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Explosive 2018 eruptions at Kīlauea driven by a collapse-induced stomp-rocket mechanism

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Abstract

Explosive volcanic eruptions produce hazardous atmospheric plumes composed of tephra particles, hot gas and entrained air. Such eruptions are generally driven by magmatic fragmentation or steam expansion. However, an eruption mechanism outside this phreatic–magmatic spectrum was suggested by a sequence of 12 explosive eruptions in May 2018 at Kīlauea, Hawaii, that occurred during the early stages of caldera collapse and produced atmospheric plumes reaching 8 km above the vent. Here we use seismic inversions for reservoir pressure as a source condition for three-dimensional simulations of transient multiphase eruptive plume ascent through a conduit and stratified atmosphere. We compare the simulations with conduit ascent times inferred from seismic and infrasound data, and with plume heights from radar data. We find that the plumes are consistent with eruptions caused by a stomp-rocket mechanism involving the abrupt subsidence of reservoir roof rock that increased pressure in the underlying magma reservoir. In our model, the reservoir was overlain by a pocket of accumulated high-temperature magmatic gas and lithic debris, which were driven through a conduit approximately 600 m long to erupt particles at rates of around 3,000 m3 s−1. Our results reveal a distinct collapse-driven type of eruption and provide a framework for integrating diverse geophysical and atmospheric data with simulations to gain a better understanding of unsteady explosive eruptions.

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Fig. 1: Collapse-driven eruption mechanism.
Fig. 2: Dynamics of a collapse-driven eruption.
Fig. 3: A sequence of collapse eruptions.
Fig. 4: Eruptive plumes.

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Data availability

Seismic and infrasound data are available through IRIS from the HV seismic network. Tiltmeter data are available as a USGS data release69. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Next Generation Radar Level 2 Base Data were obtained using the NOAA Weather and Climate Toolkit (https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/wct, https://doi.org/10.7289/V5W9574V). The crater digital elevation model is available as a USGS data release70 and the Shuttle Radar Topography Mission 1 arcsec digital elevation model is available through the USGS (10.5066/F7PR7TFT). Reanalysis atmospheric data are available through NCEP/NCAR (https://rda.ucar.edu/datasets/ds090.0/), and wind speed data are available through the National Park Service GPMP/ARS (https://ard-request.air-resource.com/data.aspx).

Code availability

Codes are available upon request to the corresponding author and following USGS software management policies.

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Acknowledgements

USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory staff including M. Patrick, C. Parcheta, D. Swanson and others shared video and provided comments. A. Van Eaton provided discussion of tephra. G. Waite provided NPT infrasound data. The Stanford Crustal Deformation and Fault Mechanics Group provided rectangular dislocation and topography codes. P. Dawson provided advice on seismic data processing. L. Mastin provided USGS review. This work was supported by the Additional Supplemental Appropriations for Disaster Relief Act of 2019 (P.L. 116-20) following the eruption of Kīlauea in 2018. The facilities of IRIS Data Services, and specifically the IRIS Data Management Center, were used for access to waveforms and related metadata used in this study. IRIS Data Services are funded through the Seismological Facilities for the Advancement of Geoscience and EarthScope (SAGE) Proposal of the National Science Foundation under Cooperative Agreement EAR-1261681. Funding was provided by National Science Foundation EAR-2036980 (L.K.). Any use of trade, firm or product names is for descriptive purposes only and does not imply endorsement by the US Government.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. US Geological Survey Volcano Science Center California Volcano Observatory, Moffett Field, CA, USA

    Josh Crozier & Kyle R. Anderson

  2. University of Oregon Department of Earth Sciences, Eugene, OR, USA

    Josef Dufek & Leif Karlstrom

  3. US Geological Survey Geology, Minerals, Energy and Geophysics Science Center, Portland, OR, USA

    Ryan Cahalan

  4. US Geological Survey Volcano Science Center Cascades Volcano Observatory, Vancouver, WA, USA

    Weston Thelen & Mary Benage

  5. Institute for Disaster Management and Reconstruction (IDMR), Sichuan University, Chengdu, China

    Chao Liang

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Contributions

J.C. conceptualization, writing, methodology. J.D. conceptualization, writing, methodology. L.K. conceptualization, writing, funding acquisition. K.R.A. conceptualization, writing. R.C. conceptualization, writing, methodology. W.T. conceptualization, writing. C.L. conceptualization. M.B. conceptualization, methodology.

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Correspondence to Josh Crozier.

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Nature Geoscience thanks John Browning and Ricardo Garza-Girón for their contribution to the peer review of this work. Primary Handling Editor: Alireza Bahadori, in collaboration with the Nature Geoscience team.

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Extended data

Extended Data Fig. 1 RIMD vertical seismic counts and stacked NPT infrasound pressures.

