April 17, 2021 • 27 mins
In recent days the Caribbean nation of St. Vincent has been buried under ash by volcanic eruptions. Meanwhile, spectacular drone footage of the lava-belching volcano outside of Reykjavik, Iceland continues to intrigue and amaze. This week, Christine and JJ break down the terrifying and mesmerizing visuals of erupting volcanos. Then, set your creep-o-metre to high for a brief description of the aftermath from one of history's most famous volcanic disasters: the haunting ruins of Pompeii.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
JJ Hunt (00:04):
Talk description to me with Christine Malec and JJ
Hunt.
Christine Malec (00:29):
Hi, I'm Christine Malec.
JJ Hunt (00:30):
And I'm JJ Hunt. This is talk description to Me where
the visuals of current eventsand the world around us get
hashtag in description richconversations.
Christine Malec (00:47):
We're going to be talking about volcanoes
today. But before we do that, wejust wanted to make a quick note
that we are now on clubhouse.
And we have a club. So if yousearch for a talk description to
me on clubhouse platform, youwill find us so we really
recommend that you follow us getengaged with us, we will be
(01:07):
starting to host events,probably in May. It's pretty
exciting. We're planning toinvite some guest experts to do
some explanation alongsidedescription of stuff that
interests us, and we think willinterest you too. So check it
out on the clubhouse. And todaywe're going to be talking about
(01:27):
something that's very much inthe news, which is volcanoes and
particularly in St. Vincent,which is ongoing. Unfortunately
for the residents there. So, JJ,I think we were we were going to
start with the visuals kind ofpre eruption.
JJ Hunt (01:46):
Yeah, I think it's a good idea to talk about the what
this volcano looks like whenthey're not erupting because
this volcano is just part oflife on the island. And so it's
there all the time. And sotalking about what it looks
like, I think is a good startingpoint. It's how it looks all the
time. But it also when youunderstand the structure, it
(02:09):
plays into the understanding ofwhat's going on when the
eruptions are happening. So Itook some pre eruption photos of
this mountain. So the mountainis the volcano is called lesu La
Soufrire. And it is a 4000 foottall, 1200 meter mountain range.
(02:30):
And I've got an aerial photohere that shows the upper
portion of this volcano and it'sin a mountain range. So it's a
it doesn't always from allangles have that classic
volcano. You know, it's not aperfect cone, but it is from the
front. And so I've got an aerialshot here that's looking down at
the upper portion of thevolcano, and the exterior
(02:54):
appears to be almost corrugated.
So it's a it's this undulatingcorrugated outside with smooth
rises and valleys that lead allthe way down the slopes. And
it's uniformly green. So it'sblanketed in lush ground cover
no trees, no bushes, no visiblerock, it's just looks like a
mossy green on the outside ofthis mountain. And it's topped
(03:17):
the mountain is topped insteadof being a perfect cone with a
peak at the top, it's flattened.
And then there are overlappingcraters at the top of this
mountain. And the overlappingcraters suggest to me that there
have been a number of vents oropenings at the top of this
(03:39):
volcano over the aeons that'sjust the that's my you know lay
person's understanding of this.
The crater I believe that we'remost concerned with now is
furthest away from us in thisimage because it's the only
complete crater suggesting to methat it's the most recent one.
And at the center of this crateris it's what looks like a big
dark cow Patty, right in thecenter of this crater. It's
(04:04):
dark, it's it's hard and itlooks like a big cow Patty, and
this is what's known as a lavadome. I dug up another photo
that was taken in December 2020and and things look a little bit
different in this image. So thefirst image I described the
aerial shot I'm guessing is afew years ago because this lava
(04:25):
dome inside this crater is quitedark. This new photo that I
found from December 2020 thereis the big lava dome, but it is
now covered with moss, it'sgreened over. Beside it so still
inside the crater but besidethis lava dome and what would
(04:46):
have been the moat right if itwas actually liquid is a smaller
black dome, with steam risingout of it. This is a new lava
dome. And it kind of looks a bitlike an anthill. And it's as if
the black soil has been pushedup through an underground tunnel
and dumped out of the hole. Imean, that's is what's
(05:09):
happening. So that's how that'swhy it looks like an anthill.
Because that's how ants dig out.
That's how these these lavadomes get built is that soil
gets pushed up or or materialgets pushed up from inside,
pushed out around the outsideand around the top. And then
what you get is this layer bylayer build up of a dome. And
(05:31):
then there's steam rising out ofthe top that was in December of
2020. In my understanding isthat on April, the ninth Friday,
April, the ninth at 8 (05:40):
41am, on the Caribbean island of St.
Vincent La Soufrire beganerupting. And my understanding
is that it blew through this newlava dome, and completely
decimated it completelydecimated the old lava dome. And
(06:01):
it has completely reshaped thepeak of this mountain entirely.
So in fact, the description thatI just gave you is likely no
longer an accurate descriptionof the landscape. It's probably
changed dramatically by now.
Christine Malec (06:17):
Can we take a step back for a second? What did
you mean by cone shaped versussome other shape? Was that
specific to volcanoes ormountains in general?
