T
T
T

Chaitén Volcano Eruption Photo Essay

Chaitén Volcano, Chile

In May 2009, the Pacific Northwest Research Station’s Charlie Crisafulli and Fred Swanson traveled to Chile at the request of Chilean academics and government officials. They were asked to establish a study to compare the ecological responses to the eruption of Chaitén—a 3,681-foot-tall caldera volcano that erupted 10 months earlier, on May 2, 2008—with those observed in the intensively studied Mount St. Helens landscape.

Like Mount St. Helens, the Chaitén landscape is dominated by a temperate rain forest with long-lived species, steep topography, and a maritime climate. The Chilean volcano’s eruption also shared similarities with Mount St. Helens’ 1980 event—including a lateral blast, tephra fall, lahars, and high levels of water and sediment runoff.

The two scientists returned to Chile in January 2010 to continue their observations and to provide assistance in building capacity for long-term volcano ecology research.

Remote sensing image that shows the locations of photo essay images (numbered), Chaitén Volcano (CV) and town (CT), and Minchinmávida volcano (M) with its extensive ice cap.
View from above Chaitén Volcano’s vent toward the northwest in May 2008, several weeks after the eruption.
last-toppled forest on northwest flank of Chaitén. In this view, trees are toppled from right (the vent) to left. Standing, blast-killed forest is in the distance on left side of image.
Blast-killed forest at the boundary between the toppled-forest zone (in distance toward the volcano) and the standing dead zone. Small patches of sprouting ferns are in the middle distance to right of camera. (Source: copyright N. La Penna, Chaitur Excursiones, Chaitén X Region, Chile).
Tephra-fall zone with approximately 20 cm (about 8 inches) of tephra deposition (as of March 2009) 30 km (~ 18 miles) downwind from the vent. Note the surviving trees, but large amount of limb debris and tree tops dropped by the weight of tephra in the canopy. (Source: F. Swanson, USDA Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station)
Rio Rayas looking downstream from the Highway 7 bridge. Aggregations of logs freshly deposited along the channel margin suggest major, post-eruption flooding, influenced, in part, by rapid runoff from slopes blanketed by very fine-grained tephra in the source watershed. The forest to the right (north) appears to have been killed by the scorching heat of the blast. (Source: F. Swanson, USDA Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station)
Rio Gigios looking upstream from Highway 7 bridge toward the rim of Chaitén’s caldera in the distance. Blast-scorched, standing-dead forest occupies the adjacent banks, and toppled forest covers hillslopes in the distance. The channel in the foreground was modified first by high runoff and, perhaps, debris flows from the mountain side and then by heavy equipment in an attempt to sustain the bridge. (Source: J. Jones, Oregon State University).
Rio Blanco (also called Rio Chaitén) on the bridge into Chaitén town looking north to the steaming domes of Chaitén volcano 10 km (about 6 miles) away.
Rio Amarillo (at the town of Amarillo) flowing from Minchinmávida, its icecap, and an extensive forested landscape with tens of centimeters of tephrafall.
A tributary to Rio Amarillo draining a watershed with substantial tehprafall. Flood-plain forest appears to have been killed by deposition of sediment (mainly fluvially transported tephra) and associated rise of the water table. (photo: J. Jones)

People

  • Person
    USDA Forest Service Logo

    Charlie Crisafulli

    PNW Researcher
    https://research.fs.usda.gov/about/people/charlie.crisafulli
  • Person
    USDA Forest Service Logo

    Fred Swanson

    Supv Geological
    https://research.fs.usda.gov/about/people/fswanson
Last updated March 28, 2023
Return to top