THE INCREDIBLE BEAUTY OF A SUPER VOLCANO

- September 17, 2022

An old geezer at a famous geyser

On the afternoon of Friday, July 15, 2022 we all piled into three very crowded cars and drove over to to the house we were booked to stay in for the next three days just over the Idaho state line near the town of West Yellowstone Montana. We were crowded because it was going to cost my daughter Misty and my daughter-in-law Carrie a ridiculous amount of money to rent a car after they arrived in Keystone South Dakota. Somehow we managed to cram 13 people into three cars until we all went our separate ways for the trip back home. When we left the Little Big Horn battlefield it was 103 degrees but when we reached our destination in Idaho it was only 53 degrees. This was the difference in altitude. Little Big Horn battlefield is 3,159 feet but our house in Idaho was almost 7,000 feet above sea level. We passed through some thunderstorms and when we arrived I thought it had snowed because the front steps were covered with ice, which turned out to be hail.

The next morning Saturday July 16 we drove over to Yellowstone National Park and our first stop was at Old Faithful. I did not know until I actually arrived in Yellowstone that the area is an active super volcano. The evidence is everywhere. You see ponds of boiling water and steam rising from them. Geysers are spewing up at various heights throughout the area. If you can believe the scientists they say that the first major eruption was 2.1 million years ago and was one of the largest volcanic eruptions in history covering 5,790 square miles with ash. It was powerful enough that it covered the entire state of Texas under 5 feet of ash. The most recent eruption was 640,000 years ago and it created a Caldera. A caldera is a large crater. Much of the crater has been filled in by lava flows over the years. The crater covered an area from thirty to forty five miles. Geysers and boiling water in the park are heated by molten rock found four to five miles below the surface. Experts are not expecting another gigantic eruption anytime soon and if there was an eruption they say that we would have weeks and even months of warning. The volcano is under constant observation by scientists. They monitor earthquakes, ground deformation, tilt, temperature and geothermal discharge.

The beauty of Yellowstone is breathtaking and is probably the prettiest country I have ever seen in my life. It can be deadly, however if you are not careful. There are grizzly bears, wolves, bisons and other wild animals roaming through the park. Boardwalks make it possible for visitors get closeup looks at the heated pools. Signs are posted warning people not to get off of the boardwalk. What looks like solid ground might be just a thin crust and you can fall into the boiling water. On July 31st, just a couple of weeks after we were there a park employee spotted what looked like the sole of a shoe in the water. Upon closer look it turned out to be the lower leg and foot of some unlucky person who left the safety of the boardwalk.