts and gets assimilated into the growing chambers as rhyolite. For the CKD, this assimilation process certainly occurs, but the assimilated magma would be more basaltic as opposed to the highly explosive rhyolite seen in Taupo.
Given, down a very long geologic timespan, if this group continues to see similar rates of magmatic input and the crust keeps thinning in the Central Kamchatka Depression, I *COULD* see this turn into a very large caldera system. We know there is a ton of magma down there (based on what Tallis mentioned as well as simply understanding the supply rate). But most of this is very deep and not ever a risk of erupting. It would be more of a batholith / laccolith that feeds overlying more shallow chambers.
A bit further down is the whopping Pauzhetka caldera, so large magma chambers can clearly occur here. It does have some similarities to Toba tectonically, although Toba also has the Great Sumatran Fault running through as well as the side-along extension-subduction front.
You’d need some of these shallower magma chambers to continue to grow in spite of high eruption rates, or to merge. And it hasn’t yet fractionated enough to produce the type of evolved magmas needed for a massive caldera eruption, most of the group erupts something akin to andesite. But it could do in the future.
Correct. For Toba, the Great Sumatran fault is what produces the decompression melt in the region. The fault is a strike slip fault, but strike slip faults often have regions where there is significant extension due to bending and fracturing in the fault. So while the fact that there is a strike slip fault is different from the CKD, it doesn’t change the fact that what matters is that this produces extension, decompression melt, and perhaps crustal thinning/weakness.
“You’d need some of these shallower magma chambers to continue to grow in spite of high eruption rates, or to merge”
Yeah, and that’s what I think will likely continue for a very long time. The thing is, the magma just seems to find it too easy to surface, and therefore does not seem to be growing large shallow chambers of evolved magma. That’s why you get a large cluster of mostly basaltic volcanoes. And when the edifice grows too large above and starts to actually block upward migration of magma, it just finds another path to the surface.
That type of behavior in my opinion is a good bit different from what you see in other regions where you see large calderas form. That’s not to say it can’t ever have a caldera formation, or won’t ever happen, but just that I don’t see this as a future VEI-8 candidate.
I can’t spoil it but there’s a process for how this could work
Thank-you for the essay on this part of Kamtchatka, one of the “Volcano Lands” of the Earth!
Klyuchevskaya is an extremely productive subduction zone volcano. Most productive subduction zone volcanoes lie in an area that has extension, so combines elements of a subduction zone with elements of a divergent zone. Anak Krakatau is an example for a subduction zone that has a part with stretching/distension. Etna profits from a zone of extension inside the Mediterranean subduction zone. Something like this happens also here, but in some different ways.
Does this same process of productive subduction zone volcanoes forming in extension areas happen in the Izu-Bonin-Volcano-Mariana Arc?
Klyuchevskaya = Russias real true Mount Doom perhaps and I guess that Kamen woud then be the dark tower of Barad Dur sourely the secret seat of the current kermlin goverment…
South of the raging fires and suffocating darkness spreading from Klyuchevskaya sits the dark, gloomy sorrowful waters of the Sea of Nurnen ( Lake Kronotskoye ) the dark, sad waters of Lake Núrnen
https://www.reddit.com/r/Volcanoes/comments/1mogu0k/new_images_of_klyuchevskaya_sopka_in_russia/
Recent photos from the summer eruption looks like the Dark Lords wrath is terrible .. at the same time Gollum is keept captive and is tortured/ asked in the dark tower … ( Kamen )
https://www.reddit.com/r/Volcanoes/comments/1mogu0k/new_images_of_klyuchevskaya_sopka_in_russia/
Recent photos from the summer eruption looks like the Dark Lords wrath is terrible .. at the same time Gollum is keept captive and is tortured/ asked in the dark tower …m ( Kamen )
Sam carries the exhausted Frodo towards the door of Sammath Naur the entry into Mount Dooms eruption canal:
Sam: “Look, Mister Frodo. A doorway! We’re almost there!!
