AVO News

On January 11, 2006 Augustine Volcano in south-central Alaska ended an almost 20-year period of repose with a series of 13 magmatic eruptions over the next 20 days. This eruption was preceded by roughly eight months of increasing unrest that included escalating earthquake activity, deformation of the volcanic edifice, gas emission and small phreatic explosions. The explosive phase of the eruption produced ash clouds to ~40,000 ft ASL that traversed Cook Inlet and south across the Gulf of Alaska, interfering with commercial air traffic, and generated pyroclastic flows and lahars on all flanks of the volcano. This was followed by a protracted period of lava extrusion from late January until mid-March. The magma formed a new summit lava dome and two blocky lava flows that moved down the north and northeast flanks of the volcano. Large block and ash flows were frequently generated when portions of the growing lava dome and flows failed. This eruption provides an opportunity to closely observe the accumulation, migration and eruption of high silica andesite to dacitic magma and related processes during both explosive and effusive behavior.

As a result of it's proximity to communities in south-central Alaska Augustine is a well-studied and -instrumented volcano. The volcano has been monitored seismically since 1970, and was instrumented with continuous GPS (CGPS) receivers by the EarthScope/Plate Boundary Observatory in 2003. The long period of precursory unrest (May 2005 to January 2006) allowed for the deployment of additional instrumentation that included six broadband seismometers, five temporary CGPS receivers, an atmospheric pressure transducer, two web-cameras and five Ocean Bottom Seismometers (OBS).

For this AGU session we seek presentations on all aspects of Augustine Volcano and especially the 2006 eruption. Submissions from researchers within all disciplines focused on active volcanic processes are encouraged. For further information please contact: Jessica Larsen, faust@gi.alaska.edu, John Power, jpower@usgs.gov, or Katharine Bull, Katharine_Bull@dnr.state.ak.us