Citation: Leonard, G.; Lowe, D.J.; McSaveney, E.; Smith, R.T.

;
Stewart, C.; Wright, I. 2007. Living on the ring of fire –
volcanoes. In: Te Ara staff (editors), “Life on the Edge – New
Zealand’s Natural Hazards and Disasters”. David Bateman,
Auckland, pp. 76-115. See also online version at http://
www.teara.govt.nz/en/volcanoes

When Mt Ruapehu started

to erupt in September
1995, water mixed with
ash, blocks and bombs was
thrown from the crater
lake. Where this mixture
fell outside the crater, it
formed several muddy
lahars that flowed down
the mountainside. This
photograph shows one
of the first eruptions, on
23 September 1995.
78 NATURAL H.A.ZARDS AND DISASTEP,<; VOLCANOES
79

•
TYPES OF VOLCANO Andesite magma is intermediate in composition and physical properties .
Erupting at around 800-1000°C it is mor e viscous than basalt , but much
less viscous than rhyolite. Andesite magma cools to form dark grey lava if
If asked to draw a volcano, most people will sketch a steep, cone-shaped gas-poor, or scoria if gas-rich .
mountain, usually with clouds billowing from the summit. This is one type, but • Basalt is rich in iron and
some of the most explosive volcanoes are less obvious, and represented by large magnesium, but has less silicon VOLCANO TYPES
depressions that may be filled with water. than other magmas. It erupts at Cone volcano
very high temperatures (around
1100-1200°C) as a very fluid
magma. Basalt magma with very
little gas cools to form black,
dense lava, but where magma
erupts with lots of gas it cools to
form ragged scoria.
• Rhyolite magma is rich in silicon,
potassium and sodium and erupts Magma feeder dikes
at temperatures between 700°C
and 850°C as an extremely viscous
(sticky) magma. Rhyolite magma Caldera volcano
containing lots of gas bubbles
cools to form pumice. Because it Pyroclastic deposits

-.
< is low in iron, rhyolite is normally
light-coloured- it may vary from
white to pink or brown. Obsidian
is a type of rhyolite produced when
lava is chilled to form glass. Caldera margin

Magma, lava or tephra? QUIET OR EXPLOSIVE Magma feeder dikes

ERUPTIONS
This aerial view, taken Molten rock is called magma when it is
with a super-wide
Although New Zealand's active Whether or not an er uption is quiet or Volcanic field
beneath the earth 's surface. When it is
angle lens, shows Banks volcanoes look quite different from one explosive depends on t he gas content
erupted and flows through a volcanic vent
Peninsula in the South another, they can be grouped into three of the magma. \Y:h.~n the gas content
it is called lava. And when it-is erupted
Island. The snow-
main landform types: is low, magma -~~t'rudes at the surface
covered Southern Alps explosively as shattered fragments hurled
are in the background. • classic cones or stratovolcanoes as lava flows . Very fluid basalt lava
into the air it is called tephra (wh ich
Akaroa Harbour is • volc~nic fields can flow over long distances, whereas
the deep harbour at includes volcan ic ash, pumice and scoria).
• calderas and collapse craters. viscous rhyolite lava piles up around
centre left. Volcan ic
activity between 6 and Each of these has distinct landforms, the vent, like toothpaste squeezed
11 million years ago led and the violence and styles of eruptions are unique to each. These differences from a tube, to for m steep-sided
to the formation of two reflect the main type of magma erupted: mounds called domes. Cone {mainly an desite)- formed by many eruptions of lava flows and
overlapping volcanic pyroclastic deposits. These build up a cone, over hundreds of thousands of
cones. After this • andE;site at the cone volcanoes When magma is .!:'}~h .i.D_gas, it years. Ruapehu is a t ypical cone volcano.
activity stopped, the • basalt at the volcanic fields can produce explosive eruptions. As /
cones were gradually • rhyolite at the calderas. magma rises to the surface, the drop Caldera (mainly rhyolite) - a basin formed when a volcano collapses dur ing
eroded to about half an eruption. Pyroclastic deposits then build up around it. Magma often
their original height in pressure causes it s gases to expand continues to come up through feeder dikes within the caldera or around
and deep valleys have TYPES OF VOLCANIC ROCK violently like the foam that explodes the edges. Lake Taupo and Lake Rotorua are both calderas that are now
formed . The harbours Magmas cont ain almost all of earth's known chemical elements, but typically out of a champagne bottle when fi r st filled by lakes.
at Akaroa and Lyttelton
(not visible in this
they consist of j ust nine: silicon, oxygen, aluminium, magnesium, iron, calcium, opened. Shattered mag ma and rock Volcanic fi eld (mainly basalt) - isolated volcanoes where magma erupts once
image) were formed sodium, potassium and tit anium. Oxygen: and silicon together are the most fr agments (pyroclastic material or at the surface. Normally there is no single vent that keeps erupting. Shown
about 7,000 years ago abundant element s, making up 48-76% by weight of most magmas. The tephra) are carried violently into the here are d ifferent types with in a field : a crater, which is a hole in the ground
when the sea rose t o formed by an eruption; a lav(! sh ield, wh ich is a low cone; and a scoria cone,
its present height and
chemistry of magma, especially silicon content, is important for influencing air before settling back to the ground. wh ich is higher. Dikes are cracks filled with magma, and act as feede rs for
flooded the valleys. t he way it erupt s. Three main magma types, and resulting volcanic rocks, are The higher the material goes, the surface erupt ions. Auckland city occupies a typ ical volcanic field .
identified on the basis of their chemical composition. further from the volcano it will be
80 NATURA L HAZAR DS AN D DI SASTERS VOLCANOES

PACIFIC RING OF FIRE

New Zealand lies at the SOl.JJh--w_es_t_ end of a vast
horseshoe-shaped zone of intense volcanism and
earthquakes. This zone extends, essentially unbroken,
around the margins of the Pacific Oceanr the so-called
Pacific Ring of Fire.
This immense belt of volcanic and earthquake
activity corresponds closely with the edge of the Pacific
tectonic plate, and also coincides with some of the most
densely populated regions on the planet. More than half
of the world's active volcanoes above sea level are found
in this zone.
New Zealand sits astride the colliding edges of
Tokatoka, near the Pacific and Australian plates. The occurrence of
Dargaville, is the earthquakes, jagged mountain ranges and volcanoes
eroded remnant of through New Zealand, and the contrasting geology and
A second type of explosive
the plug of an extin ct
andes ite volcano. eruption occurs when magma landscapes of the North and South islands, can all be
Rad iometric dating contacts water beneath the explained by the different ways in which the edges of
shows that t he
Ash, lapilli or bomb?
ground or at the surface (such the two colliding plates are interacting along the length
volcano was active
Volcan ic ash is not ash in the sense of the as in a lake or the sea). The hot of the country.
about 18 milli on years
~gci(early Mioce ne). remains of someth ing that has been burnt. magma vaporises the water When tectonic plates collide generally one of two
In volcanology it refers to the size of grains. instantly, causing violent steam things happen: either one plate slides beneath the
Grains less than 2 millimetres across are explosions. Such eruptions other, curving back down into the mantle (a process
called ash . Those from 2 to 64 millimetres take place regularly when called subduction), or the edges of the plates are crumpled
are called lapilli (from the Latin word for magma rises beneath Ruapehu's and forced up, forming a wide zone of mountain uplift.
little stones). Larger material is called a block crater lake. Subduction occurs where one of the interacting plates is thin and dense and is forced These hi gh ly magn ified
if it is dense and angular, or a bomb if it is beneath the thicker and more buoyant crust. phot ographs of
volcan ic ash , take n
full of gas bubbles and partly rounded. with a scan ning
RISING VOLCANOES electro n microscope,
As the subducting plate slides down into the revea l t he as h as
shatte red fragments
earth's hot mantle, the crustal rocks are heated (shards) of natural glass.
and water and other volatile elements are boiled The ho les in t he shards
off The chemical effect of this water is to lower record t he prese nce
of gas bubb les in t he
the melting point of rocks in the solid mantle e rupt ing magma. These
above the subducting plate, allowing magma shards, recovered
to form. This buoyant molten rock rises to the from a peat bog near
Ham ilton, are about
surface and erupts to form volcanoes such as 0.15 to 0.25 mi lli metres
A plume of ash erupts Taranaki (Mt Egmont) and Ruapehu. across, and were
f rom Ruapeh u on
erupted fro m Taupo
19 June, 1996, drift ing
ca ldera about 5,000
northwa rd with the KERMADEC RIDGE AND TAUPO years ago.
wind. Ash settling from VOLCANIC ZONE
the plume is dusting
t he snow grey. The
To the north-east of New Zealand, the
e ru ptions of 1995-96 Kermadec Ridge is a chain of mainly andesitic
produced many submarine volcanoes formed above the
sim ila r ash plumes,
and d ifferent parts
subduction zone by melting of the oceanic
of the No rth Island Australian Plate.
we re d ust ed with ash Close to New Zealand, the Australian Plate
depend ing on wind
changes from oceanic to continental crust and
d irection at the t ime.
the Kermadec Ridge merges into the Taupo
82 NATURAL HAZAR.DS AND DISASTERS VOLCANOES

