Mount St Helens Is At Risk of Erupting

Mount St Helens Is At Risk of Erupting

volcano.wr.usgs.gov

Growth of the new lava dome inside the crater of Mount St. Helens continues, accompanied by low rates of seismicity, low emissions of steam and volcanic gases, and minor production of ash. During such eruptions, changes in the level of activity can occur over days to months. The eruption could intensify suddenly or with little warning and produce explosions that cause hazardous conditions within several miles of the crater and farther downwind.

Alert Level WATCH; Aviation Color Code ORANGE

(visit the link for the full news article)

mod edit: title clarity



[edit on 1-11-2007 by sanctum]

The recent Earthquakes in California, and Wyoming along with this new activity at Mount St Helens seems to be signaling that the Earth is getting ready to release some pent-up energy. We here in North America seem greatly overdue for a Major Earthquake or Volcano Eruption.

4.2 Earthquake Rattles East Los Angeles Basin
5.6 Magnitude Earthquake Hits Northern California
4.3 Earthquake Hits Ridgecrest California

I hope all this activity doesnt trigger the "Big One" under Yellowstone. Cause if that goes Im screwed!

volcano.wr.usgs.gov
(visit the link for the full news article)

[edit on (11/1/07) by AllSeeingI]

Yikes -- this could probably kill everyone in the U.S. should it REALLY go off judging from past volcanoes. Started this thread recently about new research is pointing to volcanoes that took out the dinosaurs.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Here is a link to the Mt St Helens Web cam

www.fs.fed.us...

These are near real-time images of Mount St. Helens, taken from the Johnston Ridge Observatory (JRO) using our VolcanoCam Classic camera and the new VolcanoCamHD camera. The (JRO) and VolcanoCams are located at an elevation of approximately 4,500 feet, about five miles from the volcano. You are looking approximately south-southeast across the North Fork Toutle River Valley e/ex]

Originally posted by AllSeeingI
I hope all this activity doesnt trigger the "Big One" under Yellowstone. Cause if that goes Im screwed!

From what I've read about Yellowstone, the entire world could be screwed from such an event. We're past due for a mass extinction, hopefully this isn't it.

I wonder what the earthquake run-up is to something like this?

There's been quakes around 5.0 for days happening everywhere. Yesterday alone, there was eight quakes.

I think Mount St Helens has been at the "Current Volcanic- Alert Level WATCH ; Aviation Color Code ORANGE" level for years, at least since around this time last year. looking at the archives of the CVO's St Helens pages, they all say pretty much the same thing. For example, New years day, 2007:

MOUNT ST. HELENS UPDATE

Current Volcanic- Alert Level WATCH ; Aviation Color Code ORANGE : Growth of the new lava dome inside the crater of Mount St. Helens continues, accompanied by low rates of seismicity, low emissions of steam and volcanic gases, and minor production of ash. During such eruptions, changes in the level of activity can occur over days to months. The eruption could intensify suddenly or with little warning and produce explosions that cause hazardous conditions within several miles of the crater and farther downwind. Small lahars could suddenly descend the Toutle River if triggered by heavy rain or by interaction of hot rocks with snow and ice. These lahars pose a negligible hazard below the Sediment Retention Structure (SRS) but could pose a hazard along the river channel upstream.

Potential ash hazards: Wind forecasts from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), coupled with eruption models, show that any ash clouds rising above the crater rim today would drift southeastward early in the day and eastward later.

Potential ash hazards to aviation: Under current eruptive conditions, small, short-lived explosions may produce ash clouds that exceed 30,000 feet in altitude. Ash from such events can travel 100 miles or more downwind.

And today's

MOUNT ST. HELENS UPDATE

Current Volcanic- Alert Level WATCH; Aviation Color Code ORANGE: Growth of the new lava dome inside the crater of Mount St. Helens continues, accompanied by low rates of seismicity, low emissions of steam and volcanic gases, and minor production of ash. During such eruptions, changes in the level of activity can occur over days to months. The eruption could intensify suddenly or with little warning and produce explosions that cause hazardous conditions within several miles of the crater and farther downwind. Small lahars could suddenly descend the Toutle River if triggered by heavy rain or by interaction of hot rocks with snow and ice. These lahars pose a negligible hazard below the Sediment Retention Structure (SRS) but could pose a hazard along the river channel upstream.

Potential ash hazards: Wind forecasts from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), coupled with eruption models, show that any ash clouds rising above the crater rim today would drift east-southeast.

Potential ash hazards to aviation: Under current eruptive conditions, small, short-lived explosions may produce ash clouds that exceed 30,000 feet in altitude. Ash from such events can travel 100 miles or more downwind.

