Eyjafjallajokull - Icelandic volcano Flashcards
Stratovolcanos are characterised by a _____ profile and are ____ on the VEI scale, but low on frequency.
Steep high
Eyjafjallajokull is a _____________\ _________ volcano
Stratovolcano/composite
Eyjafjallajokull has a collapsed crater called a caldera that is _._km wide and the height of the volcano is ____meters tall.
2.5km wide and 1666 meters tall.
The lava produced by eyjafjallajokull is _________ lava which is high in silica content and has a high viscosity (thick and sticky) but has a low eruption temperature of less than ___*c. This means the lava cools and hardens before spreading far, giving the stratovolcano it’s characteristic steep sides.
Rhyolitic 750*c
If the volcano had been on a lower latitude without a glacier on top of it the spreading of ash would have been less _______. The fact that a glacier sits on top of the volcano meant that the heat from the eruption melted some of the glacier and evaporated some and this increased the ___ ________ leading to dramatic worldwide disruption.
Dramatic air moisture
Iceland was prepared for the eruption due to the many ___ _________ earthquakes which served as a warning.
Low magnitude
____ ____ equipment was used to predict eruptions.
High tech
Iceland had a good warning system with texts being sent to residents giving them a __ minute warning.
30 minute
The emergency services were ____ ________.
We’ll prepared.
The location if the volcano - directly below the ____ ______ made it impossible to prevent travel disruptions however allowing aircraft to travel may have meant deaths resulting from aircraft failure.
Gulf Stream
Between March _rd to March _th 2010 over ____ small (most less than 2 on the Richter scale) earthquakes occurred, acting as a pre warning of the larger immanent eruption.
3rd to the 5th 3000 smaller eruptions
On the __th April ____ Eyjafjallajokull’s main eruption occurred in the form of a fissure vent with lava flows more dominant on the west.
19th April 2010
Eyjafjallajokull is located on a divergent plate boundary on the southern region of Iceland where the North American plates moving ____ and the Eurasian plate is moving ____ at the ___ ________ _____.
West east mid Atlantic ridge.
The major environmental problems caused by the volcano was the volcanic ash that reached _____ meters into the air! high enough to reach into the ___________ and be distributed by high velocity jet streams.
11000 meters stratosphere
The ash was very fine ground 24% of the sample was under __um - no bigger than aerosol partials
10um
Britain had very fine ____________ weather for a lot of the time the ash cloud existed and this was problematic as _____ would have helped to disperse the ash cloud better.
Anticyclonic wind