Yachats Lions Hall, Doors open at 130p and starts at 200p
Bill Chadwick – Research Associate, Hatfield Marine Science Center: Axial Seamount: The Active Volcano in our Backyard
Axial Seamount is an active submarine volcano located ~300 miles offshore Oregon and about a mile below the ocean surface. It has erupted 3 times in the last 30 years, making it the most active volcano in the Pacific Northwest (even though you can’t see it!). It is monitored in real-time by seafloor instruments connected to a cabled observatory. Data from that monitoring network suggest that the volcano is building toward its next eruption. This talk will describe the most recent monitoring data and its implications for forecasting the next eruption.
When Mount St. Helens erupted in 1980, Bill Chadwick was a geology major at Colorado College, and he soon found an opportunity to volunteer, and later work as a field assistant there with the US Geological Survey, who were monitoring the on-going activity. After working there for 2 years, he went on to graduate school at the University of California at Santa Barbara where he got a PhD in geology. Since 1989, he has worked at OSU’s Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport studying hydrothermal vents and submarine volcanoes. Axial Seamount has been one of his focus areas for most of that time.
Oregon State University – College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences – Axial Seamount
Lions Focus Area – Environment
