Volcanoes have a unique quality that makes them natural disaster superstars. Magma
pushing violently to the surface and erupting with terrible ferocity. Images of the ancient Roman
city of Pompeii and its unfortunate inhabitants trapped in volcanic ash and pumice serve as a
sobering reminder of what occurs when a volcano "wakes up." You might be startled to learn that
the United States is one of the most volcanically active areas on the planet. It has 161 active
volcanoes in its 50 states and territories over the last 12,000 years. That is, in fact, the most
in the world. A massive magma chamber beneath Yellowstone National Park's stunning hot springs
and geysers could one day erupt as a supervolcano. According to NASA, supervolcanoes are one of
the most dangerous natural dangers to human civilization, far more deadly than asteroids. And
recently, a NASA scientist disclosed something terrifying about the Yellowstone supervolcano,
as well as NASA's plans for it. What is this astonishing revelation, and how does it affect
everyone in the world, particularly those in the United States? Join us in today's video as we
go through this shocking revelation in detail. What is a "supervolcano" or "super-eruption?"?
Both terms are relatively new and are preferred by the media over scientists, but geologists
have begun to use them in recent years to refer to explosive volcanic eruptions that eject ten
thousand times the amount of magma and ash that Mount St. Helens, one of the most explosive
eruptions in recent years, ejected. It's difficult to conceive such a gigantic eruption, but the
Earth's surface has preserved clear traces of several massive super-eruptions. Many continents
have been blanketed in thick layers of ash. And massive hollowed-out calderas - craters as large
as 60 miles (100 km) across left when a volcano collapses after emptying its entire magma chamber
at once - serve as vivid reminders of previous super-eruptions in Indonesia, New Zealand, the
United States, and Chile. Massive areas have been devastated by the eruption of these prehistoric
supervolcanoes. Mount Toba in Sumatra erupted 74,000 years ago, releasing a massive 700 cubic
miles (2,800 cubic kilometers) of lava and leaving a thick coating of ash over the entire region.
In comparison, the amount of magma spewed from Indonesia's Mount Krakatau in 1883,
one of the greatest documented eruptions, was approximately 3 cubic miles (12 cubic km).
Volcanologists are still searching for answers to numerous unresolved questions
about supervolcanoes. For example, what causes their eruptions, and why do they wait until their
magma chambers reach such gigantic sizes before erupting? How does the composition
compare to other well-known eruptions? How do we know when the next supervolcano will erupt?
But one thing is certain: super-eruptions, while they do occur, are extremely rare, and the chances
of one occurring in the lifetime of anyone viewing this video are vanishingly small. The most recent
super-eruption happened some 26,000 years ago in New Zealand. The next-to-most-recent event was the
catastrophic eruption of Mount Toba, which took place approximately 50,000 years ago. Geologists
have detected the remains of approximately 50 super-eruptions, though teams are currently
analyzing a variety of alternative possibilities. That may appear to be a high number. However,
when one group of scientists calculated the estimated frequency of eruptions by counting
all known supervolcanoes, they discovered that only 1.4 super-eruptions occur per million years.
That is not to claim that a supervolcano will erupt at regular intervals every million years.
Several millions of years may pass without a super-eruption, or many supervolcanoes may erupt
in a short period of time. The geological record indicates that supervolcanoes occur in clusters,
but the clusters are not regular enough to be used to predict future eruptions.
However, a recent NASA research shows something unexpected about Yellowstone.
Following the publication of an article about supervolcanoes last month, a group of NASA
researchers came out to provide a previously undisclosed report about the hazard - and
what could be done about it. "I was a member of NASA's Advisory Council on Planetary Defense,
which studied ways for NASA to defend the planet from asteroids and comets," Brian Wilcox of
Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) at the California Institute of Technology explains.
"During that study, I came to the conclusion that the supervolcano threat is substantially greater
than the asteroid or comet threat." There are approximately 20 known supervolcanoes on Earth,
with large eruptions happening once per 100,000 years on average. One of the most
serious concerns posed by an eruption is famine, with a prolonged volcanic winter
potentially preventing civilization from producing enough food to feed its current population.
The United Nations calculated in 2012 that global food stocks would last 74 days.
When Nasa scientists examined the issue, they discovered that the most logical approach could
simply be to cool a supervolcano. A Yellowstone volcano is essentially a massive heat generator,
equivalent to six industrial power plants. Yellowstone presently releases 60-70% of the
heat rising from below into the atmosphere through water that seeps into the magma chamber through
fissures. The remaining accumulates within the magma, allowing it to dissolve additional volatile
gases and surrounding minerals. When this heat reaches a certain point, an explosive eruption
is unavoidable. However, if more heat could be retrieved, the supervolcano would never explode.
