The Yellowstone caldera is one of the most geologically active pieces of real estate on the planet, with a high concentration of geysers, hot springs, mud volcanoes, and similar features. These features not only make Yellowstone a magnet for tourists, but they also attract the attention of geologists, who are interested in Yellowstone because it sits on top of a plume of melted mantle that has triggered titanic eruptions in the distant past. Now, two of these geologists have looked into what we know about the region in an attempt to estimate the risks for future eruptions.
A large fraction of the national park, including most of Yellowstone Lake, sits inside an ancient volcanic caldera, formed when a magma chamber blew its roof off about 640,000 years ago, releasing approximately 1,000 cubic kilometers of material in the process. An even larger eruption, about twice the size, occurred about 2 million years ago.
But volcanic activity isn't limited to these these super-eruptions. The new paper reviews evidence that between 250,000 and 500,000 years ago, there were a number of smaller eruptions that would still be very significant from the perspective of anyone near Yellowstone at the time they happened. Four of these involved large flows of lava, and two others saw pyroclastic flows, mixtures of hot gas and ash. Large lava flows have also erupted between 174,000 and 70,000 years ago.
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