Amazing Growing Deep-Sea Volcano

When put in water, volcanoes may increase in size
From National Geographic:

The science team, led by Bill Chadwick of Oregon State University, reports the volcano has been growing considerably in the last three years. Chadwick says the volcano has expanded 131 feet in height and nearly a thousand feed in width, about as tall as a 12-story building and as wide as a city block….NW Rota-1 is about 1,700 feet below sea level, and the pressure of the ocean keeps the energy released from the volcano from becoming too explosive, allowing the remote vehicle, Jason, to get close.

Dr. M (1709 Posts)


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3 comments on “Amazing Growing Deep-Sea Volcano
  1. Pingback: Lets wrap up Marking period 6 with a little extra credit. | Integrated Science at William Penn

  2. I wonder how much these undersea volcanoes contribute to the acidification of the ocean? Any work being done on this? It’s be the chemistry of a different gas from CO2 & what will be the effect on marine life of that?

  3. Well, animals live quite comfortably around hydrothermal vents which can spew out water with pH as low as 2 at times. Most vents aren’t that acidic though. Always keep in mind the dilution factor though. The reason that vents probably don’t contribute to global warming or ocean acidification is that the ocean is freakin huge. Even after thousands of years those H+ ions are recycled in some manner right, though just stay in the deep water and accrue, lowering the global pH little by little each century.

    The problem with ocean acidification, in my opinion( i.e. I’m not an OA researcher! But am a master speculator…) is that surface waters don’t make it down very deep in tropical areas where there is much life with calcium carbonate shells. The layer of warm water site on top of the deeper cold water and doesn’t mix well, except in areas of coastal upwelling. So what is in the top warm layer more or less stays there. This is where many reef animals live and hence why it is so damaging. The dilution factor is much less at the surface perhaps, than the deep sea, which has greater volume.

    Does that make sense to anyone but me?

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