Impact of Iceland volcano on upcoming Season?

[jinftl]

The thinking right now is that the eruption of the volcano (I won't dare try and type the name) will have minimal if any impact on the upcoming hurricane season. Volcanoes near the equator or low latitudes (i.e., Krakatoa and Pinatubo) have had much more impact on the summer climate than ones near the arctic.

Interesting article from Dr. Jeff Masters. Link is below, but here is a brief excerpt:

Let's examine recent volcanic eruptions that have had a significant cooling effect on the climate. In the past 200 years, Mt. Pinatubo in the Philippines (June 1991), El Chichon (Mexico, 1982), Mt. Agung (Indonesia, 1963), Santa Maria (Guatemala, 1902) Krakatoa (Indonesia, 1883), and Tambora (1815) all created noticeable cooling. The Mt. Pinatubo and El Chichon eruptions caused a greater than 10% drop in sunlight reaching the surface. The eruption of Tambora in 1815 had an even greater impact, triggering the famed Year Without a Summer in 1816. You'll notice from the list of eruptions above that all of these climate-cooling events were from volcanoes in the tropics.

Above the tropics, the stratosphere's circulation features rising air, which pulls the sulfur-containing volcanic aerosols high into the stratosphere. Upper-level winds in the stratosphere tend to flow from the Equator to the poles, so sulfur aerosols from equatorial eruptions get spread out over both hemispheres. These aerosol particles take a year or two to settle back down to earth, since there is no rain in the stratosphere to help remove them. However, if a major volcanic eruption occurs in the mid-latitudes or polar regions, the circulation of the stratosphere in those regions generally features pole-ward-flowing, sinking air, and the volcanic aerosol particles are not able to penetrate high in the stratosphere or get spread out around the entire globe

It does not appear that the current eruption of the Eyjafjallajökull volcano on Iceland was large enough to alter the atmospheric circulation of the Northern Hemisphere and cause a change in the late spring/early summer weather patterns. A series of several major eruptions over the next few weeks would be required for that to happen. The volcano is also too far north for the cooling effect of its ash cloud to affect the sea surface temperatures in the tropical Atlantic for the coming hurricane season. However, the ash could should bring spectacular sunsets to Europe over the next week, and to North America by sometime next week, as the jet stream wraps the ash cloud eastwards across the Northern Hemisphere.
http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMa ... rynum=1462

[kevin]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laki#1783_eruption

The eruption, also known as the Skaftáreldar ("Skaftá river fires") or Síðueldur, produced an estimated 14 km3 (3.4 cu mi) of basalt lava, and the total volume of tephra emitted was 0.91 km3 (0.2 cu mi).[1] Lava fountains were estimated to have reached heights of 800-1400 m (~2,600-4,600 ft). In Great Britain, the summer of 1783 was known as the "sand-summer" due to ash fallout.[6] The gases were carried by the convective eruption column to altitudes of about 15 kilometres (10 mi). The aerosols built up causing a cooling effect in the Northern Hemisphere.

So high latitude volcanoes can cause notable climate effects.

[Typhoon_Willie]

It may not be over as of yet...several times in the past when Eyjafjallajoekull erupted then Katla which is a larger volcano located only 8 miles east came up with a much larger eruption. We will see! That is what their worry is now.

[jinftl]

at least we didn't have to go too far back in history to find a high latitude volcano that effected the summer weather in a high latitude location like britain....what was the impact on the tropics though from that event almost a quarter of a millenium ago?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laki#1783_eruption

The eruption, also known as the Skaftáreldar ("Skaftá river fires") or Síðueldur, produced an estimated 14 km3 (3.4 cu mi) of basalt lava, and the total volume of tephra emitted was 0.91 km3 (0.2 cu mi).[1] Lava fountains were estimated to have reached heights of 800-1400 m (~2,600-4,600 ft). In Great Britain, the summer of 1783 was known as the "sand-summer" due to ash fallout.[6] The gases were carried by the convective eruption column to altitudes of about 15 kilometres (10 mi). The aerosols built up causing a cooling effect in the Northern Hemisphere.

So high latitude volcanoes can cause notable climate effects.

[somethingfunny]

If we were to pull analogs to some of the more recent eruptions....

Mt. Pinatubo (June 1991) - 1991 featured Hurricane Bob, one of the closest calls New England has had since 1938, and then 1992 had Hurricane Andrew. Before anyone says 1992 was quiet aside from Andrew, consider how hyperactive that year was in the Pacific.

El Chichon (Mexico, 1982) - 1982 was also extremely active in the Pacific, but quiet in the Atlantic. Like, 1992, it was an El Nino. And 1983 was the same, quiet in the Atlantic, hyperactive Pacific, and we had Alicia in the Atlantic.


