Volcano Updates

Recent Work and News

Steamboat Geyser erupted on April 3—the second major water eruption of the geyser so far in 2024.

May means the start of the field season in Yellowstone, and teams will be in the park setting up the seasonal semi-permanent GPS network and performing maintenance on continuous monitoring sites in the latter half of the month.  During May 20-22, members of the Yellowstone Volcano Observatory consortium will also gather in Mammoth Hot Springs for the biennial coordination meeting, where they will share scientific results and discuss monitoring and research priorities.  The meeting will also include a public event in Gardiner, Montana.

Seismicity

During April 2024, the University of Utah Seismograph Stations, responsible for the operation and analysis of the Yellowstone Seismic Network, located 152 earthquakes in the Yellowstone National Park region. The largest event of the month was a micro earthquake of magnitude 3.1 located about 10 miles north-northeast of West Yellowstone, Montana, on April 23 at 3:30 AM MDT.  

April seismicity in Yellowstone was marked by two swarms:

1. An ongoing swarm of 86 earthquakes, located approximately 10 miles north-northeast of West Yellowstone, MT, occurred April 23–30. The largest earthquake in the sequence was the magnitude 3.1 mentioned above.

2. A swarm of 19 earthquakes, located approximately 6 miles north of West Yellowstone, MT, occurred April 28–29. The largest earthquake in the sequence was a magnitude 1.7 on April 28 at 11:58 PM MDT. 

Earthquake sequences like these are common and account for roughly 50% of the total seismicity in the Yellowstone region.

Yellowstone earthquake activity is currently at background levels.

Ground Deformation

During the month of April, continuous GPS stations in Yellowstone caldera showed subsidence, which has been ongoing since 2015, interrupted in summer months by a pause or slight uplift caused by seasonal changes related to snowmelt and groundwater conditions.  The caldera has subsided by about 3 cm (1.2 in) since the end of September.  A slight amount of subsidence (less than 1 cm, or a fraction of an inch) has occurred at Norris Geyser Basin over the past two months.

An example of GPS data can be found at http://www.unavco.org/instrumentation/networks/status/pbo/data/NRWY (click on Static Plots / Cleaned)