[Gollum appears from behind a rock above the hobbits
Angry it hisses.. it screams…
Clever Hobbitssss, to cliiimb so high!!!!!
Fan of LOTR?
: D D :
Its a moonlit night in the misty emyn muil mountains, the moon shines through drapery of mists like a calcium dead glow illuminating black jagged shapes thats the terrain, Frodo and Sam sleeps below a cliff…
Something moves…. a ghostly starved shape crawls down verticaly towards the sleeping hobbits… its angry… it hisses… hisses like a coiled snake!… through the ugly toothed mouth comes….
hisss shhhhhssshhh!!… Thee thievesss! The thievessss… The filthy littleee thievessss!! ! wheeree iss it? WHERE IS IT!!! They STOLE IT FOM USS… myyyy preciouuusssssssss…! curse theeeem we HAAATES them… it ouurrs it is and we WANTS IT!!!!!!
Tallis:
Thank you for this thought provoking article. Do you think that Klyuchevskaya has the potential to go into caldera collapse? Where I live, only one volcano did that, Mount Mazama, in Oregon, in the Cascades Volcano chain, but that was quite a while back, about 7700 years ago. I did notice that Okmok in Alaska did a big thing too around 43 BCE. I confess that I am expecting Ioto to do a huge caldera collapse soon.
I do! Not for the next 10,000 yrs though
I actually believe it will be within 500 years or less. (but not when I am around)
A great article. Clear, concise and well written.
I most particularly liked that it gave a good feel for all the numbers, all volumes being in km^3. I think this is the first article I have read where this was the case and it really helped. Annual rates of 0.0XY km^3 (etc) are easily mentally converted to a 100 year supply for example.
Well done, loved it.
Thank you!
Thanks Tallis! Thorough and fascinating.
I did a quick estimate of the volume of the whole complex, I got an area of the wider shield structure as about 5700km2, a circle 42km radius. And a median elevation gain of about 1500m. A cone with 42km radius and 1.5km tall is 2700km3. I want to say its double that to account for subsidence but most of the ‘shield’ is alluvial outwash and probably isnt that thick. But 3000km3 is probably a safe number here and its likely more.
Thing is 3000km3 erupted st the current rate is like max 30k years old, but theres data saying the complex is like at least double that to 5x older from quick searches, and Ushovsky apparently is mostly Pleistocene. So theres probably an accelerating output going on, though how much probably needs better numbers than mine.
I wonder if Klyuchevskoy specifically got started after local deglaciation and kept going at expense of its neighbors.
Maybe if theres a lot of magma sitting below the crust ot reached a tipping point some time recently that is seeing it able to escape more and more, like a plume head but different origin, this place could become a small flood basalt in the coming millennia if all the supply collects in one place. It is a rift zone after all. This doesnt exclude more evolved volcanism alongside.
I also wonder what affect the Hawaii seamounts subducting right there have too. Trace a line along the chain its not unlikely theres a subducted seamount right under the CKD. Basalt of unusual thickness and capped with limestone, might be helping.
Yeah I am of the opinion that the system has either reached a tipping point or is doing a quick pulse of high activity. Think deglaciation may have also helped. It would hilarious if Klyuchevskaya did the Laki-sized flow instead of Hawaii or Iceland
It would probably be Tolbachik doing such a flow, it has access to a rift zone at least and a history of large volume separated eruptions.
If it is to do anything soon Klyuchevskoy is more likely to collapse and do a VEI 4-5 plinian-big lava fountain kinda thing, its magma chamber might be too deep to erupt in any other way no matter the size. Its actually not too unlikely that kind of eruption puts it to sleep for a while (few decades) though also just as easily not too.
Generally though it seems like the whole group is more in a very early constructive stage of its evolution. Lots of magma over a wide area converging. It might just be a circumstantial thing it appears to go through Klyuchevskoy now because its young and open.
