Volcanic eruptions are not easy to anticipate. Now, a new paper proposes a way to provide early clues by evaluating magma movement far beneath volcanoes. The Bárdarbunga volcanic system in Iceland began to erupt from a fissure on Aug. 29, 2014. By the time it quit six months later, it had created an almost 33-square-mile lava […]
A total run of 1.4 million sockeye salmon, along with 60,000 Chinooks, are expected to return to the Copper River in 2020, according to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G). The state forecast released on Jan. 28 compared with the recent 10-year average (2010-2019) of 2.1 million wild sockeyes returning to the […]
Across much of Alaska, permafrost is thawing. In most locations of interior and south Alaska, what permafrost exists is protected by the ecosystems around it. Trees, moss and peat shade the ground from summer heat and help slow thaw. At the same time, scientists predict that wildfire seasons in Alaska will increase in duration and […]
By the summer of 2020, a landslide will bury a portion of the road from the Denali National Park entrance to Wonder Lake. That’s the conclusion of Zena Robert, a University of Alaska Fairbanks graduate student who visited the park in summer 2019. Last summer, she did a ground survey of giant blobs of […]