Taranaki Taupo Volcanic Zone

Caldera subsidence
Hawke's Bay Volcanic Zone. This is a narrow zone ·
of rhyolife calderas, with groups CONE VOLCANOES AND
of andesite volcanoes at its southern end
- Ruapehu, Ngauruhoe and Tongariro VOLCANIC FIELDS
- and at its northern end - Mt
Edgecumbe (Putauaki), Whale Island CONE OR STRATOVOLCANOES
AUSTRALIAN (Moutohora) and Whakaari (White These are 'picture-postcard' volcanoes - ;conical structures up to several
PLATE Island). Rhyolite magmas form from hundred metres high, built by many eruptions of andesite lava over tens of
melting of the continental crust. thousands of years.
Mayor Island (Tuhua) lies 60 Eruptions at cone volcanoes can be explosive (forming tephra or pyroclastic
PACIFIC
PLATE kilometres west of the Taupo Volcanic deposits) or quiet (forming lava flows) . The eruptions often switch between these
Zone. It is separate from all the other two styles of activity during a single episode. Because of the layered sequences,
volcanoes and it ejects a rare magma or strata, oflavas and pyroclastic deposits, cone volcanoes are also called
type, unusually high in alkali elements stratovolcanoes. Sometimes the term 'composite cone' is used to indicate their
West East (peralkaline), not found elsewhere in layered nature.
New Zealand. The magma chemistry Eruptions from cone volcanoes are generally small to moderate, with small
This is an east-west causes some unusual minerals to form, and tephras from Mayor Island can be eruptions occurring every 10-5 0 years. Taranaki, Ruapehu, Tongariro (including
cross-section of the readily identified by their distinctive mineralogy. Ngauruhoe), and Whakaari (White Island) are New Zealand's largest and most
central North Island,
passing though Lake
The high alkali content is responsible for the widespread occurrence of obsidian, a frequently active cone volcanoes .
Taupo and Taranaki glassy rock, which forms when viscous lava is rapidly chilled. Mayor Island obsidian The different shapes of these four cone volcanoes reflect variations in the
{Mt Egmont). As the was collected and widely traded by early Maori settlers. Because of its distinctive size and type of eruption, the number of different vents that have erupted at each
, 1 Pacific Plate descends, composition, obsidian from Mayor Island can be readily identified by chemical analysis. volcano, and sometimes partial collapse by landsliding of the cone during an
'/ . heat.il!g causes fluids to
1
' rise into the overlying eruption, earthquake, or storm.
mantle, producing VOLCANO ACTIV_ITY
magma. These magmas
Volcanoes are classified according to their state of activity, which changes as
are mainly basalts. They
evolve into andesite magma rises towards the surface.
that erupts to form • An active volcano is one that is actually erupting, or is showing signs of unrest
cone volcanoes. Heat
(e.g. ground movement, earthquakes) that may lead to an eruption. New Zealand
from the basalt magma
causes the continental scientists use a scale of alert levels ranging from 1 (signs of unrest) to 5 (major
crust to melt. This hazardous eruption under way) to indicate the level of activity.
leads to huge rhyolite • A dormant volcano is currently inactive, but may erupt again in the future.
eruptions involving
caldera collapse. • An extinct volcano is one that is unlikely to erupt again, usually because
millions of years have elapsed since the last eruption. For example, the Dunedin
.
volcano, which last erupted about 11 million years ago, is regarded as extinct .

These two images

show the similarity
between onshore
and offshore volcanic
cones. Upper image:
the volcanoes of
Tongariro National
Mayor Island (Tuhua) Park, with Tongariro
is the top of a large in the foreground,
rhyolite volcano in the the symmetrical cone
western Bay of Plenty. of Ngauruhoe in the
The central ring of centre, and Ruapehu in
cliffs marks the edge the background. Lower
of a caldera formed by image: Whakaari
an explosive eruption (White Island), off the
about 7,000 years ago. Bay of Plenty coast,
The black volcanic is the top part of a
glass known as obsidian large submerged cone
is found in some lava volcano similar in size
flows on the island. to Tongariro.
84 NATURAL HAZARDS At'>JD DISASTERS VOLCANOES
CONES AND RING
-. PLAINS
\
The classical, almost
symmetrical cone shape of
Taranaki (Mt Egmont) is due
to recent eruptions coming
from one main vent at the
summit. The multiple peaks
of Tongariro volcano are due
to many vents being active at
about the same time, forming
several overlapping cones.
N gauruhoe dominates the
landscape, but it is simply the
most recently active vent that
has erupted many times over
the last 2,000 years.
Although the central
cone is the most obvious
part of a stratovolcano, most
are surrounded by a gently
,1 sloping plain (ring plain)
formed oflandslide deposits
from giant avalanches,
debris flows called lahars,
and tephra~ from explosi,·e
eruptions. A lahar may be
associated with a volcanic
eruption, but may also be
caused by the collapse of
the unstable steep slopes or
melting of snow near the top
of a volcanic mountain. Many
cone volcanoes like Ruapehu
have crater lakes. A large
body of water at high altitude
can result in unexpected and
disastrous lahars and floods
The final and downstream, as happened in the 1953 Tangiwai disaster.
most powerful of
Ngauruhoe's 1974-75
eruptions took VOLCANIC FIELDS
place on 19 February Rather than a single mountain or crater, a volcanic field is an area containing
1975. Within about many small, isolated scoria cones and craters. Each cone or crater has formed
30 seconds the ash
cloud had risen and usually in a single, small eruption of basalt magma, which may have lasted a few
expanded. Some of days to a few months at most.
the heavier material Existing craters or cones in volcanic fields are unlikely to erupt again. Instead
in the ash column
had started to drop,
the next eruption will form a new cone of scoria or ash, or explosion crater or small
forming pyroclastic lava flow. Sometimes craters may overlap within the same cone, as can be seen at
flows that travelled
One Tree Hill (Maungakiekie) in Auckland. The Auckland volcanic field has about
2 kilometres into the
48 cones and craters. The most recent eruption occurred about 1400 AD, forming
Mangatepopo valley.
Rangitoto Island.
Basalt volcanic fields are also found in
Northland - for example, near Kaikohe,
Bay of Islands, and Whangarei - where
there is a wide range of ages dating from
about 60,000 years to about 10 million
years. The Bombay-Pukekohe-Pokeno
area of South Auckland contains an
extinct field (0.5 million to 1.5 million
years old), and basalt \'olcanoes in the
western Waikato date from 1.5 million
years to nearly 3 million years ago. Much
older volcanic fields are found in the
South Island, for example in Otago.
ERUPTIONS IN VOLCANIC
FIELDS
The fluid basalt magma means eruptions
from volcanic fields are small, and mostly
lava-forming. Most explosive eruptions
are relatively weak, throwing scoria out
to no more than several hundred metres
from the vent. If the magma encounters
water as it is rising to the surface, steam
0 10
explosions may excavate wide shallow c::::==:--==::J
craters (such as occurred at Orakei Basin KM
and Lake Pupuke in Auckland).
Even the smallest eruption from the Auckland volcanic field would cause On the Taranaki
peninsula, a line of
major disruption to the city, and dust-size volcanic ash is likely to spread over a three cone volcanoes
large area. (Taranaki, Pouakai, and
Kaitake) is surrounded
by a huge ring plain
of avalanche, lahar,
and tephra deposits .
The ring plain appears
smooth in the digital
terrain map and
contrasts with the
dissected hill country
to the east.
Incandescent scoria,
photographed at
night with time lapse,
fountains from Mt
Ngauruhoe's crater
and cascades down
the mountain.
 NATURAL HAZARD- AND DiS AS I ERS VOLCANOES

Lake Rotorua partly

CALDERA VOLCA,NOES fills the Rotorua
caldera. This was
formed about
AND THE TAUPO . 230,000 years ago
by a huge ignimbrite
erupt ion. Moko ia
VOLCANIC ZONE Island, in the
centre of the lake,
is a rhyolite dome,
formed after the
caldera collapsed .
Lake Rotorua was
o ri ginally larger.
Rotorua city, in the
foreground, is built
mainly on the old
lake bed .

Raoul island, the The large, deep craters known as calderas have extremely violent origins. back to earth like a fountain, then surges out in
north ernmost of the
They form when a vast amount of rhyolite magma, bubbling with gas, erupts all directions from the caldera as a hurricane-like
Kermadec Islands, is an
active volcano which explosively from a magma chamber that may be only a few kilometres beneath billowing flow of hot pumice, ash and gas. These
last erupted in 2006. the ground. During these eruptions, so much magma is erupted that the chamber pyroclastic flows or 'density currents' can travel
This watercolour of
empties, leaving the ground above it unsupported. This area collapses, dropping over 100 kilometres at the speed of a racing car,
part of the caldera
was pa inted by J. Glen like a piston, to form a wide, deep depression. leaving behind a layer of volcanic (pyroclastic)
Wilson in 1854, when In places"the caldera walls can be seen as steep cliffs, but many are difficult to debris that might be more than 100 metres deep.
HMS Herald visited observe in the landscape because they may be filled in with erupted material or Some flows are so hot (600-700°C) and thick that
the island. Blue Lake
(foreground) fills covered by water. the ash and pumice fragments fuse back together,
an explosion crater. forming solid rock known as welded ignimbrite.
The small cone on CALDERA ERUPTIONS Cooler and thinner pyroclastic flows form loose,
the right side of the Thelandscapeinthe
lake erupted about Rhyolite calderas may be active for several hundred thousand years, but large comparatively soft (non-welded) ignimbrites. centre of the North
1650 AD. It was later eruptions are rare, often with thousands of years between events. Caldera collapse Island is dominated by
partly destroyed by is not the only effect on the landscape from these large explosive eruptions. Huge DOME BUILDING AFTER EXPLOSIONS volcanic features. The
an explosive eruption two largest lakes, Taupo
in 1879. The 1964 and
quantities of pumice, ash and gas are pumped into the atmosphere, and through Eruptions from rhyolite volcanoes are not always so catastrophic. A small amount and Rotorua, occupy
2006 eruptions also a combination ofheat and momentum, a seething column of this material may of rhyolite magma may remain after a caldera eruption, which is exhausted of calderas, formed by
came from this vent. rise to over 50 kilometres above the caldera. From this height, ash and especially all gas and so can only ooze from the volcano slowly, often along the faults and collapse after huge
eruptions. Many of the
aerosols - gases and tiny drops of acid - can spread around the globe, affecting fissures opened up by earlier caldera collapse. other lakes near Rotorua
the world's climate for several years. The very high viscosity of rhyolite lava means that it will not flow far, and have been caused by
instead it piles up around the vent to form steep-sided domes. These domes are changes to the drainage
after eruptions, and
PYROCLASTIC FLOWS prominent landscape features. For example, Mokoia Island and Mt Ngongotaha some occupy explosion
Closer to the caldera the landscape may be buried by metres of pumice. The are rhyolite lava domes erupted within Rotorua caldera, and Mt Tarawera is a craters.
most devastating process, however, occurs when this column of material falls collection oflava domes that erupted around 1314 AD within Okataina caldera.
 88 NAT URAL HAZARDS AND DIS .ASTERS VOLCANOES
89

