Another potential Alaskan eruption

Finally, in a very slow week for volcano news, we find a report from the Alaska Volcano Observatory about concerns of another eruption in the state. Currently, both Okmok and Cleveland are erupting, and now AVO has issued a warning about Kasatochi Volcano on the island of the same name (~100 kilometers east of Adak, roughly near 175W on the map above). The volcano is the island – more or less – and any people on the small island are being evacuated due to increased seismic activity underneath the volcano/island.

Not much is known about the eruptive activity at Kasatochi. The volcano does have a large crater lake at the top that sits less than 100 m above sea level, but the only known (confirmed) eruption was in 1760, with unconfirmed eruptions as recently as 1899. The article about the current alert does mention persistent fumarolic activity (“steaming”), which indicates that there is still hot material near the surface at Kasatochi. In terms of potential activity, most likely it would behave like most of the other Aleutian volcanoes, producing an ash column and possibly lava flows that would likely only affect the island itself and possible air routes over the Aleutians.