Agua Shuca thermal area, El Salvador

Steam rises above a hot pool at Agua Shuca, one of many thermal areas of the Ahuachapán geothermal field of El Salvador. A sudden hydrothermal explosion at Agua Shuca in October 1990 ejected steam and debris within a 200-m-radius, and about 25 people living adjacent to the thermal area were killed. The Agua Shuca thermal area east-southeast of Laguna Verde volcano had historically been one of the most frequently visited areas at Ahuachapán. A previous explosion apparently took place in 1868. Photo by Pat Dobson, 1999 (Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory). This image is made available under the Creative Commons BY-NC-ND 4.0 license terms.