And St Helens, even if it were to completely obliterate itself, would not cause catastrophic environmental damage to all of America, it would probably temporarily alter global climate (one or two years of colder weather, see Mount Tambora and the "Year without a Summer" in 1815- 1816.) but not do much long term damage, though most of Washington state would suffer large amounts of ash fallout.

Now Yellowstone is a lot larger than St Helens, and it's last (major) eruption likely threw out more material than St Helens' magma chamber contains. A Yellowstone eruption of the VEI 8 scale would cover most of the USA with ash, maybe a bit of Canada too. It would cause a lot of damage too the world in terms of climate too, but nowhere near a mass extinction event. consider, if Yellowstone had caused such an event, we likely wouldn't be here, since the last time was only 640,000 years ago.

Actually, Yellowstone has been about as overhyped in the media as radioactivity has been.

Originally posted by AllSeeingI
I hope all this activity dosen't trigger the "Big One" under Yellowstone. Cause if that goes I'm screwed!

Well how come just you? lol That super volcano if it really exsists can wipe out the entire United States when it erupts.

We're past due for a mass extinction, hopefully this isn't it.

We are actually in the middle of an extinction episode:

www.actionbioscience.org...\

reply to post by AotearoaSon


Hmm sorry if this may be a tad off topic but since the US had such a hot summer now temperatures are in the 30's. We already had two frosts. I'm concerned about the winter due to people already signing up for assistance to buy heating oil. And the prices were $94 dollars a barrel unless it went up more yesterday and today.

This is why I love this website. thanks AllSeeingI for posting this news here on ATS. I did not hear about this, actually I have not been searching my regular news sites lately but I do come to this one almost every day. I can always get the news i'm interested in here.

There has been an earthquake near my area on October 17, 2007. This is very rare for this area.

Has there been any kind of studies done to see if sucking the oil out of the Earth is making the tectonics not as lubricated thus creating more severe earthquakes?

Thanks
Star

Originally posted by Stari
Has there been any kind of studies done to see if sucking the oil out of the Earth is making the tectonics not as lubricated thus creating more severe earthquakes?

Well that makes perfect sense, doesn't it? Oil is a lubricant, and the removal of it from underground must create more friction when the plates move.

Agreed NP, Mamma Earth gets really cranky when trillions of gallons of her KY is extracted from her plates. When major quakes become commonplace the scientists will continue to poo poo it. Exxon and BP just hate bad press.

I lived in Spokane, WA when Mt. St. Helens blew her top. The sky was not the same for 6 months after that. Spectacular sunsets! It reminded me of fire season on steroids. I suspect as previously mentioned, there is nothing really unusual here. From what I've read somewhere, the next big event in WA state is more likely to be Mt. Rainier, or Mt. Adams. Saint Helens already had the "big one" in our time. I doubt another one will happen anytime soon. Geological time sees a person's lifetime as a "blink of an eye".

The "oil theory" in this thread is interesting! Does California have a big oil industry? Why hasn't the Middle East been rocked by major geological events in recent times?

Hasn't anyone blamed George Bush yet?

Originally posted by Stari
This is why I love this website. thanks AllSeeingI for posting this news here on ATS. I did not hear about this, actually I have not been searching my regular news sites lately but I do come to this one almost every day. I can always get the news i'm interested in here.

It's nothing to do with the media, why this isn't shown. It's because St Helens has been at this level of alertness for a long time, and the Media doesn't really like saying the same thing over and over again unless it changes somehow. In fact it's been at this level of eruption or similar, for about three years.

There has been an earthquake near my area on October 17, 2007. This is very rare for this area.

That is interesting, and rare, but even so, it happens from time to time, with small fault lines and similar, it really probably doesn't indicate anything out of the ordinary unless there is more than one over a few days or continued sctivity. Even then, it could be nothing.

Has there been any kind of studies done to see if sucking the oil out of the Earth is making the tectonics not as lubricated thus creating more severe earthquakes?

Thanks
Star

I don't know, but i wouldn't think it does that much to it. In actuality, I think oil is usually away from tectonic activity, since it has to be somewhere undisturbed for millions of years in order to form.

Has there been any kind of studies done to see if sucking the oil out of the Earth is making the tectonics not as lubricated thus creating more severe earthquakes?

Thanks
Star

The two things have no connection at all as far as i know.
oil is located in sedimentry rock systems, no where near any of the action.
the only way to make tectonics not as lubricated is to increase the mantles viscosity, which would just stop the process all together, killing the planet.

In reply to everyone who answered my question thank you.

I thought it made sense but wasn't sure about it. Thanks again.