JJ Hunt (06:26):
Yeah, so the classic volcano that most of us have in
mind is a perfect cone risingout of an otherwise flat
landscape, like as if, as if avolcano is a perfect mountain
unto itself. You know, allalone, and that does sometimes
happen. But often volcanoes arepart of mountain ranges. So
(06:48):
there are other mountains aroundit's part of a chain of
mountains and, and so the frontof La Soufrire is conical. So
it's coming up to that point,but it's also part of a mountain
chain, so it's not standing onits own. That's, that's what I
meant by that.
Christine Malec (07:07):
Okay. Okay. So what are things looking like
now.
JJ Hunt (07:11):
So most of the footage that I've seen, it's all about
an ash cloud. This isn't so muchabout the classic red hot lava
idea of of a volcano. So when avolcano like this explodes, when
this one exploded, peopleflipped on their cameras all
over the place, people startedtaking pictures and images or
(07:33):
satellite pictures. And the veryfirst thing that you see is this
cloud of ash shooting up intothe sky, and it rose something
like 15 kilometers in an alreadygray sky, just enormous, so big,
that for many people takingimages on the island, it was
(07:53):
difficult to get the wholepicture in the whole cloud in
one image, it was bigger thanthe frame of their that their
camera would allow them tocapture. And it's just enormous
actually found a satellite imagethat was taken just moments
after the initial eruption. Andthe ash cloud actually covers
the entire island. No landformis visible in this satellite
(08:16):
image. It's completely eclipsedby this enormous cloud of gray
ash. And from the ground. Ifyou're, again, look, taking one
of these videos, this giantcloud of churning gray, dark ash
looks like it's repeatedlyboiling over. So imagine if you
will an ever expanding head ofdull gray cauliflower. So as it
(08:42):
grows, another head begins togrow beside it. And then another
one on top of that, and so onand so on each one of these ever
expanding heads of graycauliflower, growing and
engulfing each other. And it allappears to happen in slow
motion, because of the distanceand people are so far away looks
(09:04):
like these things are happening.
in slow motion. It's actuallyvery similar to how Mount St.
Helens erupted. So that was inWashington State in May 1980.
And for many of us in the US andin Canada that volcano eruption,
Mount St. Helens, is kind of THEvolcanic eruption. And the
initial explosion of Mount St.
(09:30):
Helens was very similar to whathappened in St. Vincent.
Christine Malec (09:34):
So you said that's not necessarily the
classic image that we have inour head of a volcano. What do
you mean by that? What's the ashversion versus the hot lava
version?
JJ Hunt (09:45):
So in this version, the St. Vincent kind of volcanoes.
Right now most of the imagesthat we're getting are about the
ash that fall to the ground.
Sometimes the ash is a hugeproblem. And sometimes the lava
is a huge problem, and sometimesit's both so With St. Vincent,
the ash cloud then begins tofall right all of this ash
starts raining down. And againcell phone videos make it look
(10:08):
like snow storms at night Thesky is totally dark and weather
and I don't know if these videosare all taken at night or during
the day when the sun is justcompletely eclipsed by this
cloud. And there are gray flakesraining down and they streak
through the image to the pointwhere visibility is obscured.
It's really difficult to seeclearly it is like being in a
(10:31):
snowstorm. And then the ashcovers everything like a thick
gray blanket, the lush hillsidesthat I described completely gray
palm trees are down the frondssagging and gray cars are
covered roofs covered. I sawsome photos of footprints in the
fine because it's a very finepowdery ash. And I saw some
(10:52):
footprints that look likethey're three or four inches
deep. I've heard someonedescribe it as a lunar
landscape. And I would say thatis accurate. For some of the
photos that I've seen. There isa lava flow here that it that is
causing some some trouble, butthat most of the images that I'm
finding are not of that the lavaa lot of the time especially if
(11:15):
you're frankly a kid thinking ofa volcano, right like when we
were kids and we all made thosevolcanoes and in public school
out of paper mache Shea and thenyou would put vinegar and baking
soda in the middle so they wouldhave wrapped in the lava pours
over the edges. It's the it'sthe cinematic version of a
volcano. That kind of volcanohas it has a different look in a
(11:39):
different feel to it. That iswhen the lava comes pouring over
the sides, bubbles up from thetop pours over the side and
streams of lava come runningdown. And actually in Iceland in
March, the world was shown whatthis looks like in a way that it
(11:59):
really hasn't been before. So inMarch, just outside of Reykjavik
in Iceland, the volcano erupted.
And it's a relatively smallscale volcano. It's not
exceedingly dangerous. And it'svery photogenic. So people have
rushed from Reykjavik touristshave come in with cameras and
(12:22):
drones and filmed all kinds gotin all kinds of footage of this
of this shield volcano. So ashield volcano is a low profile
volcano. So picture CaptainAmerica's round shield that kind
of you know comes to a slow riseand then dips back down. That's
what this is. This is a lowvolcano i think it's it's under
(12:44):
400 meters tall, so only 1300feet and on March 19, a 600
meter long fissure. It's afissure vent it opened up so
this is a linear crack in thesurface. And it began spewing
bright orange lava and the lavais relatively slow moving so no
(13:05):
buildings were at risk. Like Isaid people came came in with
their cameras with their drones.