THE TAUPO VOLCANO

Lake Taupo, the largest lake in New Zealand, owes its existence and shape to
the caldera-forming eruptions of the Taupo volcano - the most frequently active
rhyolite volcano in the world. The enormous
Oruanui eruption, about 26,500 years a,go,
formed the 30-kilometre wide depression
at the northern end of Lake Taupo. Since
then there have been 28 separate eruptions,
ranging greatly in size. The latest (Taupo)
eruption occurred about 1,800 years ago,
and its effects on the landscape are still
visible today.
Radiocarbon dating indicates an uneven
spacing of Taupo's eruptions, from decades
to thousands of years apart. This makes it
difficult to forecast when the next eruption
will occur and how big it will be. N....__,_

ORUANUI ERUPTION
{ . The Oruanui eruption (about 26,500 years
ago) covered much of the central North Island with ignimbrite, up to 200 Lake Taupo occupies
metres deep. Ash fallout was spread by the wind over the entire North Island, a caldera (co llapse
crater}, fo rmed by
much of the South Island, and a large area east of New Zealand, including the the Oruanu i e ruption,
and modified by later
eruptions (top}. Us ing
The summit of information f rom a
Mt Tarawera consists
CALDERAS IN THE TAUPO VOLCANIC ZONE survey of the lake, this
of a group of rhyolite There are two active calderas in the T aupo Volcanic Zone which have erupted image shows the shape
lava domes extruded frequently in the last 10,000 years: and depth of the lake
in the final stages of bed. The deepest part
the Kaharoa eruption,
• T aupo - 22 er uptions in the last 10,000 years is near Horomatangi
about 1314 AD. The • Okataina- 6 eruptions in the last 10,000 year s. Reefs, where there are
early explosive phases T he Okataina caldera includes the Tarawera volcano which erupted most hydrothermal vents on
of th is eruption spread the lake floor.
recently in 1886 and about 1314 AD. There are also at least six older calderas,
rhyolitic ash over
much of the northern including M angakino, Kapenga, Whakamaru, Reporoa, Rotorua and Maroa. Large
A distinct white
and eastern North explosive eruptions
Island . The photograph layer of volcanic ash
over the last two enclosed in peat (left}
shows Wahanga, the
northern dome of the million years from has been known for
summit cluster, which this nested collection many years on Chatham
exhibits the steep Island (Rekohu}. In the
of rhyolite volcanoes photograph, it is the
sides and flat top
typical of a rhyolite have produced a huge thin white layer, close
lava dome. volume of pyroclastic to the handle of the
geological hammer. It
rock which has buried was originally named
older vents . The Rekohu Ash, but it has
products of these big since been identified
as coming from the
rhyolite volcanoes This road cutting (about 5 metres high} in Ash pit Rd, near Mt Tarawera, massive Oruanui
form the extensive flat shows layers of tephras draping the landscape. They were ejected from eruption in Lake Taupo
ignimbrite plateaus Mt Tarawera (background} and the nearby Okataina caldera. The white over 760 kilometres
upper layers are from the Kaharoa eruption and were probably ejected away. The thick layer
flanking the eastern above is burnt peat, not
over a number of days. The dark yellowish-brown horizons are buried
and western sides of soils. The tephra at the base of the cutting is about 13,500 years old. another ash.
the volcanic zone.
90 NATURAL HAZARDS AND DISA ' TERS VOLCANOES
91
The Taupo eruption,
abo ut 200 AD,
generat ed a ve ry
ene rgetic pyroclastic
THE KERMADEC RIDGE:
flow. ln,f rough ly
circular a~ a , with a
rad ius of about 80
SUBMARINE VOLCANOES Th e unde rsea
Ha unga roa volca no,
no rth-east of
kilometres aro und Lake New Zea land, was
Taupo, the forest s were
The Kermadec section of the Pacific Ring of Fire is mostly submarine, extending di scove red in 2002,
knocked over and burnt over 1,400 kilometres between New Zealand and Tonga. Only the Kermadec and thi s mode l has
- as these charred logs Islands occur above sea level. Even these are the emergent caps oflarger submarine bee n built from
testify. Phot ograp hed info rm ati o n gat he red
o n t he Dese rt Road
volcanoes. Sea-floor mapping techniques are now routinely discovering the location d uri ng an un de rwat er
between Rangipo and and structure of these volcanoes. Scientists can interpret the type of volcanoes survey. The real
Waiou ru, they are set in by dredging sea-floor samples. Since about 2000, these studies have discovered volca no is a bo ut
the depos it (ign imbrite) 30 kilo met res in
over 40 volcanoes larger than 5 kilometres in diameter, with some as large as d iamete r and 2,400
laid down by the violent
flow. The cutting t ool, Ruapehu, and some as shallow as 60-80 metres below sea level. It is almost metres high. On t his
used fo r scale, is about certain that other volcanoes have yet to be discovered along the Kermadec Ridge. mod el th e da rke r
30 ce ntimetres lo ng. areas are you ng
Fro m studi es of the lava flows .
wood and ignim brite, SUBMARINE CONE VOLCANOES
it is infe rred that the Submarine cone volcanoes form classic
t e mpe rature of the steep-sided seamount
ignim brite was between
400°C and soooc.
volcanoes, built with layers
of lava flows and volcanic
sediments. These
Chatham Islands . About 1,200 cubic kilometres of pumice and ash were rapidly volcanic sediments
ejected. This caused a large area of land to collapse, forming the caldera basin are typically formed
now filled by Lake Taupo. by various explosive
interactions of hot lava
TAUPO ERUPTION with cold sea water
The most recent major eruption of during eruptions or
Big bang
Taupo volcano took place in late by subsequent collapse
The Oruanu i eruption was so enormous summer-early autumn around 200 at some time after the
that it is hard to visualise. In only a few days AD, from vents near Horomatangi eruption. Most of the cone
or weeks it ejected enough mat erial to Reefs (now submerged). volcanoes are basalt or basalt-andesite in composition.
construct t hree Ruape hu-sized cones. The eruption produced a A critical factor in the evolution of submarine stratovolcanoes is water depth.
After the eruption, t he new lake gradually towering ash column, resulting in The pressure of the overlying water reduces the quantity and rate at which bubbles
filled to aJevell40 metres above the tephra-fall deposits over a wide can form in the magma rising beneath the sea floor. In deep water, bubble growth
present lake. The lake broke out to t he area from Hamilton to Gisborne. is suppressed and the magma
north, resulti ng in a huge flood. For several The airfall deposits were much generally erupts effusively
thousand years the Wa ikato River flowed thicker to the east of Taupo as pillow lavas and sheet
northwards into t he Hauraki Gulf, but it because the eruption column was flows . In shallow water,
lat er changed its course to flow through t he blown in that direction by strong bubble growth is more rapid
Hamilton lowlands to the Tasman Sea . westerly winds. and vigorous, potentially
The eruption column was leading to explosive and
followed by a devastating fragmenting eruptions that
pyroclastic flow, blanketing a roughly circular area within 80 kilometres of Lake produce volcanic sediments.
Taupo with ignimbrite, and destroying all life in its path. The ground-hugging Many of the Kermadec
pyroclastic flow appears to be one of the most powerful ever recorded, and was stratovolcanoes, built between
able to overtop Mt Tongariro and the Kaimanawa mountains, climbing 1,500 water depths between 500
metres in a matter of minutes. and 2 ,000 metres, show this This undersea image
The outlet of Lake Taupo was again blocked during the eruption, and the lake transition between effusive shows fresh -looking
level rose to 34 metres above its present height, forming a widespread terrace. and explosive eruptions:
pillow lavas on t he
up per fl anks of t he
The lake eventually broke out in a huge flood whose effects can be traced for over pillow lavas form on the Hau ngaroa volcano.
200 kilometres downstream, and include boulder beds and buried forests . deeper flanks and volcanic
 NATUR AL HAZARDS AND DISAS TERS VOLCANOES

This map of Raoul

sediments at the peak. This Island was prepared
'"" change is gradual over a range after the vis it of HMS
of depths. Herald in 1854. The
island is a complex
volcano with calderas
SUBMARINE in the centre (Raoul
CALDERA caldera) and at
Denham Bay (to the
VOLCANOES left). Eruptions in 1814
Seafloor mapping has also and 1870 led to the
shown a greater number formation of scoria
cones in Denham Bay,
and size of rhyolitic caldera rapidly destroyed by
volcanoes than previously waves. There were also
supposed. The Kermadec explosive eruptions
within Raoul caldera
!J islands of Macauley and Raoul
in 1814, 1870, 1964
were known to have phases and 2006. The small
of caldera volcanism, with cone in the centre of
the lake was partly
the associated formation and
destroyed by eruptions
dispersal of pumice. However, in 1870, and was the "'
new mapping suggests that site of later eruptions
caldera volcanism is not only in 1964 and 2006.

