Volcanos

Roundup of Global Volcanic Activity:

A new submarine volcanic eruption might have recently started off Turkey's west coast in the Marmaris Sea between the mainland and the Greek Island of Simi near Rhodes. Scientists from Istanbul's Technical University announced that they have found evidence of 2 active vents at about 200 m water depth along a north-south trending fissure of 2.5-3 km length. Read more.

Earthquake activity at and near Santorini volcano has calmed down again after the brief pulse in quakes mostly along the Amorgos Graben to the NE at the end of December.

The Stromboli volcano in Italy continues activity. The western crater produced tall, very noisy, straight candle-like strombolian fountains up to 300 m tall every 10-20 minutes from vent 2, lasting 5-20 seconds, often accompanied by ash-rich ejections from vent 1.

Earthquakes continue at El Hierro island under the eastern El Golfo area. The NE part of the island is experiencing uplift detected by GPS, which suggests that a magma intrusion at depth (so far) is the cause of the current swarm. Volcanic tremor is low.

The lava flows continue to effuse from the Southern fissure of Plosky Tolbachik volcano in Kamchatka. KVERT reports a slightly increased volcanic tremor amplitude compared to the past days. In other words, the eruption might actually be far from ending.

Popocatépetl volcano in Mexico has (temporarily?) calmed down a lot: the number of steam and gas emissions decreased to only 8 recorded during 2-3 Jan, but glow is still being observed at night.

Pacaya volcano in Guatemala had an increased phase of fumarolic activity with a steam plume reaching 3,000 m altitude for a few hours yesterday. No other surface activity was noted.

Fuego volcano produced 8 weak explosions with ash clouds reaching 3-400 m above the crater and accompanied by faint rumblings were observed during 2-3 Jan. The lava flow toward Taniluya canyon decreased to a length of only 300 meters.

The Santiaguito lava dome continued to feed its lava flows, one of which showed some advance.

Copahue volcano in Chile/ Argentina continues to emit a steam and gas plume, but no further explosions were recorded.

Tiny earthquakes continue to occur beneath Tongariro volcano in New Zealand, showing that the volcano, similar as its neighbours Ruapehu and White Island, is not completely quiet.