USGS Volcano Notice - DOI-USGS-YVO-2022-12-01T09:22:57-08:00

Recent Work and News

Winter has arrived in Yellowstone! There have been seismic experiments in the Park during the past month, aimed at better understanding geyser systems, but heavy snow has limited the ability to do field work.

Steamboat Geyser had one major water eruption during the past month, on November 5, bringing the total number of eruptions in 2022 to 10.  After a lull, minor eruptions at the geyser resumed on November 20, so hopefully another major water eruption will occur during the coming month!

Seismicity

During November 2022, the University of Utah Seismograph Stations, responsible for the operation and analysis of the Yellowstone Seismic Network, located 174 earthquakes in the Yellowstone National Park region. The largest event of the month was a minor earthquake of magnitude 2.6 located about 14 miles south-southwest of Mammoth Hot Springs in Yellowstone National Park on November 14 at 8:45 AM MST.  This event is part of ongoing seismicity that began in the area on July 29.  In November, 123 earthquakes were added to the sequence, and seismicity continued through the end of the month.  Earthquake sequences like these are common and account for roughly 50% of the total seismicity in the Yellowstone region.

Yellowstone earthquake activity is currently above background levels.

Ground Deformation

Early November saw a winter storm that disrupted some of the GPS data collected in Yellowstone National Park.  Snow accumulation on GPS antennas caused a several-day signal of apparent subsidence of 1-2 cm (less than an inch), which reversed itself by the middle of the month.  Little net deformation has been recorded over the past few months at Yellowstone owing to artifatcs from the heavy snowfall coupled with signals related to seasonal groundwater recharge that, during summer and fall months, can pause, and even reverse, the subsidence that has been ongoing since 2015.

An example of GPS data can be found at http://www.unavco.org/instrumentation/networks/status/pbo/data/NRWY (click on Static Plots / Cleaned)