Aerial strategies advance volcanic gas measurements at inaccessible, strongly degassing volcanoes.
basic_science · Level V
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 33127674.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1126/sciadv.abb9103 and PMC identifier 7608812.
- Licence recorded as CC BY.
- The licence permits redistribution, so the abstract is shown in full and the full text is available from the publisher.
Abstract
Volcanic emissions are a critical pathway in Earth's carbon cycle. Here, we show that aerial measurements of volcanic gases using unoccupied aerial systems (UAS) transform our ability to measure and monitor plumes remotely and to constrain global volatile fluxes from volcanoes. Combining multi-scale measurements from ground-based remote sensing, long-range aerial sampling, and satellites, we present comprehensive gas fluxes-3760 ± [600, 310] tons day<sup>-1</sup> CO<sub>2</sub> and 5150 ± [730, 340] tons day<sup>-1</sup> SO<sub>2</sub>-for a strong yet previously uncharacterized volcanic emitter: Manam, Papua New Guinea. The CO<sub>2</sub>/S<sub>T</sub> ratio of 1.07 ± 0.06 suggests a modest slab sediment contribution to the sub-arc mantle. We find that aerial strategies reduce uncertainties associated with ground-based remote sensing of SO<sub>2</sub> flux and enable near-real-time measurements of plume chemistry and carbon isotope composition. Our data emphasize the need to account for time averaging of temporal variability in volcanic gas emissions in global flux estimates.