And it does actually have in thecenter of this of this shield
volcano that is a classicvolcano peak that is spewing red
hot lava. So the area of thelandscape around is is either
(13:26):
snow covered or it's dry brownkind of tundra landscape. And
this volcano looks like a raisedIsland of dark, black rock. And
at the center is this peak thisconical volcano with a cracked
open top. And that's what'sspewing lava. So at the core is
(13:48):
this pool, a small lake ofmolten lava and it is white hot.
So in a lot of the imagesthere's no detail in there. It's
just to contrast it's just twowhite bright white hot lava. And
then it's around the edges ofthe pool of the lava pool. It
(14:11):
appears kind of brilliantglowing orange, truly like
liquid fire. And it's boiling.
It's bubbling like a pot oftomato sauce and heated globs
bubble up to the surface of thepool. And then they burst when
they hit the tops of this thickmolten lava spurts out and it
(14:31):
lands on the sides of the peak.
And then the color fades whenwhen the when the when the lava
bursts out, flies through theair drops back down to the
ground. Once it's hit the groundthe sides of the volcano. It
then begins to fade the colorfades to the deep red of coals
and a dying campfire. And thislava pool that's inside this
(14:53):
cone has actually broken downone side The jet black peak. So
imagine you're making a volcanoshape out of sand, and you then
slowly fill the center of itwith water. When the water gets
to the top and begins to spillover, it's likely going to
topple the weakest edge, andthat's going to allow more water
(15:15):
to escape. That's basicallywhat's happened here with lava
the lava has eaten away at oneside of the peak, and then more
of the lava is able to pour outand rushes over the edge. And in
this in this little island ofvolcanic of hardened volcanic
material, this island of darkrock, the lava has rushed over
the edge of the of the volcanopeak, and it's filling a raised
(15:38):
plateau so it forms a largeropen pool. And because there's
more surface area, the brightorange lava begins to harden and
it forms a gray crust. Butunderneath that gray crust is
still liquid like molten lava.
It's it's still bright orange,and so the the crust is streaked
(16:03):
with these cracks these shiftingcracks, it kind of looks a
little bit like very slow motionlightning bolts, because they
move and shift as the crackedcrust on top kind of floats on
this molten lava underneath. Andthen there are several spots
where the lava then flows overthe edge of the plateau like a
(16:24):
very gentle waterfall. And thelava creeps down the side of
this low black Island toward thetundra and it oozes with the
consistency of like, thick ladlethe gravy that's been sitting at
the buffet too long, right likeit's really thick and clumpy and
loses over. And people gatheraround the edges of this jet
(16:50):
black volcanic island in theplaces where the lava is oozing
down toward the tundra. And it'smoving so slowly at this point,
because the more it cools, thethicker it gets, the slower it
moves, that people can actuallystand within 20 feet of this
oozing glowing orange lava andwatch it slowly creep forward,
(17:13):
and the gray crust forms on topas it cools. And that's how this
island of black material getsbuilt. More lava pours over the
sides. It oozes onto the tundra.
it hardens and cools. And as itcools, it turns to this black
rock and that's how this islandmoves bigger and bigger and
bigger.
Christine Malec (17:34):
So when you look at images of St. Vincent
and of Iceland, which one ismore scary.
JJ Hunt (17:40):
Ah, see that's a great question. Intellectually I am
more afraid for the people inSt. Vincent. I understand that.
That is a terrible situation.
This is life and death for thepeople in St. Vincent. Their
water supply has beencontaminated by the ash. Their
power is out. 16 to 20,000people have been evacuated. They
(18:01):
take this very seriously Thelast volcano - I'm not sure it
was the last one but the mostdeadly time that this specific
volcano erupted in 1902 over1000 people died. This is
serious, serious stuff. But itjust looks like grey ash. It is
dirty looking. It is awfullooking. But it doesn't have the
(18:22):
molten fire, this liquid stoneof the Iceland volcano.
That'stantalizingly scary,right? People actually are right
at the edges of this thing. Andwhen the crust starts forming,
some of the boneheads will runright up and kick it because
(18:45):
they want it they like it, theyjust want to push it, they want
to see what it feels like theywant to get right in there.
Because it's fascinatinglydangerous, right? And so this is
a funny thing about volcanoesthey are, I mean, the
destruction that can come fromthese things, the loss of life
can be awful. But we'refascinated by them. There's a
(19:09):
terrifying beauty to them. Sowhile I might know
intellectually, that the thekind of ash volcano, that kind
of suffering and by the way,there is a there is a lava flow
in the in St. Vincent, that isthreatening houses and is
(19:29):
threatening people. It's justnot the thing that everyone's
taking pictures of right? InIceland everyone's gathering
around to take amazing photosand to take amazing pictures
because we're seeing the moltencore of our planet bubble up to
the surface. And it's scarybecause it's hot, it's liquid
fire, and we know if it was on alarger scale, if this was closer
(19:54):
to a city closer to a town, thetown would be decimated. When
lava flows start pouring, youcan't stop them. They just go
where they're going to go.
