Nature is beautiful, but never should we forget that it can also be hazardous.
Plenty of natural phenomena pose a serious risk to human habitations.
Hurricanes, tornadoes, droughts, pestilences, and plagues are just a few ways that nature
sometimes compromises our well-being and safety, but in today's video, we're going to be discussing
a force of nature that has been known to be quite literally explosive.
Volcanoes are fascinating geological features, but they can also be incredibly dangerous.
There are around 169 active volcanoes in the United States, and the United States Geological
Survey has deemed 18 of them to be at high risk for eruption.
These volcanoes are all located in the states of Alaska, Washington, California, Hawaii,
and Oregon.
While most of these volcanoes are currently considered dormant and pose little to no danger
to people living in their vicinity, a few of them could result in significant disasters
if they were to erupt.
Here is a list of the 10 most dangerous active volcanoes in the US.
Kilauea - Hawaii
Kilauea, Hawaii, is a beautiful place to visit.
The island is home to an active volcano, which is one of the main attractions for tourists.
The volcano has been continuously erupting for over 30 years and is one of the most active
volcanoes in the world.
Kilauea is one of the most visited islands in Hawaii and is a popular destination for
tourists from all over the world.
But please be careful if you do choose to visit.
The Kilauea volcano erupted in 2018, causing destruction to dozens of buildings and forcing
over 1,700 people to evacuate.
Mt.
St Helens - Washington
The tragic 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens was one of the worst in U.S. history.
An earthquake knocked a chunk of the mountain off, triggering a landslide and a blast that
sent a tower of ash up 30,000 feet, toppling trees across 230 square miles.
Succeeding eruptions sent large avalanches of hot ash, rock, and gas plummeting down
the slopes at breakneck speeds of 50 to 80 mph.
Over 50 people and thousands of animals were killed in all, and damages topped a mind-blowing
$1 billion.
The volcano reawakened in 2004 after four massive explosions blasted a deadly mixture
of ash and steam 10,000 feet up into the air.
The lava that came sludging on out formed a large dome on the crater floor until early
2008 when it erupted once again and filled a large percentage of the crater from the
1980 eruption.
Although it's said to have calmed down now, the United States Geological Survey still
warns visitors that it is still active and quite dangerous.
Mount Rainier – Washington
Mount Rainier is a volcano in the Cascade Range of Washington.
It is the most dangerous volcano in the United States.
The last eruption was over 100 years ago, but it could erupt again at any time and cause
major damage to nearby towns and cities like Seattle and Tacoma.
As Mount St. Helens showed us in 1980, volcanos pose a very serious threat to human life.
They can create hot water and rock flows that slope down the mountainside called lahars.
Two Lahars from mount Rainier made their way out to the Puget Sound after the violent eruption
that took place some 5,000 years ago.
Mount Rainier's potential for volatility and its close proximity to major cities make it
one of just two US Decade Volcanoes, a name the UN uses to designate volcanoes that are
particularly dangerous to humans.
While it's dormant, this volcano is still quite active.
As such, it's one of the closest monitored volcanoes in the nation.
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Mount Redoubt – Alaska
Mount Redoubt is a beautiful yet potentially dangerous volcano in Alaska's Lake Clark National
Park and Preserve.
Standing over 11,000 feet tall, this stratovolcano forms the tallest peak in the majestic Aleutian
mountain range.
It is one of the most active volcanoes in the United States.
It has been erupting for the last 10,000 years and has had more than 30 eruptions since then.
The last major eruption was on October 23, 2009.
In 1966, the eruption melted ice from the volcano's summit crater and caused a glacial
outburst flood known as a jokulhlaup, which is Icelandic for a glacial run.
Four decades later, the volcano reawakened for several months sending plumes of ash higher
than ten miles above sea level while triggering up to 30 earthquakes a second before exploding.
The danger of Mount Redoubt is that it can erupt without warning and cause a lot of damage
to travelers who are nearby or even those who are not near but still feel the effects
of the eruption.
Mount Shasta – California
Mount Shasta is a snow-capped volcano in the Cascade Range of northern California just
south of the Oregon-California border.
The stratovolcano is the second highest peak in the state, and it is also one of the most
active volcanoes in North America.
Mount Shasta last erupted in 1786, and in the past 10,000 years, eruptions have increased
from 800 a year to 250 a year frequency.
Future eruptions like those that have occurred in the last ten millennia will likely create
pyroclastic flows, lava flows, deposits of ash, and domes.
The flows could damage low-lying areas up to 13 miles from the volcano's summit.
This would all but obliterate the city of Shasta which sits just at the base of the
volcanoes The Mount Shasta Volcano Observatory (MSVO)
monitors Mount Shasta's activity and warns people about any potential dangers that may
arise from an eruption.
