CotoPaxi Volcano - Ecuador seismic status

[Bob]

Calming within the CotoPaxi volcano.. Diminished aftershock energy from the main seismic event off the NW Coast of Ecuador (the m7.8).. What can be seen are a few aftershocks as well as clearly defined slow wave (and harmonic oscillation, something like when the right "note is hit", through resonance, a buildup in energy can be noted, and then released)..

A brief period of eruption occurred about 0500 am local time.

Into the morning and early afternoon is the graphic below.. There is harmonic oscillation AND slow-wave within the graphics after the small eruption and prior (during the early morning hours, top graphic).. Is this pattern about something new and stronger in the offing? (see Bill's observations in the Ecuador 6.1 thread)..

[Bob]

The patterns of eruption are cyclic as can be seen in above's post, precluded with slow wave and harmonic oscillation within the "shaking" (seismic) events. Keeping an eye on this..

Tungurahu's monitoring can be used to show the aftershocks.. It is possible that the large 7.8 event redirected the magma channels in the area.

[Bob]

Good news with the eruption situation on CotoPaxi
diminished to zero eruption was apparent during the night at the volcano.. However strong aftershocks were still being received by the seismic monitors near the volcano. No strong harmonic patterns nor strong slow wave was noticed in last nite's graphics.

[Bob]

After an evening and early morning of quiet (punctuated by aftershocks), slowly and increasingly, periods of harmonic oscillation and slow wave appeared, which then followed periods of eruption..

At the same time, when the resumption started with CotoPaxi, volcano Tungurahua far to the south started periods of increased unsettled activity in the seismic monitors. Such built up continually without slowave or harmonic oscillation..

What we may be seeing then is the regional "period of activity cycle" where the bottom of the cycle (was not really showing us that "it is over") marked one part of a much larger, longer period cycle.. Somewhat like looking at how a 'rogue ocean wave' can appear out of the blue in moderate to high seas.. the "big one" may still be there, just catching up.. with the smaller cycles..

Tungurahua- below

Previously:

CotoPaxi below

Tungurahua below

[Bob]

And the cycle repeats - after an evening then day, slowly the harmonic oscillations appeared, and after an aftershock from the 7.8 event (in the upper NW), eruption started once again.

There was a strong burst of activity during this eruptive period -

[Bob]

The cyclic surging showing up in the seismic graphic is interesting in my opinion.. (see the seismic graphic readout for last nite and into the early morning hours in the above post).

Pattern: There is a long period slow wave followed by saturation of the seismic detector, brief calming, then resurging.. as if a large wave is pulsating and finding a way to release energy through magma.. A system seeking balance?

The eruption continued thru the early morning hours, diminishing shortly before 1000 am local. By 1030 a cyclic period of activity resumed once again.

[Bob]

Cyclic period is changing slightly, to a longer cycle and daytime eruption, starting in the afternoon. What is interesting about this graphic is classic harmonic oscillation associated with magma surging appears to be present, and then building.. Right before the eruption starts, spikey activity presents itself.. The harmonic oscillation starts peaking, and the cyclic period shortens dramatically, to less than a minute gap between bursts... Then the eruption happens 11 minutes later.

[Bob]

With the apparent change in the eruptive period, the activity cycle appears to have moved earlier in the afternoon for the starting.. (see below, about 1610 local time)..

(earlier in the day the graphic mechanism network went down, and that particular image may or may not come up - http://correo.igepn.edu.ec/heli/heli...2016050300.gif - since the large 7.8 earthquake, the network has been experiencing difficulty..)

Continued thru the night:

and into the early morning hours. It was still "rumbly/noisy" at 0900 am local - an earthquake can be seen at about 0837 am local.

the Tungurahua volcano's seismograph also points out the seismic event close to the same time, but EARLIER, indicating the epicenter is closer to Tungurahua than Cotopaxi's seismic center. That timing of "Events" can be useful for seeing if local activity is happening (earthquakes), or aftershocks are happening.

Regionally, there could be instability, and fault movement.

Looking at the last 30 days earthquakes and aftershocks (it is eye-opening, the quantity which happened in the upper NW area... both onshore and off - larger size bubbles equals larger quake):

This could possibly be contributing to keeping CotoPaxi's volcanic magma channels active (and emission from the Volcano)..

Rare Visual - cloud conditions have been preventing good clear views -

Relatively real time camera (may be offline at times, if no image is seen below):

[KiwiElf]

Think that may be about to get busy again by later today, around 1800 - 22:00 UT onward, & for the next 2-3 days...

[KiwiElf]

Sorry guys - that should be NZ Time - in a few hours from now!

[KiwiElf]

Hi Bob, just noticed we're starting to get an uptick in EQ activity over the last couple of hours, one down here by us in NZ and Mexico just had a 5.6M a couple of hours ago, quite shallow. (22:27 UT). I keep forgetting we're 12 hours ahead of UT so my earlier times were a bit premature.

