Dangerous Volcano Spurs Rival Nations to Cooperate
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EMERALD LAKES, TONGARIRO, NEW ZEALAND Near the summit of Mount Tongariro in New Zealand's volcanic region, the Emerald Lakes take their color partly from dissolved minerals. Courtesy of Antoine Hubert
CRATER LAKE, OREGON About 6,850 years ago, Mount Mazama blew its top in a massive explosion that rained ash, dust and lava. Following the explosion, Mazama's top collapsed to form the caldera you see in this shot, taken in 2006 from the International Space Station... Courtesy of NASA
KILAUEA CALDERA, HAWAII One of the world's most active volcanoes, Kilauea harbors a summit caldera that is covered in fresh lava flows in this satellite image. Courtesy of IKONOS/NASA
SANTA ANA VOLCANO, EL SALVADOR Look closely to spot two lakes in this colorized satellite image. The first, a crater lake, appears as a tiny blue area at the summit of the Santa Ana volcano, the highest point in El Salvador... Courtesy Robert Simmon based on data provided by Timothy Gubbels and Asad Ullah/SSAI/NASA/GSFC/METI/ERSDAC/JAROS and U.S./Japan ASTER Science Team
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CRATER LAKE, RUAPEHU, NEW ZEALAND The pale blue dot in the center of this image marks Crater Lake atop New Zealand's Mount Ruapehu, one of the most thoroughly studied and monitored volcanic lakes in the world. "Eruptions through the lake occur relatively frequently, changing the physical dimensions of the lake and posing a constant threat to human activities in the area," scientists at the University of California, Davis, wrote... NASA image created by Jesse Allen, using data provided courtesy of NASA/GSFC/METI/ERSDAC/JAROS, and U.S./Japan ASTER Science Team
The serene waters of sky pond, one of the most popular tourist attractions in northeastern Asia, belie the fact that it is nestled inside the crater of one of the region’s most dangerous volcanoes—a peak known as Changbai Mountain to the Chinese and Mount Paektu to Koreans. That 2,744-meter-tall volcano, which straddles the border between China and North Korea, last erupted in 1903 but has displayed signs of awakening in recent years.
The lake is the source of three Asian rivers that, during an eruption, could serve as conduits for lahars—devastating blends of hot ash, mud and water that have the consistency of wet cement. A major eruption could send such flows racing down the volcano’s slopes, threatening hundreds of thousands of people.
The massive earthquake and tsunami that devastated Japan in March spurred regional scientists into action. This past August teams of geologists from China and North and South Korea, in an unusual collaboration, carried out field studies on the peak and planned to hold a workshop this fall on forecasting and preparing for a natural disaster. Tapping into a seismic network installed on the Chinese side of the mountain in 1999 as well as readings from GPS equipment on the volcano’s slopes, researchers have detected a series of shallow earthquakes as well as a gradual rise in the peak since 2002, which investigators believe is being caused by the movement of magma into a chamber below the volcano. The scientists think the magma is coming from deep inside the earth’s mantle, which may make an eruption more likely.
Despite the international collaboration, data sharing to date has been sparse, says Sung-hyo Yun of Pusan National University in South Korea. “So far the work has not been easy,” he notes.
This article was originally published as "Sleeping Giant".
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