2012 SupervolcanoIn the 2012 movie a supervolcano eruption in Yellowstone National Park was part of the catastrophes that had to be faced. Hollywood style, the eruption was accompanied by cataclysmic earthquakes and other 2012 doomsday events across the globe. While the movie was science fiction, such upheavals can happen.A volcano is a rupture in earth's crust which allows gases, ash and magma that is under the surface to escape. A supervolcano develops when magma rises but is unable to break through the surface. Pressure builds until the crust can't handle it anymore and then a high-pressure eruption occurs which has the potential to reach 240 cubic miles or more, perhaps affecting a whole continent. The effects of such an eruption would cause large areas of the earth to be covered with lava and volcanic ash. According to the U. S. Geological Survey (USGS) - division of the U.S. Department of Interior - it would cause "short-term" global climate change (they define short-term to be years or decades). Severe global climate change has the potential of playing havoc on agriculture and food supply as well as causing mass extinction. History of Super Volcanic EruptionsAccording to the USGS, the last eruption of such nature occurred 74,000 years ago when the Toba Caldera erupted in Sumatra, Indonesia.The Toba catastrophe theory suggests that the eruption caused massive environmental change which resulted in annihilation of a large percentage of the population of humans and/or affecting their ability to reproduce as well as massive extinction of some species. The human race is thought to have been decreased to five to ten thousand people due to this volcanic eruption. The Presence of Volcanoes of Mass DestructionThere are few identified super volcanoes that could cause mass destruction. Three of them are located in the United States – the Yellowstone Caldera in Wyoming, the Long Valley Caldera in California, and the Valles Caldera in New Mexico.There are also volcanoes with the possibly of eruptions of a great magnitude in Indonesia, New Zealand, Japan and South America. There are few volcano observatories in the United States that continuously monitor volcanoes – the Alaska Observatory, the Cascades Observatory, the Hawaiian Observatory, the Long Valley Observatory, and the Yellowstone Observatory. In addition, there is also a U.S. Volcano Assistance Program that is ready to respond to volcanic emergencies worldwide.
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