a common eruption style

Macauley Island, which north of Raoul, but also occurs to the south. Typically the calderas are 3-10 HISTORICAL ERUPTIONS
is one of the Kermadec
kilometres in diameter (up to the size ofWellington Harbour) with the caldera Observing submarine eruptions is very difficult. Eruptions have been recorded
· ; group, is a tiny part
of a much larger land walls having relief of up to 700-800 metres. Some calderas 'overprint' each from Raoul Island since 1800, including eruption sequences in 1814, 1870, 1964
form under the sea. other and hence show multiple eruptions. Pumice has been dredged from many and 2006. Small temporary islands have also been recorded close to Raoul and
This model shows
of these calderas, and in a few cases entirely mantles the edifice. Macauley islands within the last 150 years, representing small cones that have
that Macauley Island
is on the eastern edge subsequently been washed away by waves. Aircraft and fishing boats have also
of a caldera about SUBMARINE PUMICE reported sea-surface disturbances, including rising steam, above shallow volcanoes.
10 kilometres across. Ship-towed hydrophones and seismometers on Pacific islands have recorded
How pumice forms beneath the ocean is an intriguing question. Many of these
eruptions, especially in shallow water, were explosive with a column of hot eruption sequences from Monowai volcano since the 1970s. More recently, repeat
pumice, ash and gas sheathed by steam from the surrounding sea water. The multi beam surveys of Monowai volcano in 1998 and 2004 revealed collapse of
hot pumice is suddenly chilled, with steam condensing to water in the pumice the volcano crest by about 100 metres, followed by rapid cone reconstruction.
holes, and the pumice then sinks to the sea floor. These pyroclastic columns Seismometers also recorded a large explosive eruption in May 2002.
may also collapse to produce submarine flows, cascading down the outer flanks
of the newly formed caldera .
•

Macauley Island is
composed mainly of
black basaltic lava This black basalt lava
flows with a single, flow fills a valley in the
thick layer of white light-coloured Sandy
pumice and ash: the Bay Tephra on the west
Sandy Bay Tephra. side of Macauley
Radiocarbon dating Island. The heat from
of fragments of leaves the lava has baked the
and twigs from near light-coloured pumice
the base of the tephra and ash, leaving a
shows that it was brown oxidised strip at
ejected about 7,100 the contact between
years ago. the two rock types.
 NATURAL HAZARDS AND DISASTERS VOLCANOES

FINGERPRINTING TEPHRAS
TEPHRA LAYERS.- A How can one tephra layer be distinguished
from another? Scientists use many methods
RECORD OF PAST ERUPTIONS to characterise or fingerprint each layer,
both in the landscape and laboratory.
In the landscape, colour, thickness
and position of the tephra in the sequence
are important, and sometimes the type
of pumice is useful in identifying it. For
example, pumice from the Taupo eruption
(about 200 AD) is usually cream-coloured
and easy to crush, whereas pumice from
Travelle rs along t he the Kaharoa eruption (about 1314 AD) is
Desert Road pass
t hrough road cutt ings
white and hard to crush.
showing laye rs of In the laboratory, the types of
andes itic tephra (as h mineral grains (crystals) sometimes
and lap ill i). These
allow the tephra to be identified and matched to a source volcano. For example, lnthe1950sand196Qs
have bee n eject ed
Alan Pullar (top left )
with in t he last 15,000 a widespread tephra erupted from the To.hua caldera (Mayor Island) about 7,000
and Colin Vucetich
years fro m Ru a pehu, years ago contains very unusual minerals. This tephra can be identified instantly (r ight) worked for
Ngau ru hoe (in the
with a microscope, even from just a few grains. Chemical analysis ofvolcanic the Soil Bureau,
backgrou nd) and
glass in tephra layers is the most useful way of fingerprinting them. Department of
Tonga ri ro volcanoes.
Scientific and Industrial
"' ,. Research , mapping
I

Tephra is a general term for all the fragmental material erupted explosively from DISTRIBUTION OF TEPHRAS IN so ils in different parts

a volcano- ranging from fine dust (called ash) to car-size blocks. It is a Greek Volcanic topdressing NEW ZEALAND of the North Is land.
Vucetich worked
word meaning 'ashes', originally used by Aristotle to describe a volcanic eruption The thickest tephra sections occur downwind of around Rotorua and
Frequent eruptions from the
in the Aeolian ~.slands near Sicily, about 300 BC. the Taupo Volcanic Zone, but much of the central Pullar in Gisborne
volcanoes of Tongariro National and Whakatane. They
part of the North Island has a tephra mantle up to
Park and Taranaki have added recognised that the
LAYERS IN THE LANDSCAPE several metres thick immediately beneath the land soi ls were fo rmed
small amounts of nutri ents to
North Island volcanoes have blasted huge volumes of tephra surface. Because of this, many North Island soils have on volcanic ash
Changing thickness soils downwind from the volcano.
been derived from tephra deposits rather than the layers, which were
into the air, to be blown over northern New Zealand and in Volcanic topdressing and a favour- often well exposed
A tephra layer from a single eruption some cases far out to sea, for more than 1,000 kilometres. This underlying bedrock. in road cuttings. The
able cli mate are why top-class
may be tens of metres thick near volcanism has deposited layer upon layer of tephras over the Some of the most complete tephra sequences have men started trac ing
carrots are grown at Ohakune.
its source and coarse-grained, but landscape. The layers have helped volcanologists work out the been found in lakes and bogs. T hin layers only a few out d istinctive ash
layers across the
over 100 kilometres away it thins history of volcanoes and the distribution of their far-reaching millimetres thick may be preserved, whereas they
region. Work on ash
rapidly to only a few centimetres ~r airborne products. are rapidly eroded on dry land. For example, cores from lakes near Hamilton layers (later called
millimetres of fine ash. In many parts of the North Island, natural cliffs along revealed at least 46 tephra layers 2 to 120 millimetres thick, from seven North tephrostratigraphy)
was outs ide official
terraces, river banks or at the coast, together with cuttings made Island volcanoes (Taupo, Okataina, TO.hua, Taranaki, Tongariro, Ngauruhoe and
Soil Bu reau policy, and
during road construction or quarrying, reveal blanketing layers Ruapehu) over the last 20,000 years. Similar studies from Auckland showed that was banned until the
of tephra fallout from numerous eruptions. They drape the landscape on which scores of thin tephras from the same Nor th Island volcanoes, including at least late 1960s.

they fall, generally following the contours of hills, terraces and valleys . 43 tephras from Taranaki volcano, have rained out over the area for more than
Much of the work
70,000 years. Older tephra deposits, many metres thick, strongly weathered and was therefore done in
TEPHRA AS A DATING TOOL clay-rich in many places, also occur in both these areas. weekends and holidays
on what they called
Tephra-fallout layers have two special features: 'secret correlation
• They are erupted over a very short time, geologically speaking, usually a TEPHRA ON THE SEA FLOOR missions'. The ir papers
matter of only hours or days to a few weeks . The longest and most complete tephra records have been obtained from deep-sea on the sequence
drilling. Recently, 134 tephra layers, one nearly one metre thick, were fou nd in and characteristics
• They can be spread widely over land and sea to form a thin blanket that of the main volcanic
has the same age wherever it occurs. cores from Leg 181 of the international Ocean Drilling Programme, around 700 eruptions in the
Once identified by geochemical analysis, a tephra layer provides a marker bed kilometres east of the North Island. T he layers record repeated large explosive Rotorua region became
eruptions from the Coromandel volcanic zone (Coromandel Peninsula-Tauranga the foundation fo r
for an 'instant' in time, that instant being the time of eruption that produced the later volcanological
layer. In New Zealand and elsewhere many st udies have used tephra layers as a area) from 2 to 12 million years ago, and then in the Taupo Volcanic Zone from stud ies.
dating tool, a science called tephrochronology. about 2 million years ago.
6 NATUR AL HAZA RDS AND DISASTE RS VOLCANOES

ERUPTIONS IN EARLY witnessed the eruptions ofTarawera, Rangitoto, Taranaki (Mt Egmont),
Tongariro, Ngauruhoe, Ruapehu and Whakaari (White Island).
This aerial photograph
of Rangitoto's cone