This paper looked for crustal contamination in Kamchatka from the plume-head but it seems there isn’t much evidence: https://www.mantleplumes.org/Kamchatka2.html. One possibility is that Obruchev rise is the ‘first’ volcanic plateau, and that Hawaii essentially formed at a triple-point.
That the Hawaiian hot spot formed at a triple point is something we have argued before
https://www.volcanocafe.org/hawaii-and-the-story-of-the-pacific-ocean/
What was the climate and enviroment like in this part of Russia during the Last Glacial Maximum? it soure was incredibley cold but the constant very dry airflow from Siberia meant that most places there where simply too dry for glaciation, a glacial stage is extremely dry it was more akin to a global desert in the northen hemisphere than any snow thats how dry the mammoth steppe was
I appreciate Tallis focusing our attention on Klyuchevskaya, because nature has a way of surprising us. I look at the NASA Firms satellite from time to time, and I see things happening which don’t find the current science paradigm. I did spot one of the islands off the west coast of Mexico emitting lots of heat. I did see Ioto emitting tons of heat and I even took snapshots of this. At the time, no one had an explanation. But recent posts from JMA proved that what I saw was real. And Tim Catron who posts videos to YouTube, shares that apparently some (considered) extinct volcanoes in the Hawaiian archepeggio chain are not extinct but have erupted (pumice rafts). I personally believe he has a valid point and that these eruptions did occur and we need to be careful when we make statements “so and so is extinct”
What am I saying? Let’s keep an open mind and admit that we don’t know it all.
“we need to be careful when we make statements ‘so and so is extinct'”
This is why I keep beating the dead horse of keeping an eye on Daisen. Of the places I know, it is the one I am not convinced isn’t still active.
Klyuchevskaya is part of the zone of Kamtchatka, where the Emporer-Chain seamounts are subducted. Maybe there is old pre-Hawaiian lava recycled. There could be a complex process of subduction and orogency of the Emporer-Chain seamounts.
The V3 camera at Kilauea has been replaced and appears on the old V1 camera U-tube address. The V1 camera has a new U-tube address. Activity in both vents has increased considerably.
SDH has already reached a level of deformation at which previous episodes began:
I always did figure the next VEI 6 – 7 would come from either the Aleutians or Kamchatka (if not Ioto). Seems to be a long and extensive history of caldera making blasts in those areas.
I was wondering Tallis. You’re comment at the end of your last article: “Oh I never talked about my secondary picks have I? Might have to fix that”. Thought maybe that meant you’d be doing an update and/or expansion to your “Joker and Ace” article from 2024 (https://www.volcanocafe.org/joker-and-ace/).
Thanks for the excellent and informative article! Always a treat to read from someone who’s even more in awe of the BIG big booms than I am.
Thanks! I’ll do that expansion but it’ll probably during the summer.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qu8nx1qUwEU
Ray of doom.. nice explanation
That woud be a nice trip to Mauna Keas summit watching the wall of superhot rock vapor comming over the horizon its thundering towards you! the effect of this is not that diffirent at all from a giant dwarf planetary impact with Earth
“Klyuchevskaya is the highest volcano of Eurasia”
I think Mount Elbrus would like to claim the title, as it stands some 800 meter higher. However, Klyuchevskaya may well be taller as Elbrus sits on a plateau.
Maybe we should use the term “highest working volcano”, while Elbrus does a long sabbatical since the times of Emporer Claudius I in Rome (50 AD) https://www.britannica.com/biography/Claudius-Roman-emperor
The magmas of Klyuchevskoy are Basalt to Andesite. This applies well to the often Strombolian eruptions of Klyuchevskoy (f.e. 2023). The age of Klyuchevskoy reminds to other young volcanoes like St. Helens and Hekla. They (and we) still don’t know, how they’re going to behave during their “adult” phases.
Define ‘working’. How long are volcanoes allowed to take off before being considered ‘non-working’ or ‘retired’?