Mount Hood – Oregon This 500,000 year-old stratovolcano is located
about 50 miles east of Portland, Oregon.
It last erupted in the 1790s, right before Lewis and Clark reached the Pacific Northwest
in their historic exploratory journey.
Historically, Mt.
Hood's eruptions have been somewhat irregular, but the USGS points to two eruptions as offering
a bit of perspective on potential future ones.
During an eruption that occurred around 100,000 years ago, Mt.
Hood's north flank and summit collapsed, launching a lahar down its slope into the Hood River
valley, through the Columbia River, and up into Washington's pristine White Salman River
Valley.
Another eruption that occurred 1,500 years ago, albeit smaller, produced another lahar
that managed to move boulders as big as three meters wide 30 feet above the river's typical
level.
In the process, the entire Columbia River was pushed northward.
Even though the volcano is too far away from Stumptown to smack it with a lahar, it could
still potentially pepper it with rock fragments, ash, and dust, just as Mount St. Helens did
back in 1980.
The Three Sisters – Oregon
Oregon's Three Sisters volcanoes may have a pleasant-sounding nickname, but they shouldn't
be taken lightly.
They are located in the Cascade Range and are typically lumped together as a singular
unit.
Even so, they each formed at a different period of time from a different variety of magma.
The Middle and North Sisters haven't erupted in what scientists estimate to be 14,000 years,
but the South Sister is known to have erupted only 2,000 years ago and is thus considered
to be the one that is most likely to erupt again.
The Middle and South Sisters have been sporadically active over tens of thousands of years.
That means there is a real chance that they could erupt rather explosively and produce
massive lava domes that could give way to pyroclastic flows.
The South Sisters' most recent eruptions have caused rocks more than seven feet wide to
rain down from the sky as far as 25 miles away from the crater.
If a new eruption were to occur, it could possibly endanger nearby towns in a matter
of minutes.
Akutan Peak – Alaska
Akutan Peak, located on Akutan Island in the Bering Sea is home to a few coastal towns
reliant upon a sizeable fish-processing plant as their primary source of income.
It's also home to one of the most active volcanoes in Alaska and the Aleutians.
The 4,274 feet tall stratovolcano has experienced more than 20 eruptions since 1790.
It erupted almost a dozen times just between 1980 and 1992 alone.
While it's been relatively quiet ever since, aside from a volcanic inflation event in 2017,
there are signs that it is still very much so active.
In 1996, a seismic swarm event took place that caused significant damage and prompted
some locals and employees of the fish plant to high-tail it off the island.
On Akutan island, there are still a number of hot springs and active fumaroles.
The Alaskan Volcanic Observatory has further reported multiple instances of 'notable seismicity'
in recent years, including over 100 seismic events in 2008 alone.
Makushin Volcano – Alaska
If you head southwest from Akutan island, you'll find yourself at the significantly
larger Unalaska Island.
Here an enormous snow-covered volcano named Makushin rests.
The volcano stands about 6,000 feet high and is worthy of being on a postcard.
With its broad, domelike appearance, it stands in stark contrast with the steep-sided volcanoes
that surround it.
On the island is the Aleutian Islands population center, Unalaska.
There have been numerous eruptions at Makushin Volcano in the last several thousand years.
A few of these have resulted in pyroclastic flows.
Around 8,000 years ago, an eruption occurred that scored a five on the Volcanic Explosivity
Index.
And yes, in case your curious, that's pretty bad.
Since the late 18th century, there have been quite a few small to moderate-sized eruptions
here.
The most recent of which occurred in 1995.
The volcano's eastern flanks and summit caldera are still littered with high-temp geothermal
areas that indicate areas of volcanic activity.
Since an eruption would compromise the health and livelihood of the residents of Unalaska,
Makushin is ranked as a very high risk.
Mount Spurr
Mount Spurr is a volcano in Alaska in the Aleutians, standing tall at over 11,000 feet
above sea level, that has erupted twice in the last 60 years.
It's erupted several more times over the previous 8,000 years.
The scary thing about this is that it's located just 80 miles west of Alaska's most populated
city, Anchorage.
The first modern eruption was in 1953, and it caused significant problems for travelers
because of the ash that was thrown into the air.
The second eruption was in 1992 and it also caused major problems for travelers once again
because of the ash, but this time there were also flows of hot lava that came down from
Mount Spurr.
These flows created lahars, and as we already established, these fast-moving hot mudflows
pose a serious risk to people.
Did you know that there are 18 active volcanoes in the United States that pose a severe risk
to human safety?
And did you know that quite a few of these potentially dangerous volcanoes are located
in the Pacific Northwest?
Share your thoughts on active volcanoes in the US in the comments sections.
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