ALBERT

Description: In the period from January to June 2000 Mt. Etna exhibited an exceptional explosive activity characterised by a succession of 64 Strombolian and fire-fountaining episodes from the summit South-East crater. Textural analysis of the eruptive products reveals that the magma associated with the Strombolian phases had a much larger crystal content 〉55 vol% with respect to the magma discharged during the fire-fountain phases (~35 vol%). Rheological modelling shows that the crystal-rich magma falls in a region beyond a critical crystal content where the small addition of solid particles causes an exponential increase of the effective magma viscosity. When implemented into the modelling of steady magma ascent dynamics, the large crystal content of the Strombolian eruption phases results in a one order of magnitude decrease of mass flow-rate, and in the onset of conditions where small heterogeneities in the solid fraction carried by the magma translate into highly unsteady eruption dynamics. Therefore, we argue that crystallization on top of the magmatic column during the intermediate phases when magma was not discharged caused the conditions to shift from fire-fountain to Strombolian activity. The numerical simulations also provide a consistent interpretation of the association between fire-fountain activity and emergence of lava flows from the crater flanks.

Description: The eruption that started off the south coast of El Hierro, Canary Islands, in October 2011 has emitted intriguing eruption products found floating in the sea. These specimens appeared as floating volcanic "bombs" that have in the meantime been termed "restingolites" (after the close-by village of La Restinga) and exhibit cores of white and porous pumice-like material. Currently the nature and origin of these "floating stones" is vigorously debated among researchers, with important implications for the interpretation of the hazard potential of the ongoing eruption. The "restingolites" have been proposed to be either (i) juvenile high-silica magma (e.g. rhyolite), (ii) remelted magmatic material (trachyte), (iii) altered volcanic rock, or (iv) reheated hyaloclastites or zeolite from the submarine slopes of El Hierro. Here, we provide evidence that supports yet a different conclusion. We have collected and analysed the structure and composition of samples and compared the results to previous work on similar rocks found in the archipelago. Based on their high silica content, the lack of igneous trace element signatures, and the presence of remnant quartz crystals, jasper fragments and carbonate relicts, we conclude that "restingolites" are in fact xenoliths from pre-island sedimentary rocks that were picked up and heated by the ascending magma causing them to partially melt and vesiculate. They hence represent messengers from depth that help us to understand the interaction between ascending magma and crustal lithologies in the Canary Islands as well as in similar Atlantic islands that rest on sediment/covered ocean crust (e.g. Cape Verdes, Azores). The occurrence of these "restingolites" does therefore not indicate the presence of an explosive high-silica magma that is involved in the ongoing eruption.

Description: We studied three-dimensional (3-D) vesicle size distributions by X-ray microtomography in scoria collected during the relatively quiescent Phase II of the 2010 eruption at Eyjafjallajökull volcano, Iceland. Our goal was to compare the vesicle size distributions (VSDs) measured in these samples with those found in Stromboli volcano, Italy. Stromboli was chosen because its VSDs are well-characterized and show a correlation with eruption intensity: typical Strombolian activity produces VSDs with power-law exponents near 1, whereas larger and more energetic Vulcanian-type explosions and Plinian eruptions produce VSDs with power-law exponents near 1.5. The hypothesis to be tested was whether or not the samples studied in this work would contain VSDs similar to normal Strombolian products, display higher power-law exponents, or be described by exponential functions. Before making this comparison we tested the hypothesis that the phreatomagmatic nature of the Eyjafjallajökull eruption might have a significant effect on the VSDs. We performed 1 atm bubble-growth experiments in which the samples were inundated with water and compared them to similar, control, experiments without water inundation. No significant differences between the VSDs of the two sets of experiments were found, and the hypothesis is not supported by the experimental evidence; therefore, VSDs of magmatic and phreatomagmatic eruptions can be directly compared. The Phase II Eyjafjallajökull VSDs are described by power law exponents of ~ 0.8, typical of normal Strombolian eruptions. The comparable VSDs and behavior of Phase II of the Eyjafjallajökull 2010 eruption to Stromboli are interpreted to be a reflection of similar conduit systems in both volcanoes that are being constantly fed by the ascent of deep magma that mixes with resident magma at shallow depths. Such behavior implies that continued activity during Phase II of the Eyjafjallajökull eruption could be expected and would have been predicted, had our VSDs been measured in real time during the eruption. However, the products studied show no peculiar feature that could herald renewed eruption intensity observed in the following Phase III of the eruption.