Eruption ‘imminent’ for mile-wide hidden volcano near US coast: ‘Final stages of buildup’

An increase in seismic activity has prompted predictions that a mile-wide submarine volcano named the Axial Seamount will erupt near the United States West Coast by year’s end.

“The eruptions are pretty big,” Bill Chadwick, a volcanologist at Oregon State University who studies the fire-spouting formation, told KOIN.

Located 300 miles off Oregon’s Coast, the Axial Seamount is the “most active volcano in the Northeast Pacific, which maybe some people don’t know because it’s hidden under the ocean,” Chadwick said.

Indeed, the underwater flamethrower has erupted three times in the past three decades, blowing its stack in 1998, 2011 and 2015, he wrote in a blog post. Meanwhile, a recent study published in Nature identified multiple pools of magma beneath the volcano.

But don’t prep for a fiery apocalypse just yet — if and when the volcano does blow its top, it will likely pose little risk to the public.

Due to the shield structure of the submerged peak, the Axial Seamount will simply split at the surface and cause the magma to burble forth, negating the risk of a tsunami or other calamity.


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Eruption ‘imminent’ for mile-wide hidden volcano near US coast: ‘Final stages of buildup’

“The eruptions are pretty big,” said a volcanologist at Oregon State University.

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A little more information on this particular volcano.....

Mid-Ocean Ridges​

Most of the volcanic eruptions on Earth occur on the mid-ocean ridges, but oceanographers have only recently been able to detect them. Mid-ocean ridges spread out like the seams on a baseball, across the floor of the world's oceans. They form extensive volcanic mountain ranges, averaging 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) wide, 1,000 to 2,100 meters (3,280 to 6,888 feet) high, and extend for 65,000 kilometers (40,300 miles) around Earth.

The Ring of Fire is the name given to the margin of the Pacific Basin where active volcanoes are common. Also known for its tectonic activity, the Ring of Fire is a zone of frequent earthquakes. These phenomena are manifestations of basin-encircling subduction zones where the Pacific Plate slides under another plate. The volcanic arcs are on the overriding plate and typically are parallel to the ocean trench that marks the downturning of the subducting Pacific Plate.

The Atlantic Mid-ocean Ridge is the most continuous and longest, extending from the Arctic Ocean to beyond the southern tip of Africa. Many of these ridges have spawned submarine volcanoes that lay astride the spreading zone. The Axial Seamount is an example of a submarine volcano rising from a mid-ocean ridge. It is located on the Juan de Fuca Ridge, a prominent feature on the seafloor of the northeast Pacific Ocean, about 484 kilometers (300 miles) west of Oregon and Washington.

Volcanoes, Submarine | Encyclopedia.com

Volcanoes, Submarine One of the most exciting dimensions of the Earth-building process is volcanism . The power and destructive capability of volcanoes is well known, but there are many more volcanoes underwater, termed submarine volcanoes, than there are on land. Some are quite active with...

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