Yellowstone would no longer be a hazard, according to NASA, if heat transport from its magma chamber
could be increased by 35%. The only remaining question is how. One idea is to simply add more
water to the supervolcano. However, convincing legislators to support such an undertaking would
very certainly be impossible. “Building a big aqueduct uphill into a mountainous region would
be both costly and difficult, and people don’t want their water spent that way,” Wilcox says.
“People are desperate for water all over the world and so a major infrastructure project,
where the only way the water is used is to cool down a supervolcano, would be very controversial.”
Instead, Nasa has devised a whole other strategy. They believe the most realistic option would be
to dig up to 10km inside the supervolcano and pump high-pressure water down. The circulating
water would return at a temperature of roughly 350C (662F), steadily draining heat from the
volcano day by day. While such a project would cost roughly $3.46 billion (£2.69 billion), it
comes with an intriguing catch that could persuade lawmakers to make the commitment. Wilcox estimates
that Yellowstone currently releases roughly 6GW of heat. “Through drilling in this way, it
could be used to create a geothermal plant, which generates electric power at extremely competitive
prices of around $0.10/kWh. You would have to give the geothermal companies incentives to drill
somewhat deeper and use hotter water than they usually would, but you would pay back your initial
investment, and get electricity which can power the surrounding area for a period of potentially
tens of thousands of years. And the long-term benefit is that you prevent a future supervolcano
eruption which would devastate humanity.” However, drilling into a supervolcano is
not without risks. Particularly, triggering the eruption you're attempting to prevent.
“The most important thing with this is to do no harm,” Wilcox says. “If you drill into the
top of the magma chamber and try and cool it from there, this would be very risky.
This could make the cap over the magma chamber more brittle and prone to fracture. And you
might trigger the release of harmful volatile gases in the magma at the top of the chamber
which would otherwise not be released.” Those who initiate such a project,
on the other hand, will never see it through to completion, nor will they have any clue whether
it will be successful within their lifetime. Cooling Yellowstone in this manner would occur
at a pace of one meter per year, requiring tens of thousands of years until only cold rock remains.
Although Yellowstone's magma chamber would not need to be frozen solid to no longer represent a
hazard, there would be no guarantee that the endeavor would be successful for hundreds,
if not thousands, of years. However, in order to avoid a disaster, such long-term thinking and
planning may be the only option. "With a project like this, you’d start the process and the main
ongoing benefit you’d see in everyday terms is this new supply of electrical power,” Wilcox adds.
Such a strategy could potentially be implemented to every active supervolcano on the planet, and
Nasa scientists hope that their designs will spark more practical scientific discussion and debate
on how to deal with the threat. Despite these uncertainties, the proposal is worth considering,
especially since Yellowstone is only one of around 20 supervolcanoes on the planet. NASA
hopes that their idea will spark more realistic talks and debates about what to do about these
gigantic structures before an eruption, which might plunge the Earth into a volcanic winter.
Mount St. Helens was a horrific disaster, but its scale was much, much smaller. The 1980 eruption of
Mount St. Helens was estimated to have produced 0.25 cubic kilometers of material. As a point of
perspective, the smallest of Yellowstone's super-eruptions was 280 cubic kilometers.
How huge an event, and how far-reaching an impact, would it be if Yellowstone blew up right now?
One of the most serious global worries would be what is known as a volcanic winter. In human
timescales, we've seen this with much smaller eruptions. It's when there's so much ash in
the atmosphere that it shields the Earth from sunlight, and you can get a degree or two of
cooling, which may not sound like much, but it can have disastrous consequences when it
comes to agriculture. As a result, the effects of the volcano would almost likely be devastating.
A massive eruption like this would have regional repercussions like falling ash and short-term
(years to decades) worldwide climate changes. Sections of the surrounding states of Montana,
Idaho, and Wyoming would be affected by pyroclastic flows, while other parts of the
United States would be affected by falling ash (the amount of ash would decrease with distance
from the eruption site). Those who are in or around the park will most likely have no idea
what happened because a massive explosion will occur at the start of the eruption.
Those further away will not be affected by the explosion, but the picture may not be much better.
Let us know what you think of NASA and its study on
Yellowstone's supervolcano in the comments section.