WEBVTT 00:00:06.080 --> 00:00:11.190 >> Now, I'd like to introduce the new scientist in charge at the 00:00:11.190 --> 00:00:15.840 USGS Cascades Volcano Observatory, Jon Major. 00:00:15.840 --> 00:00:18.900 >> Thanks, Brian. Welcome, everybody. 00:00:18.900 --> 00:00:24.860 In this brief talk this morning on the status of "mostly" Washington volcanoes, 00:00:24.860 --> 00:00:27.895 and I'll tell you why it's "mostly" here shortly, 00:00:27.895 --> 00:00:30.800 what I hope to do is just give you 00:00:30.800 --> 00:00:32.900 a very quick overview of some of 00:00:32.900 --> 00:00:36.635 the major volcano hazards that we worry about here in the Cascades, 00:00:36.635 --> 00:00:38.900 tell you just a very little bit about 00:00:38.900 --> 00:00:44.270 the Cascades Volcano Observatory and some of our functions and our responsibilities, 00:00:44.270 --> 00:00:48.380 and then give a very brief synopsis of what's been going 00:00:48.380 --> 00:00:53.900 on at Washington's volcanoes and what our plans are in coming years. 00:00:53.900 --> 00:00:58.850 With that, as many of you know, 00:00:58.850 --> 00:01:02.855 Washington is home to and bordered by several volcanoes. 00:01:02.855 --> 00:01:08.915 These are very charismatic landforms that are geologically quite active. 00:01:08.915 --> 00:01:11.885 This is a plot that shows 00:01:11.885 --> 00:01:16.735 eruptive activity of one or another just over the past 4,000 years. 00:01:16.735 --> 00:01:20.460 You can see that the volcanoes here in Washington, 00:01:20.460 --> 00:01:25.580 everything from Mount Baker in the north down to Mount Hood, which is just across 00:01:25.580 --> 00:01:31.310 the border in Oregon, have had a fair bit of activity over the past 4,000 years. 00:01:31.310 --> 00:01:34.340 If we look at the Cascades as a whole, 00:01:34.340 --> 00:01:38.045 when we average over about the last 12,000 years, 00:01:38.045 --> 00:01:42.320 the Cascades typically will experience about two eruptions per century. 00:01:42.320 --> 00:01:44.930 Now, this may not appear or sound like 00:01:44.930 --> 00:01:47.960 it's very significant over a single human lifetime. 00:01:47.960 --> 00:01:51.890 But when you start to think over generational time frames, 00:01:51.890 --> 00:01:55.130 then that does become significant because it does mean that 00:01:55.130 --> 00:01:59.125 society is going to have interactions with volcanic eruptions. 00:01:59.125 --> 00:02:01.730 Here at the Cascades Volcano Observatory, 00:02:01.730 --> 00:02:05.450 we can't prevent those interactions between volcanoes and society, 00:02:05.450 --> 00:02:08.900 but hopefully, we can help you try to mitigate 00:02:08.900 --> 00:02:13.250 the impacts of those interactions with society. 00:02:13.250 --> 00:02:17.770 I'll just briefly tell you about some of the major hazards that we worry about. 00:02:17.770 --> 00:02:22.190 They're generally what we'll call flow or fall type hazards. 00:02:22.190 --> 00:02:26.705 The two biggies that we really worry about here in the Cascades are these. 00:02:26.705 --> 00:02:33.170 We call them lahars or volcanic mudflows because they can travel many tens of miles 00:02:33.170 --> 00:02:36.110 down valleys, and even communities that are far 00:02:36.110 --> 00:02:40.125 removed from volcanoes can be affected by these processes. 00:02:40.125 --> 00:02:43.490 Generally, the communities we're 00:02:43.490 --> 00:02:46.550 particularly worried about that might be subject to these processes, 00:02:46.550 --> 00:02:50.270 these large lahars, are generally going to be west of the Cascades. 00:02:50.270 --> 00:02:56.830 In contrast, volcanic ashfall which we call tephra fall, 00:02:57.380 --> 00:03:01.190 when a large eruption column rises into the atmosphere, 00:03:01.190 --> 00:03:04.055 the wind will carry that material downwind. 