Do volcanos ever "die" ? Or just stay dormant and can erupt at any
time ?
Sheldon
Dolitsky
Hi Sheldon,
You've asked a good question that lots of people seem to be interested in.
Unfortunately there isn't a really short or exact answer. Certainly
there are volcanoes aroud the world where nobody has ever wittnessed an
eruption, where there are no legends about past eruptions, and no geologic
evidence of eruptions for perhaps tens of thousands of years. It would be
a good bet that such volcanoes are truely extinct. You might not want to
bet your house on it but perhaps your dog house.
On the other hand there are lots of volcanoes where nobody remembers any
eruptions and no legends of past eruptions, but the geologic evidence
shows that there have been eruptions in the past thousand years or so, or
the geologic evidence is inconclusive, or nobody has done enough research
to say one way or another. It would be a big mistake to call such
volcanoes extinct, or even dormant.
It is also important to remember that different volcanoes seem to operate
on different eruption schedules. Some, such as Merapi in Indonesia, have
been pretty much constantly erupting for years and years. Every once in a
while one of its burps is a little stronger than previous ones and people
take notice, but otherwise it continues to erupt at a relatively low
level. Other volcanoes, such as Pinatubo, are more likely to go for
hundreds of years without erupting, but when they do it is quite a show.
It was geologic mapping which showed that past Pinatubo eruptions had been
huge, and fortunately this information was used to convince political
leaders that it was important to evacuate many people.
So, to end this non-answer of your question, it depends. Surely some
volcanoes are truely dead. However, there are many who's sleep-wake cycle
is much longer than us humans are used to dealing with.
sincerely,
Scott Rowland
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