The Kamtchatka Volcanic Eruption Response Team
reported an eruption on Mount Klyuchevskoi, a 4750, stratovolcano
(cone-shaped volcano made up
of successive layers of ash and lava), on the central Kamchatka
Peninsula, on Wednesday 3 January 2017, which produced a column of ash
and steam that rose to 5.5 km above sealevel and drifted 92 km to the
northeast. The volcano had been inactive for most of this year, but began to
produce emissions on 2 December, and underwent eruptions on the
fifth, seventh, thirteenth, and twenty-first of the month.
Column of ash over Mount Klyuchevskoi. Igor Buymistrov/TASS.
Mount Klyuchevskoi is part of the Klyuchevskoi Volcano Group in the Ust-Kamchatka (East Kamchatka) District, along with mounts Bezymianny and Kamen. The Kamchatka Peninsula lies on the eastern edge of the Okhotsk Plate, close to its margin with the Pacific and North American Plates. The Pacific Plate is being subducted along the margin, and as it does so it passes under the southern part of the Kamchatka Peninsula, and as it does so is partially melted by the friction and the heat of the Earth's interior. Some of the melted material then rises through the overlying Okhotsk Plate as magma and fuelling the volcanoes of southern Kamchatka.
Simple
diagram showing the subduction of the Pacific Plate beneath the Okhotsk
Plate along the Kuril Kamchatka Trench. The Kamchatka Peninsula is at
the top of the diagram. Auburn University.
See also...
Follow Sciency Thoughts on Facebook.