Nature unleashes a torrent of energy as ash fills the air

Chalten:  Carlos Gutierrez/UPI
lying dormant for more than 9,000 years, the Chaitén volcano belched forth a 40,000-foot-tall ash plume in early May, touching off lightning and a monthlong eruption. The volcano, situated 700 miles south of Santiago, Chile, forced the evacuation of 8,000 people from the nearby village of Chaitén. It was roughly comparable in size to the 1980 Mount St. Helens eruption that released hundreds of millions of tons of debris in an explosion 1,000 times as powerful as the atomic bomb that was dropped on Nagasaki.

Scientists suspect that volcanic lightning results from particles in the ash cloud rubbing together as the plume swirls. They aren’t sure about which types of particles generate the most static electricity, nor do they know how much energy is produced during the event. Of course, the lack of research done in the field is understandable: Even scientists, when they see an erupting, lightning-spewing volcano, tend to run in the opposite direction.

Want to learn more about breakthroughs in electronics, medicine, nanotech, and more?
Subscribe to Popular Science and enter to win $5,000!

3 Comments

Who knew we had photographers in Mordor? Now was this taken from the Barad-Dur side or ...

simply amazing. Lightning photos can be difficult to catch correctly, but I suppose situations like this would make it easier.

http://beecherbowers.com



Download Our iPhone App

Stay up to date on the latest news of the future of science and technology from your iPhone with full articles, images and offline viewing



Follow Us On Twitter

Featuring every article from the magazine and website, plus links from around the Web. Also see our PopSci DIY feed



Become a Fan On Facebook

Share links with friends, comment on stories and more


November 2009: Astronaut 3.0

Inside NASA's astronaut bootcamp and the grueling new training regimen for deep space. Plus, ten young geniuses shaking up science today, one writer's quest to analyze every man-made chemical in her body and more.

Check out the issue's full contents online here

Popular Science Photo Pool


Share your photos in the Pop Sci pool at www.flickr.com!
tags_sprite.png
POP_embeddedForm_cover_May09.jpg