HISTORY RANGITOTO
and the surrounding
lava field was taken
in 1986. Rangitoto
This map shows the
Rangitoto Island, immediately east of Auckland City, is the youngest and largest is now part of
volcanic vents that of the region's volcanic cones. Maori living there witnessed its formation . From the Hauraki Gulf
have erupted in New Ash thickness radiocarbon and other dating methods, the eruption has been dated around 1400 Maritime Park. Fires
Zealand since about (em) and exotic animals
1300 and were likely to
AD. On nearby Motutapu Island, ash from Rangitoto was found lying above have been banned
have been witnessed stone tools used for hunting and fishing, and the footprints of adults and children for many years, and
by people, as well as were found within the ash . the vegetation has
the Taupo volcano, returned.
which erupted about
200 AD. Eruptions MTTARANAKI
occurred only in the (MTEGMONT)
North Island -there On the slopes of Mt Taranaki, Maori
have been none in the
South Island. umu (ovens made of stones in a
hollow) lie between ash deposits from
eruptions around 1450, 1500 and
1655 , indicating that people were
travelling through Taranaki's forests
PACIF I C before 1450. According to Maori
OCEA N oral history Karakatonga pa, on the
northern side of the mountain, was
destroyed when the volcano erupted.
The first Pakeha settlers did not
0 30
realise that Taranaki was recently
C-=====::J active, until in 1883 a local settler,
KM
A. W. Burrell, discovered pumice
lodged in the forks of large matai
THE TAUPO ERUPTION trees near the mountain.
The serene waters of Lake Taupo in the central North Island mask a violent past
- beneath the lake lies an enormous volcano. About 200 AD it unleashed the
world's most powerful eruption in 5,000 years.
During the main eruption, the volcano sent up a plume of dust and gases
50 kilometres into the stratosphere. Vast clouds of gases and 30 cubic kilometres
of glowinl-hot pumice and ash were blasted into the sky. The towering column
collapsed suddenly, and hot ground-hugging pyroclastic flows raced away from
the vents at 600-900 kilometres per hour. These incandescent clouds incinerated
everything in an area of 20,000 square kilometres. These would have caused
spectacular sunsets and several years of cooler temperatures worldwide.
No people lived in New Zealand at the time of the Taupo eruption-
Charles Heaphy
Polynesian seafarers did not settle the country for another 1,000 years. painted this
watercolour of the
POLYNESIAN SETTLEMENT volcanic cone and
crater of Rangitoto,
Volcanoes provide clues as to when the first Polynesians, the ancestors of Maori,
probably in the 1850s.
came to New Zealand. They are thought to have arrived about 1250-1300 AD. Three men and a dog
When Tarawera erupted around 1314 AD it deposited a widespread layer of ash, in the foreground
indicate the scale. At
known as Kaharoa ash. Pollen lying just below the ash at a few sites suggests that
the time the cone was
small areas of forest may have been cleared before the eruption, and remains of bare of vegetation,
occupation found by archaeologists immediately above the ash indicate that small largely because of fires
numbers of Polynesians may have been living there. lit by early European
settlers.
Maori people living in New Zealand before Europeans arrived would have
 NATURAL HAZARDS AND DISASTERS VOLCANOES

This 1886 photograph

TARAWERA of Lake Rotomahana
and the White Terrace
(centre left) is part of a
panorama taken before
Lying 24 kilometres the Tarawera eruption.
south-east of Rotorua, Mt Tarawera is in the
Tarawera is a curious- background. Although
the Kaharoa eruption
looking mountain, with had spread ash over the
several large domes and area about 570 years
a broad, flat top . Its earlier, no one at the
time this photo was
distinctive profile formed
taken was aware that
during eruptions around Tarawera was an active
1314 AD. Early Maori volcano and about to
erupt again.
and the Europeans who
arrived in the 1800s
did not realise that
Tarawera was an active Eleven days before
Mt Tarawera erupted
volcano. In June 1886, a number of people '"
however, it came to reported a disturbing
life in a violent one- sight: a ghostly, fully
laden waka (canoe)
day eruption - the being paddled across
deadliest in the history of New Zealand settlement. Lake Tarawera. The
In the 1880s, tourists were drawn to the thermal regions of Rotorua and sighting received much
attention from artists
Whakaari (White WHAKAARI (WHITE ISLAND) Tarawera. A stellar attraction was the Pink and White Terraces, on the shores of and writers after the
Island) is one of the
Whakaari (White Island) is New Zealand's most active volcano, constantly Lake Rotomahana. Their tiers of delicately tinted silica and cascading hot pools eruption, but has never
few places in the
venting steam and gases, blasting out new small vents, and intermittently were considered one of the wonders of the world. been satisfactorily
world whe re you can
explained. This 1888
walk into the crater discharging clouds of ash. The island is a feature of Maori traditions, and has In the days before Mt Tarawera erupted there was an increase in hot spring painting by Kennett
of an active volcano. activity, but otherwise there were no warning signs. Eleven days before, however,
probably been active since the ancestors of Maori arrived. Watkins shows the
Swirling ash and
In 1820 the missionary Samuel Marsden, standing on a Tauranga hilltop, saw Maori and Pakeha tourists reported a phantom Maori war canoe sailing across canoe in a dramatic
noxious gases can
evening setting.
make this unpleasant, 'immense columns of smoke' from Whakaari (White Island). However, because the Lake Tarawera, and surges in the water.
however, and gas
volcano is 48 kilometres off the Bay of Plenty coast its effect on the mainland has
masks are essential.
This photograph was been minor, mostly infrequent dustings of ash. Whakaari (White Island) is one
taken in 1977 on an of the few privately owned volcanoes in the world, and more than 10,000 tourists
exceptionally clear visit by boat or helicopter each year. The
day, when the wind
was blowing away from island's abundant sulphur deposits were
the photographer. SteamTng hot once mined, until a collapsing crater wall
The active vent is killed 11 miners in 1914.
discharging pale brown In the mid-1 800s Captain Byron
ash, wh ile fumaroles
Drury. in the Pandora, carried out
(gas vents) are ejecting
white steam and acid a hydrographic survey around
gases. The atmosphere Whakaari (White Island). He
is highly corrosive, and
described the crater:
can ruin clothing after
even a short time. '[l]n the centre is a boiling spring
about 100 yards in circumference,
It is usually difficu lt sending volumes of steam full2,000
and dangerous to
feet high in calm weather; round the
get close to an ash
column as it erupts edges of the crater are numerous
from a vent. When this small geysers, sounding like so many
photograph (right) was
high-pressure engines, and emitting
taken, in Aprill977, a
strong southerly wind steam with such velocity that a
was blowing exposing stone thrown into the vortex would
the red-hot ash and immediately be shot into the air.' 1
gas in the centre of
the column.
 I'~ATURAL H ~ZARDS A~ D DISASTERS VOLCANOES

This lithograph of
McCrae's Rotomahana
Mt Tarawera e rupting stronger buildings. Four days after the eruption the high priest Tuhoto Ariki
Hotel was the largest
on the night of 10 June was dug out alive from a house, but died several weeks later. The official death building in Te Wa iroa.
1886 was made by
A. D..Willit, based on
toll was put at around 150, but it is more likely between 108 and 120 people A large group
were killed. sheltered there as
a paintin(by Charles
Mt Tarawera erupted
Blomfield . The view is The landscape around Rotomahana and Tarawera was stripped of vegetation. in1886,buttheroof
from the Maori village
of Waitangi, on the
Thick mud and ash blanketed hundreds of square kilometres ofland, and large collapsed, and the
survivors had to take
northern shores of cracks crossed the region. The Pink and White Terraces had vanished, reduced
refuge in the house
Lake Tarawera, where to dust and fragments of sinter. of Guide Sophia
there was only a single
Hinerangi and a nearby
death. Blomfield did
meeting house. A
not see the eruption,
small house, covered
and reconstructed the
in ash and partly
dramatic scene from
collapsed, can be seen
what he had been told.
in the foreground of
In Te Wairoa, a few
this photograph.
kilometres close r to
the volcano, Charles
Haszard observed
the eruption from
his verandah and had
exclaimed, 'What a
grand sight! Should we
live a hundred years
we shall never again At Te Wairoa village, 7.5 kilometres from the terraces, people were woken
see its equal.' He died after midnight on 10 June 1886 by a series of increasingly violent earthquakes.
a few hours later when Around 2 a.m., a fissure through Ruawahia Dome on Mt Tarawera erupted, and
' .1
I
' hi-s house collapsed.
by 2.30 a.m. the craters along the summit were venting fountains of glowing
scoria and a cloud of ash up to 10 kilometres high, through which intense
lightning flickered. At 3.20 a.m. the explosions spread. Craters were blasted
This photograph of
open on the south-west side of the mountain and Mt Tarawera was
through Lake Rotomahana and the Waimangu taken more than
area. A 17-kilometre rift spewed steam, mud and 100 years after it
erupted . The rift,
ash. The eruptions were over by about 6 a.m. formed by explos ive
At Te Wairoa, people went outside to watch erupt ions on the
Tarawera erupt, but soon had to retreat indoors. night of 10 June 1886,
The site of the terraces became a crater over 100 metres deep. Steam
is still the dominating
Many sought shelter in the Hinemihi meeting eruptions continued in the crater for several months, but within 15 years it filled feature . The reddish-
house and McCrae's Hotel. When wet mud with water, forming a new Lake Rotomahana, much larger than its predecessor. brown scoria on the
began to fall, the roof and upper floor of the top had been spewed
The chain of craters at the Waimangu end of the rift became the site of many new
out in just a few
hotel gradually gave way under the weight. geothermal features, including Waimangu Geyser, the largest in the world, and hours.
More than 60 people found safety in the sturdy New Zealand's largest hot spring, Frying Pan Lake.
house of the tourist guide, Sophia Hinerangi.
When the home of the local schoolmaster
Harry Lundius (left), collapsed, three people escaped
J. C. Blythe (right)
and took refuge in a hen house.
and Clara Haszard Night of a thousand stars
sheltered from the
eruption in the hen Rumblings from the Tarawera eruption THE AFTERMATH
house after the Soon after daybreak, rescue
were heard as far south as Blenheim, in the
Haszards' house and
the nearby school South Island. In the Waikato and Bay of parties were dispatched. They
building collapsed . The Plenty, people woken by the explosions saw found that the settlements of
hen house was one of Te Tapahoro, Moura, Te Ariki,
distant flashes on the horizon. Aboard the
the few buildings in
Te Wairoa to survive. Glenelg, moored in the Bay of Plenty, Captain Totarariki and Waingongongo
Thick debris from the Stephenson saw hovering over the land 'large had been completely destroyed, or
eruption can be seen buried by falling hot mud. At Te
balls of fire, which suddenly appeared, and
on the roof.
then broke into a thousand stars'.i Wairoa 15 were dead, but many
had survived, huddled inside the
 NATU RA L HAZAR DS .AND DISAS TERS VOLCANOES

TONGARIRO AND NGAURUHOE

This southward-
looking view of the
volcanoes of Tongariro
National Park shows
the complex of
craters, cones and lava
flows of Mt Tongariro
in the foreground. Mt
Ngauruhoe, the largest
and most active cone
of the Tongariro
group, is in the centre.
Ruapehu volcano is in
the background.

