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A massive 7.2 magnitude earthquake has increased the risk of a volcano in Alaska erupting imminently as the aviation level was raised to red. The Shishaldin Volcano has been spewing great plumes of ash into the air since July 11, according to the Alaska Volcano Observatory (AVO). A US Coast Guard overflight confirmed lava erupted the same day within the summit crater. The latest data from the AVO, as of just before midnight on July 15, showed frequent explosion signals are being detected, with some explosions sending plumes of ash as high as 20,000 ft above sea level.

PEARL HARBOR (NNS) -- Commander, Submarine Forces Pacific Fleet (COMSUBPAC), Rear Adm. Douglas McAneny announced today that a sunken vessel off the coast of the Aleutian Islands is in fact the World War II submarine USS Grunion (SS 216). "I am honored to announce that, with records and information provided by the Abele family and assistance from the Naval Historical Center, USS Grunion has been located," said McAneny. "We are very grateful to the family of Grunion's Commanding Officer Lt. Cmdr. Mannert L. Abele for providing the underwater video footage and pictures that allowed us to make this determination. We...

The sunken wreckage of a U.S. submarine lost with all hands during the Second World War has been located off an island in the Aleutian chain, the U.S. Navy said Friday. The USS Grunion disappeared July 30, 1942 with 70 crew members after conducting operations against Japanese forces who had seized the Aleutian island of Kiska. Acting on a tip, sons of the submarine's commander, Lt.-Cmdr. Mannert Abele, mounted two expeditions to find the missing submarine and located it at a depth of 3,200 feet off Kiska. "It's like we won the lottery 10 times in a row," Bruce Abele,...

PEARL HARBOR, Hawaii - The Navy has confirmed the wreckage of a sunken vessel found last year off the Aleutians Islands is that of the USS Grunion, which disappeared during World War II. Underwater video footage and pictures captured by an expedition hired by sons of the commanding officer, Lt. Cmdr. Mannert L. Abele, allowed the Navy to confirm the discovery, Rear Adm. Douglas McAneny said Thursday in a news release. McAneny said the Navy was very grateful to the Abele family. "We hope this announcement will help to give closure to the families of the 70 crewmen of Grunion,"...

News of the Grunion.Someone please ping the steely-eyed killers. Thanx.

US Submarine That Vanished on 1st Mission in WWII Is Found Off Alaskan Islands By Laura Geggel 22 days ago History Nearly 80 years ago, the USS Grunion submarine sank on its inaugural mission during World War II, taking the lives of 70 sailors with it as it plunged to the bottom of the Pacific. Now, after years of searching, a team looking for WWII-era submarines has found the Grunion's bow about 2,700 feet (820 meters) under the water's surface, off the coast of the Aleutian Islands in Alaska. Upon finding the long-lost bow, the team used autonomous underwater vehicles...

For almost 75 years, the stern of the destroyer USS Abner Read lay somewhere below the dark of the Bering Sea off the Aleutian island of Kiska, where it sank after being torn off by an explosion while conducting an anti-submarine patrol.

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — William Roy Dover's memory of the World War II battle is as sharp as it was 75 years ago, even though it's been long forgotten by most everyone else. His first sergeant rousted him from his pup tent around 2 a.m. when word came the Japanese were attacking and had maybe even gotten behind the American front line, on a desolate, unforgiving slab of an occupied island in the North Pacific. "He was shouting, 'Get up! Get out!'" Dover said. Dover and most of the American soldiers rushed to an embankment on what became known as...

Alaskan tribal members have fought for decades to win approval for a 12-mile road between their remote Aleutian fishing village and a critical all-weather airport, and the federal government’s shutdown wasn’t going to get in their way. At an emotional ceremony Monday, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke signed an agreement for a land exchange that will allow construction of a road between King Cove and an all-weather airport in Cold Bay. The Obama administration blocked the project because of concerns about its impact on a wildlife refuge. Signing the deal on behalf of the King Cove Native Corp. was finance manager...

A powerful quake of magnitude 7.7 struck in the northern Pacific Ocean between the tip of the Aleutian Islands and Russia's Kamchatka, the U.S. Geological Survey said.  The quake was shallow and powerful enough to trigger a tsunami but there was no immediate advisory.

A team of researchers from the University of Hawai'i at Mānoa (UHM) published a study this week that estimated the probability of a Magnitude 9+ earthquake in the Aleutian Islands--an event with sufficient power to create a mega-tsunami especially threatening to Hawai'i. In the next 50 years, they report, there is a 9% chance of such an event. An earlier State of Hawai'i report has estimated the damage from such an event would be nearly $40 billion, with more than 300,000 people affected. Earth's crust is composed of numerous rocky plates. An earthquake occurs when two sections of crust suddenly...

