Yellowstone: USGS warns of a potentially ‘devastating’ eruption
The caldera in Yellowstone National Park was formed during the last three major events of the past 2.1 million years. It is constantly monitored by the USGS (United States Geological Survey) for any changes to the system that could indicate that history will repeat itself. Dr. Poland, the responsible scientist for the Yellowstone Volcano Observatory (YVO), exposed the sobering power of the volcano in the USGS ‘Overview, Monitoring, Hazards, and Noteworthy Results’ video.
He said, “The Yellowstone system consists of multiple magma chambers. We have this mantle-melting anomaly deep below the surface.
But there are a few magma chambers feeding this melting anomaly.
“One is quite deep, about 15 miles below the surface, and is full of very low viscosity magma called basalt.
“That’s the kind of thing that bursts out of Hawaii, low viscosity, it flows very easily.
Yellowstone Volcano is a significant threat (Image: GETTY)
Dr. Mike Poland spoke during the video (Image: USGS / YOUTUBE)
“In turn, that basaltic magma body feeds a higher-level reservoir of rhyolite – a sticky magma, more prone to be more explosive, and this is about three miles below the surface in parts of Yellowstone.”
Dr. Poland explained why it is believed that these chambers are not full of molten rock.
He added, “But don’t think of these as gigantic magma bodies filled with boiling, boiling liquid material.
“In fact, most of this is solid. The top reservoir is only five to 15 percent melted, and this bottom reservoir is only about two to five percent melted here.
“It’s a mushy plastic zone with small pieces melting in the center.
An eruption in Yellowstone would be devastating (Image: GETTY)
“This is what the Yellowstone magma system looks like, and this is what drives the dangers in the region.”
Despite this, the expert then sent a warning about Yellowstone’s capabilities in the event of a super eruption.
He said, “Everyone knows the gigantic explosions that are ending the world.
“They are very big explosions, not events at the end of the world, but there have been a few that have happened in the last two million years.
“There was one that happened 2.1 million years ago, a smaller one 1.3 million years ago, and then 630,000 years ago we had the formation of the Yellowstone caldera in the park.
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The Yellowstone caldera is monitored by the USGS (Image: GETTY)
“If things like that happened today, it would be very devastating for the central part of the US.
“We did simulations of how ash would fall and cover much of the US, this is probably what happened when this caldera was first formed 631,000 years ago.”
However, the expert detailed the type of eruption more likely to be seen in the near geological future.
He continued: “But the likelihood of these kinds of events is very small, they occur once or twice every million years.
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The super volcano is located in Yellowstone National Park (Image: GETTY)
“The interval between these things is more than 700,000 years between events.
“What happens more often are lava flows. Since the last great Yellowstone explosion, 631,000 years ago, there have been about two dozen lava flows, and you can see them in these different colors here.
“The first pulse of lava flow activity was 500-600,000 years ago.
“We let out these orange pieces of lava, and then there was another pulse of activity that happened about 170,000 years ago to 70,000 years ago, giving us all this pink. [shaded] lava here. “