"' ,
I

MT TONGARIRO ground with a white dust, like snow. They said that
Ash clouds rise from
Mt Tongariro is not a single volcano, but a complex of craters that have been during a previous eruption, in 1865, the Taupo district
the upper crater of
Te Maari (below). The active at different periods. In 1868, violent earthquakes marked the eruption that Lava flow - and even the water of the lake - was covered with
view is from the south- formed the upper Te Maari crater, named after a Maor i chieftainess. Upper Te several inches of black dust. The showers of ash that
west, on the track from
During Ngauruhoe's 1954 eruption,
Maari erupted again in 1896-91, dumping 50 millimetres of ash on the Desert fell into Rotoaira, a small lake between the volcano
Ketetah i to Central D. R. Gregg of the New Zealand
Crater. The date of Road, and wafting ash as far as Napier. and Lake Taupo, had poisoned the fish there.
Geological Survey observed a lava
this photograph is * flow on 30 June at dose quarters:
uncertain, but it was
MT NGAURUHOE: YOUNG AND ACTIVE THE 1870 ERUPTIONS
probably taken in
'The more rapidly moving parts Many eye-witness accounts describe the eruption of
the 1890s. Although r egarded as a separate volcano, Mt Ngauruhoe is Tongariro's main
of t he flow were moving forward Ngauruhoe on I July 1870, which followed about
active vent. The remarkable symmetry ofNgauruhoe's steep cone is the result of
regular eruptions. bod ily. Boulders were tumbling 30 years of intermittent ash eruptions. Two lava flows
Ngauruhoe frequently belches from the face and exposing the travelled down the north side of the mountain, and loud
out clouds of ash. Over 10 ash red-hot interior of the flow as it detonations continued for three months, heard as far
eruptions have occurred between slowly advanced over the fallen away as Hamilton, Rotorua, New Plymouth and Napier.
1839 and 1915, on average about debri s. As the blocks fell off. The lava was also visible from distant areas. In July
six years apart. Eruptions of lava incandescent dust trickled out. 1870 Colonel J. M. Roberts, at a constabulary post on
are less common - they have The fi ner dust particles remained the Napier-Taupo road, wrote of the event:
been witnessed only in 1870, suspended in the air, producing 'One night a glow was observed spreading
1949 and 1954. a reddish-brown smoke most down the cone, comparable to a tree fern fire
In 1867, Maori people told irritating to the eyes. As the flow on a distant hill, and the following day three
the scientist and explorer James moved, it produced continual great columns of steam were seen rising, one
Hector that in May ash from grating and clanking noises.'s from the summit crater and the others from the
N gauruhoe had covered the lower slopes.' 4·
104 NATU AL HAZARDS AND Dl A TERS VOLCANOES

THE 1948-49
ERtJPTIONS RUAPEHU, 1861-1945
In l~H8, explosive eruptions
tossing out blocks many metres EARLY EYE-WITNESS ACCOUNTS
thick culminated in a three-week To New Zealand's earliest European settlers, snow-capped Mt Ruapehu appeared
eruption in February 1949. The benign and too remote to pose any danger. The earliest written accounts of
eruptions were accompanied by activity are from 1861, when it was reported in the New Zealand Spectator and The 1945 eruption of
loud blasts, and a small lava flow. Cook 's Strait Guardian that, 'dense volumes of smoke were seen issuing from the Mt Ruapehu emptied
Crater Lake when a
A plume of ash rose 6 kilometres crater, and at night a lurid glare was reflected by the heavens'. 5 The settler Henry plug of semi-solid lava
into the air. Sarjeant witnessed an outburst from Ruapehu's Crater Lake surging down the was forced up through
Whangaehu River: the vent into the
lake floor, d isplacing
THE 1954 ERUPTIONS 'I suddenly saw .. . a huge wave of water and tumbling logs ... [the wave] and evaporating
In 1954 Mt Ngauruhoe produced appeared to be covered with what we first thought to be pumice but the the water. In this
more than six million cubic metres intense cold which made us shiver and turn blue caused us to discover that this photograph, climbers
view the lava dome
of lava - the largest flow ever seen was no less than frozen snow. Mixed with this was a mass oflogs and debris. from the relative
in New Zealand in historic times. Very soon a bridge passed us stuck in the roots of a giant tree and a few safety of the summit
Spectacular lava fountains played minutes later about a dozen canoes came down.' 6 of Paretetaitaonga in ,..
Members of Sir James August 1945. At this
above the summit, and a sizeable scoria cone built up within Ngauruhoe's crater.
Gunson's household at time, most of the
Mangatepopo valley
In the 19th century Ruapehu's activity was low-key, limited to occasional small ash and steam were
watch Mt Ngauruhoe ERUPTIONS 1973-75 steam and ash eruptions from the summit Crater Lake. In 1889, 1895, 1903 and being discharged on
erupting in 1928. the eastern side of
The discharge of red-hot blocks oflava in January 1973 heralded the most recent 1925, eruptions spilled water out of the lake, creating volcanic mud flows known
Gunson, who was the the crater.
m;:tyor of Auckland at
major eruption ofNgauruhoe. Sporadic activity continued through the year, as lahars.
the.time, was a strong building up to highly explosive eruptions of ash in January and March 1974, and
advocate of opening up in February 1975. One of these threw a 3,000-tonne block oflava 100 metres out RUAPEHU ERUPTIONS, 1945
Tongariro National Park
of the crater. During the last and most violent eruption, gases streamed from the In March 1945 Mt Ruapehu stirred,
to people from the city.
crater for several h,ours, producing a churning plume of ash that towered up to beginning a series of eruptions that
13 kilometres abo\'e the crater. This column collapsed under its own weight, continued intermittently through
forming ash and scoria avalanches that swept down the flanks of N gauruhoe, the year.
leaving trails of rubble in their wake. On 8 March the pilot of a plane
Although Ngauruhoe's eruptions have seldom been more than nine years reported a plume of steam rising
apart, the mountain has been quiet since 1975- the longest break in activity in from the crater, and ash dusting the
its recorded history. Its steam vents have temporarily cooled, suggesting that mountain's eastern slopes. On 19 March
the main vent has become blocked. a dome of lava emerged from Crater
Lake, accompanied by steam explosions
visible from about a hundred kilometres
away. A week later, however, in
another large explosion, the lava dome
disappeared.
In the first two weeks of May, steam
The final and
most powerful of and ash rose in a continuous column.
Ngauruhoe's 1974-75 Activity then slackened. But by 19 June
eruptions was on ash was pouring from the volcano,
19 February 1975. Eight
seconds after the initial covering a large region as far north as
explosion, the ash Taupo. Another lava dome appeared
cloud had expanded. on 7 May, and it grew through June,
Incandescent lava
blocks, some the size of
spilling all the water out of Crater Lake.
small cars, leave vapour In July, August and early September
trails in the sky. Some explosive eruptions ejected rocks
blocks were thrown as
far as 2 kilometres from
and columns of steam and ash. Wind
the crater. carried the ash as far south as Upper
Hutt, near Wellington, and as far
06 NATURAL H.A.ZARDS AND DISASTERS VOLCANOES

