Another volcano awakens in the "land of geysers"

A volcano called Bezymyanny has stopped erupting in Kamchatka, a peninsula in the northeast of the Asian part of Russia that is often referred to as "the land of geysers." According to Alexei Ozerov, senior researcher with the Active Volcanism Laboratory of the Institute of Volcanology, Far Eastern Department of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the eruption in question was probably the shortest in the history of the Bezymyanny. It began at 13:00 Moscow time on July 26, with spurts of gas, ash and water vapor reaching as high as 8 kilometers above the crater and avalanches of gas and pumice running down the eastern slope of the volcano with a speed of 30 kmph. Everything was over in three hours.

Photographs taken from space showed that a cloud of gas and ash stretched out 200 kilometers to the northwest. Seismic stations registered a large number of surface tremors.

By now, the volcano's seismic activity is running down, with a few small avalanches still running down the slopes. Space photography shows that the top of the volcano is still warm. The whole vicinity is gas-laden.

As a rule, the Bezymyanny erupts 2-3 times a year. The eruptions are short-lived but powerful.

The last eruption of the Bezymyanny, which rises 2,869 meters above sea level, took place on December 24-26, 2002.