National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration
United States Department of Commerce


 

FY 2000

1998 eruption of Axial Volcano: Multibeam anomalies and seafloor observations

Embley, R.W., W.W. Chadwick, Jr., D. Clague, and D. Stakes

Geophys. Res. Lett., 26(23), 3425–3428, doi: 10.1029/1999GL002328 (1999)


Lava flows erupted during the January/February 1998 seismic swarm at Axial Volcano on the Juan de Fuca Ridge have been identified by differencing of pre- and post-event multibeam bathymetric surveys and by seafloor observations. A sheet flow more than 3 km in length and 500-800 m wide erupted from the uppermost south rift is the site of a robust hydrothermal system. 1998 lavas occur over about 9 km of the upper south rift zone, or about 20% of the along-axis length of the seismicity event (~50 km). The estimated volume of laval erupted is 18-76 × 10 m for the extrusion and 100-150 × 10 m for the intrusion. The total volume is consistent with the volume from modeling of seafloor strain measurements recorded during the event.




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