A dark cock's-tail plume is ejected from Crater Lake during the 8 May 1971 eruption of Ruapehu. This view from the NW shows Mitre Peak in the background at the onset of the eruption, which ejected material to 1.5 km above the crater. It was the largest of a series of phreatic and phreatomagmatic eruptions from 3 April to November.

Photo by Peter Otway, 1971 (New Zealand Geological Survey).

This image is made available under the Creative Commons BY-NC 4.0 license terms.

Galleries: Explosive Eruptions | Magma / Water

Keywords: lava water interaction | Surtseyan | eruption | explosive eruption | cock’s-tail plume | ballistic ejecta | pyroclastic surge

Ruapehu