Supervolcanoes: are we next?

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Jonathan Vaughan

Ms Crow

Period 5

09th January 2010

Supervolcanoes: Are we Next?

Amidst the growing hysteria of 2012 and other apocalyptic theories supervolcanoes are a growing topic of today.  These mammoth sized volcanoes have plagued Earth’s history for millions of years causing numerous mass extinctions.  The question then arises: will humans be next?  By studying the Earth’s explosive history and analyzing how supervolcanoes impact ecosystems we can better predict the future welfare of humankind.  Many believe these volcanic giants are waiting ready to wreak havoc on the unsuspecting public.  Others have gone as far as to say the next super eruption will bring upon the apocalypse.  Whatever does happen, humanity will be ill prepared.

Many of us today are unaware of what supervolcanoes actually are and are oblivious to the destructive potential they possess.  These giants can be viewed as the older, more destructive brothers of regular volcanoes.  By definition, a volcano that spews greater than 1000 cubic kilometers of ejecta is considered a supervolcano.  There are, however, many more characteristic of these destructive giants.  Supervolcanoes are born when magma escapes from an underground chamber thousands of miles beneath the Earth’s surface.  This magma then travels towards Earth’s surface and creates a ginourmous pool of magma within the Earth’s crust; otherwise known as a caldera.  Over time the pressure within a caldera builds up and eventually blows rupturing the ground around it; this is a super eruption.  A super eruption can eject magma, ash, rock, and gas into the atmosphere.  This explosion is often times disastrous for surrounding areas causing unrelentless damage.  Despite current technology, eruptions and eruption size cannot be forecasted making supervolcanoes an unpredictable killer.  Scientists are only able to monitor seismic activity around a supervolcano which often escalates days before a possible super eruption.  Through this monitoring, a possible eruption can be predicted and surrounding areas can be evacuated and braced.  Such a technique, however, is unreliable as often times seismic activity surrounding a supervolcano will increase resulting in no eruption.  Moreover, super eruptions are often very different in nature.  Some super eruptions spew incredibly hot lava out of the volcano at a very slow rate.  This lava is extremely destructive but very slow.  The amount of lava emitted within an eruption varies substantially.  An incredible four million cubic kilometers of lava is thought to have been released over a period of roughly one million years during a super volcanic eruption in ancient history.  The daunting truth is that some supervolcanoes of today possess similar potential.  In other super eruptions a combination of red hot lava, gas, rock, and ash are ejected.  These eruptions are often times more destructive.  Areas close to the eruption fall victim to the merciless pyroclastic surge. A pyroclastic surge is a racing cloud of ash, gas, and rock that destroys everything in its path.  The surges can reach up to 1050km/h, reach temperatures up to 1000 degrees Celsius and travel up to ten kilometers.  Moreover, during super eruptions greenhouse gases can contaminate the atmosphere.  This could alter the Earth’s climate and make it less inhabitable for certain organism including humans. Perhaps the most destructive agent of a super eruption, however, is the volcanic ash.  To many, the threat of ash does not seem daunting, volcanic ash, however, is highly destructive.  When inhaled, the ash combines with the moisture in your lungs creating a liquid cement-like substance.  Inhale too much contaminated air and “you essentially drown in liquid cement” (BBC). Furthermore, this ash has been known to bury many people alive, destroy homes, devastate resources, and wipe out infrastructure. Theoretically, if the Yellowstone Caldera were to erupt, the ash alone could kill virtually all crops and livestock, contaminate all water supplies, collapse roofs, destroy infrastructure, and, if inhaled, essentially drown millions alive.  Factor in the collapse of a global power the size of the United States and the entire world could implode.  The global stock market would collapse, trade routes and resources would cease, and hysteria would outbreak.  Super eruptions have the potential to cover the majority of Earth’s landmass in volcanic ash and scorch nearly the entire sky.  If such an event were to occur a global winter would then ensue.  These winters last decades possibly even centuries.  Undoubtedly, the ash alone could devastate this planet.   Following a large scale super eruption the Earth would appear as if it had gone through a nuclear holocaust. Many areas would be left a desolate wasteland, and the Earth’s natural climate would be contaminated.  Truly, the supervolcano is nature’s atomic bomb.

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Despite being on our planet since the dawn of age, humans still have very limited primary evidence and knowledge of supervolcanoes and how they impact the ecosystem.  As a result, we turn to Earth’s explosive history to learn more on how supervolcanoes could impact us today. Throughout history supervolcanoes have relentlessly devastated life on Earth.  The merciless destruction of supervolcanoes has blemished our planet’s history and has arguably caused two mass extinctions and the near destruction of humankind.  Hundreds of millions of years ago possibly the largest super volcanic eruption Earth has ever witnessed took place.  The eruption was on ...

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