Sara Barsotti

Gradual caldera collapse at Bárdarbunga volcano, Iceland, regulated by lateral magma outflow

Driven to collapse Volcanic eruptions occur frequently, but only rarely are they large enough to cause the top of the mountain to collapse and form a caldera. Gudmundsson et al. used a variety of geophysical tools to monitor the caldera formation that accompanied the 2014 Bárdarbunga volcanic eruption in Iceland. The volcanic edifice became unstable as magma from beneath Bárdarbunga spilled out into the nearby Holuhraun lava field. The timing of the gradual collapse revealed that it is the eruption that drives caldera formation and not the other way around. Science, this issue p. 262 Magma flow from under the Bárdarbunga volcano drove caldera collapse during the 2014 eruption. INTRODUCTION The Bárdarbunga caldera volcano in central Iceland collapsed from August 2014 to February 2015 during the largest eruption in Europe since 1784. An ice-filled subsidence bowl, 110 square kilometers (km2) in area and up to 65 meters (m) deep developed, while magma drained laterally for 48 km along a subterranean path and erupted as a major lava flow northeast of the volcano. Our data provide unprecedented insight into the workings of a collapsing caldera. RATIONALE Collapses of caldera volcanoes are, fortunately, not very frequent, because they are often associated with very large volcanic eruptions. On the other hand, the rarity of caldera collapses limits insight into this major geological hazard. Since the formation of Katmai caldera in 1912, during the 20th century’s largest eruption, only five caldera collapses are known to have occurred before that at Bárdarbunga. We used aircraft-based altimetry, satellite photogrammetry, radar interferometry, ground-based GPS, evolution of seismicity, radio-echo soundings of ice thickness, ice flow modeling, and geobarometry to describe and analyze the evolving subsidence geometry, its underlying cause, the amount of magma erupted, the geometry of the subsurface caldera ring faults, and the moment tensor solutions of the collapse-related earthquakes. RESULTS After initial lateral withdrawal of magma for some days though a magma-filled fracture propagating through Earth’s upper crust, preexisting ring faults under the volcano were reactivated over the period 20 to 24 August, marking the onset of collapse. On 31 August, the eruption started, and it terminated when the collapse stopped, having produced 1.5 km of basaltic lava. The subsidence of the caldera declined with time in a near-exponential manner, in phase with the lava flow rate. The volume of the subsidence bowl was about 1.8 km3. Using radio-echo soundings, we find that the subglacial bedrock surface after the collapse is down-sagged, with no indications of steep fault escarpments. Using geobarometry, we determined the depth of magma reservoir to be ~12 km, and modeling of geodetic observations gives a similar result. High-precision earthquake locations and moment tensor analysis of the remarkable magnitude M5 earthquake series are consistent with steeply dipping ring faults. Statistical analysis of seismicity reveals communication over tens of kilometers between the caldera and the dike. CONCLUSION We conclude that interaction between the pressure exerted by the subsiding reservoir roof and the physical properties of the subsurface flow path explain the gradual near-exponential decline of both the collapse rate and the intensity of the 180-day-long eruption. By combining our various data sets, we show that the onset of collapse was caused by outflow of magma from underneath the caldera when 12 to 20% of the total magma intruded and erupted had flowed from the magma reservoir. However, the continued subsidence was driven by a feedback between the pressure of the piston-like block overlying the reservoir and the 48-km-long magma outflow path. Our data provide better constraints on caldera mechanisms than previously available, demonstrating what caused the onset and how both the roof overburden and the flow path properties regulate the collapse. The Bárdarbunga caldera and the lateral magma flow path to the Holuhraun eruption site. (A) Aerial view of the ice-filled Bárdarbunga caldera on 24 October 2014, view from the north. (B) The effusive eruption in Holuhraun, about 40 km to the northeast of the caldera

Satellite detection, long-range transport, and air quality impacts of volcanic sulfur dioxide from the 2014-2015 flood lava eruption at Bárðarbunga (Iceland)

The 2014–2015 Barðarbunga-Veiðivotn fissure eruption at Holuhraun produced about 1.5 km3 of lava, making it the largest eruption in Iceland in more than 200 years. Over the course of the eruption, daily volcanic sulfur dioxide (SO2) emissions exceeded daily SO2 emissions from all anthropogenic sources in Europe in 2010 by at least a factor of 3. We present surface air quality observations from across Northern Europe together with satellite remote sensing data and model simulations of volcanic SO2 for September 2014. We show that volcanic SO2 was transported in the lowermost troposphere over long distances and detected by air quality monitoring stations up to 2750 km away from the source. Using retrievals from the Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) and the Infrared Atmospheric Sounding Interferometer (IASI), we calculate an average daily SO2 mass burden of 99 ± 49 kilotons (kt) of SO2 from OMI and 61 ± 18 kt of SO2 from IASI for September 2014. This volcanic burden is at least a factor of 2 greater than the average SO2 mass burden between 2007 and 2009 due to anthropogenic emissions from the whole of Europe. Combining the observational data with model simulations using the United Kingdom Met Offices Numerical Atmospheric-dispersion Modelling Environment model, we are able to constrain SO2 emission rates to up to 120 kilotons per day (kt/d) during early September 2014, followed by a decrease to 20–60 kt/d between 6 and 22 September 2014, followed by a renewed increase to 60–120 kt/d until the end of September 2014. Based on these fluxes, we estimate that the eruption emitted a total of 2.0 ± 0.6 Tg of SO2 during September 2014, in good agreement with ground-based remote sensing and petrological estimates. Although satellite-derived and model-simulated vertical column densities of SO2 agree well, the model simulations are biased low by up to a factor of 8 when compared to surface observations of volcanic SO2 on 6–7 September 2014 in Ireland. These biases are mainly due to relatively small horizontal and vertical positional errors in the simulations of the volcanic plume occurring over transport distances of thousands of kilometers. Although the volcanic air pollution episodes were transient and lava-dominated volcanic eruptions are sporadic events, the observations suggest that (i) during an eruption, volcanic SO2 measurements should be assimilated for near real-time air quality forecasting and (ii) existing air quality monitoring networks should be retained or extended to monitor SO2 and other volcanic pollutants.