There's nothing that can bedone. They are so destructive.
Christine Malec (20:09):
And I understand that there's a
possibly incipient volcano inthe Congo that people have their
eye on. What's that about?
JJ Hunt (20:17):
Yeah. So while I was looking up information on what's
going on in St. Vincent, I cameacross an article about another
volcano. And in some newsreports, this is in the Virunga
National Park in the Congo. Sothere's been a lot of volcanic
activity there in recent years,that mirrors activity proceeding
major eruptions in 1977, and2002. So the same activity
(20:42):
they're seeing now led to majoreruptions back then. So people
are concerned that this, thisvolcano could erupt again in the
same kind of devastating way.
But they've been major fundingcuts to the monitoring systems
and the personnel there. Sothere's real concern that the
final warning system warningsigns are going to be missed.
But I thought it might be worthtaking a very quick look at this
(21:03):
because it's quite possible thisis going to erupt in the next
few years. So this is a youknow, an opportunity to file
away a bit of a description inour mind so that you know if and
when that happens, we have anidea of what of what the
situation looked like. So thisis that classic looking cone
volcano, the conical volcanothat's more or less on its own,
(21:24):
it's on it's on top of a conicalmountain this this volcano
crater, and inside this this bigcrater, there's a very wide open
crater, a very dark rock. And soinside the crater is an angry
active mini cone. So you've gota conical mountain, the conical
(21:47):
volcano with a huge crater atthe top. Inside that crater is a
smaller what's called a minicone so it looks like a tiny
crater inside a bigger crater.
And it's a perfect circle with araised edge. And inside is a
lava lake that glows brightorange, and it has a cracked
(22:11):
crust on top that's dotted withbright white hot spots. It's
bright enough that it turns thenight sky into this eerie
Halloween orange color. It'sjust such a bright lava lake
inside this mini cone. And allof the photos I've seen steam is
constantly rising from this minicone inside this greater crater.
(22:34):
And like I said, it's one tofile away this image because it
seems likely that this is goingto erupt in a dramatic way
sometime in the next few years.
Christine Malec (22:45):
One of the most striking visuals for kind of I
guess the consequence of anatural disaster is the ruins of
Pompei. And it's something thatI've heard referenced many times
as being eerie and fascinatingbut creepy at the same time. And
(23:07):
it's about the way that theeruption of Vesuvius was so
sudden that it it left peopleright in place, and we get a
weird cross section creepysnapshot and it's referred to
often. But I wonder I thought itwould be really interesting to
talk about that and do somedescription. So JJ, what are
(23:27):
some of the most common visualsthat you see on the topic?
JJ Hunt (23:31):
So what happened is, in 79 AD Mount Vesuvius erupts. And
it covers everyone in this ash,something like four to six
meters of volcanic ash. Itlands, hard lands heavy, and it
just buries everything. Itessentially entombed the entire
(23:52):
town in volcanic ash, and thatbecomes hardened rock. And over
the centuries, the organicmaterial inside this layer of
rock, eventually, you knowdecomposes so all the wood, all
the people all the straw, allthe animals decomposes and what
(24:12):
that leaves are perfect voidsinside this hardened ash. And so
archaeologists were then able touse these voids as moulds to mak
plaster casts they pump plastein chip away the volcanic as
and what's left are essentiallsculptures that are exac
(24:34):
replicas of people in their lasmoments of life as this volcani
ash is raining down on them. Ive not been to to Pompei in p
rson so I pulled up some photoand again, like you say, they
re referenced all the time. Tey get shown all the time but w
en you see take a moment and lok at them, and go through t
(24:55):
em flip through them they I man they really are incredi
ly creepy. So stone figures, ofen huddled together in the fe
al position. There's one tht's quite famous - I want to ca
l them sculptures because thats what they look like but they
re not - this one figure crawlng along the ground with their h
(25:21):
ad up. And you can see their libs are quite clearly defined t
is figure has a face I'm not sre if that face would have been
he facial features would have ben actually created by the plas
er being pumped into the voidor have someone scraped the the
ye sockets and and you knw, aligned for the mouth,
(25:42):
or perhaps not perhaps, that leel of detail was possible
by filling in this, this mouldhis void with plaster. And,
and there's another image here oa, of a person sitting down
ith their knees up. So they'vegot their legs tucked in their k
ees or pulled to their chst, they've got the hands cla
(26:04):
ped together and held kind of tothe to the bridge of the nose
ith the head bowed down. Andhis person is made of again of
his plastic material and it'sind of flaky, it looks like
It looks like a charred bodso that there's there's
ome flakiness to the plaster thee's a there's a gray color to
(26:26):
the plaster that makes it lookike a perfect figure that was
hen charred, that that's reallyhat this person looks like. The
're animals to a harnessed hrse lying on its side. And,
you know, because the harnesswas made of leather that you
can find where the straps were.
