How many cubic feet of lava flows out of Mauna loa per year?
Terry
Hi Terryo,
The answer depends on how you want to calculate things. If you add up
the surface-erupted volume of lava that has erupted since 1840 (when
written records were started), and divide that by the time since 1840,
you get a number somewhere around 1 cubic meter per second. However,
when you measure the volumes of the tube-fed pahoehoe eruptions on Mauna
Loa, and divide them by the durations of the eruptions, you get a number
closer to 5 cubic meters per year. We haven't watched a pahoehoe
eruption on Mauna Loa since geophysical instruments were installed, but
on Kilauea it appears that during similar pahoehoe eruptions input from
the deep magma source equals output at the surface. This implies that
this 5 cubic meter/sec value is the supply rate to Kilauea. By
analogy this might be the supply rate to Mauna Loa as well. This could
mean that: 1) the supply rate is 5 cubic meters/sec but the eruption rate
is only 1 cubic meter/sec therefore 80% is intruded and not erupted; 2)
the supply rate is not constant but that during tube-fed pahoehoe
eruptions it is 5 cubic meters/sec; or 3) some combination of these two.
I hope this helps to answer your question.
Sincerely,
Scott Rowland
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