00:03:04.055 --> 00:03:06.920 Our downwind direction here is generally from 00:03:06.920 --> 00:03:09.680 the west to the east so the communities that 00:03:09.680 --> 00:03:12.230 are east of the Cascades are the communities 00:03:12.230 --> 00:03:15.050 that are going to be generally subjected to these volcanic ashfalls. 00:03:15.050 --> 00:03:21.285 These ashfalls can go tens to hundreds of miles or more downwind. 00:03:21.285 --> 00:03:24.500 Communities that are not close to the volcanoes 00:03:24.500 --> 00:03:27.920 can be severely affected by volcanic processes. 00:03:27.920 --> 00:03:32.600 Another one that we've come to appreciate much more in the aftermath of the 00:03:32.600 --> 00:03:36.590 Mount St. Helens 1980 eruption is all the sedimentation, 00:03:36.590 --> 00:03:42.120 all the sediment that moves down river systems in the years to decades after eruptions, 00:03:42.120 --> 00:03:47.580 and that can present really long-term challenges to society. 00:03:47.840 --> 00:03:51.663 At the USGS Cascades Volcano Observatory here, 00:03:51.663 --> 00:03:53.131 down in Vancouver, Washington, 00:03:53.131 --> 00:03:56.320 our mission is to provide volcano hazard assessments, 00:03:56.320 --> 00:04:01.105 to detect unrest, to give timely warnings about volcanic activity, 00:04:01.105 --> 00:04:03.550 and to work with folks like you, our stakeholders, 00:04:03.550 --> 00:04:06.920 to ensure that your communities are volcano ready. 00:04:06.920 --> 00:04:11.410 We have three basic core functions here within our observatory. 00:04:11.410 --> 00:04:16.540 One is research where we do lots of research on eruptive histories, 00:04:16.540 --> 00:04:21.010 we research the types of processes that pose hazards to societies, 00:04:21.010 --> 00:04:25.735 we develop lots of hazard assessment tools, 00:04:25.735 --> 00:04:30.190 various models that allow us to assess and try to predict and anticipate 00:04:30.190 --> 00:04:35.405 what different types of processes might do under different types of scenarios. 00:04:35.405 --> 00:04:37.160 Another core function here at 00:04:37.160 --> 00:04:41.900 the Cascades Volcano Observatory is we monitor the volcanoes. 00:04:41.900 --> 00:04:44.720 We have instrumentation that we put out on 00:04:44.720 --> 00:04:48.365 the landscape and we'll talk about that a little bit more. 00:04:48.365 --> 00:04:50.840 But this is a way for us, 00:04:50.840 --> 00:04:52.985 it's like going to the doctor. 00:04:52.985 --> 00:04:57.365 It's our way of detecting what's going on at a volcano. 00:04:57.365 --> 00:05:00.140 A third function here at the observatory 00:05:00.140 --> 00:05:04.310 is we call it community preparedness or outreach, 00:05:04.310 --> 00:05:08.210 and we'll talk about that in a little bit more detail in a few slides. 00:05:08.210 --> 00:05:11.120 With regard to volcano monitoring, 00:05:11.120 --> 00:05:17.865 there are basically three major monitoring techniques that we use. 00:05:17.865 --> 00:05:20.715 One of them is earthquakes. 00:05:20.715 --> 00:05:24.380 As magma moves its way up through the earth, 00:05:24.380 --> 00:05:27.425 it has to find a pathway to get to the surface. 00:05:27.425 --> 00:05:29.000 As it finds that pathway, 00:05:29.000 --> 00:05:30.380 it has to break rock. 00:05:30.380 --> 00:05:34.075 As that rock breaks, it generates earthquakes. 00:05:34.075 --> 00:05:40.400 One of the major tools we use in our monitoring arsenal are seismometers. 00:05:40.400 --> 00:05:43.245 This allow us to detect earthquakes. 00:05:43.245 --> 00:05:50.270 Depending upon the placement of the seismometers around a volcano, 00:05:50.270 --> 00:05:52.775 this allows us to get 00:05:52.775 --> 00:05:57.020 more precise locations of where these earthquakes are occurring and how large they are. 00:05:57.020 --> 00:06:00.950 It'll tell us whether these earthquakes are related to magma movement, 00:06:00.950 --> 00:06:04.160 whether they're related to fluid movement along the existing faults, 00:06:04.160 --> 00:06:06.760 or whether they're even on the volcano at all. 00:06:06.760 --> 00:06:12.544 Another form of monitoring we like to watch for is surface deformation. 