Skip to main content

What Causes Volcanic Lightning?

 






    On March 10, 2010, Eyjafjallajökull volcano, a caldera in Iceland covered by an ice cap, erupted. It sent plumes of clouds across most of Europe and the Atlantic Ocean. Photos of the eruption show lightning originating and ending in the cloud of ash that hovered over the volcanic opening.

   The largest volcanic storms are similar to supercell thunderstorms that spread across the American Midwest. But while those thunderstorms are fairly well understood, volcanic lightning still remains mysterious. The remote location of volcanoes and infrequent eruptions make volcanic lightning difficult to study. In general, lightning occurs through the separation of positively and negatively charged particles. Differences in the aerodynamics of the particles separate the positive and negative. When the difference in charge is great, electrons flow between the positive and negative regions. A lightning bolt is a natural way of correcting the charge distribution.


   So what makes volcanic lightning so difficult to understand? Scientists believe ejections from the volcano into the atmosphere carry a large electrical charge, but they aren’t sure if it originates in the volcano or occurs afterward. Very high  frequency radio emissions and other types of electromagnetic waves now allow scientists to observe the lightning inside the ash plume. Since 2006, scientists have used the new technology during three separate eruptions, including Eyjafjallajökull, and can distinguish two phases for volcanic lightning. The first phase, called the eruptive phase, is the intense lightning immediately after the eruption near the crater. Presumably, charged particles from the volcano are the source of this lightning that occurs near the crater. Phase two, called the plume phase, is lightning that forms inside the ash plume downwind of the crater. The origins of this lightning remain a mystery.
    In the 2010 eruption of Eyjafjallajökull, plumes of smoke significantly interrupted airline traffic, resulting in billions of dollars of lost revenue. The more we understand about volcanoes, the better we get at predicting an eruption and the potential consequences. Some scientists hope that studies of the composition of  gases inside a volcanic plume could tell us more about the early stages of our planet and the conditions that created the building blocks of life, making volcanic lightning a worthy pursuit. At a safe distance, of course.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Is Cold Fusion Possible?

       Italian inventor Andrea Rossi really wants us to believe in cold fusion. He claims that his Energy Catalyzer, or E-Cat, a liter-sized device he designed, can output three times as much energy as it draws via low energy nuclear reactions, or LENRs As hydrogen passes over an electrified nickel-based catalyst, hydrogen nuclei supposedly fuse to the nickel, transmuting the metal into copper and releasing heat in the process. If we could harness that heat, the process could furnish cheap electricity banishing greenhouse simultaneously production gases-all creating any harmful waste.      There's only one problem: Cold fusion is almost certainly a myth. Backers aside, has yet to perform a truly independent test of his E-Cat; in most tests by third parties, Rossi handled the materials or was involved in some way. Critics argue that Rossi's device doesn't produce nearly as much energy as he claims and that his suggestion of building factories for large...
Post a Comment
Read more

Is the Y Chromosome Doomed?

     Humans store their genes in 23 pairs of chromosomes, 22 of which are identically matched. The 23rd is a two-sided biological coin—twin Xs mean you’re female; an X and a Y, male. Chromosome pairs often trade bits of DNA in a process called recombination, the purpose of which is to keep genes functioning properly. Talk of men’s path toward extinction began in the late 1990s, when it was discovered that the human Y chromosome, which is stumpy compared with the X, does not share enough genetic material with the X to practice recombination. Left without a way to renew damaged genes, the Y would continue to degrade and would eventually disappear, geneticists announced. They slapped an expiration date on the male half of the species of sometime in the next 5 to 10 million years. To get a perspective on this prediction, scientists looked to our closest genetic relatives—the chimps. Because humans and chimpanzees shared a common ancestor 6 million years ago, genet...
Post a Comment
Read more