Manam Volcano in Pacific Erupts in Awesome Beauty

New Guinea (HDW) November 1, 2004 - Even though eyes in the United States of America are focused on the eruptions of a volcano at Mount St. Helens in Washington State, there is an even more active volcano that is showing its beauty and power in the South Pacific. The island of Manam sits in the Bismarck Sea across the Stephan Strait from the east coast of mainland Papua New Guinea. Only 10 kilometers wide, the island results from the activity of the Manam Volcano, one of the New Guinea’s most active. In this image from a NASA satellite, a large ash plume spreads northwestward after the eruption of Manam, located at bottom right. The thermally active areas on the volcano are outlined in red.

Interestingly, the winds higher up in the atmosphere appear to have been blowing in the opposite direction at the time this image was captured. Streamers of clouds stretch from the coast northeastward over the ash plume and farther out to sea. In the afternoon sunlight, the thicker clouds cast shadows down onto the ash plume. North of the cloud streamers, the tail of the ash plume is being rippled by the wind into rows of evenly spaced, nearly parallel waves.

The Manam Volcano’s 1,870-meter summit is bare and is carved by four large avalanche valleys that radiate from the summit down the flanks. These valleys are spaced roughly 90 degrees apart around the cone-shaped mountain. Lava and debris flows have funneled through these valleys and reached the coast in past eruptions. The volcano has two summit craters, and both are active. The island is inhabited, and emergency agencies urged residents to move to safer parts of the island; however, NASA and other news reported no casualties as of 27 October.