BJ Deming

Nevado del Ruiz: May 31, 2007 UTC

  • Status: Orange, but —

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    The take-away here: Ruiz might wind up steadily, if that’s on its agenda, or it might just give them a few minutes’ notice before the “big one.”

  • Interactive official hazard map (autotranslated), via Relief Web; En español
  • USAID April 4th map (autotranslated) posted on May 18 at Relief Web.
  • Links to webcams, public data, and other information.
  • Update archive.

Update, May 31, 1:07 p.m., Pacific: TROPOMI picked up an SO2 emission yesterday, and there was a VAAC advisory (since lifted) overnight:

The summit is a little nevado on this morning’s images that Jhon/VIDJCB uses in his video:

https://youtu.be/n32RNkcEFE0&rel=0

As always, he is reading the current SGC bulletin. Here is the gist in English, via Google Translate, with emphasis added by SGC or by me:

From 9:00 a.m. yesterday (May 30) until the time of publication of this bulletin, the seismicity in general presented low levels. For its part, the seismic activity associated with the movement of fluids inside the volcanic conduits maintained similar levels in the number of earthquakes
registered and a slight increase in seismic energy compared to May 29. Some of the registered earthquakes were associated with the activity of the lava dome (bulge or mound) existing at the bottom of the Arenas crater or to pulsatile ash emissions confirmed through the web cameras used for volcanic monitoring.

In the same way, seismic activity was recorded related to rock fracturing inside the volcanic building with similar levels in the number of registered earthquakes and seismic energy released, compared to May 29. The earthquakes were located mainly in the Arenas crater and in the northeast and southeast sectors to the southwest of the volcano, at an approximate distance of up to 7 km from the crater. The magnitudes of the earthquakes remained low and their depths
ranged from 0.5 to 4 km.

With respect to surface activity, the maximum height of the column of gases and steam was 500 m, measured from the top of the volcano. The direction of dispersal continued predominantly towards the northwest of the volcano causing the permanence of the column for more than two days towards that
sector, which has caused personnel from the military base in Cerro GualĂ­ to continue to receive smell of sulfur compounds as was reported again yesterday evening. The perception of this smell is an occasional and normal phenomenon in a volcano at the Orange level of activity and even Yellow, and occurs when factors such as SO2 concentration, high humidity and direction come together of the wind.

On the other hand, the variations in the degassing of sulfur dioxide and the output of water vapor from the crater to the atmosphere. At dawn today there was a report of a thermal anomaly of significant value in the bottom of the crater from the platforms of satellite monitoring.

It is important to note that the activity of the Nevado del Ruiz volcano is still very unstable. Although several days have passed in which the seismic activity, in general, has
decreased compared to previous weeks, it is important to remember that this does not imply that the volcano has returned to its normal levels of activity, so it is recommended not to get used to these oscillating changes of activity and think that it is a normal activity of the volcano. Satellite detection of significant thermal anomalies at the bottom of the crater indicates the
presence of very hot material near the surface. Likewise, the output permanence of ash sometimes pulsatile and sometimes more continuous, the persistence of a slight deformation terrain, and decreased sulfur dioxide output, indicate that the volcano could still make a major eruption in days or weeks.

Therefore, we reiterate that the activity of the Nevado del Ruiz volcano continues at ORANGE LEVEL, which indicates that there is a probability that in days or weeks there will be a larger eruption than it has done in the last 10 years. To change the level and return to the yellow level, a period of time is required where trends and patterns can be observed that allow inferring the possible decrease in activity, aspects that the current activity of the volcano still does not show, reason for which warns that the level of activity of the Nevado del Ruiz volcano will remain at LEVEL ORANGE for several weeks. During this time, in the event of an acceleration of processes that suggest an imminent eruption or that the eruption itself occurs, the level of activity will change to red.

We recommend that the community remain calm, follow all the instructions of the Unit National for Disaster Risk Management (UNGRD) and local authorities, and be attentive to the information provided by the Colombian Geological Service on the evolution of the state of the volcano.

The COLOMBIAN GEOLOGICAL SERVICE will continue to monitor the evolution of the volcanic phenomenon and will inform in a timely manner about the changes that may occur.

For more information visit the following link:
https://www2.sgc.gov.co/Noticias/boletinesDocumentos/Forms/AllItems.aspx

Lingo Tube translation tells me that this following video basically quotes the SGC bulletin about the sulfur smell and the crater thermal anomaly, but it also contains many images of various summit areas from today, too:

https://youtu.be/ffP_JAZwOTk&rel=0

Featured image: Ric Photography/Shutterstock

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