This handout image obtained courtesy of the NASA Earth Observatory taken on June 22, 2019, shows Raikoke volcano erupting in the Kuril Islands in Russia's Sakhalin Oblast region, near the Kamchatka Peninsula. (Photo: JOSHUA STEVENS, AFP/Getty Images)
The volcano sat dormant for almost a century. Then, at 4 a.m. last Saturday, it awoke.
In striking photos captured by satellites and astronauts on the International Space Station, smoke is seen billowing from the volcano on Raikoke, northeast of Japan, as the uninhabited island saw its first volcanic eruption since 1924.
The photos released this week by NASA show volcanic plumes that rarely rise from the stratovolcano, which is almost a half mile wide and 650 feet deep.
Raikoke is a tiny island not even 2 square miles large in the Sea of Okhotsk and has been under Russia’s control since World War II.
The eruption consisted of at least nine explosions and lasted into the evening, according to the Smithsonian Institution’s Global Volcanism Program activity report.
A thick plume of volcanic ash rises above the dense cloud cover in this close-up #Himawari8 view of the #Raikoke volcano's eruption. This was the volcano's first eruption since 1924. More imagery: https://t.co/wIF4txQIDWpic.twitter.com/vZExba5QDZ
The ash plumes containing large amounts of sulfur dioxide rose as high as 42,700 feet, or 8 miles. Lightning was detected in the plumes as they drifted east and northeast, the report stated.
By the next day, barely any ash remained visible to satellites, according to NASA Earth Observatory.
“What a spectacular image. It reminds me of the classic Sarychev Peak astronaut photograph of an eruption in the Kuriles from about 10 years ago,” said Simon Carn, a volcanologist at Michigan Tech.
An unexpected series of blasts from the remote #Raikoke volcano in the Kuril Islands sent ash and volcanic gases streaming high over the North Pacific Ocean. https://t.co/ptL4i4dNOH#NASApic.twitter.com/XAUziKxurK
Before the 1924 eruption, the Raikoke volcano hadn’t erupted since 1778, according to NASA.
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