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For those of you that are unsure what the term “supervolcano” means, the terminology refers to a volcano or volcanic eruption that will produce a giant crater (caldera) upon eruption, this caldera is generally larger than 48 cubic miles. The eruption that comes from a supervolcano is able to cause an actual long-lasting change to the weather, can threaten the extinction of a species and literally cover large areas of land with lava and ash.

There are still many of these supervolcanos around our planet that have not erupted in thousands of years, Scientists have included Long Valley in California, Taupo in New Zealand, Yellowstone in Wyoming to be a few of these supervolcanos. To give you an idea of the enormity of these volcano’s: Toba in Indonesia erupted nearly 74,000 years ago, the blast was believed to be 10,000 times more powerful than Mt. St. Helens in Washington State. If that still doesn’t give you an idea, about the power of this type of volcano, listen to this…the ash that came from the eruption of Toba blocked the sun for months and the temperature around the globe is believed to have dropped nearly 21 degrees!

That being said, the caldera at Yellowstone has been quite active lately! Geologists at the Yellowstone Volcano Observatory (YVO) have noted several instances of earthquake activity under the Yellowstone Lake over the holidays. Since 2004 anywhere between one to two thousand tremors annually are reported from the Yellowstone Caldera, however last week the high number of tremors that were reported, around 400, is extremely abnormal.

According to experts, although this swarm of activity is indeed valid, the alert status at Yellowstone remains green. If the status changes to yellow or red, then we all have something to worry about!

This chart shows the estimated extent of ash that would fall as a result of an eruption from the Yellowstone caldera.

Photo Credit: Discovery Channel

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