Is a time frame of 1000 years appropriate? There must also be a deep sleep that gives high certainty that a volcano doesn’t erupt surprisingly soon.
seems too short to me. large eruptions tend to come from systems that have been sleeping for a long time. Here we are limited by the length of the historical record: the volcanoes were often considered extinct or even non-volcanic. Pinatubo had slept for 500 years, Krakatau 300 years, Tambora much longer. Vesuvius in roman time was not considered volcanic. Taupo has not erupted for >1500 years but is clearly not extinct and is in working order. A 1000-year sleep is not a warranty against a major eruption. One wonders whether the prince who woke the sleeping beauty was aware of the dangers.
Not all big eruptions are from recently awakend long dormant systems Albert. Hunga Tonga Hunga Ha’apai was very active historically, but blew up with power comparable to Krakatau, and probably bigger than Pinatubo.
There is also the case that many huge calderas, even qualified supervolcanoes, are also highly active volcanoes that just erupt constantly with little output venerally, building a new chamber. Aso, Aira and Kikai on Kyushu, Tondano on Suluwesi, Amatitlan in Guatemala. All are VEI 7+ systems that have erupted in the last decade or are doing so presently. All are also still active as full calderas. Aso is a confirmed qualified VEI 8, Aira is borderline, Tondano js probably an 8 too.
We tend to know little about minor eruptions before the historical record. Hunga Tonga is a system where the recurrence of large eruptions may be 1000 years but which does (did?) frequent small eruptions so it is indeed a counter example. The big explosion came as a complete surprise. We know that Krakatau did not erupt between 1680 (or so) and the final series of events. Tambora too was quiet without even an oral history of eruptions. Taupo has, I believe, itself been quiet (volcanically speaking) in the historical record – we don’t know further back. (Our New Zealand expert may correct this.) But the wider area did have eruptions. The question was how long a volcano should have been asleep before the danger is gone (or lessened.) I don’t know! But I would not consider 1000 years as safe.
Regarding the large calderas, it seems to me that such systems may remain active for a long time after the big caldera forming event. Krakatau has done so. They may not remain so. Yellowstone has gone to deep sleep – in fact that is probably a requirement for geyser systems. Campi Flegrei had a puff 500 years ago but overall is scarily quiet. Auckland too (although not a system that does large events.) It is the quiet ones I am worried about.. with the exception of Yellowstone which does feel pretty safe.
I wouldn’t call Taupō (the macron matters) “quiet”, Albert!
It has at least 25 confirmed eruptions in the last 10,000 years – mostly VEI3-4
Its reputation as the most active rhyolitic caldera of the Holocene is well-earned!
Thanks Mike! When was the most recent eruption? How long has it been ‘quasi-quiet’? (That sounds like an infamous finance minister in the UK.)
As I added in the second sentence, there must also be a deep somnolence like in Mount Elbrus that makes us certain that an eruption doesn’t happen soon.
Compared to this a “working volcano” can have a light somnolence which can change anytime quickly towards an eruption. Pinatubo, St. Helens and Krakatau are volcanoes are dormant on a different level than Mount Elbrus.
I will disagree on you regarding Elbrus. It is considered dormant, but a new eruption there would not be a major surprise.
I would consider anything that hasn’t erupted for 1 million years likely extinct. Anything that hasn’t erupted for 100,000 years inactive but with potential for renewal. Anything within 10,000 years is dormant to active.
Though I suppose this category sorting could also be easily complicated by visible or detected signs of unrest from long term non-eruptors.
And what about Damavand, the next highest volcano in Eurasia after Elbrus? (Huh, I almost wrote: “Erebus”. I always mix these two…).
Wikipedia says that “Its last eruption was around 5300 BCE”.
How about one Great Year, ~26000 “short” years? It’s just one such “year” from Oruanui eruption of Taupō, and also about the same time (or maybe slightly more) from the most recent eruptions of Ciomadul in Romania.
It seems to be an interesting case: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ciomadul
When we will have an ewesome article about it?