00:06:12.544 --> 00:06:15.935 As magma moves up into a volcano, 00:06:15.935 --> 00:06:17.270 even at great depths, 00:06:17.270 --> 00:06:24.820 it will begin to cause very small but detectable deflections of the ground surface. 00:06:25.190 --> 00:06:28.790 We can monitor those through a variety of techniques. 00:06:28.790 --> 00:06:30.740 GPS is one way we do it, 00:06:30.740 --> 00:06:33.140 we can also do it by satellite technologies. 00:06:33.140 --> 00:06:36.990 But those are the two biggies that we use to monitor. 00:06:36.990 --> 00:06:39.350 But we also monitor for gases that are 00:06:39.350 --> 00:06:42.230 released from magmas as they approached the surface, 00:06:42.230 --> 00:06:45.560 and we have some other techniques that we'll talk about a little bit. 00:06:45.560 --> 00:06:49.879 It's particularly as they relate to things that are happening on the surface, 00:06:49.879 --> 00:06:53.370 and they relate to lahars, and we'll get to that shortly. 00:06:53.390 --> 00:06:57.950 In the Cascades, the volcanoes that 00:06:57.950 --> 00:07:01.510 we are responsible for monitoring extend from the Canadian border, 00:07:01.510 --> 00:07:03.950 so Mount Baker up near the Canadian border in the north, 00:07:03.950 --> 00:07:07.505 all the way down to Crater Lake, 00:07:07.505 --> 00:07:09.595 down here to southern Oregon border. 00:07:09.595 --> 00:07:11.010 This is our purview. 00:07:11.010 --> 00:07:14.625 These are the volcanoes we're responsible to monitor. 00:07:14.625 --> 00:07:17.795 This little diagram here just shows you 00:07:17.795 --> 00:07:22.475 our current state of monitoring equipment that we have out on the landscape. 00:07:22.475 --> 00:07:24.830 You can see that it ranges quite widely. 00:07:24.830 --> 00:07:27.065 I mean, Mount St. Helens, for example, 00:07:27.065 --> 00:07:30.190 you can see that it's got a lot of instrumentation on it. 00:07:30.190 --> 00:07:33.560 If you recall that one diagram a few slides ago, 00:07:33.560 --> 00:07:37.175 Mount St. Helens is one of the most frequently active volcanoes in the Cascade. 00:07:37.175 --> 00:07:38.885 It's quite well monitored. 00:07:38.885 --> 00:07:40.430 Glacier Peak, on the other hand, 00:07:40.430 --> 00:07:43.450 has only one seismometer on it right now. 00:07:43.450 --> 00:07:47.270 Yet Glacier Peak does pose a significant threat to 00:07:47.270 --> 00:07:50.510 society because it has had some fairly large eruptions in the past. 00:07:50.510 --> 00:07:55.160 One of the things we're trying to do and planning to do is start bringing up 00:07:55.160 --> 00:07:58.610 our monitoring arsenal particularly on 00:07:58.610 --> 00:08:00.740 these volcanoes that are under monitored with 00:08:00.740 --> 00:08:03.960 respect to the threat that they pose to society. 00:08:04.610 --> 00:08:07.820 Some plans we have coming up, 00:08:07.820 --> 00:08:10.000 we'll go into little more detail shortly, 00:08:10.000 --> 00:08:12.405 is with Mount Baker. 00:08:12.405 --> 00:08:16.390 We are going to start scoping out some sites where we hope 00:08:16.390 --> 00:08:20.900 to install some new instrumentation sites in the future, 00:08:20.900 --> 00:08:23.710 we hope to start scoping out those sites this year. 00:08:23.710 --> 00:08:27.190 We're also in the process of doing a next generation 00:08:27.190 --> 00:08:31.250 lahar hazard assessment with some new hazard assessment tools that we've developed. 00:08:31.250 --> 00:08:38.565 At Glacier Peak, we have plans right now to install four more seismometers and GPS sites. 