Volcanic California - Including Eagle Lake!

[Cudedog]

Probably most of you roll your eyes when I post about my love of volcanoes, but there were two really interesting articles I found posted online this morning that I found fascinating:

With Eight Threatening Volcanoes, USGS Says California Deserves Close Monitoring [includes cool slide show!]

"While Mount Shasta unsurprisingly tops USGS's list of very-high threat volcanoes in California, there are seven other volcanic areas in the state that are also young, nervy, jacked up on magma and "likely to erupt."

http://www.seattlepi.com/local/science/article/With-8-dangerous-volcanoes-California-has-a-11746331.php#photo-13666409

and:

Of all Cascade Volcanoes, Rainier is the most dangerous

http://www.seattlepi.com/local/science/article/Cascade-volcanoes-Mount-Rainier-is-the-most-11743019.php

Then there is the "Eagle Lake Volcanic Field". Lots of interesting and fun volcanic features to look at in and around Eagle Lake! Check out this USGS page:

https://volcanoes.usgs.gov/volcanoes/eagle_lake_field/

Lots of lava (igneous) rocks to look at in Merrill campground!

Anne

[Queen]

Volcanos have always freaked me out. Probably visiting Mt. Vesuvius and Pompeii when I was a kid, seeing people and animals encased in lava... kinda messes with a ten year old head a bit.

[JudyJB]

My elderly aunt whose parents were Greek went to Vesuvius when she was a child, but wisely made her and her sisters stay home because it was so gruesome for kids! Smart.

[Queen]

My older brother told me they were going to wake up and come after me. I spent the night sitting in the well-lit campground bathroom, shaking like a leaf.

[MandysMom]

I read that to Mel off local kcra news this morning as we waited in chemo. Another reason to move but not sure where.
Velda

[snowball]

I live in the almost shadow of what I understand to be the biggest of them all....Yellowstone....can't worry about it what happens happens....
sheila

[Cudedog]

My older brother told me they were going to wake up and come after me. I spent the night sitting in the well-lit campground bathroom, shaking like a leaf.

Back in the early '50's, my Dad moved his young family from the midwest to Hollywood so that he could transition from radio into the brand-new medium of television. He then worked in television for many, many years, until he retired (he was a technician, not a performer).

Consequently, we had one of the first tv's on the block - I don't remember how we got it, perhaps it was sent home by the studio he worked for. All the neighbors were totally enthralled by this new technology, and for a while our house was pretty mobbed with neighbors coming and going (until they got their own tv sets - maybe that was part of the plan!).

Anyway, when I was seven or eight years old, I watched the 1935 version of "The Last Days of Pompeii" one afternoon. I was completely and totally terrified by this thing - the mobs of helpless people running and screaming was something, as a young child, I had never before imagined (my, how times have changed!) to be possible. Fiery, exploding mountains a complete and total astonishment. How could this be even possible?

We then lived in the San Fernando Valley, north of Los Angeles (and Hollywood). In those days there were not so many people, and not so much smog - so I could easily see the range of hills in the distance that surrounded the valley, out our living room window.

After watching "Pompeii", I had nightmares for months, would wake up screaming, and my parents could not convince me that any (to my impressionable young mind, probably all) of the surrounding hills I watched with dread were not volcanoes, due to erupt at any time, most probably right now, today.

Over time (again, it was months. My parents must have been at their wits end) my terrors gradually subsided, as they do in the way of children, probably to be replaced with some other terror that I can no longer remember.

The interesting thing about all of this is that I can pinpoint this experience as the precise moment that my interest in, and fascination by, volcanoes first began.

An interest and passion that has stayed with me all of my life.

Funny how that is.

Anne

[hokiephile]

I live in the almost shadow of what I understand to be the biggest of them all....Yellowstone....can't worry about it what happens happens....
sheila

Snowball, have you seen that docudrama The Discovery Channel did about what will go down when Yellowstone blows? It's called "Supervolcano."
You can watch it on youtube and Netflix.

Terry

[snowball]

nope live close enough no hope it blows we all do
sheila living with her head in the sand

[Cudedog]

nope live close enough no hope it blows we all do
sheila living with her head in the sand

LOL.

Sheila, I think you are pretty safe.

For now. . .

Last I researched Yellowstone, I seem to remember that Yellowstone has periodic activity about every 650,000 years or so. Although one can never be sure about volcanoes (however, the science of predicting volcanic eruptions has come a long way, thanks in part to the studies of the eruptions of St. Helen's and Mt. Pinatubo) likely Yellowstone has about 50,000 +/- years to go.

And, should it erupt before then, it is likely that it will give plenty of warning. Where everyone in the United States east of Yellowstone will need to go is another matter. . .

On the other hand, there is another "supervolcano" in the continental United States, located right here in good ol' California, that few people have heard of. This is the Long Valley Caldera, part of the complex of volcanoes around the famous ski resort, Mammoth Mountain.

Being a California Girl, I'm keeping my eye on that one!

If anyone, like me, has an interest in volcanoes, I strongly recommend the book "Fire Mountains of the West, the Cascade and Mono Lake Volcanoes", 3rd edition, by Stephen Harris.

https://www.amazon.com/Fire-Mountains-West-Volcanoes-2005-07-30/dp/B01FGMWMEI/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1502725805&sr=8-2&keywords=fire+mountains+of+the+west+the+cascade+and+mono+lake+volcanoes

Excellent, excellent book. Written so that the layperson can understand it, it is kind of a "travelogue" of the major western volcanoes (there are a lot of them!). It tells what kind of volcano they are, where they are located, and how to get there if one would like to visit one (or all!) of them.

It also describes whether or not any of these volcanoes is ever likely to erupt again.

The answer? A resounding YES!!

Anne