Cracking Volcanoes

A selection of the large eruptions that Santiaguito has produced in 2016. Left: 11 April (Source: INSIVUMEH ). Middle: 19 May (Source: INSIVUMEH ). Right: 17 June (Source:  Stereo100Noticias ). Last week Anthony Lamur and I were back in Guatemala to collect more observations from Santiaguito volcano . The fieldwork was prompted by the occurrence of several very large eruptions at the volcano in 2016 (like those in the image above), a departure from the regular but relatively small explosions that are typical of the place. What we wanted to know was what mechanism is driving the much larger explosions? Our campsite on Santa Maria on the morning of June 13th. The shadow of Santa Maria (3,772 m high) stretches far into the distance.  Our task for the trip was simple: we would camp on Santa Maria and watch Santiaguito for a few days with optical and thermal cameras to record any explosions. We also deployed a temporary acoustic microphone to record the infrasound prod...

This is a guest post by Becky Coats , a volcanology postgraduate here at the University of Liverpool. She has written about her amazing recent fieldwork to Unzen volcano in Japan!   Meet the A Team: Mission Unzen-Fugen, feat. (left to right, top to bottom) Claire Harnett , Paul Wallace , Dr. Mark Thomas , Dr. Takahiro Miwa , James Ashworth ,  Dr. Jackie Kendrick , Prof. Yan Lavallée , and me! This trip was a collaboration between the University of Liverpool (Jackie, Yan, Paul, James and myself), the University of Leeds (Mark and Claire) and the National Research Institute for Earth Science and Disaster Prevention, Japan (Taka). Those of us from UK universities were in Japan from the 8th to the 20th of May and were granted permission for 6 days work on the lava dome each armed with our own specialist tasks but with one collaborative question: How stable is the dome today? My assignment was to collect samples from a near by pyroclastic deposit that represent the ...

The fieldwork group with Santiaguito and Santa Maria in the background. From left: Yours truly, Silvio De Angelis, Andreas Rietbrock, Armando Pineda, Adrian Hornby, Anthony Lamur and Yan Lavallee. Last Thursday I returned to the UK after an amazing three weeks of fieldwork around the Santiaguito volcano in Guatemala. For this post I will write a little bit about the experience and what had to be done during the trip. For those interested, I've also added a section at the end about the activity that we witnessed during our time there. Quetzaltenango (also known as Xela), our base for the fieldwork. Photo taken from near the summit of Santa Maria. After negotiating the mazy and congested streets of Guatemala City, and finally getting our equipment through customs, we arrived in the lovely little city of Quetzaltenango. Guatemala's second largest city sits in the shadow of the Santa Maria volcano, at the foot of which is the volcano we had come to study. We had a tight s...

This wednesday, I will be starting three weeks of fieldwork in Guatemala. There I will be working with a group of fellow volcanologists and seismologists from the University of Liverpool. We are heading to the Santiaguito dome complex, one of the most active and fascinating volcanoes in the world. Santiaguito dome complex, with an explosion plume rising from the active Caliente vent. The older Santa Maria volcano forms the high peak on the far right. (Taken Dec. 2005. Source: photovolcanica.com)  I've introduced Santiaguito on this blog before , but I thought I would rewrite it with a little update on its recent activity. Santiaguito is a lava dome complex that has been growing non-stop since 1922; an exceptionally long eruption for any kind of volcano. It is forming inside a crater created during a massive VEI 6 eruption of the Santa Maria volcano in 1902. The dome eruption has been accompanied by regular vulcanian explosions, lava flows, pyroclastic flows, and lahars. In ...

Volcan de Colima, looking north-west, with the active lava dome on the summit and Volcancito on the east flank (taken 3rd June 2014). Since my last blog post  I have been lucky enough to head out to Colima, Mexico, for fieldwork. The state boasts long pacific beaches, beautiful river gorges, friendly locals, delicious food, and one very big, very active volcano. Volcan de Colima has been erupting near-continuously since 1998 and is one of the volcanoes that I am investigating as part of my project (see my introduction to the volcanoes ). On a clear day, its hard to not notice the volcano which completely dominates the generally low-lying landscape around it; this is nicely shown by this photo  taken from the ISS last year. The latest phase of it's eruption has been going since January 2013, and is producing a new lava dome accompanied by many small pyroclastic flows, rockfalls, and explosions (over 4000 in total as of the start of May 2014). The lava dome at th...