Right now (1232 NZ Time on 6th May) we're a few hours away from a close Earth & Moon line-up with Venus (which started a few hours ago), then the Sun & then Mercury. (My earlier "hunch"). Hope I'm wrong.

[Bob]

And there appears indeed to be an uptick, earlier 1530 local Ecuador time, eruptive cycle starts again.. with the harmonic oscillation, that appears to be related to magma movements

[KiwiElf]

As I suspected. OK, right now Moon is centered over the Pacific Ring of Fire with a lean toward the Asian side, and the Sun is "centered" pretty much the same area. I'm anticipating (but hoping NOT) for QUITE an uptick (I don't think major at this stage, but who knows???) . If you look at USGS, we've been having smaller ones all over the place about every 15 mins so far. What's the "translation" trend of your graph showing??

(BTW Im a hooge airplane nut - what's the airplane ur sitting in on your Avatar? Is it a Duke?? )

[Bob]

Cyclic activity did increase yesterday and into the early morning hours as shown below.

(the daytime seismic graphic is not currently showing up, as seen in the last displaying graphic, about 0405 am local (possibly network/computer issues at the Institute).. It may come back later - so if there is a gap, it is due to the reporting issues in Ecuador's Geological institute.

(BTW Im a hooge airplane nut - what's the airplane ur sitting in on your Avatar? Is it a Duke?? )

(That's looking into the cockpit of an old small Cessna Citation jet KiwiElf)

[KiwiElf]

This is not good... Earthquake Swarms under Mt St Helens increasing, Washington

http://www.theguardian.com/world/201...ted-washington

[Bob]

Posted by KiwiElf (here)
This is not good... Earthquake Swarms under Mt St Helens increasing, Washington

http://www.theguardian.com/world/201...ted-washington

Apparently going on for a month .. they say "nothing imminent.." but magma is moving around, maybe refilling the main magma chamber(s)... The so much seems to be what may be happening with CotoPaxi - there are swarms and magma movements, AND periods of gaseous eruption..

The U.S. Geological Survey said Friday they have discovered a swarm of small earthquakes underneath Mount St. Helens since March, which could mean it’s recharging with magma.

Scientists said the Pacific Northwest Seismic Network detected more than 130 earthquakes, between 1.2 and 4 miles deep, in the region since March 13. Researchers said the majority of the quakes have registered as a magnitude 0.5 or less and some are too small to detect.

There’s no indication there will be an eruption anytime soon, scientists said.

that there is activity up and down this side of the ring of fire is important to keep an eye on. CotoPaxi and Tungurahua are great indicators.. (as are a few others to watch)

[Bob]

Through the late evening starting at about 1600 hours, and into the early morning hours, eruptive activity continued within the volcano CotoPaxi.

This is currently an 18 hour eruptive cycle as of the time of this post.

[Bob]

Looking into the evening's seismic reports, CotoPaxi was very quiet.

Spikey activity was seen throughout the nite, and then near 5am local time, harmonic slow wave oscillation started back up.. Spikey activity is associated with rocks fracturing under pressure. Harmonic slow wave is associated with magma movements.

Then in the daytime morning hours things changed a bit.

A large afterhock or regional quake event appeared shortly before 0800 local time. Two hours afterwards (the apparent cyclic time to "respond" to the shock), strong harmonic slow wave activity appeared in CotoPaxi.

What appears interesting (see below), Tungurahua volcano to the South near Banos became active, as if the shock was able to free up magma movement in the Tungurahua volcano. (see graphic below).. refer to the corresponding times in the CotoPaxi seismic graphic above. It can be seen where there is any regional correlation and when UNIQUE activity is happening.. This increase in activity in Tungurahua may indicate a magma shift to that volcano. It may be too soon to look at "predicting" more activity at Tungurahua. I didn't see harmonic slow-wave signatures in the Tungurahua seismic graphic, but what was noted is Tungurahua's signature DOUBLE-PULSE events (big explosion followed by a slightly smaller one, in close timing).

[Bob]

Again during the day we see a calmer CotoPaxi volcano..

Triggers appear to be related to regional earthquakes, aftershocks, and magma channel molten rock movement. Noticing spikey activity, harmonic slow wave periods, and seeing these happening in cycles, seems to give some measure of local instability, and possibly with enough data from enough volcano seismic detectors, maybe further than regional activity could be a useful way to 'predict' earthquake and maybe eruptive activity..

Evening into the early morning graphic (image presents after 1800 local time)

[Bob]

Yesterday was mostly quiet during the day, and at night mostly spikey activity was noted with very weak periods of slow-wave harmonic activity was noted.

Watch right around 7am local time, the slow-wave harmonic oscillation tremors started to speed up, and gain in amplitude.

At 0915 am local time, then an eruption started.. Being able to look for the patterns gives some indication of when eruption is imminent :