00:08:38.565 --> 00:08:41.500 We were hoping that we might be able to do that this year, 00:08:41.500 --> 00:08:44.800 but it looks like it's going to be delayed until 2022. 00:08:44.800 --> 00:08:49.095 Our permitting process is now underway with the Forest Service. 00:08:49.095 --> 00:08:53.325 This is in a wilderness area so the permitting process takes a little bit of time. 00:08:53.325 --> 00:08:59.075 At Mount Rainier, we added some new stations last year. 00:08:59.075 --> 00:09:02.505 We call these lahar detection system stations. 00:09:02.505 --> 00:09:05.810 This year, we are planning to hopefully 00:09:05.810 --> 00:09:09.345 install nine more lahar detection stations at Mount Rainier. 00:09:09.345 --> 00:09:10.920 We're in the process of working with 00:09:10.920 --> 00:09:16.150 the National Park Service to finalize the permitting on that. 00:09:16.150 --> 00:09:18.915 We have completed very recently, 00:09:18.915 --> 00:09:23.730 a next generation lahar hazard assessment for lahars at Mount Rainier. 00:09:23.730 --> 00:09:26.460 I'll give you a status of that in a second. 00:09:26.460 --> 00:09:30.200 I'll talk about this handoff again shortly. 00:09:30.200 --> 00:09:32.310 Then at Mount St. Helens, 00:09:32.310 --> 00:09:35.045 we've got some plans to do some station upgrades, 00:09:35.045 --> 00:09:38.945 and we've recently completed a hazard assessment 00:09:38.945 --> 00:09:45.310 for what would be at risk and what could happen if Spirit Lake was to breach. 00:09:45.310 --> 00:09:50.590 Let's just take a little tour of the Cascades and talk about each individual volcano. 00:09:50.590 --> 00:09:52.115 Here at Mount Baker, 00:09:52.115 --> 00:09:55.240 there's no unusual activity going on at Mount Baker. 00:09:55.240 --> 00:09:59.045 I mean, sometimes, there's some steaming if the atmospheric conditions are right, 00:09:59.045 --> 00:10:01.370 people down in Bellingham can actually see 00:10:01.370 --> 00:10:03.980 some steam generally coming from the Sherman Crater. 00:10:03.980 --> 00:10:06.830 But there's nothing unusual happening at Baker right now, 00:10:06.830 --> 00:10:08.845 and there hasn't been for a while. 00:10:08.845 --> 00:10:13.410 We did a tabletop eruption exercise at Mount Baker a few years ago, 00:10:13.410 --> 00:10:15.890 and this is one way we work with stakeholders to try 00:10:15.890 --> 00:10:19.400 to assess our readiness and your readiness and 00:10:19.400 --> 00:10:21.710 communications to make sure that everything is working and 00:10:21.710 --> 00:10:26.675 all the communication links are right and who does what and what's expected of whom. 00:10:26.675 --> 00:10:29.780 These are tabletop exercises that we hope to 00:10:29.780 --> 00:10:32.900 continue doing and hopefully over the next maybe year or two, 00:10:32.900 --> 00:10:38.195 we hope to revisit some more tabletop exercises for some of these other volcanoes. 00:10:38.195 --> 00:10:42.815 I mentioned that we have a new lahar hazard assessment that's underway, 00:10:42.815 --> 00:10:47.305 using some of these new tools that we've developed over the past several years. 00:10:47.305 --> 00:10:50.050 As I mentioned, in 2021, hopefully, 00:10:50.050 --> 00:10:53.390 we're going to begin scoping out some sites that will be 00:10:53.390 --> 00:10:57.685 suitable to allow us to expand our monitoring network at Baker. 00:10:57.685 --> 00:11:04.900 At Glacier Peak, there's no unusual activity going on at Glacier Peak. 00:11:04.980 --> 00:11:08.215 Just in February of 2020, 00:11:08.215 --> 00:11:12.310 City of Darrington officials participated in a Binational Exchange 00:11:12.310 --> 00:11:17.050 where a group of folks from Darrington traveled down to Colombia in 00:11:17.050 --> 00:11:22.705 South America to learn more about lahars and lahar hazards and community education. 00:11:22.705 --> 00:11:25.030 This was part of a Binational Exchange. 