What will yellowstone blow up

The next most likely hazard to affect park visitors is a large earthquake , Poland said. On 17 August , a magnitude 7. The landslide and resulting flooding killed 28 people, most of whom were camping along the river, and drastically changed the landscape by creating a new lake, Quake Lake.

However, a big earthquake could affect the hydrothermal systems and perhaps increase or decrease geyser activity, Farrell said. Old Faithful could shut down tomorrow, which would be a big change to the Yellowstone experience. In April, I backpacked through the Black Canyon of the Yellowstone, a kilometer trek known for being the best early-season backpacking trip in the park.

In the 3 days we spent on trail, we saw only two day hikers, dodged hundreds of bison and elk, and followed in the frighteningly fresh footsteps of both grizzly bears and mountain lions. When hiking in bear country, I travel in groups, make noise I skip the bells and use my voice , carry bear spray, and store all food and scented items away from camp. Keeping a clean camp and storing food properly high in a tree, up a bear pole, or in an approved bear canister are the best ways to keep bears from associating humans with food rewards.

Yellowstone is famous for its long, deep winters, and a few decades ago, I might have needed snowshoes to hike the Black Canyon in early April and may have also been less likely to cross paths with still-hibernating bears.

But the spring thaw is coming weeks earlier to Yellowstone, affecting snowpack, streamflow, water availability, vegetation patterns, and bear sleep schedules and stoking landscape-scale wildfires.

Since , average temperatures have increased by 1. Grizzly tracks are formidable, but the human footprint on Yellowstone is large and getting larger. In , more than 4. Often portrayed as a vast wilderness, in reality the nearly 9,square-kilometer park is crisscrossed by more than kilometers of roads that connect more than 1, buildings, including nine hotels and 11 visitor centers and museums.

In our lifetimes, I expect climate will be the dominating force of change in Yellowstone. Ask the average person to imagine the future of Yellowstone, and that person might picture a mushroom cloud looming over a smoking crater. On multimillion-year timescales, as the North American plate continues moving southwest over the Yellowstone hot spot, the plume will migrate to the northeast, toward the thicker crust of the Beartooth Plateau.

The true story of Yellowstone isn't anywhere near as terrifying and dramatic as the breathless articles and dire documentaries would have you believe. But in the science world, reality rules. And it's not like an enormous caldera blown in the northwest corner of Wyoming, sitting atop a large and active magma chamber, filled with hydrothermal activity, can in any way be boring!

Let's adjust our expectations and set some rumors to rest. In terms of large explosions, Yellowstone has experienced three -- at 2. This comes out to an average of about , years between eruptions. That being the case, we still have about , years to go, but this number is based on very little data and so is basically meaningless would you base any conclusion on the average of just two numbers? The point, however, is that if someone, or some article or documentary, says that Yellowstone erupts every , years, you know right off the bat that they are full of baloney With rare exceptions, volcanoes do not accumulate magma at a constant rate in the few cases where that does happen, eruptions can be somewhat regular.

Instead, volcanoes erupt when there is a sufficient supply of liquid magma in the subsurface and sufficient pressure to cause that magma to ascend to the surface. This does not generally happen on a schedule. Okay, but, when it does go, it'll wipe out humanity, or at least most of North America, right? I know, I know, you're really hoping for something epic disaster-movie worthy, but I'm afraid the science says No, Yellowstone isn't going to wipe out humanity.

YVO gets a lot of questions about the potential for Yellowstone, or some other caldera system, to end all life on Earth. So, we'll answer that question right off the bat—no, a large explosive eruption at Yellowstone will not lead to the end of the human race most Yellowstone eruptions do not fit this worst-case scenario anyhow, but rather are lava flows. The aftermath of such an explosion wouldn't be pleasant, certainly, but we won't go extinct.

How do we know? Because this "super eruption" experiment has already been run. But it has to be dangerous! People wouldn't make such a big deal out of it if it wasn't! Yellowstone may not be a human-species ender, but that doesn't mean it's not hazardous! Hazards abound, and the good people at YVO are keeping a close eye on them. Number 2 on this list will definitely surprise you!

The Real Hazards of Yellowstone. News articles, websites, and videos often exaggerate the rarest events, while ignoring hazards that may actually happen during a person's life.

So right here, right now, we're going to flip this around and discuss Yellowstone's geologic hazard scenarios in order from most to least likely. Okay, but, surely, Yellowstone's at the top of the list when it comes to the most dangerous volcanoes in the United States, right? The overall threat score is determined by multiplying the sum of the hazard factors by the sum of the exposure factors.

Since the most recent giant caldera-forming eruption , years ago, approximately 80 relatively nonexplosive eruptions have occurred. Of these eruptions, at least 27 were rhyolite lava flows in the caldera, 13 were rhyolite lava flows outside the caldera, and 40 were basalt vents outside the caldera. The most recent volcanic eruption at How far in advance could scientists forecast an eruption of the Yellowstone volcano? The science of forecasting a volcanic eruption has significantly advanced over the past 25 years.

Most scientists think that the buildup preceding a catastrophic eruption would be detectable for weeks and perhaps months to years. Precursors to volcanic eruptions include strong earthquake swarms and rapid ground deformation and typically take place Can we drill into Yellowstone to stop it from erupting?

In some cases, limited scientific drilling for research can help us understand magmatic and hydrothermal hot water systems; however, drilling to mitigate a volcanic threat is a much different subject with unknown consequences, high costs, and severe environmental impacts.

In addition to the enormous expense and technological difficulties in Could a large Yellowstone eruption significantly change the climate? If another catastrophic, caldera-forming Yellowstone eruption were to occur, it would probably alter global weather patterns and have enormous impacts on human activity especially agricultural production for many years.

At this time, however, scientists do not have the ability to predict specific consequences or durations of possible global Filter Total Items: 6. Pat; Lowenstern, Jacob B. View Citation. Morgan, L. Year Published: Protocols for geologic hazards response by the Yellowstone Volcano Observatory The Yellowstone Plateau hosts an active volcanic system, with subterranean magma molten rock , boiling, pressurized waters, and a variety of active faults with significant earthquake hazards.

Year Published: Geologic hazards at volcanoes Most volcano hazards are associated with eruptions. Myers, Bobbie; Driedger, Carolyn L. Year Published: Steam explosions, earthquakes, and volcanic eruptions -- what's in Yellowstone's future? Lowenstern, Jacob B. Year Published: Tracking changes in Yellowstone's restless volcanic system No abstract available.

Stauffer, Peter H. Wright, Thomas L. Filter Total Items: 7. Date published: December 19, Date published: May 17, This EarthWord is straight up steampunk But the rocky plumbing networks are remarkably complex, Dzurisin says, with small, undetectable changes constantly increasing and decreasing the chances of a blast.

The possibility of more explosions remains highly speculative, so the team does not recommend closing off the region to visitors. The geyser had similar upticks in activity in the s and early s, perhaps also linked to basin breathing cycles. But if this really is the case, why is this particular geyser putting on a show when several others remain quiet? Still, the fact that researchers were able to craft a narrative that might explain these dramatic changes is a testament to decades of accumulated data and modern scientific techniques.

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