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Galeras, Colombia (Decade Volcano)

15/6/2011

 
Galeras in Colombia is one of the most active in the country and has seen regular eruptions for the past 1 million years. With 7 eruptions since the turn of the century and one occuring in 2010 the activity hasn't stopped since. The 2010 activity caused the evacuation of 8000 people from its vicinity. A nice overview of the area is available here at the NASA Earth Observatory.
Picture
From the GVP page for Galeras.
Galeras at ~4276 m high is a stratovolcano which towers over the town of Pasto and produces predominantly andesitic products. The reason for volcanism at this location is the subduction of the Nazca plate. A nice diagram of this is shown here. The summit of Galeras is complex as it has had a diverse and extremely interesting history, involving a couple of caldera forming events, one which occurred 500,000 years ago and the other around 100,000 years ago. In addition to these events a series of edifice collapse episodes have left a horseshoe shape at the summit.

Since the first historic eruption was recorded by the Spanish in the 16th century, the volcanism has been lightly explosive, producing ash clouds and pyroclatic flows in what can be described as vulcanian to sub-plinian events.

This volcano became infamous in 1993 when it sadly killed nine people (six of who were scientists) who were in the summit crater at the time of the eruption. Prior to this sad event, Galeras was designated a Decade Volcano in 1991.

Other Volcano News
Today is the 20th anniversary of the eruption of Pinatubo in 1991. Over at the Eruptions blog by Erik Klemmeti there is an excellent anniversary post, I reccomend you check it out!
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Update: Eruption of Nabro in Ertitrea (not Dubbi!).

13/6/2011

 
It appears that I was a bit premature earlier in assuming, as reports at the time had suggested, that the eruption was from Dubbi! As new information has come to light (discussed in the eruptions blog and the volcanism blog) it appears that the eruption has orignated from the Nabro volcano. A subtle reminder to us all that volcanoes and volcanology can be quite unpredictable! A little about Nabro is posted below.

Nabro, which is located in the Danakil depression is a mysterious volcano located at the South-Easterly end of the Danakil alps. It is the highest peak of the Nabro Volcanic Complex at ~2218 m. The Nabro volcanic complex is a roughly NNE to SSW trending system with Dubbi at the most NNE point, Nabro in the centre and Bara Ale at the most SSW point. The length of the complex is roughly 110 km. At the summit are two calderas 5  and 8 km wide. Also present in the area around Nabro are lava domes, evidence of lava flows and ignimbrites. The lava flows are generally basaltic in nature whilst the lava domes and ignimbrites are distinctly rhyolitic in nature, there are also some obsidian flows in the area. It seems that the early evolution of Nabro was dominated by more evolved magmas (rhyolitic) and ignimbrite forming eruptions whilst later on in life activity became more effusive in nature. (Wiart and Oppenheimer, 2005)

I have kept my previous post on Dubbi active and is available here, it still provides a good overview of Dubbi volcano and volcanism in the area.

Sources
Wiart and Oppenheimer, 2005. Large magnitude silicic volcanism in north Afar: The Nabro Volcanic Range and Ma'alalta volcano. Bulletin of Volcanology  
Global Volcanism Program
Picture
Global Volcanism Program image of Nabro.

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