Volcanic activity world-wide 6-8 September 2012: Apoyeque, Krakatau, Etna, Campi Flegrei, El Hierro, Popocatépetl, Fuego, Pacaya, Santiaguito, Nevado del Ruiz, Tungurahua, Reventador, Pagan, Batu Tara, Sakurajima

Apoyeque volcano near Managua, Nicaragua, has been experiencing a seismic swarm of shallow quakes including several larger than magnitude 3 since Thursday.

Krakatau volcano is currently calm. There is little seismic activity reported from the observatory and no ash or steam plumes weere visible on the recent Terra and Acqua satellite images. For this reason, we postpone our planned Krakatau Special trip to when activity starts picking up again. Be sure to be on our newsletter list if you want to be informed.

Etna volcano: Around 13:17 local time 6 Sep, an ash emission episode that lasted about 5 minutes from a vent between the two main vents of the SE crater was observed. It consisted of small explosions at intervals of about 10 seconds.
No further ash emissions have been observed since, and it is the first time since a similar event on 27 August.

The earthquake swarm at El Hierro continues at modest intensity with an average of about 15 quakes per day, typically located at about 10 km depth in the western El Golfo area.


A new earthquake swarm started in the Campi Flegrei near Naples. On the morning of 8 Sep, over 200 small quakes were recorded. The swarm is related to the ongoing phenomenon of bradyseismus of the area, a low ground movement that periodically raises and sinks the land.

Activity of Popocatépetl has remained at relatively low levels. Over the past 24 hours, weak mostly steam explosions occured at an rate of 1 every 2-3 hours. At night, glowing material ejected during such explosions can be sometimes seen.

Fuego volcano, Guatemala: After the end of its recent paroxysm on 4 August, the volcano has quieted down a lot. INSIVUMEH reports only white steaming and that the lava flows are cooling and not producing avalanches.
No explosions are mentioned although the seismic signal suggests that some minor activity might be going on.

Santiaguito volcano continues to have 4 active flows generating block avalanches and produces occasional ash explosions with plumes up to 300-700 m height.

Pacaya volcano stays quiet at the surface, but there are quite a few weak tremor and volcano-tectonic quakes visible on the current seismograms.

The alert level of Nevado del Ruiz volcano has been lowered, as the volcano continues to show an overall decrease in activity.

Tungurahua volcano in Ecuador produces a constant steam plume, but there were no recent explosions or reports of ash emissions. The tremor is low at the moment.

Reventador volcano has become more active in the past days, and produces a plume of steam and some ash reaching up to 3 km height. An explosion with incandescent material ejected was observed during the night 6-7 September.

Pagan volcano in the Marianas continues to produce a steam plume, but has not had any explosions.

Batu Tara continues to eject ash plumes rising to 7,000 ft altitude on most days.

Sakura-jima (Japan): Moderately strong explosions have been occurring at very irregular frequency 0-3 times per day, with a maximum ash cloud altitude at 3.7 km after an explosion on 5 Sep.