This view of
Mt Ruape hu shows
th e ash clo ud fo rmed
north as Whakatane.
Noisy eruptions RUAPEHU AND THE
during th e 1945 during the first week
eru~i o ~ Ash was
spread o\E?r much
of August made TANGIWAI DISASTER
of the central North authorities briefly
Island, and many consider evacuating
people suffered eye
communities around
and thro at irritations.
the mountain.
On 1 September
a group of sightseers
barely escaped injury
when they ventured
up to the summit and
were bombarded by
small rocks. Volcanic
activity continued
Th ree years afte r
through September Mt Ruapehu erupted in 1945, but by the end of the year the excitement was over. Mt Ruape hu's 1945
at a moderate level. The crater, about 300 metres deep, slowly refilled with water. The mountain did e rupt io n, Crater
In late September not seem dangerous, and it was no longer being monitored. By 1953, however, Lake had rise n t o
a ppro xim at e ly its
and October ash fell Crater Lake was 8 metres higher than its level before 1945. Few realised that the p re vi o us leve l. This
on Taupo, Rotorua, water was now held in by an unstable mass of ice and volcanic rubble and ash. pa no rama shows t he
Whakatane, Napier swo lle n lake o n La bo ur
VVee ke nd l 953, about
and Hastings . THE LAHAR t wo mo nth s befo re
Eruptions in At 8 p.m. on Christmas Eve 1953, the debris at the outlet of Crater Lake th e Tang iwa i d isast e r
November and early collapsed. About 340,000 cubic metres of water poured into the head of the in Dece m ber 1953.
December spread Whangaehu River and swept down the valley, picking up sand, silt and boulders
ash on communities as it went. Soon after 10 p.m . this
around the mountain volcanic mud flow, known as a lahar,
and in Hawke's Bay. smashed into the main trunk railway
A lucky escape bridge at Tangiwai. The concrete
piers were knocked out and the bridge
In M ay and June 1945 geologist
In 1945 Chateau Tongariro, 9 kilometres from Ruapehu's crater, partially collapsed.
Robin Oliver observed Mt Ruapehu's
was a wartime mental hospital. Its electricity failed repeatedly when Driving through the darkness,
growing lava dome. During a quieter
ash penetrated the hospital's generators, and the streams supplying Cyril Ellis stopped when he saw
period, he and J W itten Hannah
water eventually became too muddied to be filtered. The hospital that the bridge ahead was under
camped overnight inside the crater.
closed in December, and 180 patients had to be relocated. water, even though there had been
An explosio n on the evening of l July
Ruapehu's outbursts caused more wide-ranging disruption. no rain. Realising that a train was
showered them w ith red-hot rocks
The wind spread ash for hundreds of kilometres. In heavy ashfalls, approaching the nearby rail bridge,
and ash. Both men received burns
asthmatics suffered and many people remained indoors. Hundreds he ran along the track towards it,
and Oliver was knocked unconscious. This phot ograp h, fro m
of cases of'Ruapehu throat' were reported to doctors and waving a torch to flag it down. It th e Auckland Star, of
Hannah hauled him some dist ance
pharmacists, and eye irritations were common wherever ash fell. was the passenger express from Tan giwa i was t ake n
from the crater, left him in a sleeping
Dry ash was easily stirred up by passing vehicles. Gritty Wellington, packed with 285 people th e day afte r th e ra il
bag, and descended the mountain disast e r. The da mage d
clouds drifted into houses and buildings, and played havoc with heading to Auckland for the holidays . road br idge is in t he
in the dark for help. A rescue party
machinery. Wet ash stuck like cement to roofs, windows and The driver saw him and applied fo regro und , but th e
found O liver the next day. The men
flat surfaces. It contaminated rainwater tanks if people did not the brakes, but the train's momentum rail bridge, a bo ut
were lucky to survive - t he explosion 200 metres upst ream,
disconnect their downpipes before the ash fell . carried it out onto the bridge. The was alm ost whol ly
had blasted out rocks weighing up to
Cars were vulnerable, their paintwork and windscreens engine and first carriage nosedived, washed away. Some
8 tonnes.
scratched by ash. The New Zealand Army was forced to move landing against the opposite bank. of th e carri ages th at
plummeted f rom th e
some 700 vehicles from Waiouru. Crops around Ohakune Four more carriages plunged into the da maged brid ge can be
withered, and stock did not like the taste of ash-covered pastures. Farmers river, floating in the torrent briefly see n in th e river bed .
around Taihape found ash in the wool of the sheep they sheared. before sinking. Another four carriages
108 NA rURAL HAZARDS AND DISASTERS VOLCANOES
109

The remains of a
railway carriage lies
beside a section of
RUAPEHU SINCE 1945
rail track; another
rests on -hts si~e on the
opposite s%!e of the
AN UNEASY QUIET
river. The Whangaehu Following the 1945 eruption, Mt Ruapehu settled
River has dropped into a fitful slumber. Between 1945 and 1986,
back to its normal scientists reported 61 volcanic disturbances,
level, but the mud
that covers everything mostly small steam eruptions that splashed water
indicates the extent of and mud within the summit crater.
the flood. A few were more substantial. Shortly after
midnight on 22 June 1969, the volcano produced a
lahar that destroyed the kiosk at the Whakapapa
ski field . On 8 May 19/1 a party surveying the
crater rim saw the lake surface bulge, then burst
skyward. Two of the men were drenched with acid
water, blasted by choking ash and toxic gas, and
bombarded with rocks. In 1975, eruptions sent
lahars down the Whangaehu River and through
the Whakapapa ski field .

THE 1995-96 ERUPTIONS

From January 1995, scientists monitoring Ruapehu
remained on the track, but one of them dangled over the river. Ellis and guard detected a growing restlessness. On 18 and 20
William Inglis attempted to help people off, but the coupling snapped and the September, small eruptions produced mud flows from Crater Lake. Around 5 p.m. There was little
carriage toppled into the river. Rolling several times, it came to rest on its side, on 23 September, hundreds of skiers were on the slopes when lake water, steam volcanic activity in
Ruapehu's Crater Lake
with water flowing through it. Ellis knocked out several windows and hoisted and ash were suddenly blasted into the sky. Rocks were tossed up to 1.5 kilometres in the late 1950s and
people outside as passenger John Holman lifted fellow travellers out to him. In from the crater. Most of the skiers dropped their gear and fled. A cloud of steam early 1960s, and it
all, 26 people escaped, huddled on the carriage for over an hour until the torrent and.some volcanic ash rose 12 kilometres, and lahars raced down three valleys. One became regarded as
a tourist attraction.
subsided. The men then formed a human chain in waist-deep water, helping narrowly missed Whakapapa's Far West T-Ear and its queuing area, where only an Melting snow and
everyone reach the bank safely. hour earlier hundreds summer rain filled the
On the other side of the flooded road bridge, Arthur Bell and his wife had also of people had thronged. lake, which was heated
by steam. Renewed
seen the train crash into the river. Mrs Bell went for help, while Arthur assisted A series of volcanic activity
15 people from the carriage that had hit the riverbank. explosions just a after 1965 made the
One carriage was carried more than 2 kilometres downstream. The others few minutes apart lake more acid and
more unpredictable,
were swept : cross the flooded main road or rammed into the riverbanks. Some followed on 24 and 25
and swimming was
people had escaped and swam to the banks, but dozens drowned in the tangles of September, sending discouraged.
gorse there. half the water in
The work of recovering victims went on for several days along 60 kilometres Crater Lake down the
of the river. Twenty bodies were never found; it was assumed they had washed out Whangaehu River. In late September 1995,
explosive eruptions
to sea, some 120 kilometres away. A 10-kilometre-high spread mud and water
plume of ash rose from the crater lake
NEW ZEALAND IN MOURNING skyward, falling to of Ruapehu around
the summit, and
New Zealanders woke on Christmas morning to the shocking news that 151 lives smother the Desert caused lahars down
had been lost. Tangiwai had lived up to ·its Maori name - 'weeping waters'. Road. the valleys. This
Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip were visiting New Zealand at the Nevertheless, skiers photograph (left),
taken on 24 September
time. Prince Philip attended the state funeral for 21 unidentified victims, and were quick to return 1995, shows an
the Queen presented Cyril Ellis and John Holman with the George Medal, and to the slopes once the eruption under way,
William Inglis and Arthur Bell with the British Empire Medal. mountain quieted. But with mud from an
earlier eruption
A commission of inquiry into the disaster later determined that the lahar on 7 October they were covering the snow
could not have been anticipated. Since then, Ruapehu's Crater Lake has been once again threatened around the crater.
carefully monitored. when earthquakes
 0 NATURAL HAZARDS AND DISASTERS VOLCANOES

This satellite
photograph of New
Zealand (right) shows
accompanied a new series of eruptions that lasted
until 15 October. Crater Lake was emptied of its .,.
RAOUL ISLAND
the plume of ash remaining water. Raoul Island is the largest of the Kermadec Islands, over 1,000 kilometres
frQfT1 t~e Ruapehu
eruptio\of 17 June
Activity dropped off and by mid-November lakes north-east of the North Island . It is the emergent part of a large volcano, almost
1996 extending were re-forming in the crater. But in June 1996 20 kilometres in diameter. Although apparently isolated, the island lies on the
for hundreds of Ruapehu once again began blasting out plumes of Kermadec ridge, a chain of submarine volcanoes.
kilometres north-
ash, blocks of hot rock, and lava bombs. On 20 July The island's irregular anvil shape is,due to a combination of volcanic activity
north-east of the
vent. Where it drifts fountains of hot lava were seen, and sonic booms shook and marine erosion. Detailed onshore and offshore investigations show that there
depends on wind the area. An 11-kilometre-high cloud dispersed ash as are two large collapse calderas (Raoul and Denham), both of which have erupted
direction. The end
far as Opotiki, on the East Coast. By early September, frequently over the last few thousand years.
result, over hundreds
of years, is that a Ruapehu was quiet once more.
dusting of volcanic ash
hasbeenaddedtothe
topsoil and enhanced
A COSTLY SPECTACLE
its fertility. Ruapehu's 1995-96 eruptions were similar in size to
those of 1945, but their social and economic impacts
were much greater. New Zealand's population had doubled since 1945, and
visitors to the mountain had increased dramatically. In 1945 there was one ski
This large ash eruption
is from the crater
area, and no ski lifts; by 1995 there were three ski areas and 36 ski lifts. On some
of Mt Ruapehu, and days up to 10,000 skiers swarmed the slopes, and when the three ski areas closed
occurred during the it cost the region $100 million.
1995-96 eruptions.
Chateau Tongariro is in
Avoiding an erupting volcano made travel difficult. The main highway and
.1 the foreground. railway line connecting Wellington and Auckland skirt Ruapehu. During eruptions
the central North Island also became off-limits to aircraft. Detours were lengthy
and costly. Drifting ash intermittently closed
airports, including Auckland and Wellington;
the value of cancelled flights alone was
$2.4 million.
Electricity suppliers lost $22 million as ash
shorted out power pylons and later wrecked the
turbines of the Rangipo power station.

