Volcano of the Week!

A new feature to the blog starts this week!

Every week a volcano from around the world will be picked randomly and gain the title of ‘volcano of the week’. Information on this volcano, including eruptive history will be posted.

The title this week goes to:

Nyiragongo

Location: DC Congo, Africa

Type: Stratovolcano

Summit: 3470m

Last Eruption: Continuing

Status: ACTIVE

Details:

Nyiragongo is an active volcano famous for its active lava lake and fluid lava flows. It consists of a crater measuring 1.2 km in diameter which indicates the depth of the previous lava lake before it drained in 1977.

The first recorded eruption was in 1884 and the most recent one is continuing to this day. In 1977 the lava lake drained in an hour causing fluid lava flows travelling at 60 miles/h. Numerous villages were destroyed or inundated by the lava flows. There is no clear reports on the number of fatalities, however according to reports up to 100 people were killed.

On 17^th January 2002 another eruption draining the lava lakes took place. 45 people were killed and over 400 injured. The lava flows destroyed 14 villages in the surrounding area. Lava flows also travelled to the town of Goma located 10 km south of the volcano, with an estimated speed of 2-3miles/minute. Homes and infrastructures were destroyed by the lava flows. A port and an airport in Goma were also destroyed or damaged extensively. Thousands evacuated the city of Goma which had a population over approximately 400,000. An explosion at a gas station caused by the advancing lava flows in Goma killed a further 100 people. 

According to reports some of the lava flows were 2 metres high and 30 metres wide.

The eruptions at Nyiragongo have been a VEI 1 or VEI 2 according to the Global Volcanism Program.  

The photos below show the lava lake at Nyiragongo.

Photographer: Olivier Grunewald

Photographer: Olivier Grunewald

Below is a satellite image combined with an elevation model. The city of Goma is shown in pink. A partial map of the recent lava flows is shown in red.

                                                      Source: NASA: (Earth observatory)