Tweet of the Day, See The BOOM At The Krakatau Volcano edition.

It’s an impressive BOOM, too.

I assume that this isn’t going to be another 1883 event.  Not that there’s a single thing that I could think that we could do if it was a 1883 event, except get in a supply lawn chairs and warm socks for the next few months in order to properly watch all those spectacular sunsets.  Still: cool lightning flashes, dude.

5 thoughts on “Tweet of the Day, See The BOOM At The Krakatau Volcano edition.”

  1. A 1883 event may also shut up the Climate Cultists for a while. Volcanic Winter is nothing to sneeze at.

  2. It won’t.
    This is cinder cone stuff, and necessarily basalt. It has a (relatively!) low melting point, and is fairly liquid when molten.
    Anything really explosive will require a more felsic (lighter in color when cooled, AKA more K-spar than plagioclase) composition, and a blockage. Some might follow (being heavier, and deeper in the melt) but not in any way that’s likely to become dangerous for a very, very long time.
    .
    The classic cinder cone eruption also rules out a blockage. (Obviously.)
    .
    I’ll try to find time to give the nutshell version of how the thing will build itself later on today.

    1. So .. Krakatau’s a relatively safe eruption .. as was Mt. St. Helens, back when she blew her top.
      .
      As the Yellowstone Caldera’s potential eruption has generated some chatter over the years, would that be .. a good example of “potentially unsafe”?
      .
      Mew

      1. Mt. St. Helens was the most significant Cascade eruption in 7000 years.
        Due to its isolation and strident warnings from vulcanologists, there was a death toll of 57.
        Most of which were due to debris flows from the rapidly-melted glacier traveling down waterways.
        .
        It’s likely not the best example if you’re looking to get hysterical.
        .
        Krakatoa was the biggest eruption in modern history, but nearly all the deaths were due to tidal waves and crop failures.
        .
        Even if one of the “supervolcanoes” blew, you’d likely survive the immediate eruption if you were 35 miles away (albeit, in need of a change of pants, and possessing a profound insight as to your place in the Universe).
        .
        It’s not the explosion, it’s the fallout.
        And ash, ash never changes.

    2. But…
      Back to the topic at hand.
      The force that propels an eruption is steam. Stratovolcanoes (or composite cone volcanoes, as they’re alternately called) can have violent eruptions because the volcano itself is basically a pressure cooker, and the pressure will build until it finds a path to escape. Sometimes (not most of the time, or stratovolcanoes would be *much* smaller) by catastrophically rupturing the pot.
      .
      In the case of Krakatoa specifically, there isn’t much left that would contain the pressure. So you have a cinder cone allowing almost unregulated access to the surface.
      In time, a plug of more resistant stone will form in the volcano’s throat.
      But the main body is scoria basalt (aah-aah if you’re feeling Hawaiian) which isn’t very resistant. At this point, you’ll have flood basalts (panhoehoe if you’re feeling Hawaiian) ooze out of the base of the volcano until it reaches the plug.
      At this point, you have a shield volcano that can begin forming a dome volcano on top of it (hence the “composite volcano”). Which has its own evolution process.
      It’s going to take a great many eruptions for this scion of Krakatoa to build itself into something significant.
      .
      .
      There are, of course, other types of explosive eruptions, but maars and supervolcanoes aren’t as photogenic as Mt. Fuji.

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