00:11:25.030 --> 00:11:29.725 A couple of years prior to when the folks from Darrington traveled down to Colombia, 00:11:29.725 --> 00:11:31.989 several Colombians came up to Washington, 00:11:31.989 --> 00:11:36.370 and Darrington officials and some Washington officials hosted them. 00:11:36.370 --> 00:11:39.490 Folks from Colombia got to hear about what are 00:11:39.490 --> 00:11:42.670 the things that the emergency management folks like you are worrying 00:11:42.670 --> 00:11:49.255 about at Glacier Peak and how you interact with us and how we interact with you. 00:11:49.255 --> 00:11:53.680 These Binational Exchanges, this is one of a handful we've done. 00:11:53.680 --> 00:11:56.635 These are really good ways of exchanging 00:11:56.635 --> 00:11:59.920 information and communication and learning from each other in 00:11:59.920 --> 00:12:06.745 places where volcano hazards have been some serious catastrophes. 00:12:06.745 --> 00:12:10.360 It's a way of exchanging information and making some of 00:12:10.360 --> 00:12:14.065 the stuff that seems really abstract a bit more visceral and a bit more real. 00:12:14.065 --> 00:12:19.329 We're working with the US Forest Service as I said on permitting four new stations 00:12:19.329 --> 00:12:22.977 in the wilderness area around Glacier Peak. 00:12:22.977 --> 00:12:24.815 At Mount Rainier, 00:12:24.815 --> 00:12:27.075 over the past couple of years, 00:12:27.075 --> 00:12:29.640 earlier this year and last year we had some earthquake swarms. 00:12:29.640 --> 00:12:32.460 These are pretty typical, nothing unusual. 00:12:32.460 --> 00:12:36.845 These swarms consist of tens of locatable earthquakes. 00:12:36.845 --> 00:12:41.185 They're fairly small magnitudes, generally less than about magnitude 2.5. 00:12:41.185 --> 00:12:45.370 Not the stuff that even if you were standing on the ground surface pretty close by, 00:12:45.370 --> 00:12:47.395 you'd be unlikely to feel this. 00:12:47.395 --> 00:12:53.125 At Rainier, the depths have been fairly shallow, 0-2 kilometers. 00:12:53.125 --> 00:12:55.465 As I mentioned, these are fairly common. 00:12:55.465 --> 00:12:58.375 These volcanoes, while they may look quiet, 00:12:58.375 --> 00:12:59.905 might look stately on the landscape, 00:12:59.905 --> 00:13:03.250 they chatter all the time and so for 00:13:03.250 --> 00:13:08.755 these volcanoes to undergo these swarms off and on is not unusual at all. 00:13:08.755 --> 00:13:11.530 As I mentioned, we've completed now 00:13:11.530 --> 00:13:14.995 a next-generation lahar hazard assessment particularly, 00:13:14.995 --> 00:13:19.775 excuse me, for the Nisqually and the Puyallup River system drainages. 00:13:19.775 --> 00:13:23.460 That's working its way through our USGS publication system, 00:13:23.460 --> 00:13:27.600 and we're hoping that sometime pretty soon that work will actually be out on 00:13:27.600 --> 00:13:29.550 the streets and we will certainly be presenting 00:13:29.550 --> 00:13:32.860 that and then talking to you about that once that hits the street. 00:13:33.710 --> 00:13:37.230 Last September, we installed 00:13:37.230 --> 00:13:43.470 five new monitoring lahar detection stations at Mount Rainier. 00:13:43.470 --> 00:13:46.290 Right now we're working with the Park to expand 00:13:46.290 --> 00:13:49.575 that lahar detection system within the National Park. 00:13:49.575 --> 00:13:53.860 We're awaiting some final public comments and permanent issuance. 00:13:53.860 --> 00:13:56.920 We just learned the other day from the Park Service that 00:13:56.920 --> 00:14:01.300 the public comment period is going to be opened from May 27th to June 25th. 00:14:01.300 --> 00:14:04.600 Carolyn Driedger and Seth Moran from our office will 00:14:04.600 --> 00:14:10.760 be actually giving a public meeting about this on June 9th. 00:14:12.450 --> 00:14:17.380 The stations as I mentioned they include seismometers, 00:14:17.380 --> 00:14:20.350 but we also include sensors that are called infrasound sensors. 