All of these figures, like I sy, the facial features are not
(26:53):
ecessarily always clear, bt the body language is absolute
y clear. And it's it's really qite haunting.
Christine Malec (27:05):
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Talk description to me with Christine Malec and JJ
Hunt.
Christine Malec (00:29):
Hi, I'm Christine Malec.
JJ Hunt (00:30):
And I'm JJ Hunt. This is talk description to Me where
the visuals of current eventsand the world around us get
hashtag in description richconversations.
Christine Malec (00:47):
We're going to be talking about volcanoes
today. But before we do that, wejust wanted to make a quick note
that we are now on clubhouse.
And we have a club. So if yousearch for a talk description to
me on clubhouse platform, youwill find us so we really
recommend that you follow us getengaged with us, we will be
(01:07):
starting to host events,probably in May. It's pretty
exciting. We're planning toinvite some guest experts to do
some explanation alongsidedescription of stuff that
interests us, and we think willinterest you too. So check it
out on the clubhouse. And todaywe're going to be talking about
(01:27):
something that's very much inthe news, which is volcanoes and
particularly in St. Vincent,which is ongoing. Unfortunately
for the residents there. So, JJ,I think we were we were going to
start with the visuals kind ofpre eruption.
JJ Hunt (01:46):
Yeah, I think it's a good idea to talk about the what
this volcano looks like whenthey're not erupting because
this volcano is just part oflife on the island. And so it's
there all the time. And sotalking about what it looks
like, I think is a good startingpoint. It's how it looks all the
time. But it also when youunderstand the structure, it
(02:09):
plays into the understanding ofwhat's going on when the
eruptions are happening. So Itook some pre eruption photos of
this mountain. So the mountainis the volcano is called lesu La
Soufrire. And it is a 4000 foottall, 1200 meter mountain range.
(02:30):
And I've got an aerial photohere that shows the upper
portion of this volcano and it'sin a mountain range. So it's a
it doesn't always from allangles have that classic
volcano. You know, it's not aperfect cone, but it is from the
front. And so I've got an aerialshot here that's looking down at
the upper portion of thevolcano, and the exterior
(02:54):
appears to be almost corrugated.
So it's a it's this undulatingcorrugated outside with smooth
rises and valleys that lead allthe way down the slopes. And
it's uniformly green. So it'sblanketed in lush ground cover
no trees, no bushes, no visiblerock, it's just looks like a
mossy green on the outside ofthis mountain. And it's topped
(03:17):
the mountain is topped insteadof being a perfect cone with a
peak at the top, it's flattened.
And then there are overlappingcraters at the top of this
mountain. And the overlappingcraters suggest to me that there
have been a number of vents oropenings at the top of this
(03:39):
volcano over the aeons that'sjust the that's my you know lay
person's understanding of this.
The crater I believe that we'remost concerned with now is
furthest away from us in thisimage because it's the only
complete crater suggesting to methat it's the most recent one.
And at the center of this crateris it's what looks like a big
dark cow Patty, right in thecenter of this crater. It's
(04:04):
dark, it's it's hard and itlooks like a big cow Patty, and
this is what's known as a lavadome. I dug up another photo
that was taken in December 2020and and things look a little bit
different in this image. So thefirst image I described the
aerial shot I'm guessing is afew years ago because this lava
(04:25):
dome inside this crater is quitedark. This new photo that I
found from December 2020 thereis the big lava dome, but it is
now covered with moss, it'sgreened over. Beside it so still
inside the crater but besidethis lava dome and what would
(04:46):
have been the moat right if itwas actually liquid is a smaller
black dome, with steam risingout of it. This is a new lava
dome. And it kind of looks a bitlike an anthill. And it's as if
the black soil has been pushedup through an underground tunnel
and dumped out of the hole. Imean, that's is what's
(05:09):
happening. So that's how that'swhy it looks like an anthill.
Because that's how ants dig out.
That's how these these lavadomes get built is that soil
gets pushed up or or materialgets pushed up from inside,
pushed out around the outsideand around the top. And then
what you get is this layer bylayer build up of a dome. And
(05:31):
then there's steam rising out ofthe top that was in December of
2020. In my understanding isthat on April, the ninth Friday,
April, the ninth at 8 (05:40):
41am, on the Caribbean island of St.
Vincent La Soufrire beganerupting. And my understanding
is that it blew through this newlava dome, and completely
decimated it completelydecimated the old lava dome. And
(06:01):
it has completely reshaped thepeak of this mountain entirely.
So in fact, the description thatI just gave you is likely no
longer an accurate descriptionof the landscape. It's probably
changed dramatically by now.
Christine Malec (06:17):
Can we take a step back for a second? What did
you mean by cone shaped versussome other shape? Was that
specific to volcanoes ormountains in general?
