Super Volcano Apocalypse 2018

Where is Yellowstone?

Yellowstone volcano is found in Yellowstone National Park, located in the western zone of United States of America. More specific, Yellowstone together with caldera, its constituent, is found in Rock Mountains found in Wyoming State. About 1% of Yellowstone is located in Idaho, 3% of Yellowstone is located in Montana, and 96% of the Yellowstone is the one found in Wyoming State. Yellowstone occupies about 8,987 square kilometres on the earth's surface. Since most of the Yellowstone is within Wyoming, it is easily accessed through two significant entrances in Wyoming: East entrance that is near Cody and the South entry that is found in northern Jackson and Grand Teton National Park. Yellowstone National Park is a global-renowned attraction from the time it was formed in 1872, having the most massive geysers collection across the globe. According to Huang et al. (774), the geysers are usually the water discharges that are from the holes found in the ground, characterized by high pressure with steam mostly spurred by volcanic.

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What is a Supervolcano?

A supervolcano refers to the large volcano which has undergone an eruption with a magnitude of 8 that is the largest ever recorded value on Volcanic Explosivity Index (VEI). Therefore, the deposits volumes that are erupted by a supervolcano are more than 240 cubic miles. A supervolcano will occur at the time when magma that is found inside the mantle start rising into crust, and it loses the ability to break through it as the pressure start developing in the growing and large magma pool to a point whereby the crust becomes unable to continue containing the exerted force. This may occur at different hotspots and given subduction zones. According to the study by Miller and Wark (13), supervolcano also refers to the volcano which can produce the most and largest voluminous types of an eruption occurring on the earth. The real explosive of the supervolcano eruption usually varies although the sheer extruded magma is adequate to cause radical altering of the landscape and severely affecting the global climate for several years which has cataclysmic effects on the life on the earth.

The recovery from the supervolcano eruptions is usually an extended process since the magmatic and volcano system attempt to establish equilibrium just as a water body that has been altered by a given rock which has been dropped in it. For supervolcanoes that have massive eruption characterized by potential global implications frequently appear to be not following volcanic mechanics that are conventional of the internal pressure that continues to rise until a point is attained whereby the volcano blows. It is estimated that such kind of chambers can erupt given that the roof that is found above them starts collapsing or cracking.

What is the timeline for an eruption?

Several geologists have become more aware of the movement of fresh magma in the supervolcano system. In the previous years, the supervolcano eruptions have been perceived to occur after thousand years. However, many geologists confirm that the timeline that can be used to attain underground basin starting filling to a point where they can trigger eruption is more likely to take place after several decades. A supervolcano can make an eruption that has the power which can change the life's story on earth. The geologic activity that is taking place at the Yellowstone continues to remain at a constant state over the past 3o years hence the supervolcano eruption's timeline is not expecting an eruption to occur within the next thousand or ten thousand years. Each of the main Yellowstone's eruption that occurred used to take place with a range of about 650, 00 years apart given in some cases taking 1 million years apart hence the timeline of a supervolcano is exceedingly rare.

Find three different maps of how the eruption will impact NC

Ash impacts

Given that a supervolcano eruption occurs, there is the ordinarily significant amount of ash that falls in the neighbouring environment as well as the creation of giant depression making up caldera while the ground starts collapsing due to the eruption that causes magma withdrawal from inside the volcano. When a supervolcano erupts, they usually shoot out a significant amount of lava that eventually becomes ash at the time of eruption which is then shuttered into very tiny particles on the earth's surface. The supervolcanic ash contains dust-like, small fragments of jagged minerals, volcanic glass and rock. The supervolcanic ash does not dissolve in water, and they have the potential of conducting electric current whenever they are wet. Supervolcano usually ejects more than 240 cubic miles of ash and pumice in one eruption event occurring in any given location in earth's past.

When supervolcano was to erupt fully, the ash formed would be much such that it buries a large part of United States resulting to massive killing of individuals. Within 1,00 cubic kilometres of supervolcano eruption, most individuals will have to die as a result of inhaling ash present in the air which forms substances that are cement-like in lungs.

Climate Impacts

A supervolcano represents a global event that is most cataclysmic and has been the one responsible during the past years for causing long-term alterations to climate as well as volcanic winters mainly caused by the supervolcano ash that cut out the sunlight. When a supervolcano erupts, it emits a mixture of particles and gases into the air. Among the components of the particles being emitted such as sulphur dioxide and ash usually possess a cooling effect since they can reflect sunlight away hindering it from reaching the earth's surface. The cooling effects cause a significant reduction of the global temperatures for an extended period which causes changes in the climate (Jones, Sparks, and Valdes 560). These cooler temperatures may last for more than a year whereby the temperatures would afterwards warm back to the average temperatures. In case of such kind of disruption of the global temperatures, there would be the creation of failure of seasonal monsoon which would lead to having the Asian countries experiencing drought as they depend on monsoon rains.

Other Impacts

Other impacts of the eruption of a supervolcano are that the magma emitted will fail becoming lava and instead get blasted into the atmosphere. When the magma gets emitted into the atmosphere, it will float while it is made up of extraordinarily sharp and hot particles. Some of the ash from a supervolcano will reach several parts of the world such as Europe when the supervolcano erupts in the United States although, outside the United States, the ash that will be formed would be looking as dusting hence these parts will not experience worst implication of supervolcano eruption. The most major ash impacts include reduction of the amount of light reaching the earth's surface from the sun, killing of animals and humans, causing the type of rainfall which results to a lot of mudslides, pollution of the surrounding water supply, and decimating of vegetation and crops. The ash will hang in the air for many days which blocks light and makes it hard for living organisms to breathe including human. The ash will decimate the crops which will make it challenging to grow food for a given period.

How does Yellowstone compare to Toba and Mt. St. Helens?

The molten hot rock which is beneath the Yellowstone National Park is estimated to be 2 times greater than it was previously expected. This means that the Yellowstone supervolcano possesses the ability to erupt using a force of about 2,00 times the Mount St. Helens' size. The major difference that exists between Yellowstone and Toba is the location. Yellowstone is found in the northern hemisphere where it lies at moderate latitude meaning that the surrounding parts in the northern hemisphere will be disproportionately impacted. Toba is found in the tropics, and the emitted gas can affect both hemispheres equally. Toba Caldera emitted about 2800 cubic km of rock after it undergone eruption about 75,000 years ago. This kind of eruption was recorded as the largest during the history of Yellowstone. Toba supervolcano is known to the underground chamber of magma that is bigger than Yellowstone. Yellowstone can make eruptions that are 1000 times more violent than when compared to the eruption that Mount St. Helens made during 1980 (Lowenstern and Hurwitz 36). Toba, Mount St. Helens, and Yellowstone can make an eruption that is big enough such that t can lead to significant effects on the global climate and emit large quantities of aerosols which would reflect sunlight away from reaching the earth's surface.

Works Cited

Huang, Hsin-Hua, et al. "The Yellowstone magmatic system from the mantle plume to the upper crust." Science 348.6236 (2015): 773-776.

Jones, Morgan T., R. Stephen J. Sparks, and Paul J. Valdes. "The climatic impact of supervolcanic ash blankets." Climate Dynamics 29.6 (2007): 553-564.

Lowenstern, Jacob B., and Shaul Hurwitz. "Monitoring a supervolcano in repose: Heat and volatile flux at the Yellowstone Caldera." Elements 4.1 (2008): 35-40.

Miller, Calvin F., and David A. Wark. "Supervolcanoes and their explosive supereruptions." Elements 4.1 (2008): 11-15.