00:14:20.350 --> 00:14:24.040 These infrasound sensors, in combination with these seismometers, 00:14:24.040 --> 00:14:26.950 allow us to provide more precise information about the location, 00:14:26.950 --> 00:14:30.520 the timing, and so are the relative vigor and size of an event. 00:14:30.520 --> 00:14:36.100 We'll not only know from these systems if and when an event occurs but hopefully, 00:14:36.100 --> 00:14:38.845 we'll actually be able to get some sense of how large that event is, 00:14:38.845 --> 00:14:41.590 which improves our warning capability for folks 00:14:41.590 --> 00:14:47.020 downstream as we've soon improved early hazard warning. 00:14:47.020 --> 00:14:50.410 Sometime in the next coming months right now, 00:14:50.410 --> 00:14:52.990 Pierce County officials are the owners and 00:14:52.990 --> 00:14:57.385 operators of the lahar detection system and the river system. 00:14:57.385 --> 00:15:01.255 But with this new instrumentation, 00:15:01.255 --> 00:15:05.620 we at the USGS are actually going to be taking over the ownership of 00:15:05.620 --> 00:15:10.735 that system and that hand-off is going to occur sometime over the next few months. 00:15:10.735 --> 00:15:15.610 We're in the process now of scheduling some workshops and meetings with 00:15:15.610 --> 00:15:16.900 the Pierce County officials and 00:15:16.900 --> 00:15:20.650 the South Sound 911 and emergency management folks so that we can work 00:15:20.650 --> 00:15:25.330 out the standard operating procedures and the protocols and make 00:15:25.330 --> 00:15:31.130 sure that our systems are actually communicating with folks in Pierce County. 00:15:31.130 --> 00:15:33.810 But we'll be taking that over, 00:15:33.810 --> 00:15:36.390 and so we've got some work coming up here in a few months 00:15:36.390 --> 00:15:39.965 to do a little bit of exercise on those systems. 00:15:39.965 --> 00:15:43.840 At Mount Adams, there is no unusual activity. 00:15:43.840 --> 00:15:45.745 Adams is really quite quiet, 00:15:45.745 --> 00:15:49.300 but still, we plan to put some instrumentation out on the landscape. 00:15:49.300 --> 00:15:54.700 We've now sited where we want to put those instruments. 00:15:54.700 --> 00:15:59.965 We began engaging with the Forest Service about obtaining the permits to do that. 00:15:59.965 --> 00:16:04.780 We'll also be trying to engage with the Yakama Tribe in particular as they have 00:16:04.780 --> 00:16:09.295 lands around there and have a fairly vested interest in what goes on at Mount Adams. 00:16:09.295 --> 00:16:11.950 At Mount St. Helens, 00:16:11.950 --> 00:16:15.955 this summer we plan to do some maintenance and station upgrades. 00:16:15.955 --> 00:16:21.310 We're going to be installing a new gas monitoring station over on the east flank. 00:16:21.310 --> 00:16:23.245 In addition to that, 00:16:23.245 --> 00:16:25.285 every season typically in the fall, 00:16:25.285 --> 00:16:27.130 when the first heavy rains come in, 00:16:27.130 --> 00:16:30.745 we typically get these small debris flows that get triggered at Mount St. Helens. 00:16:30.745 --> 00:16:34.240 They also get triggered at Mount Rainier and may get to other places. 00:16:34.240 --> 00:16:36.339 These only travel a few kilometers, 00:16:36.339 --> 00:16:38.140 but they're good test cases. 00:16:38.140 --> 00:16:41.380 What we're going to do this coming fall is we're going to be 00:16:41.380 --> 00:16:45.385 installing temporary seismic and infrasound networks around Mount St. Helens, 00:16:45.385 --> 00:16:50.005 which will help us better characterize relationships between 00:16:50.005 --> 00:16:52.510 the seismic signal that these debris flows 00:16:52.510 --> 00:16:55.090 generate and the infrasound signal that they generate. 