JJ Hunt (06:26):
Yeah, so the classic volcano that most of us have in
mind is a perfect cone risingout of an otherwise flat
landscape, like as if, as if avolcano is a perfect mountain
unto itself. You know, allalone, and that does sometimes
happen. But often volcanoes arepart of mountain ranges. So
(06:48):
there are other mountains aroundit's part of a chain of
mountains and, and so the frontof La Soufrire is conical. So
it's coming up to that point,but it's also part of a mountain
chain, so it's not standing onits own. That's, that's what I
meant by that.
Christine Malec (07:07):
Okay. Okay. So what are things looking like
now.
JJ Hunt (07:11):
So most of the footage that I've seen, it's all about
an ash cloud. This isn't so muchabout the classic red hot lava
idea of of a volcano. So when avolcano like this explodes, when
this one exploded, peopleflipped on their cameras all
over the place, people startedtaking pictures and images or
(07:33):
satellite pictures. And the veryfirst thing that you see is this
cloud of ash shooting up intothe sky, and it rose something
like 15 kilometers in an alreadygray sky, just enormous, so big,
that for many people takingimages on the island, it was
(07:53):
difficult to get the wholepicture in the whole cloud in
one image, it was bigger thanthe frame of their that their
camera would allow them tocapture. And it's just enormous
actually found a satellite imagethat was taken just moments
after the initial eruption. Andthe ash cloud actually covers
the entire island. No landformis visible in this satellite
(08:16):
image. It's completely eclipsedby this enormous cloud of gray
ash. And from the ground. Ifyou're, again, look, taking one
of these videos, this giantcloud of churning gray, dark ash
looks like it's repeatedlyboiling over. So imagine if you
will an ever expanding head ofdull gray cauliflower. So as it
(08:42):
grows, another head begins togrow beside it. And then another
one on top of that, and so onand so on each one of these ever
expanding heads of graycauliflower, growing and
engulfing each other. And it allappears to happen in slow
motion, because of the distanceand people are so far away looks
(09:04):
like these things are happening.
in slow motion. It's actuallyvery similar to how Mount St.
Helens erupted. So that was inWashington State in May 1980.
And for many of us in the US andin Canada that volcano eruption,
Mount St. Helens, is kind of THEvolcanic eruption. And the
initial explosion of Mount St.
(09:30):
Helens was very similar to whathappened in St. Vincent.
Christine Malec (09:34):
So you said that's not necessarily the
classic image that we have inour head of a volcano. What do
you mean by that? What's the ashversion versus the hot lava
version?
JJ Hunt (09:45):
So in this version, the St. Vincent kind of volcanoes.
Right now most of the imagesthat we're getting are about the
ash that fall to the ground.
Sometimes the ash is a hugeproblem. And sometimes the lava
is a huge problem, and sometimesit's both so With St. Vincent,
the ash cloud then begins tofall right all of this ash
starts raining down. And againcell phone videos make it look
(10:08):
like snow storms at night Thesky is totally dark and weather
and I don't know if these videosare all taken at night or during
the day when the sun is justcompletely eclipsed by this
cloud. And there are gray flakesraining down and they streak
through the image to the pointwhere visibility is obscured.
It's really difficult to seeclearly it is like being in a
(10:31):
snowstorm. And then the ashcovers everything like a thick
gray blanket, the lush hillsidesthat I described completely gray
palm trees are down the frondssagging and gray cars are
covered roofs covered. I sawsome photos of footprints in the
fine because it's a very finepowdery ash. And I saw some
(10:52):
footprints that look likethey're three or four inches
deep. I've heard someonedescribe it as a lunar
landscape. And I would say thatis accurate. For some of the
photos that I've seen. There isa lava flow here that it that is
causing some some trouble, butthat most of the images that I'm
finding are not of that the lavaa lot of the time especially if
(11:15):
you're frankly a kid thinking ofa volcano, right like when we
were kids and we all made thosevolcanoes and in public school
out of paper mache Shea and thenyou would put vinegar and baking
soda in the middle so they wouldhave wrapped in the lava pours
over the edges. It's the it'sthe cinematic version of a
volcano. That kind of volcanohas it has a different look in a
(11:39):
different feel to it. That iswhen the lava comes pouring over
the sides, bubbles up from thetop pours over the side and
streams of lava come runningdown. And actually in Iceland in
March, the world was shown whatthis looks like in a way that it
(11:59):
really hasn't been before. So inMarch, just outside of Reykjavik
in Iceland, the volcano erupted.
And it's a relatively smallscale volcano. It's not
exceedingly dangerous. And it'svery photogenic. So people have
rushed from Reykjavik touristshave come in with cameras and
(12:22):
drones and filmed all kinds gotin all kinds of footage of this
of this shield volcano. So ashield volcano is a low profile
volcano. So picture CaptainAmerica's round shield that kind
of you know comes to a slow riseand then dips back down. That's
what this is. This is a lowvolcano i think it's it's under
(12:44):
400 meters tall, so only 1300feet and on March 19, a 600
meter long fissure. It's afissure vent it opened up so
this is a linear crack in thesurface. And it began spewing
bright orange lava and the lavais relatively slow moving so no
(13:05):
buildings were at risk. Like Isaid people came came in with
their cameras with their drones.