Last confirmed eruption was a 260CE moose fart AFAIK – around 30 years after the last big one, the ~233CE VEI6.
That is a long period of quiescence for this system
Well, so we have to look for a different aspect on which Klyuchevskoya is the highest ?? of Eurasia.
Although the current effusive activity of Great Sitkin is somewhat boring and steady, it is unsual, if we look at the volcano history: All historical eruptions were short and predominantly explosive. Does Great Sitkin erupt degassed lava that lost its gasses during previous historical eruptions and fumaroles?
The opposite of Klyuchevskaya…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iouC1eJBUr8
Happened yesterday. In the glorious descriptive language of Geonet’s Mike Ross: an actual moose fart, since it’s Yellowstone.
I should write a popular sicence article about on volcanism on alien Super Earths and even Mega Earths… hypervolcanic due to their mass if they haves an earthlike composition. But it haves alot to do…with other stuff
I should write a popular sicence article about on volcanism on alien Super Earths and even Mega Earths… hypervolcanic due to their mass if they haves an earthlike composition. But i haves alot to do…with other stuff in my life
I think Earth is not large enough to satisfy my intrests
Super Earths around Orange Dwarf stars are very intresting in search for habitable planets, the stars live longer than our sun. and the larger rocky planets will runn an active sillicate – carbon cycle for much longer than Earth ever will. A Super Earth perfect for life is both older and larger than our planet and the sun is somewhat smaller than our sun
Spattering on Kilauea has begun: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tk0tfYDxrUA
This is the slowly commencing Xmas and 39th episode of Kilauea.
50% (20) of the 39 episodes have happened until early May. Until end of May there were 23 episodes. Since June Kilauea did 15 episodes. Since July the frequency is two episodes per month, while before July the months contained more episodes. But the episodes have grown in size and strength since July.
https://www.usgs.gov/observatories/hvo/news/commemorating-a-fountain-filled-year-kilauea
If we sum up the episodes to one great eruption, we’ll get around 30 days of eruptive activity. The total volume until now was 52.7 billion gallons, that applies to 0.2 km³, if I calculated correctly. That’s the volume of Mauna Ulu I (1969-71) within 874 days. Only the LERZ eruptions had higher rates, f.e. Kapoho 1960 and 2018.
I think the vents are close to the same level as the vent before the 2018 eruption.
And also calendar of all the fountains.
While Kilauea has shown constant spattering since yesterday, Svarts is now approaching its highest volume. If it manages to empty as much as on april 1st (and actually breaks through this time), then we could be in for quite a big show (and also potential damage if it doesnt go north again).
The next event may well be the last of this series
it comes down to how long it can sustain the ~1m³/s inflow ig..im down for a new chapter just pls dont make me wait decades lol
Kilauea is showing vigorous flaming at the moment. Maybe a day or two before overflows? Just guessing
Not just that, but the north vent has built up a spatter cone within the crater, with short, slow flows flowing into the other pit. The south vent was spattering too, but seems to be glowing at the moment. Overflows are more likely in about a few hoursto maybe a day I feel like.
Overflows have started from the south vent.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=alStK7o2i5Q
CLVD earthquakes from the Izu-Bonin arc causing some tsunamis in Japan. I think this was discussed on here at the time, as a potential underwater caldera eruption.
That’s such a potent area. As long as the resulting tsunami isn’t cataclysmic, there’ll be a fun show there sometime or another.
To be honest, Kyushu/Ryukyu scare me more, because there is no doubting the impact that their large-scale eruptions have on civilization.
It gets overshadowed by its more recently-active neighbors, but Ibusuki/Ata Caldera deserves more attention.
I found that almost unwatchable. Truly repellent AI voice and cringeworthy visuals.
Good that he cites sources, but he doesn’t adequately explain his somewhat sensationalist conclusions or justify the crummy stock footage he uses to illustrates his theory.
