Eyjafjallajökull

"Why did the recent volcanic eruption in Iceland create so much ash? Although the large ash plume was not unparalleled in its abundance, its location was particularly noticeable because it drifted across such well populated areas. The Eyjafjallajökull volcano in southern Iceland began erupting on March 20, with a second eruption starting under the center of small glacier on April 14. Neither eruption was unusually powerful. The second eruption, however, melted a large amount of glacial ice which then cooled and fragmented lava into gritty glass particles that were carried up with the rising volcanic plume. Pictured above two days ago, lightning bolts illuminate ash pouring out of the Eyjafjallajökull volcano."

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap100419.html

-Maureen Lang

Comments

[confusedponderer]

It sure does look apocalyptic. Thanks for posting.

Don't know about the US, but flights all over Europe have all but ceased. I was at the Mosel yesterday (after visiting an extinct volcano in the Eifel (Laacher See; last active only 12900 years ago (i.e. before my time - but still, geologically that was yesterday))), and the sky was just blue - no contrails to be seen far and wide.

Now I could swear the sun is kinda milky and the sunset red-ish but that could as well be just normal humidity, and I could imagine seeing that because I know that that would be a consequence of dust in the atmosphere.

[John Minnerath]

Thank you for placing that image here for all SST readers to see.A few others can be seen here:
http://www.spaceweather.com/submissions/large_image_popup.php?image_name=Olivier-Vandeginste-IMG_9705_1271594202.jpg
That one is the ultimate picture of pure primeval power.
Volcanoes and earth quakes have probably affected Humans more than any other natural phenomena.
We being totally helpless to their power.
Look now how only a moderate eruption on a tiny island in the Atlantic has disrupted so much of our high tech world.

[jonst]

Thanks for posting this! I don't mean this to sound pejorative to our distant forerunners, but I wonder what people living 50k year thought about explosions such as this? Must have scared the hell out of them.

[Maureen Lang]

Thanks to all for your comments, & special thanks for the great link from John Minnerath to spaceweather.com.

Re: jonst's comment- how did prehistoric populations explain volcanic eruptions (in the event some of them were fortunate enough to survive same)? Agreed, catastrophic volcanic activity must have scared the hell out of the survivors in 50k. And when something scares the hell out of you, you'd better come up with a somewhat plausible explanation for why it happened, ergo tales of the gods being angry, fighting monsters or each other, etc, etc. Or in the case of Icelandic folk tradition, perhaps fairies, elves, trolls conducting a turf war...

Much of the oldest mythology in all cultures contains elaborate stories derived from catastrophoc prehistory events as ancient man tried to come to grips with the causes/meaning of natural phenomena such as volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, floods, etc. Iceland no doubt had its share of oral volcanic myths passed down to become an integral part of their Eddas, other sagas, & folkloric tales:

http://www.chiff.com/a/iceland-myths.htm