A major earthquake could cause the Mauna Loa volcano to erupt, researchers said

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Kilauea has been a stellar volcano in Hawaii in recent decades, but its neighbor Mauna Loa isn’t slack in this section either, erupting every seven years on average, according to the geological record.

The world’s largest active volcano last appeared in 1984, when lava flows moved 4 miles from Hilo.

It looks like Mauna Loa is a little late.

Researchers at the University of Miami in Florida have published a paper saying that Mauna Loa may be close to its next eruption and that an earthquake of magnitude 6 or greater could trigger its eruption.

Not only did the newspaper warn of the possibility of a strong earthquake; Crackle says, if it happens, you will be on Kona side of mountain.

“If the rate (magma flow) continues at the current rate, it should be close,” said Falk Amelung, a professor of geophysics at the Rosenstiel School in Miami and one of the co-authors on the research, along with lead author Bovan Farago, a doctoral candidate and one of Amelung’s students.

To reach their conclusion, the researchers examined decade-old data taken from satellites and from Global Positioning System stations on Earth to model magma movements over time.

The study, a continuation of the work of Amelong, a former University of Hawaii researcher, was published in 2007, last month in Nature’s Scientific Reports.

It’s been two years since the USGS Hawaii Volcano Observatory changed the Mauna Loa alert level from “normal” to “advisory” after a steady increase in earthquakes and land swells. The guidelines indicate that the volcano is showing signs of “rising turbulence” compared to the typical long-term background levels.

In recent months, HVO researchers, armed with increasingly sophisticated tools, have recorded small but unusual changes at Mauna Loa that reflect a restless mountain:

>> In March, the agency reported that the trend of deformation, or land swelling, at the summit had reversed twice in five months, shifting back and forth from the outward (expansion) direction to the inward (systolic) direction.

>> A small, shallow earthquake of magnitude 3.2 occurred on March 6 at the summit of the caldera, Mokwawuu, causing a 4-inch collapse in a small portion of the crater. The accident led scientists to believe that the rift may have slid all the way to the surface.

>> In late March, a clinometer near the summit recorded for the first time a change in tilt, or slope angle, associated with changes in the Mauna Loa volcanic system.

Also in March, HVO in its weekly Volcano Watch column urged Hawaii residents to prepare for an eruption on Mauna Loa by creating a personal eruption plan.

The column suggested packing “go” bags containing essential items, including important documents such as a birth certificate, bonds, legal papers and medication, in case of an eviction order.

HVO said the preparation was especially important for those on the western side of the island because flows from the southwest rift zone at Mauna Loa can reach — and have reached — populated areas within hours.

Also in March, state lawmakers formally requested that the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency develop an evacuation plan for Hawaii County in the event of an eruption of the Mauna Loa volcano.

By decision of the Senate, plans will be made for all parts of the island except for North and South Kohala and parts of Hamakua.

Ingrid Johansson, HVO research scientist, said the mountain has been relatively calm in the past two months, both in terms of deformation and earthquakes.

“I still consider it in the Troubled Period,” Johansson said. “In some ways, the current lack of deformation is as interesting as previous activity.”

Researchers in Miami found plenty of turbulence in their examination of the mountain. They estimated that between 2014 and 2020 enough new magma to fill 44,000 Olympic-size pools broke into the vertical “dam-like magma body” below and south of the summit caldera, with the upper rim of the magma just over 1.5 miles below the surface. summit.

They were able to determine that in 2015 magma began to expand south, where the topographical height is lower and the weight of the mountain is not so heavy. But then the magma flow inexplicably diminished in 2017 and returned to its previous 2014-2015 horizontal state.

Such changes in the magma body have not been observed before.

“Our hypothesis is that this is related to less magma entry. So why has magma supply decreased? We don’t know. It could be related to Kilauea. But that’s just speculation,” Amelong said.

The researchers also found that there was ground movement unrelated to seismic activity along the horizontal fault below the eastern flank, while no such movement was observed under the western wing.

“The Kona Wing doesn’t do that. There is nothing,” he said.

Amelong said the findings suggest an earthquake occurred on the Kona side, because such movements under the mountain flanks are essential features of volcanic growth.

However, there are some uncertainties, including the magnitude of the earthquake. The magnitude can depend on the size of the fault patch that ruptures or on the amount of time that passes until the actual earthquake strikes. It’s possible, he said, that the longer you wait, the stronger the earthquake.

Amelong said the quake would literally shake the system, releasing gases similar to shaking a soda bottle, and generating the kind of pressure needed to break the rock over the magma.

But with no satellite data available to pinpoint movements prior to 2002, it’s hard to say exactly what awaits the volcano.

“We will continue to monitor, and this will eventually lead to better models for predicting the location of the next eruption,” Amelong said.

Johansson said the potential interaction between the earthquake on the horizontal fault under Mauna Loa and the eruption is something HVO has considered for some time.

As the paper notes, there were two magnitude-6 earthquakes before the big eruptions – in 1950 and 1984.

There is a chicken or egg side to them, Johansson said. While removing pressure from a magma chamber can cause magma to rise like soda in a bottle, increased pressure due to a magma flow imparts stresses to the surrounding rock, making earthquakes more likely.

“So while an earthquake could trigger an explosion, it’s possible that the earthquake itself wouldn’t happen unless Mauna Loa was preparing to explode anyway,” she said. “I expect we’ll see additional signs that Mauna Loa is heading toward a volcanic eruption before such an earthquake occurs.”

Hawaii experiences, on average, an earthquake of magnitude 6 or greater every 10 years, according to data from the Hawaii Volcano Observatory. The last 6.9-magnitude earthquake struck on May 4, 2018, just hours after the eruption of Lower Puna began at Kilauea.

Meanwhile, Mauna Loa has erupted 33 times since 1843, with periods between eruptions ranging from months to decades, according to HVO.

Scientists say that when Mauna Loa erupts, it tends to produce a lot of fast-moving lava that can flow into communities on both sides of the island.

Hilo has been threatened by seven Mauna Loa lava flows over the past century and a half, according to HVO, while flows have reached the island’s southern and western coasts eight times. In 1950, it took only three hours for lava to reach the Kona coast.

be ready

>> An example of the “go” bag checklist can be found at bit.ly/3qbLxmp.

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