Equilibrium Viscosity and Disequilibrium Rheology of a high Magnesium Basalt from Piton De La Fournaise volcano, La Reunion, Indian Ocean, France

Lava flows are a common hazard at basaltic to intermediate volcanoes and have posed a significant threat to La Reunion Island over the past centuries. In sustained flow units, the efficiency of lava transport away from the vent is dominated by cooling. For basaltic to intermediate lavas, it is the ability of the lava to solidify during cooling which exerts a first-order control on spatial extent and flow distance. As a consequence, understanding the sub-liquidus rheology of lavas has become a key focus in lava flow research in the past decade. To date, the development of a systematic understanding of lava rheology during emplacement conditions has been significantly hampered by a lack of experimental data. Here we present new data on the rheological evolution of crystallizing high-Mg basalt from Piton de la Fournaise. Sub-liquidus experiments were performed at constant cooling rates ranging from 0.5 to 5 K/min. Those rates mimic thermal conditions experienced 1) by lava during flow on the surface and 2) by magma during dike and sill emplacement. Our data show that the effective viscosity of the crystallizing suspension increases until reaching a specific sub-liquidus temperature, the so-called "rheological cutoff temperature" (T-cutoff), at which the lava becomes rheologically immobile and flow ceases. This departure from the pure liquid viscosity curve to higher viscosity is a consequence of rapid crystallization and its variability for a given lava is found to be primarily controlled by the imposed cooling rate. Based on these experimental data, we adapt the failure forecasting method (FFM) - commonly used to describe the self- accelerating nature of seismic signals to forecast material failure - to predict the rheological cut-off temperature (T-cutoff). The presented data substantially expand the modest experimental database on non-equilibrium rheology of lavas and represent a step towards understanding the underlying process dynamics

Quantifying Microstructural Evolution in Moving Magma

Many of the grand challenges in volcanic and magmatic research are focused on understanding the dynamics of highly heterogeneous systems and the critical conditions that enable magmas to move or eruptions to initiate. From the formation and development of magma reservoirs, through propagation and arrest of magma, to the conditions in the conduit, gas escape, eruption dynamics, and beyond into the environmental impacts of that eruption, we are trying to define how processes occur, their rates and timings, and their causes and consequences. However, we are usually unable to observe the processes directly. Here we give a short synopsis of the new capabilities and highlight the potential insights that in situ observation can provide. We present the XRheo and Pele furnace experimental apparatus and analytical toolkit for the in situ X-ray tomography-based quantification of magmatic microstructural evolution during rheological testing. We present the first 3D data showing the evolving textural heterogeneity within a shearing magma, highlighting the dynamic changes to microstructure that occur from the initiation of shear, and the variability of the microstructural response to that shear as deformation progresses. The particular shear experiments highlighted here focus on the effect of shear on bubble coalescence with a view to shedding light on both magma transport and fragmentation processes. The XRheo system is intended to help us understand the microstructural controls on the complex and non-Newtonian evolution of magma rheology, and is therefore used to elucidate the many mobilization, transport, and eruption phenomena controlled by the rheological evolution of a multi-phase magmatic flows. The detailed, in situ characterization of sample textures presented here therefore represents the opening of a new field for the accurate parameterization of dynamic microstructural control on rheological behavior

Controls on explosive-effusive volcanic eruption styles

One of the biggest challenges in volcanic hazard assessment is to understand how and why eruptive style changes within the same eruptive period or even from one eruption to the next at a given volcano. This review evaluates the competing processes that lead to explosive and effusive eruptions of silicic magmas. Eruptive style depends on a set of feedbacks involving interrelated magmatic properties and processes. Foremost of these are magma viscosity, gas loss, and external properties such as conduit geometry. Ultimately, these parameters control the speed at which magmas ascend, decompress and outgas en route to the surface, and thus determine eruptive style and evolution

Welding of pyroclastic conduit infill: A mechanism for cyclical explosive eruptions

AbstractVulcanian‐style eruptions are small‐ to moderate‐sized, singular to cyclical events commonly having volcanic explosivity indices of 1–3. They produce pyroclastic flows, disperse tephra over considerable areas, and can occur as precursors to larger (e.g., Plinian) eruptions. The fallout deposits of the 2360 B.P. eruption of Mount Meager, BC, Canada, contain bread‐crusted blocks of welded breccia as accessory lithics. They display a range of compaction/welding intensity and provide a remarkable opportunity to constrain the nature and timescales of mechanical processes operating within explosive volcanic conduits during repose periods between eruptive cycles. We address the deformation and porosity/permeability reduction within natural pyroclastic deposits infilling volcanic conduits. We measure the porosity, permeability, and ultrasonic wave velocities for a suite of samples and quantify the strain recorded by pumice clasts. We explore the correlations between the physical properties and deformation fabric. Based on these correlations, we reconstruct the deformation history within the conduit, model the permeability reduction timescales, and outline the implications for the repressurization of the volcanic conduit. Our results highlight a profound directionality in the measured physical properties of these samples related to the deformation‐induced fabric. Gas permeability varies drastically with increasing strain and decreasing porosity along the compaction direction of the fabric but varies little along the elongation direction of the fabric. The deformation fabric records a combination of compaction within the conduit and postcompaction stretching associated with subsequent eruption. Model timescales of these processes are in good agreement with repose periods of cyclic vulcanian eruptions