I guess we have previous threads on this topic back in 2005 and 2009, but this time the academics has found real proof.
So to address Icon’s concern back in 2009, the Tatun volcano group, part of the Yangmingshan National Park, is indeed still active.
Researchers used recent shock waves from earthquakes in Yilan to triangulate the location and estimate the size of Tatun volcano’s underground magma chamber. As shock waves travels through the magma chamber, the waves slow down compares to waves traveling through rocks. These waves effectively become a sonar to detect underground magma chambers when monitored from different locations.
The magma chamber is about 20 KM underground, and it’s size is about a quarter of the size of Taipei city. As long as the chamber is no closer to the ground than 10KM, there’s not much need to be alarmed.
The last time Tatun erupted is also reestimate to be around 5000 years ago, which roughly corresponds to the end of activities at the Yuanshan neolithic site.
They do indeed. Really bad for all kinds of electronics, slow killers for people. Ash is not the best case scenario. Ashes get in the food, the skin, water supply.
I remember the ashes in our ceiling. The thing becomes like cement when wet. This means gutters, pipes, everything is either cleaned daily… or solidifies. With so many rivers in Taiwan, one fears for wildlife… and also flash floods.
A friend who lives in Costa Rica, where they have had an eruption ongoing over two years now, has a Maltese like Bobby. Poor thing must be washed throughly twice a week at least, because of the ashes.
Heard of stories from ex-gf that they had to open a hole on the wall of the family home’s second floor to make a door because it’s now the first floor, and the first floor is now a basement.
A map from the paper indicating the magma reservoir’s underground position and how it corresponds to the surface.
We are talking about Taipei here. The farthest you can get from Taipei Main Station to the North is only 28KM. The magma reservoir’s corresponding surface location is half that in distance.
Pyroclastic flow alone is able to extend up to 50 KM from its source. Half of that distance is enough to cover most of the Taipei metropolitan area. As some article stated, if Tatun is indeed active, then Taipei is the world’s closest city to an active volcano.
We are not even talking about the ash, which will at least have Northern Taiwan covered.
Oh, and there are two Nuclear power plants right on top of the magma reservoir, so we can also worry about the fall out, and radiation pollution of the sea along the North coast.
Well, thanks to Hansioux, I also learned that in the ol country the closest active volcano is 25 kms away from the capital, but we have no nuclear reactors… and half the population of Yonghe.
Given the sudden and unpredictable nature of these natural phenomena, may I suggest we move Taipei (government offices, businesses, people) to Taichung? Not far enough?
Asked what signs would show that a volcano is becoming increasingly active, Shin said that one sign to observe is if small earthquakes happen more frequently, because it shows that the magma chamber is gradually moving close to the surface.“
Another sign would be the depth of the epicenters of the earthquakes, whether they are getting closer to the surface. These two factors would help determine if the magma chamber is moving upward,” he said.
So far, the bureau has yet to detect any increase in the frequency of small earthquakes or other seismic activity in the Datun Volcanic Group that would point to the development of an active volcano, Shin said.
What a change huh? Wasn’t all that long ago the Tatun and Turtle Island volcanos were thought to be long dormant and just about extinct. Last eruptionthought to be hundreds of thousands of years ago! NOW, thought to have erupted about 5000 years ago !
The suckers are ACTIVE.
I’ve never liked the fact that Taipei rhymes with Pompei.
