To start, these names are the names of two big volcanos, both in Washington State, both deadly, but on different scales. Mt. Rainier’s last eruption was 150 years ago. Yellowstone’s last eruption was 640,000 years ago. Yellowstone’s reputation of being the ultimate super volcano versus Mt. Rainier, the most dangerous volcano in the country. The difference between these volcanos is looks, damage, stability and tourism. Let’s begin with a little knowledge of Mt. Rainier and Yellowstone. Well, they are both in Washington. Rainier’s last few eruptions had lahars; we know this because of previous paths of destruction. This volcano is dormant, just blowing off a little steam sometimes. The last lahar was 500 years ago. If that happened again, …show more content…
What is a super volcano, what is a volcano? A volcano itself is a hill or mountain with vents to the crusts of the earth that let magma sit under or in the mountain. “A super volcano is any volcano capable of producing a volcanic eruption with an ejecta volume greater than 1,000 km3 (240 cu mi). This is thousands of times larger than normal volcanic eruptions. Super volcanos are on a much bigger scale than other volcanoes. Unlike composite volcanoes, with their steep sides, they are difficult to spot.” (Internet Geography, geography.learnontheinternet.co.uk) An average volcano in the world would just cause local damage, but this super volcano could end life on earth. Not just with the eruption but the ash would cause a volcanic winter blocking the sun to long and then even more the ash would choke everything out and collapse roofs. Yea Rainier would kill thousands of people, but Yellowstone would literally kill billions plus of people. In comparison, Rainier is a little fly and Yellowstone is a Griffin {The big eagle lion bird thing}. Yellowstone has the capability to erupt 1,000 times stronger than Rainier ever could. …show more content…
Rainier does blow steam all the time, but it isn’t the same how Yellowstone has geysers. Yellowstone’s most famous geyser is Old Faithful. “It depends on the duration of the eruption. Scientists estimate that the amount ranges from 3,700 gallons (for a short duration of 1.5 minutes) to 8,400 gallons (for a longer duration of 4.5 minutes). During an eruption, the water temperature at the vent has been measured at 204°F (95.6C). The steam temperature has been measured above 350°.” (nps.gov) Yellowstone is fair weathered. The actual mountain of Rainier is pointed like a cone with steep sides while Yellowstone is just a huge hill. They both are viewed as places to go and visit, but people climb up Rainier’s steep sides and people in Yellowstone walk through its trails and view the geysers. Yellowstone gets snow, but Rainier has 1 cubic ice glacier formed on the top of the
Many of us know Mount Shasta to be a beautiful mountain and a popular tourist location in California. However, this mountain is much more than that, this mountain is actually a volcano. Volcanoes come with a number of hazards and a volcano of this size is of no exception. Previous eruptions on Mount Shasta have given us an idea of the power this volcano has and the damage it may do. With this information scientists are able to predict what may happen should another explosion occur.
The town of Orting is built in the valley of Mount Rainer in western Washington. Located 30 miles from the volcano, Orting is built upon deposits of 500 year old lahar erupted from the volcano. Mount Rainier is an active stratovolcano of andesitic rock, located along the convergent plate boundary where the North American Plate and the Pacific Plate meet. Mount Rainier is the most prominent mountain in the contiguous United States and is approximately 500,000 years old (The Cardinal). Although Mount Rainier is considered to be an active volcano because of its lahar flow, it is currently in resting state. The last eruption of this massive volcano occurred more than 115 years ago in 1884.
On May 18th, 1980, one of the most prominent volcanic eruptions in US History took place in the state of Washington. Mount St. Helens had been dormant for almost 100 years before March 15th. On this day, two months before the eruption several small earthquakes shook the earth. This indicated a magma buildup below the surface, and the first minor event that would lead to one of the greatest eruptions the US has ever known. Following the first set of earthquakes, “Steam explosions blasted a 60- to 75-m (200- to 250-ft) wide crater through the volcano 's summit ice cap and covered the snow-clad southeast sector with dark ash. Within a week the crater had grown to about 400 m (1,300 ft) in diameter and two giant crack systems crossed the entire summit area. Eruptions occurred on average from
Lassen Peak and Mount St. Helens are the only two volcanoes in the contiguous United States to erupt during the 20th century.
Yellowstone is bigger than Rhode Island and Delaware combined. There are 50 mammal species, 311 bird species, and five endangered species. Rivers and lakes make up only 5% of Yellowstone (By 1870, Gold Fever Was Gone and the Great Yellowstone Expeditions Began. "Yellowstone National Park History."). The largest lake is called the Yellowstone Lake and is 136 miles long. The lake is known for having the highest altitude in North America ("56 Interesting Facts About . . . Var Addthis_config = ). In addition to lakes and rivers, there are about 290 waterfalls in the park. The highest waterfall is called Lower Falls and is 308 ft tall. Forests make up 80% of the park and an additional 15% is made up of grassland ("10 Surprising Facts About Yellowstone." National Geographic.). Yellowstone has one of the largest petrified forests from the big 1978 fire. The burned trees reformed into wood and minerals due to heat from the fire. The park sits on the Continental Divide, this means that half of the lakes run to the Pacific and the other half run into the Atlantic Ocean (United States. National Park Service. "Park Facts.). The average temperature during the summer is 70-80 degrees Fahrenheit and in the winter the average temperature is 0-20 degrees Fahrenheit. The average elevation is about 8,000 feet above sea level covered by mountains and lakes ( "Yellowstone National Park - Fast Facts."). The highest peak in the park is called Eagle Peak and is 11,358 feet high. The lowest peak in the park is Reese Creek which is 5,282 feet high. ( United States. National Park Service. "Park
Yosemite National Park, is a beautiful piece of nature it is a 195 mile nature getaway from the urban life that is lived San Francisco, CA and 315 miles away from the fast pace and overwhelming life that is lived in Los Angeles CA. This place is like no other in the beauty of its nature. The park is “747,956 acres, and is the home to hundreds of wildlife species and thousands of Yosemite plants” (U.S. Nat. Park Service). Yosemite is known for so many beautiful features, from its granite cliffs, waterfalls, clear streams, giant sequoia groves and biological diversity. And also for its two rivers which are the Tuolumne and Merced rivers. These rivers begin in the park and flow as far as west to the Central Valley.
