Quick programming update: There won’t be a newsletter on June 27 (I’ll be on vacation).

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Eruptions Newsletter #14 for June 13, 2025

Activity News

Kīlauea, Hawai’i

The 25th eruptive episode of the current activity at Kīlauea started — and stopped — on June 11. As some of you might know having followed some of the action on Bluesky, I pondering how to write about the meager sputtering from the volcano so far this week, but then, the volcano gods offered me a 1,000 foot lava fountain.

Maybe the word is overused, but the lava fountain was spectacular. No matter how many times I see one, the concept of molten rock being sprayed 1,000 feet into the air is astonishing. For whatever reason, the primary fountain (yes, there were two again) created a shower of volcanic bombs and ash to the side of the vent. You can see in the image below how much the fountain was creating a curtain of debris falling inside and outside the Halema’uma’u Crater.

This vigorous fountaining also fed lava flows within the crater. The video capture from the livestream shows both the lava fountain in all its glory and the lava flows creeping along the crater floor. Sometimes it can be hard to see the lava flow front moving, so open the video in YouTube and speed it up to 2x. Watch the bottom of the video carefully and you’ll notice the flow front moving. I’ve added an annotated image below to give a guide to where the flow front sits in this video.

And then, after a mere 8 hours, it was done. Both fountains ceased and Kīlauea went back into its respite period. Remember, if you want the details of how lava fountains work, check out my Discover post. Now we wait for what will likely be the 26th episode in the next week or so. If you’re like me and have lost track of all the new activity at Kīlauea since December 2024, HVO has produced a handy timeline of all the episodes. Until then, enjoy some of these videos and images of the 25th.

Fuego, Guatemala

In Guatemala, Fuego has entered a new phase of vigorous activity. Lava fountains, lava flows, pyroclastic flows and lahars were all reported at the volcano by the Instituto Nacional de Sismología, Vulcanologia, Meteorologia e Hidrología (INSIVUMEH). The activity was so hazardous that over 700 people living in Chimaltenango, Escuintla and Sacatepequez near Fuego had to be evacuated, many of which spent at least a day in nearby shelters. Ash plumes from the eruptions were as tall as 3-7 km (10,000-22,000 feet).

According to INSIVUMEH, the pyroclastic flows traveled up to 7 km (4.3 miles) from the voclano on June 5 and lava flows stretched 1.2 km (0.75 miles) from the summit vent by June 6.

Volcano Word of the Week

This week’s pick originally started off as an “odds & ends”, but lo and behold, we got a Word of the Week out of it.

I am a big fan of Pulp (the band) and they just released their first album is 24 years. It’s called More and the album cover looks like this:

Now, as I like to think, there is always a volcano angle. I took one look at this picture and thought “that’s Iceland, right?” Well, lead singer Jarvis Cocker did prove me right (as directed to me by Bluesky user thomas π)

This shot was taken at Kerlingarfjöll, a lovely spot in the middle of Iceland only accessible during the summer by 4×4. It is an old rhyolite volcano! The colors are all thanks to the hydrothermal activity (hot fluid flow - mostly water) and a quirk about how many of the eruptions happened. Research on Kerlingarfjöll suggest that most of its eruptions occurred between ~68,000-300,000 years ago.

So, what is that quirk? This volcano is likely a tuya (our word of the week), meaning it erupted underneath a glacier. Iceland is known for its glaciers and in the past, much of the island was covered by a thick sheet of ice. Researchers looking at the eruptions at Kerlingarfjöll show that much of the activity had to have occurred like the volcano was capped with ice and likely generated copious meltwater.

The weirdest thing is that the ice likely acted like when you sneeze into a tissue — it kept much of the explosive products like volcanic ash and debris from moving very far. So, all the deposits got trapped, mixed up with water and sediment, and created fun deposits called peperites (mixes of wet sediment and volcanic debris). You can find columnar joints in many of these deposits as well, supporting a subglacial origin.

I’ve written about tuyas before because we can see them in the Oregon Cascades as well. Kerlingarfjöll is a little different than Hayrick Butte because of the former’s explosive countenance, but nevertheless, it is a tuya.

Now, I made a valiant effort to pinpoint exactly where the cover of More was shot, but no matter how much I spun the Google Earth image, I couldn’t reproduce it. I did take a stab at it based on the road and trail network I could discern, but still, I find it very cool that subglacial rhyolite volcanism in Iceland made it on the cover of such a great album.

Odds & Ends

One brief Odd & End (is that a thing?) is an article about a new geyser that became active near Reno, Nevada. Now, many times people associate geysers only with volcanic places like Yellowstone or the Waimangu Valley in New Zealand. However, geysers don’t require volcanic activity to occur.

Case in point: these hotsprings near Reno where the geyser has appeared as the result of water percolating through the crust, heating up at depth mostly thanks to the fact that the grounds does, indeed, get hotter as you go down, and then coming back up along faults. The region around Reno is full of faults due to its location in the Basin & Range province, so springs like this show up in many places in the Great Basin.

What exactly caused this geyser to form is not clear, but likely has to do with how the water is flowing underground. Geysers form when water can get trapped and slowly heat to boiling before exploding to the surface. Some can be regular like Old Faithful and some not so much. We’ll see how long this one lasts near Reno.

Sounds of the Week

Seems obvious, right? I talk about Pulp. So, in honor of that, here are a few of my favorite songs by Jarvis and company.

“Grown Ups” is one of the best from More and let me tell you, a 61-year-old taking about still growing up speaks to me (note: I am not 61. Jarvis is.) Be sure to stay for the story towards the end of the song.

Few people do bitter-but-not-vengeful like Pulp. Make sure you watch the official video which is full of bad cover versions of a pile of famous people.

The one-off single from 2011, “After You” joins the forces of Pulp and another of my favorites (James Murphy of LCD Soundsystem). If this had been Pulp’s swansong, it would have handled that mantel handily.

Like many people in the States, Different Class is the album that introduced me to Pulp. Hard to pick a singular song from the album, but “Sorted for E’s and Wizz” dips and dives like so many great Pulp songs.

Last one, I promise. Originally on the Trainspotting soundtrack, it is far from a compilation throw away song.

Questions? Comments? Thoughts? Feel free to leave a comment, send me a note or follow me on Bluesky (@erikklemetti.bsky.social).

Be sure to check out my podcast, 5 Minute Volcano and the Patreon page for the Eruptions Newsletter/5 Minute Volcano Podcast.