Posted on 09/06/2012 9:44:21 PM PDT by LibWhacker
TOKYO: Pressure in the magma chamber of Japan's Mount Fuji is now higher than it was the last time the volcano erupted more than 300 years ago, scientists say.
Tectonic shifts triggered by last year's huge 9.0 magnitude undersea quake have left the chamber under 16 times the minimum pressure at which an eruption can occur, researchers said.
Researchers at the National Research Institute for Earth Science and Disaster Prevention studied the tectonic movements caused by the tsunami-triggering quake on March 11, 2011 and a magnitude 6.4 quake that rocked central Japan four days later, Kyodo News reported.
Mount Fuji last erupted in 1707
They estimated that 1.6 megapascals of pressure, equivalent to atmospheric pressure of some 15.8 kilograms per square centimetre (226 pounds per square inch), was being exerted on the magma chamber.
Volcanic eruptions can be triggered by as little as 0.1 megapascals of pressure, and the reading of 1.6 megapascals is "not a small figure", said senior researcher Eisuke Fujita, according to Kyodo.
(Excerpt) Read more at cosmosmagazine.com ...
How the **** was anyone able to measure that chamber pressure, 300 YEARS AGO???
Good question. I have no idea. We’ll have to wait for the resident geologists to chime in. Wonder if they can tell by examining ejecta post-eruption under the microscope? Or maybe there is a mathematical relationship between the pressure and height of the column of smoke and ash? Just guessing...
“How the **** was anyone able to measure that chamber pressure, 300 YEARS AGO???”
And in Metric no less!
“How the **** was anyone able to measure that chamber pressure, 300 YEARS AGO???”
I would suspect by looking at the magma chamber rock ejected from the last eruption..
Scientists have been studying volcanoes for a long time. The science of magma is fairly well established and they know what Fuji is made out of and where the breaking point, where Fuji finally would erupt, would be.
They probably cannot say to an exactness, but they can say to a fair degree of accuracy what will happen.
Boy, the other troubles and now Fugi wants to pop. Like the Japanese need more troubles.
Ping
First, you get a flux capacitor...
That and the distance the ejecta shot out by eyewitness reports.
December 21, 2012???
They still got some eyewitnesses around???
;)
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