Insights into the eruptions of Steamboat Geyser Release Date:
January 11, 2021
The tallest active geyser in the world has been erupting at a record pace since March 2018. Why are eruptions so energetic, what influences the intervals between eruptions, and why did Steamboat reactivate in the first place?
Yellowstone Caldera Chronicles is a weekly column written by scientists and collaborators of the Yellowstone Volcano Observatory. This week s contribution is from Mara H. Reed, former graduate student at the University of California, Berkeley.
Steamboat Geyser erupts in the golden light of sunrise on July 18th, 2019. The water-dominated part of a Steamboat eruption usually lasts anywhere from 3 to 90 minutes. Afterwards, a steam-dominated phase continues for many hours.
New Study Says Steamboat Geyser Reawakening Remains a Mystery
It s no reach to say that the ecosystem of Yellowstone National Park is one of the most dynamic and interesting in the world. It s a constantly changing environment that is not short on mystery. One of the biggest questions in the park over the past several years is why did Steamboat Geyser reawaken. A new study attempted to solve the mystery, but the conclusion is they still don t know.
If you re not familiar with Steamboat Geyser, it s reawakening back in 2018 has made it one of the must-visit parts of the Norris Geyser Basin in Yellowstone thanks to spectacular eruptions like this one.
By Ellen Fike, Cowboy State Daily
Researchers still can’t quite explain what caused a Yellowstone National Park geyser to reawaken in 2018, according to a recently published study.
The Steamboat Geyser, inside of the park’s Norris Basin, reawakened in 2018 after four years of complete dormancy. Since becoming active, the geyser has regularly erupted every year since then.
A recent study published by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America was penned by 11 researchers that investigated the geyser’s resurgence and its eruption dynamics.
“The reason for reactivation remains ambiguous,” the group concluded.