Images

An HVO scientist tests a colorimeter instrument on the water lake within Halema‘uma‘u, at Kīlauea's summit. Colorimetry is the measurement of the wavelength and intensity of light. USGS photo by M. Patrick. 

A pack string crossing the Yellowstone River in the remote Thorofare region. National Park Service photo courtesy of Sherrie and Ron White, August 21, 2016.

Imperial Geyser hot spring pool in Yellowstone National Park is about 30 m (about 100 ft) across and contains alkaline-Cl waters with a steam vent in the pool and mudpots outside the pool area (in the upper right part of this photo). USGS Photo by Pat Shanks, 2019.

Visitors in the busy Old Faithful area. National Park Service photo by Neal Herbert, May 27, 2017.

Map of roads in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. Source: Yellowstone Spatial Analysis Center.

A typical section of shoreline in the Kapoho area, formed by thick toothpaste lava that originated from Fissure 8 during the 2018 eruption. USGS photo by M. Zoeller.

Field observations today show that the diameters of the crater lake within Halema‘uma‘u at the summit of Kīlauea are about 94 m (308 ft) north-south and around 192-195 m (630-640 ft) east-west. Too much steam at the west end interfered with measurements this morning.

On January 17, 2020, USGS-HVO scientists and DOI Unoccupied Aerial System (UAS) team members collected three additional samples of water from the Halema‘uma‘u crater lake. Here, the sampling device and temperature logger were readied for takeoff. The plastic sleeve was attached to the UAS (drone) with a cord about 20 feet (6 m) long.

Schematic diagram of the magmatic system underneath Yellowstone caldera and the processes leading to a "shadow zone".

GeoGirls Geology and Technology Field Camp 2020

Cascades Volcano Observatory Open House May 9, 2020

A digital elevation map of Yellowstone National Park (left) with the location of Yellowstone Lake indicated by the white box. Satellite image (right) of the study site with collection location of core YL16-2C shown by the red circle. Map was originally published in Sabrina Brown’s dissertation (2019).

Sabrina Brown collecting samples from Yellowstone Lake core YL16-2C at the National Lacustrine Core Facility (LacCore) at the University of Minnesota.

A wide array of phototrophic microbial community textures exhibited in an alkaline (pH ~8.5) hot spring outflow channel in the Biscuit Basin, including thick mats, toadstools, ropes, and pinnacles. The differences in color are due to pigments (chlorophylls, bacteriochlorophylls, and carotenoids) produced by phototrophic microorganisms.

Sapphire Pool, an alkaline (pH ~7.5) spring in the Biscuit Basin area of the Upper Geyser Basin, Yellowstone National Park.

An unnamed small acidic (pH ~3) hot spring (with a temperature of about 55°C at the source) in the Gibbon Geyser Basin of Yellowstone National Park. The yellow region is due to the precipitation of sulfur by sulfide-oxidizing chemotrophic microorganisms.

Manuel Nathenson is a scientists emeritus with the USGS Volcano Science Center.

Map of seismicity (yellow circles) in the Yellowstone region during 2019. Gray lines are roads, red line shows the caldera boundary, Yellowstone National Park is outlined by black dashed line, and gray dashed lines denote state boundaries.

Map showing ice cover in the Yellowstone region. Light shaded areas bounded by black and red lines indicate areas covered during the Pinedale (about 20,000-15,000 years ago) and Bull Lake (about 150,000 years ago) glaciations, respectively. Blue lines are contours in thousands of feet on the maximum reconstructed Pinedale glacier surface.

Summary diagram of the geological record and timing of the Huckleberry Ridge Tuff eruption. See Swallow et al. (2019) for more details.

A sample of the digital elevation model from the 2019 LiDAR survey of Kīlauea, showing the vicinity of the former HVO office and Jaggar Museum in Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park.