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Piton la Fournaise eruption
From:
Thomas Staudacher <staud@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
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On Friday March 30, at 23:00 a short eruption started on the south-east
flank of Piton de la Fournaise at 1900 m altitude, which lasted only 9
hours and formed a small lava flow there.
Two day later, on April 2 at 10:00, a new 1 km long vent opened between
1000 and 500 m altitude in the southern part of Grand Brûlé. The active
vent is situated on the lower part of the fissure about 200 m north of
the rampart. The lava flows arrived at the national road at 15:30 and
reached the sea at 21:30. Today the eruption tremor is highly increasing
and the debit of the lava flow is very important, probably much higher
than 100 m3 per second, a value which has not been observed at Réunion
Island within the last 20 or 30 years. The national road is cut over
more than 1 km.
High values of sometimes over 300 micrograms per m3 of SO2 had been
measured by the Observatoire Réunionnais de l’Air (ORA) in the western
and northern part of the island.
Dust and Pele’s hair from the eruption site were observed even at 10 to
20 km away and small, mm sized grains of basalt, formed by the lava flow
into the sea and transported by the panache were observed within 5 km of
the site.
Together with the eruption, a high seismic activity is observed beneath
the summit of Piton de la Fournaise between sea level and 1000 m above.
This seismicity might indicate a possible pit crater formation within
Dolomieu crater, due to the emptying of the magma chamber by the eruption.
In the same time and due to the proximity of the rampart south, a
propagation of the dyke to inhabited areas can not be excluded and the
authorities prepared a possible evacuation of the population in this
part of the island if ever necessary, even though no seismic events had
been observed yet, indicating an eruption there.
Th. Staudacher
Observatoire Volcanologique du Piton de la Fournaise
Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris
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Thomas Staudacher
Observatoire volcanologique du Piton de la Fournaise
14 RN3 le 27ème km
F-97418 La Plaine des Cafres
La Réunion
tél +262(0)262 27 52 92
fax +262(0)262 59 12 04
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