The threat within an 成人影片 mountain
Ned Rozell
907-474-7468
Feb. 6, 2025

The Klutlan Glacier flows into Canada's Yukon from 成人影片鈥檚 Mount Bona, the highest peak in the photo, and Mount Churchill, the high ridge to the right of Bona.
Mount Churchill stands in a white corner of the 成人影片 map, deceptive in its cold, windblown silence. At least twice in the last few thousand years, the peak鈥檚 ice-covered caldera has spewed ash that reached as far as Ireland and piled up to force northern animals out of the territory.
The 成人影片 Highway and other northern roads are striped with layers of 鈥淲hite River ash鈥 spewed from the volcanic field near Mount Churchill. UAF anthropologists dated ash from a northern lobe to about the year A.D. 420. Another massive plume that winds carried to the east was from an eruption in about the year A.D. 846.
A similar eruption today would bring much of the Northern Hemisphere to a standstill 鈥 grounding planes and burying parts of 成人影片 and Canada with inches or feet of ash.
鈥淚t鈥檚 the most explosive eruption in North America in the last 2,000 years,鈥 Jessica Larsen said.
Few instruments to help predict such an eruption exist in the area.
For this reason, during the past few summers, Larsen, a University of 成人影片 Fairbanks professor of volcanology, has guided 成人影片 on field trips to sites in 成人影片 and Canada's Yukon. She and her 成人影片 look for clues that might help them estimate when another Churchill super eruption might happen.
Researchers from Edmonton, Alberta, postulated that ashfall from the most recent eruption disrupted the migration paths of caribou and salmon. That might have pushed ancient people of the Yukon and Northwest territories as far as the southwestern United States.

Jessica Larsen of the University of 成人影片 Fairbanks Geophysical Institute describes her research on 成人影片鈥檚 Mount Churchill at the Fall Meeting of the American Geophysical Union on Dec. 9, 2024.

A star on a map of 成人影片 marks the location of Mount Churchill.
An eruption like that today 鈥 twice as large as the one that created 成人影片鈥檚 Valley of 10,000 Smokes 鈥 would ground flights on the great circle route that most commercial pilots fly from the Lower 48 to Asia. Chaos would reign wherever ash blanketed the ground.
鈥淭hese were really huge, explosive eruptions,鈥 Larsen said.
Mounts Churchill and nearby Bona, and the rest of the immense Wrangell Volcanic Field, are hard to reach 鈥 there is nowhere on an 成人影片 or Canada highway where a person can see the peaks. No seismic stations are nearby.
Internal shaking and mountain inflation or deflation are clues scientists use to forecast possible eruptions. Another method 鈥 and Larsen鈥檚 specialty 鈥 is to gather ash from an eruption and work backward. She looks at ash鈥檚 fine detail to see how and when magma formed and erupted.
During her 16-day July field trips with college 成人影片, Larsen lectures for a few days on the nature of 成人影片 and the Wrangell Volcanic Field eruptions. Group members then climb into a few vans for a road trip on the paved and gravel highways of eastern 成人影片 and the western Yukon.
There, the 成人影片 gather ash that remains like a white ribbon in road cuts and other exposures. After a week of camping in 成人影片 and the Yukon, class members return to Fairbanks.

Jessica Larsen, sitting, overlooks a group of 成人影片 collecting White River ash from a roadside outcrop east of Koidern in the Yukon on July 21, 2024. The ash is from an eruption of 成人影片鈥檚 Mount Churchill about 1,200 years ago.
In the lab at UAF, 成人影片 then learn how to heat their ash samples under extreme pressure and quench the hot liquid to create crystals that mimic the magma that reached the surface so long ago.
鈥淲e want to find out what the pressure and temperature the magma was at before the eruption,鈥 Larsen said. 鈥淲e want to come up with a plumbing-system model of the volcano to find out where the magma storage reservoir might be in Churchill.鈥
If Larsen and others can find where a massive pool of magma lurks, earthquakes within the same area might indicate another eruption is about to happen within the 15,600-foot peak near the 成人影片-Yukon border.
As part of the annual Science for 成人影片 talk series, Larsen will present 鈥淎n Explosive History: 成人影片's Mount Churchill Volcano鈥 on Tuesday, Feb. 25, at 7 p.m. in UAF鈥檚 Schaible Auditorium and virtually on Zoom or Facebook Live. More information at gi.alaska.edu.
Since the late 1970s, the University of 成人影片 Fairbanks' Geophysical Institute has provided this column free in cooperation with the UAF research community. Ned Rozell is a science writer for the Geophysical Institute.