00:16:55.090 --> 00:17:00.220 Which will then help us to calibrate the systems that we're putting out 00:17:00.220 --> 00:17:02.290 at Rainier because it's the same type of 00:17:02.290 --> 00:17:06.640 instrumentation and this is a good testbed and a way to calibrate things. 00:17:06.640 --> 00:17:12.220 As I mentioned, we've recently completed a hazard assessment of what 00:17:12.220 --> 00:17:14.560 possibly could happen downstream if Spirit Lake was to 00:17:14.560 --> 00:17:17.635 breach and that report is now in progress. 00:17:17.635 --> 00:17:20.740 At Mount Hood over in Oregon, last fall, 00:17:20.740 --> 00:17:23.545 we installed three new stations on the flanks of Mount Hood. 00:17:23.545 --> 00:17:26.920 They were combinations of GPS and seismometers. 00:17:26.920 --> 00:17:28.600 This was a cooperative project with 00:17:28.600 --> 00:17:32.000 the Forest Service and the Mount Hood National Forest. 00:17:32.310 --> 00:17:37.195 Since we've put some of that instrumentation in, 00:17:37.195 --> 00:17:41.890 we've detected a few earthquake swarms earlier this year at Mount Hood. 00:17:41.890 --> 00:17:44.350 Again, these are common swarms at Mount Hood, 00:17:44.350 --> 00:17:47.575 they lasted anywhere from tens of minutes to maybe a few hours. 00:17:47.575 --> 00:17:50.140 Maximum magnitudes were less than three, 00:17:50.140 --> 00:17:51.340 so pretty small things. 00:17:51.340 --> 00:17:54.880 They were all pretty deep, 1-7 kilometers below sea level. 00:17:54.880 --> 00:17:58.120 By putting in the GPS stations, 00:17:58.120 --> 00:18:00.010 we were able to confirm that there was 00:18:00.010 --> 00:18:03.655 no deformation that was associated with earthquake swarms. 00:18:03.655 --> 00:18:07.660 That tells us that these aren't the result of magma moving in the system because 00:18:07.660 --> 00:18:11.785 if magma was moving in the system we'd probably detect some surface deformation. 00:18:11.785 --> 00:18:17.600 Instead, these are related to fluid movement along existing faults around the volcano. 00:18:17.970 --> 00:18:20.109 Just out of curiosity, 00:18:20.109 --> 00:18:24.880 we installed some temperature sensors in springs near 00:18:24.880 --> 00:18:28.000 Government Camp just to see if there might be any change 00:18:28.000 --> 00:18:32.420 in water temperatures associated with this earthquake swarm. 00:18:35.160 --> 00:18:38.920 We also had a temporary deployment of infrasound sensors, 00:18:38.920 --> 00:18:42.715 to try to calibrate against event occurrence and size and compare it with 00:18:42.715 --> 00:18:44.470 seismic signals. And we had this 00:18:44.470 --> 00:18:47.020 winter, we were actually detecting snow avalanches. 00:18:47.020 --> 00:18:50.740 It's a way of us being able to calibrate size and 00:18:50.740 --> 00:18:56.510 magnitude with the seismic signals that we also collect at the same time. 00:18:56.760 --> 00:19:01.630 Sometime probably in 2022, 2023, 00:19:01.630 --> 00:19:03.715 we're going to try to install 00:19:03.715 --> 00:19:08.200 a new gas detection station up at Crater Rock up at Mount Hood. 00:19:08.200 --> 00:19:10.435 One of the other things we do, 00:19:10.435 --> 00:19:13.480 we have these volcano hazard response plans that have been 00:19:13.480 --> 00:19:16.870 developed in cooperation with lots of you folks, 00:19:16.870 --> 00:19:21.550 the Emergency Management Division and offices of emergency management. 