Mount Redoubt

South side of the volcano, 1980

Mount Redoubt is covered with glaciers, active stratovolcano volcano with 3108 meters the highest mountain in the Aleutian Island chain. It is located 170 km southwest of Anchorage in the Chigmit Mountains on the Alaska Peninsula in the Cook Inlet in Alaska and is part of the Lake Clark National Park. The emergence of the volcano began about 890,000 years ago.

Outbreaks

Powerful eruptions took place about 10500-13000 years ago and about 3500 years ago. The resulting rockfalls achieved in part the Cook Inlet. Mount Redoubt erupted in 1881, 1902, 1966.1989 and 2009. At the outbreak in 1989, a 14,000 -meter-high cloud of ash arose. The ash covered an area of ​​over 20,000 square kilometers.

On 15 December 1989, became a Boeing 747-400 KLM Royal Dutch Airlines in 28,000 feet ( 8.500 meters ) height on the flight from Amsterdam Schiphol to Anchorage in this ash cloud.

1881

In 1881 there appeared an eruption which has been described as " the east smokes the volcano constantly with periods of greater activity. Fires could be seen from the sea. A large outbreak there in 1881 as a group of natural hunters, halfway from lava surprised were only two people escaped. ". However, this outbreak has not been well documented by other sources.

1902

The volcano erupted in 1902 rather abruptly. He spat ash from 18 to 21 January of the year. A local newspaper described this way: " It was just informed that Redoubt, one of the volcanoes in the Cook Inlet, on January 18, had an eruption and covered the land in a radius of 150 kilometers with ash and lava. The news comes from Sunrise, but it is not clear whether there was damage, there still were no boats in the vicinity of the volcano. " There were other news reports about the outbreak of a described him thus: " there was a severe earthquake that broke apart the mountain and a large gap left " that may be the cracking of the volcanic crater described, but this is unlikely. Supposedly flames were out of the crater of the volcano and the eruptions frightened locals in the area. Newspapers speculated that the ash more than 150 km of came to the other side of Cook Inlet.

1989-1990

The volcano erupted on 15 December 1989. This lasted five months. Sudden onset of melting snow and ice on the summit by pyroclastic flows and lahars caused a collapse of the dome or mudslides that flowed down the northern flank of the mountain. Much of the mudslides walked toward Cook Inlet, about 35 km from the volcano. Some lahars came into the nearby river, and it was feared that oil deposits nearby could thereby be destroyed.

2009

January 30, 2009 volcanic activity have been discovered, which are an indication of a possible new outbreak of the volcano. Among other things, formed in the volcano glacier covering a fumarole with the size of two football fields and glacier run-off water, which speaks for the ascent of magma heat. In the night of 22 March 23, 2009, there was an eruption of Mount Redoubt. An ash cloud reached an estimated altitude of 16,000 m. Ash deposits were observed in the vicinity, population centers were not threatened. The Anchorage airport was closed several times briefly.

The eruption continued with several lahars that devastated the drift Valley below the mountain. You risk a petroleum - bearing on the coast. The Chevron Corporation stopped then an oil production in Cook Inlet. So far I managed to bring only a part of the stored there oil reserves in safety. Parts of the terrain of the Drift River Oil Terminal were flooded by the lahars. The previously strengthened outbreak occurred on April 4. He reached the level of the strongest event of outbreaks of 1989 / 90th On this day, a new lava dome was also first observed in the summit crater of Mt.

During the months of April and May, the mountain let out gas well and the lava slowly grew. The activity decreased in the course of June, the lava dome no longer grew significantly after reaching a length of 1000 m. The observer of the Alaska Volcano Observatory consider it possible that the activity phase is completed and classified back the warnings for aviation on June 30.