FUTURE VOLCANIC ACTIVITY Heading for the hills

Impressive as they were, the 1995-96
eruptions were relatively minor, and W illiam Covat and his family were living
Raoul Island has been
scientists of the future are unlikely to in Denham Bay when eruptions started in RECO RDED ERUPTIO N S shaped by volcanic
find evidence of them in the long-term June 1870. Alarmed by earthquakes, volcanic Eruptions have been observed and activity and marine
geological record. Existing deposits around explosions and suffocating fumes, they fled to recorded in 1814, 1870, 1964 and 2006. erosion. In the last
few thousand years
the mountain from lava flows, pyroclastic t he hills, and were very pleased to be rescued On 9 March 1814 Captain Barnes of volcanism has been
flows (clouds of hot gas, pumice and rock in early October. They never returned . the Jif.ferson, who had landed in Denham centred in the Raoul
fragments) and avalanches of volcanic debris Bay several days earlier, reported a and Denham calderas.
These are collapse
suggest that Ruapehu is capable of much thick, dark cloud above Raoul. Returning structures that formed
more violent activity. two months later, he found that there was a volcanic island made of scoria in after major volcanic
As in 1945, the 1995-96 eruptions added the middle of Denham Bay. Explosive activity occurred at the same time in eruptions. Although
the Denham caldera
unstable debris to the rim of Crater Lake, Raoul caldera. is largely offshore, its
setting the scene for another breakaway The scoria island had disappeared by 1854, when a survey in Denham Bay was existence has been
flood down the Whangaehu River. However, made by HMS Herald. confirmed by marine
seismic surveys.
the hazard is now continuously monitored, Primary records indicate that there were eruptions in both the Denham Bay
and systems are in place to give early and Raoul calderas between June and October 1870. Captain Preble of the Ellen
warnings of lahars moving towards the Goodspeed described an erupting volcano in Denham Bay on 5 July that blasted
Desert Road and Tangiwai. A lahar from the a dark column of ash and steam up to 1,000 metres. In early October 1870, there
lake on 18 March 2007 caused little damage. were two separate volcanic islands in Denham Bay.
Til NATURAL HAZARDS AND DISASTERS VOLCANOES
nl
The blast from the
1964 Raoul Island
eruption stripped MONITORING ACTIVE
all the vegetation
from "!\he t~ees, and
deposited a t~ck layer
VOLCANOES
of mud over the area
close to the vents. The thick mantle of ignimbrites and tephra-fall
layers forming the central North Island landscape
is clear evidence of many large volcanic eruptions
over the last few thousand years and earlier.

DEBATE ABOUT VOLCANIC

HAZARDS
In 1920, Thomas Jaggar, Director of the Hawaii
Volcano Observatory, reported on the need
for volcano surveillance in New Zealand, but
his recommendations were not implemented.
Nuclear tests However, his visit initiated detailed mapping of
volcanic rocks in the Taupo Volcanic Zone by
In 1954 the British government During the same period there was an eruption in Raoul Leslie Grange from 1926 to 1929. Grange reiterated the need for
requested permission to test a The warning system
caldera which blasted a crater 600 metres across, knocking over close observation of volcanoes in this region, but no action was taken. on Mt Ruapehu only
hydrogen bomb in the Kermadec trees and covering the floor of the crater with mud and boulders. The Tangiwai disaster in December 1953 led to recognition that volcanoes works if people are
. !' lands. Although there had been There was no further volcanic activity for the next 90 likely to erupt again should be regularly monitored. Although an eruption cannot aware of the potential
·eDuptions in 1814 and 1870, no one years, and Raoul Island has been occupied almost continuously. danger from lahars.
be prevented, monitoring should indicate increased activity before an eruption,
This sign was erected
recognised that Raoul was an active The area devastated in the centre of the Raoul caldera was allowing for evacuation of people and mitigating the effects on property. by the Department of
volcano. Indeed. the central flat soon covered in trees that grow rapidly in the subtropical Conservation on a track
area surrounded by steep cliffs environment. MONITORING NATURAL HAZARDS near Ohakune, to advise
trampers of potentially
(now recognised as the Raoul In 2006 monitoring of natural hazards (including volcanoes) was the responsibility hazardous areas.
caldera) seemed an excellent testing RECENT TIMES of GeoNet, a collaborative project between the Earthquake Commission, GNS
spot. Fortunately the request was A series of strong earthquakes started on 10 November 1964, Science, and the Foundation for Research, Science and Technology.
declined by the New Zealand and by 15 November volcanic tremor was recorded. At about Before an eruption happens, magma moves up towards the surface.
government - for political reasons . the same time Green Lake started to heat up, and the level rose
several metres. An explosive eruption commencing about 6 a.m.
on 22 November opened a large vent near Green Lake which devastated the
immediate area, and there were 11 other small vents within the Raoul caldera.
Activity gra~ually tailed off after early February 1965. Mud ejected from the
vents was confined to the central part of the Raoul caldera.
A plume of discoloured bubbling water containing pumice fragments was
observed in Denham Bay in November and December.
An earthquake swarm started near Raoul Island on Sunday 12 March 2006,
but the tremors rapidly declined over the next few days . Then on 17 March
at 8 .21 a.m. there was a sudden explosive eruption near Green Lake. Mud and
rocks were ejected, together with a plume of steam and gas. Mark Kearney, a
Department of Conservation observer, was killed by the explosion. Green Lake
was heated, and the level rose several metres during the next few days.

Scientists Marshall
PATTERN OF ERUPTION Muller and Cindy
All historic eruptions include explosive activity within the Raoul caldera close to Werner collect a
Green Lake, probably caused by disruption of the geothermal system as magma sample of gases from
a sulphur-encrusted
moves upwards. There appears to be a close connection with vents in the Denham
fumarole on Whakaari
caldera, as the 1814, 1870 and 1964 eruptions occurred there at the same time. It (White Island}.
is highly probable that there will be future eruptions from the same vents.
 NATURAL HAZARDS AND DISASTERS VOLCANOES
5
Acknowledgements to
Ted Lloyd (formerly
Volcanologists use several methods to detect the movement of magma: a matter of a day or two (as in Auckland)
New Zealand Geological • detecting earthquakes .. but in others (such as Taupo) it may be
Survey, DSIR), • measuring ground deformation prolonged for months or even years.
Vznce Ne<tll (A;{assey
University), H{.a d Scott
• monitoring volcanic gases
and David Johnston • monitoring changes in the chemistry and temperature of crater lakes. KERMADEC VOLCANOES
(GNS Science). Earthquakes usually provide the first sign of unrest. The seismic results are The Kermadec Ridge continues north-
sent by radio telemetry to GeoNet headquarters and continuously monitored. eastwards for over 1,400 kilometres
Once increased activity is detected, more detailed observations are undertaken. from the Taupo Volcanic Zone as
Earthquakes caused by the rise of magma- identified as 'volcanic earthquakes' a chain of submarine volcanoes.
- can be distinguished from those arising from ground movement caused by Oceanographic research has shown
tectonic (non-volcanic) processes. evidence of recent volcanic or
hydrothermal activity. Three volcanic
NEW ZEALAND'S ACTIVE OR POTENTIALLY islands occur towards the northern end
ACTIVE VOLCANOES of the ridge, and there is a seismograph
This map shows the
regularly monitored
Those volcanoes that have erupted within the last 10,000 years, especially on Raoul Island (900 kilometres north-
areas where those with multiple eruptions in that period, are the most likely to erupt east ofNew Zealand). In contrast to
volcanic eruptions again. Together with Taranaki (Mt Egmont) and the Tuhua caldera (Mayor the volcanoes on or close to the North
have occurred
within the last few
Island), most of the active volcanic centres are in the Taupo Volcanic Zone, and Island, there is little monitoring along
thousand years. include Ruapehu, Ngauruhoe, Tongariro, Taupo caldera, Okataina caldera, Mt most of the Kermadec Ridge. U
Edgecumbe (Putauaki) and Whakaari (White Island).
Taranaki (Mt Egmont) has erupted at
There is a network of
least a dozen times since about 1300 AD,
* Volcanoes erupted
since 1300 AD the most recent (Tahurangi) occurring
seismographs, which
measure earthquake
activity, at sites where
>" ' Volcanic activity in probably around 17 55. Taranaki has
' last 4,000 years volcanic eruptions are
generated a series of lahars in the last few likely. A protective
thousand years, as well as eruptions, and box surrounds
this seismograph
part of the volcano's summit probably
(foreground) in
collapsed between 1860 and 1897. a remote part of
Mayor Island (Tuhua), 25 kilometres Tongariro National Park,
offshore in the western Bay of Plenty, has with Ruapehu in the
background. The results
erupted several times in the last 10,000 are telemetered to
years. A caldera-forming event about GeoNet headquarters,
7,000 years ago spread tephra over part where any changes in
Tiihua (Mayor Is.) activity are monitored.
of the North Island. The latest eruption, Power is provided by a
of lavas, took place possibly about 3,000 solar panel (centre).
years ago.
Mt Edgecumbe (Putauaki), an Most large cone
andesitic cone volcano, was acti,·e about volcanoes have a
complex history
3,200 years ago.
of cone-building
New Plymouth~.• -:-- Small eruptions have occurred followed by collapse.
Mt Taranaki '1tr irregularly over a large area in the The mounds in
(Mt Egmont~
front of Mt Taranaki
Auckland volcanic field, the latest being the
(Mt Egmont) are the
formation of Rangitoto Island around 1400 remains of a huge
AD. Past experience suggests that future landslide that occurred
about 23,000 years ago
eruptions in Auckland are likely to come
when a large volcanic
from new vents rather than existing cones. cone collapsed and
All these volcanoes are monitored by spread debris over a
the existing seismic network, which should huge area. The present
cone built up after
give early warning of renewed volcanic this avalanche. The
0 100
r::.:=.==--=-=
KM
activity. In some cases, however, the period older Pouakai volcano
of warning before an eruption may be only is at left.