Skip to main content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Publications

Filter Total Items: 2677

2001 volcanic activity in Alaska and Kamchatka: Summary of events and response of the Alaska Volcano Observatory

The Alaska Volcano Observatory (AVO) monitors the more than 40 historically active volcanoes of the Aleutian Arc. Of these, 22 are monitored with short-period seismic instrument networks as of the end of 2001. The AVO core monitoring program also includes daily analysis of satellite imagery, observation overflights, compilation of pilot reports and reports from local residents and mariners. In 200
Authors
Robert G. McGimsey, Christina A. Neal, Olga Girina

Pre-1980 eruptive history of Mount St. Helens, Washington

No abstract available.
Authors
Michael A. Clynne, David W. Ramsey, Edward W. Wolfe, James W. Hendley, Peter H. Stauffer

Distinguishing between debris flows and floods from field evidence in small watersheds

Post-flood indirect measurement techniques to back-calculate flood magnitude are not valid for debris flows, which commonly occur in small steep watersheds during intense rainstorms. This is because debris flows can move much faster than floods in steep channel reaches and much slower than floods in low-gradient reaches. In addition, debris-flow deposition may drastically alter channel geometry in
Authors
Thomas C. Pierson

Steam explosions, earthquakes, and volcanic eruptions -- what's in Yellowstone's future?

Yellowstone, one of the world’s largest active volcanic systems, has produced several giant volcanic eruptions in the past few million years, as well as many smaller eruptions and steam explosions. Although no eruptions of lava or volcanic ash have occurred for many thousands of years, future eruptions are likely. In the next few hundred years, hazards will most probably be limited to ongoing geys
Authors
Jacob B. Lowenstern, Robert L. Christiansen, Robert B. Smith, Lisa A. Morgan, Henry Heasler

Reconnaissance gas measurements on the East Rift Zone of Kilauea Volcano, Hawai'i by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy

We report the results of a set of measurements of volcanic gases on two small ground level plumes in the vicinity of Pu`u `O`o cone on the middle East Rift Zone (ERZ) of Kilauea volcano, Hawai`i on 15 June 2001 using open-path Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy. The work was carried out as a reconnaissance survey to assess the monitoring and research value of FTIR measurements at this
Authors
Kenneth A. McGee, Tamar Elias, A. Jefferson Sutton, Michael P. Doukas, Peter G. Zemek, Terrence M. Gerlach

Tephra layers of blind Spring Valley and related upper Pliocene and Pleistocene tephra layers, California, Nevada, and Utah: Isotopic ages, correlation, and magnetostratigraphy

Numerical ages have been determined for a stratigraphic sequence of silicic tephra layers exposed at the Cowan Pumice Mine in Blind Spring Valley, near Benton Hot Springs, east-central California, as well as at Chalk Cliffs, north of Bishop, Calif. The tephra layers at these sites were deposited after eruptions from nearby sources, most of them from near Glass Mountain, and some from unknown sourc
Authors
Andrei M. Sarna-Wojcicki, Marith C. Reheis, Malcolm S. Pringle, Robert J. Fleck, Doug Burbank, Charles E. Meyer, Janet L. Slate, Elmira Wan, James R. Budahn, Bennie Troxel, James P. Walker

Paleontology of the upper Eocene to quaternary postimpact section in the USGS-NASA Langley core, Hampton, Virginia

The USGS-NASA Langley corehole was drilled in 2000 in Hampton, Va. The core serves as a benchmark for the study of calcareous nannofossils, dinoflagellates, diatoms and silico flagellates, mollusks, ostracodes, planktonic foraminifera and bolboformids, and vertebrate remains in the upper Eocene, Oligocene, Miocene, and Pliocene sediments in southeastern Virginia. These sediments were deposited aft
Authors
Lucy E. Edwards, John A. Barron, David Bukry, Laurel M. Bybell, Thomas M. Cronin, C. Wylie Poag, Robert E. Weems, G. Lynn Wingard

Paleoceanographic history of the Guaymas Basin, Gulf of California, during the past 15,000 years based on diatoms, silicoflagellates, and biogenic sediments

High-resolution records of calcium carbonate, biogenic opal, diatoms, and silicoflagellates from western Guaymas Basin gravity core GGC55 and piston core JPC56 and eastern Guaymas Basin DSDP Site 480 reveal a complex paleoceanographic history of the central Gulf of California during the past 15,000 years. Prior to ∼ 6.2 ka, the eastern and western Guaymas Basin proxy records were remarkably simila
Authors
John A. Barron, David Bukry, Walter E. Dean

Volcano hazards

Not only do “Volcanoes assail the senses …” (Decker and Decker, 1997, p. vii), but they also assail the environment when they erupt, terrifying and fascinating humankind for countless millennia. Volcanic processes and products – beneficial and hazardous – have profoundly impacted and continue to impact society (Chester, 1993, Chapter 14, this volume).It is estimated that about 10% of the world's p
Authors
Robert I. Tilling

Catalog of earthquake hypocenters at Alaskan volcanoes: January 1 through December 31, 2004

The Alaska Volcano Observatory (AVO), a cooperative program of the U.S. Geological Survey, the Geophysical Institute of the University of Alaska Fairbanks, and the Alaska Division of Geological and Geophysical Surveys, has maintained seismic monitoring networks at historically active volcanoes in Alaska since 1988. The primary objectives of the seismic program are the real-time seismic monitoring
Authors
James P. Dixon, Scott D. Stihler, John A. Power, Guy Tytgat, Steve Estes, Stephanie Prejean, John J. Sanchez, Rebecca Sanches, Stephen R. McNutt, John Paskievitch

Mount St. Helens erupts again: Activity from September 2004 through March 2005

Eruptive activity at Mount St. Helens captured the world’s attention in 1980 when the largest historical landslide on Earth and a powerful explosion reshaped the volcano, created its distinctive crater, and dramatically modified the surrounding landscape. Over the next 6 years, episodic extrusions of lava built a large dome in the crater. From 1987 to 2004, Mount St. Helens returned to a period of
Authors
Jon J. Major, William E. Scott, Carolyn Driedger, Dan Dzurisin