The Soufriere Crater Lake as a calorimeter

Document Type

Article

Date of Original Version

12-1-1978

Abstract

IN 1971-72, 8 × 107m3 of basaltic andesite lava were extruded into the summit crater of Soufriere volcano, St. Vincent 1. The first half of the eruption took place entirely subaqueously and the second half almost entirely so and these facts have provided us with an unusual opportunity to carry out quantitative studies of several aspects of the eruption. Before the eruption the crater contained 7.5 × 10 7m3 of water and the potential of this lake as a giant condenser of volcanic gases has already been demonstrated2. We show here that by treating the crater lake as a giant calorimeter we can make reasonably accurate estimates of the rate at which heat was lost by the erupted lava and hence draw important conclusions about its mode of extrusion. The heat transfer data are consistent with the idea that the lava mass accumulated by the multiple extrusion of numerous small lava bodies1 rather than by extrusion of a single domelike mass, as has been proposed by other workers 3, 4. © 1978 Nature Publishing Group.

Publication Title, e.g., Journal

Nature

Volume

271

Issue

5643

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