A powerful earthquake in Alaska sent towering waves up to 30 feet (9 meters) tall crashing down on Hawaii about 500 years ago, leaving behind fragments of coral, mollusk shells and coarse beach sand in a sinkhole located on the island of Kauai, new research finds. The quake, likely a magnitude 9.0, sent the mighty waves toward Hawaii sometime between 1425 and 1665, the study found. It's possible that another large Alaskan earthquake could trigger a comparable tsunami on Hawaii's shores in the future, experts said. The tsunami was at least three times the size of the damaging 1946 tsunami,...

Scientists traveled to the Aleutian Chain last summer to check out a colossal submarine landslide blamed for one of the most devastating tsunamis of the 20th century. They wanted to find out how sea-floor life responded to such a huge disturbance and produce detailed charts. What they got was a shock of seismic proportions. Instead of a 12-mile-wide avalanche dropping 30 to 40 miles down the continental slope into the abyss of the Aleutian Trench, sonar surveys and the remotely operated underwater vehicle Jason II found regular ocean bottom, eroded and crusty and largely undisturbed. There was no slide. And...

Scientists say a fault-line running across Alaska could cause tsunamis of the same magnitude as the Japanese disaster of March last year. Attention has turned to the Alaskan-Aleutian subduction zone, a region where one of the earth's tectonic plate, carrying the Pacific Ocean, drops beneath the North American plate. A particular section of the fault near the Semidi Islands has not ruptured since at least 1788, and measurements on this area - which lies four to five kilometres under water - reveal the pressure is accumulating rapidly. If the Pacific Ocean plate slips, as happened in the geographically-similar Tohoku subduction...

Six months after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Japan prepared to deal one more decisive blow to the U.S. Naval forces in the Pacific. The aim was to destroy U.S. aircraft carriers and occupy the strategically important Midway Atoll, a tiny island nearly halfway between Asia and North America that was home to a U.S. Naval air station. American codebreakers deciphered the Japanese plans, allowing the U.S. Navy to plan an ambush. On June 3, 1942, the Battle of Midway commenced.

MAP 7.3 2011/06/24 03:10:00 52.100 -171.700 40.0 FOX ISLANDS, ALEUTIAN ISLANDS, ALASKA MAP 7.4 2011/06/24 03:09:40 52.042 -171.842 46.8 FOX ISLANDS, ALEUTIAN ISLANDS, ALASKA

Dutch Harbor Remembrance Day State Flags Lowered on June 3, 2009 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE No. 09-139 State Flags Lowered for Dutch Harbor Remembrance Day World War II bombing commemorated June 2, 2009, Anchorage, Alaska – Governor Sarah Palin has ordered state flags to be lowered to half-staff on June 3 to mark the 67th anniversary of the bombing of Dutch Harbor during World War II. “Today and every day, I encourage the residents of Dutch Harbor and all Alaskans to remember the soldiers who died or were injured defending and reclaiming our shores,” Governor Palin said. “We are forever in...

Okmok on August 3. It's gotten less active since this big day. Larsen, Jessica. Image courtesy of the AVO/UAF-GI. Kastochi: Aviation hazard code is RED Google Earth image showing AVHRR image of volcanic cloud (band 4) from Kasatochi, and earthquakes located in the region. Note: coastlines are slightly mis-registered in this image. To download a .kmz file of AVO located earthquakes, see this page: http://www.avo.alaska.edu/earthquakes/ . Picture Date: August 07, 2008 Image Creator: Bailey, John Image courtesy of the AVO/UAF-GI and USGS. Quickbird true-color satellite image of Kasatochi Island collected on April 9, 2004. Image copyright Digital Globe. Picture Date:...

Alaska's Okmok volcano started erupting on July 12 and is still going. The most recent update from yesterday indicated an ash plume could be at 35,000 feet. This has a definite current events aspect because a lot of planes flying to China (Olympics) will fly near this event. Aircraft jet engines do not do well on an ash-rich diet. Okmok has always been one of my favorite Aleutian volcanoes because it has an incredible 10-km wide circular caldera, almost like a "Lost World" setting. So after my two-week hiatus, I'll provide a picture of the current eruption, and a couple...

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — The mangled remains of a vessel found in the Bering Sea are likely those of a World War II submarine that disappeared with a crew of 70 off the Aleutian Island of Kiska. The discovery of the USS Grunion on Wednesday night culminates a five-year search led by the sons of its commander, Mannert Abele, and may finally shine a light on the mysterious last moments of the doomed vessel. "Obviously, this is a very big thing," the oldest son, Bruce Abele, said Thursday from his home in Newton, Mass. "I told my wife about it when...