According to the Philippines' chief volcanologist, the Mayon volcano erupted on Friday, a day after ejecting ash amid swarms of earthquakes.

"It is a quiet eruption as of now. A hazardous eruption is possible. We don't know when, maybe within weeks" - Renato Solidum, chief of the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology, who ordered the alert level raised after observers saw "lava trickles" flowing down the slopes of the 8,118-foot volcano.

Read more

Position 13.257°N, 123.685°E

Attached Images

103175091_a5fec209c5_o.jpg (53.7 KB, 7 views)

__________________
`Irony` actually does mean `metal like`...

Lava and rocks as big as cars rolled down Mt. Mayon yesterday, prompting officials to recommend that Albay be placed under a state of calamity and Malacañang to ask residents to leave immediately.

Scientists also expanded the danger zone around the volcano to 6 km around the peak and 7 km around its southeastern slope, fearing an imminent explosion.

Read more

__________________
`Irony` actually does mean `metal like`...

This is the latest news report from Reuters

Volcanologists have warned that Mount Mayon, in the province of Albay, could explode at any time but that the gravitational pull of a full moon could provide the final push.

"To put it in a simple way, it's like it massages a volcano," Ernesto Corpuz, head of monitoring and eruption prediction at the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology, told Reuters.


A full moon coincided with at least three of Mayon's nearly 50 explosions over the last four centuries, including the two most recent in 2000 and 2001, Corpuz said.

What does everyone think? Does this make sense?
At first I thought garbage, the moon being full is not going to increase its gravitational pull. It's still the same distance away. But then I thought tides. We get king tides when the moon and the sun line up on the same or opposite sides of the earth. At a full moon they are on opposite sides, so is this massaging the earth's crust to encourage an eruption?

What does everyone else think?

Note: I've merged three existing threads on todays' reporting to this thread in the Small Media at Large section in order to avoid posts scattered about three separate sections. Let's focus upon the astronomical aspects there. Thanks.

Seems bunk to me. First, the tidal effect will be greatest at new moon, when the moon and sun tidal effects are in the same direction. 2nd, how close does the full moon need to be to the explosion to be considered to be "coinciding"? I would assume that they mean on the same calendar day. That gives a ~3.5% chance that an explosion would coincide with any particular phase of the moon. Having 3 out of 50 (6%) isn't so far from 3.5% for me to think that this isn't just random chance.

Especially if they relaxed their standards. Suppose they considered an explosion to coincide with a full moon if one occurred within 24 hours of the other. Then you'd expect such a (random) coincidence ~ 7% of the time.

Mount Mayon, (13.2576°N, 123.6856°E), showed signs a major eruption was imminent as it belched smoke and spewed burning rocks and mud.
Six explosions have been recorded since Saturday.
The seismic network around the volcano in the central Philippines recorded mild outbursts at 5:14am, 5:18am, 12:11pm, 2:25pm, and 3:50pm, yesterday and 3:54am today.
A greyish cloud was briefly seen after the 3:50pm ash explosion, which quickly dissipated and drifted to the east-southeast of the volcano. The 3:50pm ash explosion was among the largest to date, based on instrumental records since the volcano began spewing ash last 07 August 2006.
The Sulphur Dioxide (SO2) emission produced a total of 6,876 tonnes (t/d) yesterday.
Alert Level 4 is still in effect, which means that a high probability of hazardous explosive eruption exists.

Source PHIVOLCS-DOST

__________________
`Irony` actually does mean `metal like`...

Uh-oh. A full moon is just 25 days away.

__________________
0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0....

Spring tides are at both full and new moon.

__________________
"God bless thee, my son; I will give thee the greatest jewel I have ...
"The end of our foundation is the knowledge of causes, and secret motions of things; and the enlarging of the bounds of human empire, to the effecting of all things possible."Trying to make sense of computers, The Error Log.