Three new monitoring stations installed at Mount Hood (2020)
These stations enhance the existing monitoring network at this high-threat volcano and improve the ability of CVO scientists and their partners to detect and provide warning of any changes in earthquake activity or ground deformation that may signal an increase in volcanic activity and a subsequent danger to people and property.
During September 29 to October 2, 2020, the USGS Cascades Volcano Observatory, in cooperation with the U.S. Forest Service and Mount Hood National Forest, installed three new volcano monitoring stations on the flanks of Mount Hood. The three stations enhance the existing seismic, GPS and volcanic gas monitoring network that is currently in operation around Mount Hood.
Each station includes seismic and GPS instruments. The broadband seismometer detects the tiny earthquakes (smaller than Magnitude 1.0 and not felt by humans) caused when magma, gas, or fluids move beneath the volcano. The GPS equipment measures subtle ground deformation of the volcano in response to magma entering or leaving the magma reservoir several miles below the summit.
Mount Hood has erupted repeatedly for hundreds of thousands of years, but its most recent eruption series was from 1781 to 1793, just before the arrival of Lewis and Clark in 1805. While Mount Hood is not currently erupting, it produces frequent earthquakes and earthquake swarms, and steam and volcanic gases are emitted in the area around Crater Rock near the volcano’s summit. Because of the significant hazards the volcano poses to nearby communities and infrastructure as well as to aviation, USGS researchers designated Mount Hood as a very high threat volcano in an updated 2018 National Volcanic Threat Assessment, in part because of its proximity to nearby communities and popular recreation areas, major highways and potential to impact airspace affecting the Portland metropolitan area during unrest or eruption.
Robust monitoring networks are a key tool for mitigating volcano hazards that will affect people and property. Volcanoes can awaken rapidly — in just days to weeks — and initial precursors to that awakening can be subtle, including small earthquakes, small ground movements and minor changes in gas chemistry. The most effective volcano monitoring network requires that instruments be installed in multiple locations on the volcano’s flanks well before unrest begins to catch these early changes.
Data from these unoccupied, remote monitoring stations are transmit in real-time data to the Cascades Volcano Observatory and its monitoring partner, the Pacific Northwest Seismic Network. View data from these new stations on the CVO webpage Mount Hood monitoring data (all monitoring data streams) or at PNSN (earthquakes only).
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