Huge Magma Chamber Found Deeply Buried at Yellowstone

[G_j]

Hot times at Yellowstone: huge magma chamber found deeply buried

http://news.yahoo.com/hot-times-yellowstone-huge-magma-chamber-found-deeply-195312513.html

By Will Dunham

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Deep beneath Yellowstone National Park, one of the world's most dynamic volcanic systems, lies an enormous, previously unknown reservoir of hot, partly molten rock big enough to fill up the Grand Canyon 11 times, scientists say.

Researchers on Thursday said they used a technique called seismic tomography to a produce for the first time a complete picture of the volcanic "plumbing system" at Yellowstone, from the Earth's mantle up to the surface.

Yellowstone, which straddles the borders of Wyoming, Idaho and Montana, and boasts a remarkable array of geothermal features including geysers, mudpots, steam vents and hot springs, sits atop a supervolcano that has had three calamitous past eruptions.

Scientists already knew of a large magma chamber under Yellowstone that fed the eruptions 2 million, 1.2 million and 640,000 years ago. The new study, published in the journal Science, revealed a second, deeper reservoir 4.5 times larger.

"The existence of the second magma chamber does not make it any more or less likely that a large volcanic eruption at Yellowstone will occur. These findings do not change the current volcanic hazard at Yellowstone," University of Utah seismologist Jamie Farrell said.

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Yellowstone National Park's Grand Prismatic hot spring is pictured in this undated handout photo obtained by Reuters April 23, 2015. REUTERS/Robert B. Smith, Lee J. Siegel/Handout via Reuters

[B2G]

1. Well that's gonna cause a mess if it erupts

B2G, master of the understatement.

[eppur_se_muova]

2. Thanks, Obama ! nt

[Faux pas]

3. Ha!

And I thought it was going to be the rethug agenda that would wipe out the USA.

[Amishman]

4. don't count them out

just waiting for 'Maybe there is oil under the magma, we should frack yellowstone and find out!'

[Faux pas]

5. LOLOL

nailed it Amishman!

[2naSalit]

12. they're already

getting as close as possible on the eastern, southern and northern borders of the park:


http://earthjustice.org/features/wyoming-and-fracking


http://www.nwf.org/~/media/Content/Environmental%20Issues/Wyoming-Pinedale_Ecoflight_219X219.ashx


http://www.salon.com/2014/07/17/gop_candidate_wants_to_open_up_drilling_in_yellowstone_national_park/





I recommend taking a tour on Google Earth and have a look.

[Brother Buzz]

7. I think it Mother Nature's way to win back congress

She's got a wicked sense of humor.

[Faux pas]

8. Teeheehee

Thanks for making the picture a little happier Brother Buzz. Whew! I'm just outside the kill-primary ash-secondary ash zone. So glad Oregon is Blue.

[EL34x4]

9. What will the surviving Democrats eat?

I suspect each other eventually.

I know you're being sardonic but in all seriousness, an eruption of this magnitude would render our country to something resembling Cormac McCarthy's The Road.

Politics would no longer matter to anyone.

[Brother Buzz]

10. Politics is local

My spear trumps your stick

[EL34x4]

11. Prolonging the inevitable.

Eventually there'd be no food left to kill for.

Worst case scenario (the one popular with conspiracy theorists, less so with actual scientists), a massive eruption brings about a "volcano winter" that would kill crops across the world. Water reservoirs would be fouled with ash. Humans that survived would be returned to the Stone Age.

A true "reset" button.

[dreamnightwind]

14. 6L6 (x4)

Twin Reverb, though sometimes I use a McIntosh power amp so in that case just the preamp part of the twin, bypassing the 6L6's.

[FSogol]

13. Did the FBI catch the Somali teens responsible?