Mt. Agung (Indonesia, 1963) - I recall a monstrous hurricane named Flora striking Cuba in 1963. 1964 has already been mentioned as an analog to this season, and was an awful year for the United States - Cleo, Dora, Hilda, and Isbell.

Santa Maria (Guatemala, 1902) Krakatoa (Indonesia, 1883), and Tambora (1815)
....I don't know enough about these seasons to draw much of a correlation.

Ultimately, I don't think that there's much evidence out there that a volcanic eruption can suppress a hurricane season. At least not a relatively moderate one like Eyjafjallajoekull. Maybe one on the caliber of Krakatoa would cause a big drop-off in cyclone activity.

[somethingfunny]

Regarding Laki, in 1783, the "sand summer" in Europe and the "summer that never came" in Alaska....

from Wikipedia;

1783 Atlantic hurricane season
Three ships were sunk caused by a hurricane that remained offshore of the East Coast of the United States on September 19.
Another tropical cyclone struck North Carolina and Virginia. Extensive damage was seen in North Carolina. Richmond saw violent northeast gusts for 24 hours, but no damage. Norfolk and Portsmouth reported a "25 foot tide" which caused damage (Pennsylvania Gazette October 29, 1783 and Ludlum 1963 p. 29).

1784 Atlantic hurricane seaon
Jamaica was hit by a hurricane on July 30, causing 2 deaths from drowning and possibly many more.
On an unknown date, a hurricane hit Curaçao; many ships were either damaged or destroyed.

1785 Atlantic hurricane season
On August 24, a westward moving hurricane hit St. Croix. It continued to hit Puerto Rico, Jamaica, and Cuba before last being seen on the 29th. It caused 142 deaths.
Delaware was hit by a hurricane on September 2, one of the few hurricanes in that state on record. It caused 181 casualties.
A hurricane on September 23-24 led to the "highest tide ever before known in Norfolk." It struck the lower Chesapeake Bay. Portsmouth experienced a strong northeast to northwest gale for 3 days. The storm in Virginia was noted in both the Virginia Gazette of October 1, and the New Jersey Gazette of October 1 (from Ludlum 1963 p. 30). The Annual Register the next year reported that several ships had been driven ashore by the tide and the wind, with a total damage estimated at around £30,000.

Sounds like it was a bad time to be in Norfolk. I have to wonder if the late August storm in the Caribbean and the September 2nd hurricane in Delaware were the same storm...


On the other hand, the period from 1883, 1884, and 1885 following Krakatoa were very quiet in the Atlantic (I have no idea about the Pacific) with the only major impact being a Category 2 landfall in Georgia in 1885. In 1886, the city of Indianola was completely destroyed by one of four major hurricanes striking Texas.

[cycloneye]

What I see from the above information is that if there is any impact from this volcano to the degree of affecting the activity in the tropics,it may be in 2011.

[jinftl]

Keep in mind the following though from article quoted above:

Let's examine recent volcanic eruptions that have had a significant cooling effect on the climate. In the past 200 years, Mt. Pinatubo in the Philippines (June 1991), El Chichon (Mexico, 1982), Mt. Agung (Indonesia, 1963), Santa Maria (Guatemala, 1902) Krakatoa (Indonesia, 1883), and Tambora (1815) all created noticeable cooling. The Mt. Pinatubo and El Chichon eruptions caused a greater than 10% drop in sunlight reaching the surface. The eruption of Tambora in 1815 had an even greater impact, triggering the famed Year Without a Summer in 1816. You'll notice from the list of eruptions above that all of these climate-cooling events were from volcanoes in the tropics.

What I see from the above information is that if there is any impact from this volcano to the degree of affecting the activity in the tropics,it may be in 2011.

[HurricaneBill]

Did Novarupta have any impact when it erupted in 1912? It was the largest eruption of the 20th century.

Novarupta

[jinftl]

According to NASA research, Novarupta erupted near the arctic with a blast as strong as Krakatoa, but had little impact on climate in the continental u.s. and tropics...

In June 1912, Novarupta—one of a chain of volcanoes on the Alaska Peninsula—erupted in what turned out to be the largest blast of the twentieth century. It was so powerful that it drained magma from under another volcano, Mount Katmai, six miles east, causing the summit of Katmai to collapse to form a caldera half a mile deep. Novarupta also expelled three cubic miles of magma and ash into the air, which fell to cover an area of 3,000 square miles more than a foot deep.