The history of volcanic activity at Yellowstone starts with its first eruption at Huckleberry Ridge 2.1 million years ago, the leftovers reached as far as Iowa and central Texas. Then 800,000 years later, another eruption took place in Mesa Falls creating Henry Fork Caldera near Park, Montana. The last eruption took place 630,000 years ago, called the Lava Creek eruption, spewing 240 cubic miles of debris, and spreading as far as Louisiana and California.
Mount Rainier is a volcano that is located in the Cascade Range in Mount Rainier National Park, Washington. This volcano is 14,411 feet (4,392 meters) in its elevation. This is the highest mountain in Washington. This volcano is in the same mountain range as Mount Adams, Mount Baker, Mount St. Helens and Glacier Peak. It is known as a stratovolcano which is a large, steep volcano built up of alternating layers of lava and ash or cinders. This volcano is an active volcano and the last time it erupted was in 1894. The largest eruption this volcano has had was 2200 years ago. It has been recorded that the areas has had a lot of small high-frequency earthquakes. Some of them occur daily. According to geologist the cause of this is hot fluids moving inside the mountain. It is composed of two overlapping volcano crater that are 1000 ft. around. This volcano has three different summits; they are Columbia Crest, Point Success and Liberty cap, the highest which is 14,411 feet and the lowest which is 14,112 feet. It lies on the Juan de Fuca Plate. This is a divergent boundary. It was formed by the subduction of the Juan de Fuca Plate and the North American Plate. This volcano also has lahars which are large mudflows that happen in the deposits of sediments that surrounds volcanoes; they can be hot or cold. This volcano includes but not limited to the rock andesite.
The eruption on Mount Saint Helens has a specific cause and comes with many effects. A multifold of people would say that the “mountain looked like the site of an atomic blast” (Bredeson 30). That is a very accurate depiction as it took great power to inflict as much damage as it did. The reason for this impressive amount of force is that when magma is built up with pressure and an earthquake hits, the pressure gets magnified and the volcano explodes (Lewis). This is exactly what happened inside Mount Saint Helens. Furthermore, it has been revealed that “The earthquake that triggered the explosion was a 5.2 on the Richter scale” (Gunn 559). The earthquake to the magma can be compared as a match to gasoline. Even though the earthquake was not huge, the scale of the eruption was much greater than that of the earthquake (Gunn 560). The earthquake was only the trigger that allowed for more devastating things to occur. Thirteen hundred feet of the volcano were lost in the explosion followed by landslides, mudslides, and lava flows...
The first time I saw Mt. Rainier for myself, was last summer when my boyfriend and I drove to Washington. It was the most beautiful, peaceful looking mountain I have ever seen. However, underneath it's great beauty, it hides a deadly secret. Mt. Rainier is one of the most dangerous volcanoes that we have here in the United States. One of the reasons it is so dangerous is because of it's great beauty. People enjoy looking at it, and the area that surrounds it, so they have made their homes here. Mt Rainier is not the only volcano I am interested in, in fact this last summer I also went to Mt. St. Helens and Crater Lake. But it is the volcano I chose to research for this paper because it does have so much beauty and at the same time so much power. I already know the basics about volcanoes, how they form, the different types, etc., but I wanted to find out more about what would happen if this great volcano were to erupt, what type of eruption would it be, and how would it affect the people that live around it.
Volcanoes. The naturally forming landforms that can look remarkably beautiful. Gentle slopes, or high rising heights with snow caps and greenery that seems to attract many tourists and sightseers around the world. These magnificent landforms can also cause major destruction and can produce forces that can explode, burn, and create a great deal of damage. Two of these extravagant wonders of the world is the Mount Saint Helens composite volcano in Washington, US, and the Mauna Loa shield volcano in Hawaii, US. These landforms have a eruption history of many colors. One has a great power in eruption, but another has a eruption that is quiet and gentle. In comparing these two volcanoes there are many likes, and dislikes, to consider. So the following
Stories about volcanoes are captivating. Myths come in different versions, but all of them are capable of capturing yours, and everybody’s imagination.
It is known however that lying underneath one of America's areas of great natural beauty, Yellowstone Park, lays one of the largest super volcanoes in the world. Scientists have discovered that it has been on a regular eruption cycle of 600,000 years. The last eruption was 640,000 years ago, therefore this shows the next eruption is late and could erupt at any moment. Scientists know that the collision of a Yellowstone eruption is terrifying to understand.
1980 eruption of Mt. St. Helens and the 1991 eruption Mt. Pinatubo. (Ball, J. n.d.).
There are other short-term effects, and these effects don’t just take place in the area of an eruption, but expands to other parts of the world. Globally, what has become an issue of its own is climate change. In the Encyclopedia Britannica, Jackson (2013) defined climate change as a “periodic modification of Earth's climate brought about as a result of changes in the atmosphere as well as interactions between the atmosphere and various other geologic, chemical, biological, and geographic factors within the Earth system.” With all of the debris that enters the atmosphere from eruptions, volcanoes can make an impact on climate change. Volcanic activity can cause global cooling, but some sources say that it has the potential to impact global warming as well, due to the amount of carbon dioxide (CO...