Home to more than 10,000 thermal features, Yellowstone has experienced over 20 large hydrothermal explosions producing craters from 100 to over 2500 meters in diameter during the past 16,000 years. Using new mapping, sampling, and analysis techniques, this volume documents a broad spectrum of ages and geologic settings for these events and considers additional processes and alternative triggering mechanisms that have not been explored in previous studies. Although large hydrothermal explosions are rare on the human time scale, the potential for future explosions in Yellowstone is not insignificant, and events large enough to create a 100-m-wide crater might be expected every 200 years. This work presents information useful for determining the timing, distribution, and possible causes of these events in Yellowstone, which will aid in the planning of monitoring strategies and the anticipation of hydrothermal explosions."--Publisher's description.
Hydrothermal explosions are violent and dramatic events resulting in the rapid ejection of boiling water, steam, mud, and rock fragments from source craters that range from a few meters up to more than 2 km in diameter; associated breccia can be emplaced as much as 3 to 4 km from the largest craters. Hydrothermal explosions occur where shallow interconnected reservoirs of steam- and liquid-saturated fluids with temperatures at or near the boiling curve underlie thermal fields. Sudden reduction in confining pressure causes fluids to flash to steam, resulting in significant expansion, rock fragmentation, and debris ejection. In Yellowstone, hydrothermal explosions are a potentially significant hazard for visitors and facilities and can damage or even destroy thermal features. The breccia deposits and associated craters formed from hydrothermal explosions are mapped as mostly Holocene (the Mary Bay deposit is older) units throughout Yellowstone National Park (YNP) and are spatially related to within the 0.64-Ma Yellowstone caldera and along the active Norris-Mammoth tectonic corridor.
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