The Masaya Lava Lake Laboratory
The recent formation (Oct 2015) of a lava lake at Masaya volcano, Nicaragua, is a rare opportunity for a series of experiments above a rapidly convecting lava lake (> 30 m/s) at the bottom of a ~500-m wide, ~400-m deep crater. This project aims to improve our understanding of the mechanisms of atmospheric transport and dilution of the volcanic gas plume; for over 150 years, Masaya has been fumigating numerous villages in the 1250 km2 area downwind.
In order to obtain these measurements, GEOARC, a non-profit specialising in leading extreme science expeditions in otherwise inaccessible conditions and locations, has partnered withSimon Fraser University as well as other for- and non-profit organisations and universities including Alphasense.com, the Petzl Foundation, the International Volcano Monitoring Fund (ivm-fund.org), and the Government of Nicaragua.
The team, which includes volcanologists and professional rope access technicians, has now installed over 1.1 km of rope across the crater to enable deployment of Multigas sensors directly above the lava lake as well as on Santiago crater rim; FLYSPEC SO2 flux measurements will be made simultaneously 5 km downwind. Lava samples from the lake will also be collected over the next few days for melt inclusion analyses.
You can follow the daily progress of the experiment on Facebook at GeoArc.Organization and Instagram or Twitter, @_geoarc
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