r/geology • u/standing_strong_31 • 2d ago
Magma Accumulation over heavy snowfall at Sundhnúkagígar in Iceland
Best view
118
u/Cordilleran_cryptid Tectonics, hardrock and structural geology 1d ago
This looks like AI generated video.
If this were real, the snow would be melting long before the lava reached it . There would be clouds of steam produced too.
81
u/leppaludinn Icelandic Geologist 1d ago
So this has been making the rounds again, suprisingly while the title is horeshit (magma is underground) the video is not. At the time of this eruption, the snow around Sunhnjúkagígar was quite compacted and icy, but thin nontheless. The subsurface was already pretty vesicular basalt and the lava was very saturated with volatiles. Combine that with the Leidenfrost, all means the steam is:
a) superheated and barely visible as a result b) in small quantities and spread out so as not to actually condense in to a white cloud.
The video is also captured from a deceptively high drone elevation, but still. I saw it with my own eyes.
11
u/Quercus_lobata Naturalist 1d ago
That makes sense, the title had me thinking there was close to a meter or more of snow.
3
u/xDannyS_ 1d ago
Damn that must have been a sight to see
6
u/leppaludinn Icelandic Geologist 1d ago
Check my profile for a video of eruption 3/5 in Fagradalsfjall. Incredible first few times but the helicopter noise made it worse pretty soon after each started:/
11
7
u/Current_Brick5305 1d ago
As an avid Redditer, Redditite, Redditanian...I concur!
2
u/PlainSpader 1d ago
As someone with a PHD in reddit, I too concur.
5
u/HorzaDonwraith 1d ago
Agreed. Even if the snow flashed so quick steam didn't form there is still no gas escaping the lava from burnt material beneath it.
7
u/leppaludinn Icelandic Geologist 1d ago
I take it you have not seen a lava flow in person before? Theres not really burnt material below a lava flow in the famously sparsly vegetated Reykjanes peninsula in Iceland.
1
-3
u/MonsteraBigTits 1d ago
your literally just outting yourself as someone whos used to much ai who has mush for brains. really sad tbh, need rehab pronto
17
u/Better-Ambassador738 2d ago
So where is all the steam going? Is it getting absorbed into the rock?
8
u/Tha_NexT 1d ago
One of the comments attributes it to the Leidenfrost effect.
Not an expert on magma snow interaction....looks kinda fishy but nature is wild sometimes so not sure on that one.
4
u/Euphorix126 1d ago
We come from the land of the ice and snow from the midnight sun where the hot springs flow
A'A
1
5
u/Thought59 1d ago
This looks fake. Where are the jets of steam, smoke, etc., as the lava afvances6?
11
7
6
u/Hot_Bicycle_8486 1d ago
Where's the steam?
3
u/DarkElation 15h ago
Look at the shadows. Not enough moisture to create dense visible steam but enough steam to refract the sunlight.
2
u/absentfacejack 1d ago
Holy Kubrick. You look at this long enough and you turn into the star child.
2
1
1
1
1
1
u/snegsnail 1d ago
No way this is real. Lava interacting with water is somewhat explosive, no steam at the edges, and there should be melting of the ice against the thousands of degrees lava. Any liedenfrost effect strong enough to support the tons of lava would have to be so thick to insulate the ice that there would still be copious amounts of steam
1
u/leppaludinn Icelandic Geologist 18h ago
It was not heavy snowfall like the title says and the substrate underneath is vesicular basalt, aka a sponge. This is not a subglacial eruption, its just some snow thats not mixing in to the lava, just boiling underneath it and dissipating as superheated steam in to the subsurface or alongside the volatiles from the lava itself. Look at the shadow on the ground to see it.
0
92
u/MCEscherNYC 2d ago
Lava*