A recent survey of Yellowstone National Park's underground magma reservoirs by USGS scientists has revealed a shift in the area where potential volcanic activity is likely to occur. While a massive eruption is not expected anytime soon, the magma is moving northeast of the Yellowstone Caldera.
Rangers at Yellowstone National Park are often asked to predict when the next massive volcanic eruption will occur there. A team of USGS scientists, who surveyed the park’s underground magma reservoirs, recently confirmed the standard response, ‘probably not any time soon.’ But they have pointed out that the area where such activity is likely to occur has shifted, according to a survey over the past two million years.
Those events are labeled ‘caldera forming,’ because the molten rock vacating the underground reservoirs leaves an empty space, which leads to the land above collapsing, ultimately forming a bowl-shaped basin. Beneath those basins, called ‘calderas,’ sit reservoirs of magma. The recent survey shows that the magma within them has not stood still. It now appears to be shifting to the northeast of the Yellowstone Caldera. For the past 160,000 or so years, the magma reservoirs have mainly existed beneath the caldera. However, a number of geologic factors suggest that, despite the movement, ‘the reservoirs are not eruptible,’ according to the paper. That doesn’t necessarily mean that the region will be completely devoid of volcanic activity — just that it wouldn’t be as cataclysmically explosive as the previous Big Three. Yellowstone is a destination largely because of volcanic activity. The hot liquid rock beneath the crust fuels the geysers, hot springs, and boiling mud pots that attract swarms of tourists to that corner of Wyoming. So how did the geologists come to their conclusion? First, not all magma is created equally. It is formed from different kinds of melted rock. Some contain more silica, some hold more basalt. Some is rich in minerals like iron or magnesium, some less so. These differences are important for two reasons. First, these different mineral mixes give off a variety of magnetic and electrical fields — which geologists can measur
VOLCANIC ACTIVITY YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK MAGMA USGS ERUPTION
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