Click photo to view more images. (British Antarctic Survey)
Posted on 08/12/2011 11:15:45 AM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach
Reader “Mark” in Tips and Notes writes:
Surprise Underwater Volcanic Eruption Discovered
Excellent 3D graphic representation of the lava. Note this particular volcano was previously report by Scarlet- yesterday.
Click photo to view more images. (British Antarctic Survey)
“An undersea volcano has erupted off the coast of Oregon, spewing forth a layer of lava more than 12 feet (4 meters) thick in some places, and opening up deep vents that belch forth a cloudy stew of hot water and microbes from deep inside the Earth.
Scientists uncovered evidence of the early April eruption on a routine expedition in late July to the Axial Seamount, an underwater volcano that stands 250 miles (400 kilometers) off the Oregon coast.”
“At first we were really confused, and thought we were in the wrong place,” said Bill Chadwick, a geologist with Oregon State University. “Finally we figured out we were in the right place but the whole seafloor had changed, and that’s why we couldn’t recognize anything. All of a sudden it hit us that, wow, there had been an eruption. So it was very exciting.”
http://news.yahoo.com/surprise-underwater-volcanic-eruption-discovered-210202200.html
And in mid July, Voice of America reported:
July 13, 2011
VOA News
A British research team has discovered a chain of 12 undersea volcanoes near the remote South Sandwich Islands in the southern Atlantic Ocean. It is the first group of large undersea volcanoes ever found in the Antarctic region.
Scientists from the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) say that seven of the massive volcanoes are still active. Some of the mountain peaks rise three kilometers above the ocean floor, nearly tall enough to break the water’s surface. The collapsed craters of others measure five kilometers across.
fyi
Algore is deeply saddened.
Not sure how much I will be able to do over the week end.
Good luck!
Off the coast of Oregon.
It’s that Plate Teutonics again. ;-)
69 Responses to Undersea volcanoes might be more common than previously thought
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Alan the Brit says:
So, volcanoes, undersea, erupting, they’re large, spewing all sorts of under ground crap like CO2 (used to be called the Carbon Cycle in my day) & microbes??? There are dozens of them, they’ve only just been discovered? They’re hot giving off large amounts of undersea heat? And here I am thinking Earth sciences are settled science with NOTHING left to discover, ever! I don’t suppose they just happen to lie around the West Antarctic Penninsula or could possibly affect the ocean temperatures locally at all, causing the water to be enriched by life that those whales & all the other sea based life forms seem to like so much? ;-)) Anyway it is an interesting post.
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Microbes....who knew!!!!
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Gareth Phillips says:
How much do undersea volcanos contribute to Ocean acidification? If it is a significant amount, how do these animals that thrive near vents and have a calcium carbonate shell survive?
Scientists should not be telling folks that they're inventing the wheel.
We're talking 150 years ago!!
And it’s only 350 miles from Mount Saint Helens.
And it’s only 350 miles from Mount Saint Helens.
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Gary Pearse says:
Undersea volcanoes have been known by geologists for well over a century. Iceland, Hawaii and a host of other islands and terrains are born of undersea vulcanism. I mapped “pillowed” basalts in the Archean of the Canadian Shield over 50 years ago myself and these are 2.5-3.0 billion years old.
http://bing.search.sympatico.ca/?q=Archean%20age&mkt=en-ca&setLang=en-CA
Click on the images on the right for modern Hawaiian pillows and for ancient precambrian pillows in the Canadian Shield. It is a common thing among scientists these days to be “rediscovering” well known phenomena and finding them much more prevalent “than thought (by themselves)”. Thought seems to be of declining interest. If they go for the Nobel Prize, I might try to horn in on it for my prior work but of course there will be another 20,000 geologist in line.
Oh, and Alan the Brit:
“I don’t suppose they just happen to lie around the West Antarctic Penninsula or could possibly affect the ocean temperatures locally at all,”
Yes they are:
http://iceagenow.com/Underwater_volcanoes_heating_Antarctic_waters.htm
They were also reported by WUWT some time ago. Indeed the most common rocks on the Western Peninsula are volcanic rocks.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geology_of_Antarctica
Godzilla? (I think that’s pronounced “Gah Zirra”)
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John F. Hultquist says:
A says:
August 11, 2011 at 4:02 am
“Image of bubbles of liquid carbon dioxide”
Liquid CO2? am i missing something????
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Yes you are. I missed it with respect to salt water so am returning the favor. Here is the link you need:
http://www.standnes.no/chemix/english/phase-diagram-co2.htm
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