Despite the fact that the eruption was comparable to that of the far more famous eruption of Krakatau in Indonesia in 1883 and so near the continental United States, it was hardly known at the time because the area was so remote from English-speaking people. Almost a hundred years later, researchers are paying attention. Novarupta is near the Arctic Circle and its impact on climate appears to be quite different from that of "ordinary" tropical volcanoes, according to recent research by climatologists using a NASA computer model.

When a volcano anywhere erupts, it does more than spew clouds of ash, which can shadow a region from sunlight and cool it for a few days. It also spews sulfur dioxide. If the eruption is strongly vertical, it shoots that sulfur dioxide high into the stratosphere more than 10 miles above Earth.

Up in the stratosphere, sulfur dioxide reacts with water vapor to form sulfate aerosols. Because these aerosols float above the altitude of rain, they don't get washed out. They linger, reflecting sunlight and cooling Earth's surface.

This can create a kind of nuclear winter (a.k.a. "volcanic winter") for a year or more after an eruption. In April 1815, for instance, the Tambora volcano in Indonesia erupted. The following year, 1816, was called "the year without a summer," with snow falling across the United States in July. Even the smaller June 1991 eruption of Pinatubo in the Philippines cooled the average temperature of the northern hemisphere summer of 1992 to well below average. But both those volcanoes as well as Krakatau were in the tropics.

Novarupta is just south of the Arctic Circle. Using a NASA computer model at the the Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), Prof. Alan Robock of Rutgers University and colleagues found that Novarupta's effects on the world's climate would have been different. (Their research was funded by the National Science Foundation.) Robock explains: "The stratosphere's average circulation is from the equator to the poles, so aerosols from tropical volcanoes tend to spread across all latitudes both north and south of the Equator." Aerosols would quickly circulate to all parts of the globe.

But the NASA GISS climate model showed that aerosols from an arctic eruption such as Novarupta tend to stay north of 30ºN—that is, no further south than the continental United States or Europe. Indeed, they would mix with the rest of Earth's atmosphere only very slowly.

http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/sc ... novarupta/

Did Novarupta have any impact when it erupted in 1912? It was the largest eruption of the 20th century.

Novarupta

[Tireman4]

The Year Without A Summer....very interesting....Read Volcano Weather about event.

The eruption of Tambora in 1815 had an even greater impact, triggering the famed Year Without a Summer in 1816. You'll notice from the list of eruptions above that all of these climate-cooling events were from volcanoes in the tropics.

Also had a partial responsibility for the Panic of 1819....so, this could have some reaching possibilities.

[TreasureIslandFLGal]

I read somewhere that the result of this same volcano erupting was that the subsequent year the monsoons were broken up/lessened in the tropics across India and Africa. Less waves developed.

If that is true, then I would suspect that NEXT season there will be less frequent waves of energy coming across Africa with the ability to turn into Cape Verde systems.

Of course, nothing was mentioned about the volcano's impact on our home-grown tropical systems that originate through low pressure spinups in the western hemisphere on their own.

This event may help rectify, at least temporarily, the ongoing arctic melt. Maybe even allowing the northwest passage to ice over again over the next year. -Especially if this eruption is a long one (1 month+), or even like the last big one that lasted 2 years! And who knows if that will spawn the other volcano nearby to erupt as well.

(everything seems to be going at once, eh? Let's hope that volcano off of northeast africa doesn't blow now too and cause 1/2 of the island to slip into the Atlantic in that long-feared landslide they have been worrying about...the one that will cause a huge tsunami that will put a huge swath of US eastern seaboard underwater.)

[HURAKAN]

1991 and 1992; prior, during and after the Pinatubo eruption.





I don't much an effect from the volcano and Pinatubo's eruption was several times more significant this Iceland's volcano. What contributed to the active 1991 and 1992 season in the Pacific and less active in the Atlantic was El Niño. Nonetheless, the global temperature decreased a bit after Pinatubo's eruption but it seems the Pacific didn't care about that fact.

[HURAKAN]

Typhoon Yunya passed just 50 miles north of Pinatubo while it was erupting

[TreasureIslandFLGal]

That same article I read also pointed to that fact...about Pinatubo not having so much of an affect and the El Nino status being more of an influence. -but it also pointed out the importance of location. Tropical area Volcanos don't seem to have the same impact as northern hemisphere volcanic ash has been shown to have, unless very very large.

Apparently a northern hemisphere volcano impacts the system differently with less ash to affect the monsoonal flow. Not sure how/why....but that's what it said. It used this same volcano's historic eruptions and also mentioned Mt. St. Hellens and a few Alaskan eruptions that have occurred over the last century.

[OuterBanker]

Not much effect on weather and close to none in the tropics. This volcano is near the artic circle. Mt Pintubo was in the tropics. To have any affect on the tropics it has to be in the tropical zones.