And it does actually have in thecenter of this of this shield
volcano that is a classicvolcano peak that is spewing red
hot lava. So the area of thelandscape around is is either
(13:26):
snow covered or it's dry brownkind of tundra landscape. And
this volcano looks like a raisedIsland of dark, black rock. And
at the center is this peak thisconical volcano with a cracked
open top. And that's what'sspewing lava. So at the core is
(13:48):
this pool, a small lake ofmolten lava and it is white hot.
So in a lot of the imagesthere's no detail in there. It's
just to contrast it's just twowhite bright white hot lava. And
then it's around the edges ofthe pool of the lava pool. It
(14:11):
appears kind of brilliantglowing orange, truly like
liquid fire. And it's boiling.
It's bubbling like a pot oftomato sauce and heated globs
bubble up to the surface of thepool. And then they burst when
they hit the tops of this thickmolten lava spurts out and it
(14:31):
lands on the sides of the peak.
And then the color fades whenwhen the when the when the lava
bursts out, flies through theair drops back down to the
ground. Once it's hit the groundthe sides of the volcano. It
then begins to fade the colorfades to the deep red of coals
and a dying campfire. And thislava pool that's inside this
(14:53):
cone has actually broken downone side The jet black peak. So
imagine you're making a volcanoshape out of sand, and you then
slowly fill the center of itwith water. When the water gets
to the top and begins to spillover, it's likely going to
topple the weakest edge, andthat's going to allow more water
(15:15):
to escape. That's basicallywhat's happened here with lava
the lava has eaten away at oneside of the peak, and then more
of the lava is able to pour outand rushes over the edge. And in
this in this little island ofvolcanic of hardened volcanic
material, this island of darkrock, the lava has rushed over
the edge of the of the volcanopeak, and it's filling a raised
(15:38):
plateau so it forms a largeropen pool. And because there's
more surface area, the brightorange lava begins to harden and
it forms a gray crust. Butunderneath that gray crust is
still liquid like molten lava.
It's it's still bright orange,and so the the crust is streaked
(16:03):
with these cracks these shiftingcracks, it kind of looks a
little bit like very slow motionlightning bolts, because they
move and shift as the crackedcrust on top kind of floats on
this molten lava underneath. Andthen there are several spots
where the lava then flows overthe edge of the plateau like a
(16:24):
very gentle waterfall. And thelava creeps down the side of
this low black Island toward thetundra and it oozes with the
consistency of like, thick ladlethe gravy that's been sitting at
the buffet too long, right likeit's really thick and clumpy and
loses over. And people gatheraround the edges of this jet
(16:50):
black volcanic island in theplaces where the lava is oozing
down toward the tundra. And it'smoving so slowly at this point,
because the more it cools, thethicker it gets, the slower it
moves, that people can actuallystand within 20 feet of this
oozing glowing orange lava andwatch it slowly creep forward,
(17:13):
and the gray crust forms on topas it cools. And that's how this
island of black material getsbuilt. More lava pours over the
sides. It oozes onto the tundra.
it hardens and cools. And as itcools, it turns to this black
rock and that's how this islandmoves bigger and bigger and
bigger.
Christine Malec (17:34):
So when you look at images of St. Vincent
and of Iceland, which one ismore scary.
JJ Hunt (17:40):
Ah, see that's a great question. Intellectually I am
more afraid for the people inSt. Vincent. I understand that.
That is a terrible situation.
This is life and death for thepeople in St. Vincent. Their
water supply has beencontaminated by the ash. Their
power is out. 16 to 20,000people have been evacuated. They
(18:01):
take this very seriously Thelast volcano - I'm not sure it
was the last one but the mostdeadly time that this specific
volcano erupted in 1902 over1000 people died. This is
serious, serious stuff. But itjust looks like grey ash. It is
dirty looking. It is awfullooking. But it doesn't have the
(18:22):
molten fire, this liquid stoneof the Iceland volcano.
That'stantalizingly scary,right? People actually are right
at the edges of this thing. Andwhen the crust starts forming,
some of the boneheads will runright up and kick it because
(18:45):
they want it they like it, theyjust want to push it, they want
to see what it feels like theywant to get right in there.
Because it's fascinatinglydangerous, right? And so this is
a funny thing about volcanoesthey are, I mean, the
destruction that can come fromthese things, the loss of life
can be awful. But we'refascinated by them. There's a
(19:09):
terrifying beauty to them. Sowhile I might know
intellectually, that the thekind of ash volcano, that kind
of suffering and by the way,there is a there is a lava flow
in the in St. Vincent, that isthreatening houses and is
(19:29):
threatening people. It's justnot the thing that everyone's
taking pictures of right? InIceland everyone's gathering
around to take amazing photosand to take amazing pictures
because we're seeing the moltencore of our planet bubble up to
the surface. And it's scarybecause it's hot, it's liquid
fire, and we know if it was on alarger scale, if this was closer
(19:54):
to a city closer to a town, thetown would be decimated. When
lava flows start pouring, youcan't stop them. They just go
where they're going to go.
