Beginning on September 6, 2010, Chile’s ice-covered Planchón-Peteroa Volcano has erupted a series of small ash and gas clouds. The chilean National Service of Geology and Mining (Sernageomin) reported that the eruptions were probably phreatomagmatic: caused by the interaction of water with magma inside the volcano.
This natural-color satellite image was acquired on September 18, 2010, by the Advanced Land Imager (ALI) aboard Earth Observing-1 (EO-1). A dark volcanic plume trails at least 22 kilometers (14 miles) southeast & into Argentina from the Peteroa summit (the currently active crater). Fallen ash colors the snow underneath the plume brown.
NASA Earth Observatory image by Robert Simmon, using ALI data from the NASA EO-1 team. Caption by Robert Simmon.