Major impact of volcanic gases on the chemical composition of precipitation in Iceland during the 2014-15 Holuhraun eruption

The Holuhraun eruption in 2014-15 was the largest in Iceland for more than 200 years. It resulted in emissions of large quantities of volcanic gases into the atmosphere (11 Mt SO2, 0.1 Mt HCl and 0.05 Mt HF). During the eruption the volcanic gases had major effects on F, SO4 and to a lesser extent Cl concentrations in precipitation throughout Iceland, effects not observed in recent decades. The concentrations of F, Cl and SO4 (n = 705) reached values of 444 μM, 12,270 μM and 17,324 μM during the eruption and were on average ~20 times higher for F and SO4 and much lower for Cl compared to pre-eruption times. The concentrations of major cations (Si, Na, K, Ca, Mg, Al and Fe) (n = 151) in the precipitation, were taken as having originated from seawater spray and dissolution of rock dust and aerosol. Based on the mixing model developed here, it is demonstrated that the source of the enrichment of F and SO4 was indeed the volcanic gas emissions with >60-100 mol% of SO4 and F in the precipitation originated from volcanic gas, whereas the Cl originated mostly from seawater spray, making the volcanic gas input of Cl relatively less important than for F and SO4. The results showed that large volcanic eruptions can have major effects on atmospheric chemistry and impact the composition of precipitation.

Reconstructing eruptive source parameters from tephra deposit: a numerical study of medium-sized explosive eruptions at Etna volcano

Abstract Since the 1970s, multiple reconstruction techniques have been proposed and are currently used, to extrapolate and quantify eruptive parameters from sampled tephra fall deposit datasets. Atmospheric transport and deposition processes strongly control the spatial distribution of tephra deposit; therefore, a large uncertainty affects mass derived estimations especially for fall layer that are not well exposed. This paper has two main aims: the first is to analyse the sensitivity to the deposit sampling strategy of reconstruction techniques. The second is to assess whether there are differences between the modelled values for emitted mass and grainsize, versus values estimated from the deposits. We find significant differences and propose a new correction strategy. A numerical approach is demonstrated by simulating with a dispersal code a mild explosive event occurring at Mt. Etna on 24 November 2006. Eruptive parameters are reconstructed by an inversion information collected after the eruption. A full synthetic deposit is created by integrating the deposited mass computed by the model over the computational domain (i.e., an area of 7.5 × 104 km 2). A statistical analysis based on 2000 sampling tests of 50 sampling points shows a large variability, up to 50 % for all the reconstruction techniques. Moreover, for some test examples Power Law errors are larger than estimated uncertainty. A similar analysis, on simulated grain-size classes, shows how spatial sampling limitations strongly reduce the utility of available information on the total grain size distribution. For example, information on particles coarser than ϕ(−4) is completely lost when sampling at 1.5 km from the vent for all columns with heights less than 2000 m above the vent. To correct for this effect an optimal sampling strategy and a new reconstruction method are presented. A sensitivity study shows that our method can be extended to a wide range of eruptive scenarios including those in which aggregation processes are important. The new correction method allows an estimate of the deficiency for each simulated class in calculated mass deposited, providing reliable estimation of uncertainties in the reconstructed total (whole deposit) grainsize distribution.

Large-eddy simulation of pyroclastic density currents

We investigate the dynamics of turbulent pyroclastic density currents (PDCs) by adopting a 3D, Eulerian-Eulerian multiphase flow model, in which solid particles are treated as a continuum and the grain-size distribution is simplified by assuming two particulate phases. The turbulent sub-grid stress of the gas phase is modelled within the framework of Large-Eddy Simulation (LES) by means of a eddy-viscosity model together with a wall closure. Despite the significant numerical diffusion associated to the upwind method adopted for the Finite-Volume discretization, numerical simulations demonstrate the need of adopting a Sub-Grid Scale (SGS) model, while revealing the complex interplay between the grid and the SGS filter sizes. We also analyse the relationship between the averaged flow dynamic pressure and the action exerted by the PDC on a cubic obstacle, to evaluate the impact of a PDC on a building. Numerical results suggest that the average flow dynamic pressure can be used as a proxy for the force per unit surface acting on the building envelope (Fig. 5), even for such steeply stratified flows. However, it is not possible to express such proportionality as a constant coefficient such as the drag coefficient in a steady-state current. The present results indeed indicate that the large epistemic and aleatory uncertainty on initial and boundary conditions has an impact on the numerical predictions which is comparable to that of grid resolution.