Notes and Observations on Geysers in Yellowstone and Elsewhere
I've updated the New Crater/Steamboat video to add a short clip of a superburst recorded in 1984.
Otherwise, I've run out of videos to upload for now. There's a lot more raw material, but I need to spend some selecting and editing and producing the best parts. But it's time to start watching geysers in person. Maybe later this summer a few more items of interest will appear here.
On 2000 June 30, the NPS closed the Firehole Lake Drive because a large hole had developed on one of those wooden culverts south of Firehole Lake. That was a Friday, and with the upcoming holiday weekend, it meant that the road crews wouldn't be available to fix the problem until at least Jul 05.
I heard about the problem late that day, from some geyser gazers who were incensed that they wouldn't be able to get to Great Fountain for days. That night I realized that the situation was exactly opposite. The Firehole Lake Drive was now a backcountry area with a paved bike path through it. At dawn, well before it was time to head back out to Grand, I loaded up my bike and drove to the junction with the Loop road, and parked at the closed gate. No other vehicle was there.
It turned out it wasn't even close to time for an eruption of Great Fountain, but I had the area to myself. My next visit was on Jul 02. By then, a few people had figured the situation out, but as this video shows, it wasn't many.
I made one more visit on Jul 04, and the road was repaired and reopened the next day.
In October 1987, the first Giant hot periods since 1955 were observed. They started about six weeks after the 1987 Sep 12 eruption. More hot periods were observed in the spring, with the next eruption of Giant on 1988 Jun 28.
More hot periods were observed in late July, just as the fire activity in the park started to pick up. By late August 1988, Giant was having hot periods almost daily. All of us had no idea what to look for or what was the progression of events leading up to an eruption. Notice the confusion over which vents are which, and what they should be called. Also notice also how excited we could get over what we now know are pretty minor hot periods.
As it turned out, there wasn't much chance of observing Giant due to the fire activity, and the evacuation of the Old Faithful area. Giant did erupt just a week after the last hot period on this video, on 1988 Sep 12.
The New Crater Geyser also has a second official name: "Steamboat Geyser". I prefer the first name officially given to it in 1930. It's so much more descriptive and bureaucratic.
Update: 2018 May 30 Added a 1984 superburst, and appearance two days after the 1983 May 24 eruption.
The GeyserLog AppleTV v2.0 app is now in the Apple App Store.
This major change in this update is the inclusion of the display of GeyserTimes predictions, and the display of notes and comments. It also includes more filtering options, and the usual display cleanup, bug fixes and crash elimination.
The app is not free. The price helps pay for the costs of software tools and graphics tools needed for app development. Geyser gazers are welcome to contact me and get a Promo Code which will allow downloading of this app, and the iPhone/iPad app for free. I'm also open to suggestions for features users would like to see added, or bugs that need to be fixed.
Giant Hot Period on 2001 Sep 02. Video by Paul Strasser.