00:19:21.550 --> 00:19:24.040 But if you look at the dates on these, 00:19:24.040 --> 00:19:28.435 they're a little stale some of them are getting on to be about 10 years old now. 00:19:28.435 --> 00:19:31.300 We're proposing and one of the things we plan to 00:19:31.300 --> 00:19:33.970 do is over the next couple of years is to try 00:19:33.970 --> 00:19:36.670 to regenerate some of these volcano working groups and 00:19:36.670 --> 00:19:39.895 meeting with you folks and trying to bring these documents up to date. 00:19:39.895 --> 00:19:42.640 People change, there's lots of call-down numbers and 00:19:42.640 --> 00:19:45.670 call-down names in these documents so we plan 00:19:45.670 --> 00:19:48.130 to try to bring these things up to date and we'll certainly be 00:19:48.130 --> 00:19:52.400 contacting you for assistance and communications on that. 00:19:52.590 --> 00:19:56.725 Just a little more on our community preparedness and outreach, 00:19:56.725 --> 00:19:59.305 we hold tabletop exercises, 00:19:59.305 --> 00:20:03.430 we hold sessions like this with you folks. 00:20:03.430 --> 00:20:05.740 We're very active on our social media, 00:20:05.740 --> 00:20:07.270 we do lots of news, 00:20:07.270 --> 00:20:09.415 we interact with lots of news media. 00:20:09.415 --> 00:20:12.385 We've developed lots of hazard products that are out there 00:20:12.385 --> 00:20:16.630 that we try to push out to you and at least make you aware of. 00:20:16.630 --> 00:20:21.820 There's a bunch of links here at the bottom of this slide, 00:20:21.820 --> 00:20:24.130 and these links will show up in my last slide. 00:20:24.130 --> 00:20:25.960 But these are places where you can go and get 00:20:25.960 --> 00:20:28.690 information about what's going on and perhaps 00:20:28.690 --> 00:20:31.780 the one I'll bring to your attention 00:20:31.780 --> 00:20:35.440 the most is this one called the Volcano Notification Service. 00:20:35.440 --> 00:20:40.870 Because anytime there's any information release or 00:20:40.870 --> 00:20:46.795 any activity that we feel is significant enough to put out any notification, 00:20:46.795 --> 00:20:48.145 it'll be pushed out on that. 00:20:48.145 --> 00:20:51.070 That's actually a service you can subscribe to fairly easily, 00:20:51.070 --> 00:20:52.135 you can sign up for it, 00:20:52.135 --> 00:20:54.280 and then you will get your notices automatically via 00:20:54.280 --> 00:20:56.920 email so you wouldn't have to go searching for things, 00:20:56.920 --> 00:20:59.180 that information will come to you. 00:20:59.580 --> 00:21:03.310 Just in summary, I think we have a pretty good handle on 00:21:03.310 --> 00:21:07.045 the hazards at each of the volcanoes and the Cascades. 00:21:07.045 --> 00:21:10.600 CVO has now been in existence for 40 years, 00:21:10.600 --> 00:21:12.490 we've got lots of information, 00:21:12.490 --> 00:21:15.160 lots of depth, lots of knowledge about these volcanoes. 00:21:15.160 --> 00:21:17.500 Fortunately, most of our volcanoes are remote, 00:21:17.500 --> 00:21:21.280 so some of the processes that are restricted to areas 00:21:21.280 --> 00:21:25.765 fairly close to the volcano are not going to put large populations at risk. However, 00:21:25.765 --> 00:21:28.570 there are some volcano processes that do expose 00:21:28.570 --> 00:21:30.940 large populations to hazards and those are going to be 00:21:30.940 --> 00:21:33.490 these large mudflows that travel long distances down 00:21:33.490 --> 00:21:38.090 river systems and the ashfall that's going to travel long distances downwind. 00:21:38.130 --> 00:21:43.555 But, it's a double-edged sword because the remoteness of our volcanoes, 00:21:43.555 --> 00:21:50.170 the media onslaught that obviously will ensue the next time one of our volcanoes awakens, 00:21:50.170 --> 00:21:53.350 and potentially long durations of eruptions are going to 00:21:53.350 --> 00:21:56.770 really severely challenge and task the eruption response, 00:21:56.770 --> 00:21:58.690 therefore, good planning is needed. 00:21:58.690 --> 00:22:04.555 That good planning relies on good communication and good interaction between us and you. 00:22:04.555 --> 00:22:08.725 With that, I'd be happy to answer any questions you might have. 00:22:08.725 --> 00:22:10.430 Thank you, John.