UBC and McGill researchers stir up a supervolcano

Using Plexiglas models filled with corn syrup, researchers from UBC have simulated the collapse of a volcano’s magma chamber—a catastrophic occurrence that can turn ordinary eruptions into so-called supervolcanoes.

"There’s currently no way to predict a supervolcano eruption," says Ben Kennedy, a post-doctoral fellow with UBC’s Department of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences and lead author on the study. "But this new information explains for the first time what happens inside a magma chamber as the roof caves in, and provides insights that could be useful when making hazard maps of such an eruption."

The study—published this week in Nature Geoscience—was conducted by Kennedy and Mark Jellinek (also with Earth and Ocean Sciences) and John Stix of McGill University. The researchers used relatively simple tools to simulate how magma in a volcano's chamber might behave if the roof of the chamber caved in. Essentially, the magma is stirred by roof debris falling into the chamber, causing flow effects that are unique to a supervolcano.

Supervolcanic eruptions are orders of magnitude greater than typical volcanic eruptions, and are capable of causing long-lasting changes to weather patterns and covering huge areas with lava and ash.

The eruption of Mount Tambora in Indonesia in 1815--the only known supervolcano eruption in modern history--was 100 times more powerful than Vesuvius or Mount St. Helens. It caused more than 100,000 deaths in Indonesia alone, and blew a column of ash about 70 kilometres into the atmosphere. The resulting disruptions of the planet's climate led 1816 to be christened "the year without summer."

"And this was a small supervolcano," notes Stix. "A really big one could create the equivalent of a global nuclear winter. There would be devastation for many hundreds of kilometres near the eruption and there would be would be global crop failures because of the ash falling from the sky, and even more important, because of the rapid cooling of the climate."

There are potential supervolcano sites all over the world, most famously under Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming.