As of October 2nd, 2022, there are 50 volcanoes actively erupting on the planet.
One of these erupting 50 is the Kilauea volcano in Hawaii, whose eruption just passed a major
milestone.
Its ongoing eruption which began on September 29th of 2021 has just passed the 1 year long
mark!
Although this is somewhat impressive, it does not compare to Kilauea's famous 35 year long
eruption which lasted from 1983 to 2018.
In fact, since 1800 there have been 5 additional distinct eruptions of the volcano's 39 during
this timespan that have reached that milestone.
With this being said, here are this week's major volcano related news stories.
In Japan, a new explosive eruption began at the Nishinoshima island volcano, sending a
plume of ash visible from satellite several kilometers into the atmosphere.
Meanwhile, in Alaska, the alert level of the Trident volcano was raised from green to yellow
due to in part to a possible magmatic intrusion.
And, in Turkey, a swarm of earthquakes struck underneath the Tendürek volcano, potentially
representing a change in the overall volcano.
For context the Tendürek volcano is located in far eastern Turkey where it is 34 miles
or 55 kilometers southwest of the far more famous Ararat volcano.
Tendürek is quite an interesting volcanic complex, as unlike the vast majority of volcanoes
within the country it is a shield volcano.
Although it has not produced as many confirmed eruptions as some other nearby volcanoes,
I suspect that Tendürek has been more active than current records suggest simply owed to
450 square kilometers of land being covered by dark black lava which looks less than 30,000
years old and the number of cinder and spatter cones with only minimal to moderate levels
of erosion present.
Regardless, Tendürek is somewhat notable because it produced Turkey's last eruption
in 1855.
In recent years, this volcano has produced semi regular albeit low magnitude earthquakes
potentially due to a slow influx of magma into the volcano's magma chamber.
The latest earthquake swarm began on October 1st at around 7:00 am local time.
During the next 5 hours, about 20 volcano tectonic earthquakes occurred the largest
of which was a magnitude 2.5.
Strangely, these quakes occurred on a seemingly west-southwest trend which parallels two of
the volcano's most notable vents, suggesting that some underlying fault or dike intrusion
might be involved.
Although the ongoing earthquakes cannot be definitively linked to volcanic activity,
the shallowness of some of the quakes being less than 5 kilometers or 3 miles deep on
the southern flank of the volcano is quite suspicious.
Meanwhile, in Japan, the scenic Nishinoshima volcano produced a new volcanic eruption,
sending a plume of ash 2 kilometers into the atmosphere.
This represent's the volcano's first eruption since 2021, when it produced a 2 day long
eruption in August.
Although no one lives in close proximity to this remote volcano, it is quite an interesting
complex as it has consistently been enlargened without much erosion between most of its eruptions.
This is likely due to the abundance of lava this volcano produces as in contrast many
other shallow submarine or small island volcanoes produce higher quantities of ash.
The ongoing eruption seems relatively consistent with a high end VEI 1 or low end VEI 2 eruption,
and has caused water discoloration to the island's southwest which is visible from satellite.
Although not much of a danger, it could disrupt some regional air traffic.
Within Alaska, the alert level was raised at the Trident volcano from green to yellow
on September 29th.
This change was made due to a prolonged swarm of earthquakes which began underneath the
volcano on August 24th.
These quakes got progressively shallower over time, in what appeared to be an example of
a textbook magmatic intrusion from the suspected depth of the crust mantle boundary.
After the rate of earthquakes declined, they spiked once again on September 22nd when 40
earthquakes occurred in rapid succession, largely at 3 miles or 5 kilometers in depth.
Additionally, via an INSAR dataset I detected likely ground uplift to the south of the volcano,
indicating that if confirmed it proves that magma is moving shallower into the crust,
and I speculate that molten rock might currently be at between 3 and 9 miles in depth.
Here is a quick list of every volcano which is currently erupting.
Also, here are some volcanoes showing signs of unrest which are not erupting but could
erupt in the near future.
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