He totally ignores, let alone tries to rule out, the most common cause for an apparently relatively small earthquake causing a disproportionately large tsunami: a slow-rupture event; a ‘tsunami earthquake’ as they’re sometimes called. He needs to get into exactly how magnitudes were determined, and an analysis of the waveforms and rupture duration.
That’s actually his real voice and is a geologist, but then again there could be other factors to the tsunamis to be honest…
https://youtu.be/40_coN4N9I0?si=VOMA6ST39gaO0K6_ – video by Shawn Willsey with GeologyHub (Tim Catron).
Hes been making videos for years now lol I thought it was obvious it isnt AI at this point. Hes done a face reveal and livestreams on location in Iceland in 2022, and Kilauea only a few months back. Some people are just monotone by default
North vent at Kilauea is really starting to fountian now.
Both vents have growing fountains now; this could be it.
Yes, the show is on!
links for the rest of us?
https://www.youtube.com/live/gXKuUyKt8mc?si=tqU22h_G5RUpS8jH – V3 Camera
https://www.youtube.com/live/tk0tfYDxrUA?si=jEqDYg4KUVgoY1aw – V1 Camera
https://www.youtube.com/live/fiyttmA7YkA?si=__HCp_iTnr1kFvLI – V2 Camera (would not recommend at the moment unless if it clears up a bit)
Honestly, I did not see this coming. I was expecting overflows only but I guess we got a early Christmas present instead…
Much appreciated by me, and probably many others.
Thank you very much.
“Kilauea Message 2025-12-23 22:27:31 HST
The south vent reached a maximum fountain height of about 1400 feet at 9:30 pm HST. The north vent reached about 900 feet at the same time. Currently the south vent is at 1000 feet and the north vent at 600 feet.”
So if you scroll back to 21:30 o’clock, then you get the tallest lava fountains of E39. Now (23:40 HST) the lava fountains continue to retreat.
Someone couldn’t wait for Christmas and let Kilauea erupt too early. And now someone is standing in front of the V1 camera. Remember Iceland? But again a sight for sore eyes!
Maybe Kilauea remembered the western Polynesian roots of native Hawaiians and honored the west pacific islands which already had 24th December during the start of E39.
Yep it’s Christmas Day here in NZ and it’s erupting!
If it lasts another 70 minutes it will be a christmas eruption for me too 🙂
That qualifies for me. Happy Christmas eruption, everyone!
E39 lasted around 8 hours from 6 p.m. to 2 a.m. while E38 lasted 12 hours.
Deflation was smaller than E38. The difference is stronger on SDH than on UWD tiltmeter.
And it is over. Sorry Chad
Hahhaha it stopped as always but there will be more very soon
Hahaha = hisss shhhhhssshhh!!… Thee thievesss! The thievessss… The filthy littleee thievessss!! ! wheeree iss it? WHEEEEEERE IS IT!!! They STOLE IT FOM USS… myyyy preciouuusssssssss…!
curse iit weee HAAATES it… it ouurrs it is!! and we WANTS MOOORE!!!!! … ( cough! Gollum )
Etna might be about to throw a present. SO2 has been climbing for a few weeks, tremor is shooting up, while the Northeast Crater is steaming strongly (which seems to be where the magma column is rising). There’s a chance we might see a paroxysm or flank eruption.
https://www.ct.ingv.it/index.php/monitoraggio-e-sorveglianza/segnali-in-tempo-reale/tremore-vulcanico
Also, Pele has been busy making a lot of Christmas trees, hanging golden vitric ornaments:
https://youtu.be/fIgy0aIO4Uo?si=evsD4fL_yyXAsAtQ
New post is up! The monumental Andes
https://www.volcanocafe.org/andean-volcanoes-and-inca-shrines/
I’m not really a volcanologist, but your articles are very interesting. By the way, Klyuchevskaya may be the highest active volcano of Eurasia, but Elbrus (5642 m) seems to be the highest volcano (active or dormant).