Léon Prunelle / Originally published September 30, 2014 This is a re-post of an article by Henrik, written during the Bardarbunga eruption when the caldera had started its collapse. It does not take long for a newcomer to volcano-watching, if we are to call our hobby that, to come across the term “caldera”, cauldron. The term is…
Guest post for VolcanoCafé by Greg S (Aka Cbus05) One thing I have come to realize after years of reading about and following volcanoes, is that there is a considerable bias in people’s interest towards certain volcanoes. I used to think there was a western bias, but this phenomenon is just as prevalent in Japan…
As most of us are aware, a lava lake appeared on the crater floor inside Santiago Crater on Nicaragua’s Volcan Masaya back in December 2015. This however wasn’t the first time Volcan Masaya hosted an active lava lake, Masaya has had a history of having a lava lake appear and disappear over the centuries and it…
First of all, this article is the official start of our celebratory week and we have no less than two things to celebrate since our five year birthday as a beacon light of volcanic science is on Wednesday. More about that later in the week, first we have another jubilee to take care of. A…
The facts of Eldgja are well established. We know approximately when it happened, where it happened, how much lava, tephra and sulphate was ejected. We have found the tephra in Greenland. We think we know the human impact over much of the northern world, arising from three years of winter. But on other aspects, our…
The previous post described what we think we know about the Eldgja eruption. Our knowledge about one of the largest eruptions in Iceland is somewhat limited, surprisingly so given that Iceland was already well populated. One of the few things which seems secure is the date. Eldgja is believed to date to 934 AD, continuing…
Iceland is the most volcanic place in the world. Explosive eruptions, from many different volcanoes, are common, unpredictable and, when seen from afar, exciting. But don’t be fooled. These volcanic explosions are small fry, and mostly harmless. Less common but far more devastating are the other type, responsible for 80% of all Icelandic lava and…
We haven’t seen a large eruption since Tambora, 200 years ago. That is a good thing: the world has had enough troubles in that time, and a major volcanic disaster was really not needed. There has never been a major eruption in a highly developed area, and we don’t know how resilient a…
After writing the Woolly Mammoth Guide to Icelandic Volcanism I vowed to not write about Iceland for a while. That comment bit me in the posterior rather quickly. Since the cessation of the Holuhraun eruption the central volcano Bárðarbunga has been highly seismically active. Many people have fervently believed that this has been due to…
In the previous part we learned that Grimsvötn indeed is able to produce large scale eruptions as we looked closer into the Saksunarvatn tephras. The first part can be found by following the link below. http://www.volcanocafe.org/grimsvotn-the-saksunarvatn-tephras/ This time we will look into what this new information might mean for the future eruptions of Grimsvötn. But…