There's nothing that can bedone. They are so destructive.
Christine Malec (20:09):
And I understand that there's a
possibly incipient volcano inthe Congo that people have their
eye on. What's that about?
JJ Hunt (20:17):
Yeah. So while I was looking up information on what's
going on in St. Vincent, I cameacross an article about another
volcano. And in some newsreports, this is in the Virunga
National Park in the Congo. Sothere's been a lot of volcanic
activity there in recent years,that mirrors activity proceeding
major eruptions in 1977, and2002. So the same activity
(20:42):
they're seeing now led to majoreruptions back then. So people
are concerned that this, thisvolcano could erupt again in the
same kind of devastating way.
But they've been major fundingcuts to the monitoring systems
and the personnel there. Sothere's real concern that the
final warning system warningsigns are going to be missed.
But I thought it might be worthtaking a very quick look at this
(21:03):
because it's quite possible thisis going to erupt in the next
few years. So this is a youknow, an opportunity to file
away a bit of a description inour mind so that you know if and
when that happens, we have anidea of what of what the
situation looked like. So thisis that classic looking cone
volcano, the conical volcanothat's more or less on its own,
(21:24):
it's on it's on top of a conicalmountain this this volcano
crater, and inside this this bigcrater, there's a very wide open
crater, a very dark rock. And soinside the crater is an angry
active mini cone. So you've gota conical mountain, the conical
(21:47):
volcano with a huge crater atthe top. Inside that crater is a
smaller what's called a minicone so it looks like a tiny
crater inside a bigger crater.
And it's a perfect circle with araised edge. And inside is a
lava lake that glows brightorange, and it has a cracked
(22:11):
crust on top that's dotted withbright white hot spots. It's
bright enough that it turns thenight sky into this eerie
Halloween orange color. It'sjust such a bright lava lake
inside this mini cone. And allof the photos I've seen steam is
constantly rising from this minicone inside this greater crater.
(22:34):
And like I said, it's one tofile away this image because it
seems likely that this is goingto erupt in a dramatic way
sometime in the next few years.
Christine Malec (22:45):
One of the most striking visuals for kind of I
guess the consequence of anatural disaster is the ruins of
Pompei. And it's something thatI've heard referenced many times
as being eerie and fascinatingbut creepy at the same time. And
(23:07):
it's about the way that theeruption of Vesuvius was so
sudden that it it left peopleright in place, and we get a
weird cross section creepysnapshot and it's referred to
often. But I wonder I thought itwould be really interesting to
talk about that and do somedescription. So JJ, what are
(23:27):
some of the most common visualsthat you see on the topic?
JJ Hunt (23:31):
So what happened is, in 79 AD Mount Vesuvius erupts. And
it covers everyone in this ash,something like four to six
meters of volcanic ash. Itlands, hard lands heavy, and it
just buries everything. Itessentially entombed the entire
(23:52):
town in volcanic ash, and thatbecomes hardened rock. And over
the centuries, the organicmaterial inside this layer of
rock, eventually, you knowdecomposes so all the wood, all
the people all the straw, allthe animals decomposes and what
(24:12):
that leaves are perfect voidsinside this hardened ash. And so
archaeologists were then able touse these voids as moulds to mak
plaster casts they pump plastein chip away the volcanic as
and what's left are essentiallsculptures that are exac
(24:34):
replicas of people in their lasmoments of life as this volcani
ash is raining down on them. Ive not been to to Pompei in p
rson so I pulled up some photoand again, like you say, they
re referenced all the time. Tey get shown all the time but w
en you see take a moment and lok at them, and go through t
(24:55):
em flip through them they I man they really are incredi
ly creepy. So stone figures, ofen huddled together in the fe
al position. There's one tht's quite famous - I want to ca
l them sculptures because thats what they look like but they
re not - this one figure crawlng along the ground with their h
(25:21):
ad up. And you can see their libs are quite clearly defined t
is figure has a face I'm not sre if that face would have been
he facial features would have ben actually created by the plas
er being pumped into the voidor have someone scraped the the
ye sockets and and you knw, aligned for the mouth,
(25:42):
or perhaps not perhaps, that leel of detail was possible
by filling in this, this mouldhis void with plaster. And,
and there's another image here oa, of a person sitting down
ith their knees up. So they'vegot their legs tucked in their k
ees or pulled to their chst, they've got the hands cla
(26:04):
ped together and held kind of tothe to the bridge of the nose
ith the head bowed down. Andhis person is made of again of
his plastic material and it'sind of flaky, it looks like
It looks like a charred bodso that there's there's
ome flakiness to the plaster thee's a there's a gray color to
(26:26):
the plaster that makes it lookike a perfect figure that was
hen charred, that that's reallyhat this person looks like. The
're animals to a harnessed hrse lying on its side. And,
you know, because the harnesswas made of leather that you
can find where the straps were.
All of these figures, like I sy, the facial features are not
(26:53):
ecessarily always clear, bt the body language is absolute
y clear. And it's it's really qite haunting.
Christine Malec (27:05):
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