How large can an explosive volcanic eruption get?
In: Earth Science
They measure how powerful volcanic eruptions are in terms of the amount of material expelled. On this scale, Mount St Helens in 1980 expelled around 5 cubic kilometres of material. The last Yellowstone eruption 640,000 years ago is estimated to have ejected 1000 cubic kilometres, e.g. 200 times larger, and that’s by no means the largest in history–the absolute largest are approaching 10,000 cubic kilometres.
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