NASA Monitoring Yellowstone Supervolcano

0 views

Skip to first unread message

Heaven soon

unread,

Dec 13, 2011, 3:56:42 PM12/13/11

to Heavensoon

NASA Monitoring Yellowstone Supervolcano
Yellowstone National Park's caldera, which covers a 25- by 37-mile (40- by 60-kilometer) swath of Wyoming, is an ancient crater formed after the last big blast, some 640,000 years ago. The simmering volcano has produced major eruptions—each a thousand times more powerful than Mount St. Helens's 1980 eruption—three times in the past 2.1 million years. The supervolcano has recently caused miles of ground to rise dramatically, scientists report beginning in 2004, which saw the ground above the caldera rise upward at rates as high as 2.8 inches (7 centimeters) a year. Recent earthquakes on the west side of Yellowstone caldera were part of the intense January/February 2010 earthquake swarm of ~2,350 earthquakes.