Each infrasound channel is time-shifted based on approximate acoustic travel times from the vent centroid. Infrasound traces between events have been normalized to similar amplitudes. Ground shaking induced motion of the infrasound instrument likely contributes to these signals.

Extended Data Fig. 2 Single force source inversions and predicted plume heights.

a-c, Source location. Dots mark best fits and plus symbols and dotted lines mark bounds where fits within a misfit ratio of 1.05 of the best fit can be found. d, Vertical force. e, Predicted plume heights from a vertical single force of 2.5 × 1012 N assuming a particle density of 2000 kg/m3.

Extended Data Fig. 3 Moment tensor source inversions.

a-c, Source location. Dots mark best fits and plus symbols and dotted lines mark bounds where fits within a misfit ratio of 1.05 of the best fit can be found. d, Scalar moment. e, Decomposition components.

Extended Data Fig. 4 Spherical reservoir source inversions.

a-c, Source location. Dots mark best fits and plus symbols and dotted lines mark bounds where fits within a misfit ratio of 1.05 of the best fit can be found. d, Volume change.

Extended Data Fig. 5 Dike combined with spherical reservoir source inversions.

In these inversions spherical source location was fixed based on geodetic inversions. a-g, Dike location and geometry. Dots mark best fits and plus symbols and dotted lines mark bounds where fits within a misfit ratio of 1.05 of the best fit can be found. Dip angle is measured to the right of the strike azimuth. h, Sphere and Dike pressure change. i, Sphere and dike volume change.

Extended Data Fig. 6 Ring fault plus spherical reservoir source inversions with ring fault centered over spherical reservoir and uniform slip.

In these inversions spherical source location was fixed based on geodetic inversions. a-d, Ring fault location and geometry. Dots mark best fits and plus symbols and dotted lines mark bounds where fits within a misfit ratio of 1.05 of the best fit can be found. Negative dips represent inward dip** ring faults. e, Sphere volume change and ring fault dip–slip motion.

Extended Data Fig. 7 Ring fault spherical reservoir source inversions with ring fault centered over spherical reservoir and Gaussian slip.

In these inversions spherical source location was fixed based on geodetic inversions. a-d, Ring fault location and geometry. Dots mark best fits and plus symbols and dotted lines mark bounds where fits within a misfit ratio of 1.05 of the best fit can be found. Dips between -90° and 0° represent inward dip** ring faults. e, Azimuth at which the Gaussian ring fault slip distribution is centered. f, Sphere volume change and ring fault dip–slip motion (at the center of the Gaussian slip distribution).

Extended Data Fig. 8 Reservoir Model.

a, Model sketch (not to scale). Blue colors indicate the co-collapse reservoir inflation, magma head increase, and collapse volume. b-d, Model results for different initial reservoir volumes, gas pocket volumes, gas pocket radii, and magma compressibilities. b, Pre-collapse total reservoir fluid (gas pocket and magma) compressibility. Bounds from previous work are shown. c, Co-collapse gas pocket pressurization. d, Volume of the collapse block introduced into the reservoir during collapse.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Information

Supplementary Figs. 1–15 and Tables 1 and 2.

Supplementary Video 1

Animation and sonification30 of data from the second 20 May event. a, Spectrogram stacked from near-field broadband seismometers. b, Raw seismic counts show an abrupt collapse onset. c, Integrated seismic displacement (solid black) and the fit from inversions for a pressurized spherical reservoir (dotted black) show a step-like reservoir pressurization, once band-limitation-induced tapers are removed to create plume simulation input (blue). d, Infrasound stacked at array NPT (shifted by acoustic travel time from the vent) shows a pressure drop at the collapse onset, then a spike when the eruptive plume arrives at the crater floor. Some instrument shaking effects are present. e, Radial (from the reservoir centroid) ground deformation shows the step-like inflation without seismic artefacts, although tiltmeter data have some ground-motion-induced artefacts and GNSS data (stacked from NPIT, HOVL, OUTL, CRIM and BYRL) have higher noise. f, Webcam images taken every 5 s from Uēkahuna show atmospheric plume ascent. g, Ground inflation was measured by seismometers (pink arrows) and is fitted using an inversion for a pressurized spherical reservoir (black arrows). The 1 cm scale bar applies to vertical displacements (dotted arrows); horizontal vectors (solid arrows) include translation + tilt and are shown at half of this scale. The map is coloured according to modelled vertical displacement. Audio: the right audio channel is NPT vertical seismic counts, and the left audio channel is stacked NPT infrasound. Both types of datum are highpass filtered at 0.05 Hz, stretched to the video duration and pitch shifted to within audible range.

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Crozier, J., Dufek, J., Karlstrom, L. et al. Explosive 2018 eruptions at Kīlauea driven by a collapse-induced stomp-rocket mechanism. Nat. Geosci. 17, 572–578 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-024-01442-0

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