[Geysers] Two Mastiff eruptions and one Giant eruption (Stephens)

[elizabeth medley]

Lynn,

Thanks for your wonderful detailed account of the Mastiff/ Giant eruption. 
I can just visualize it!

Libby Medley

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "lynn stephens" <lstephens.eagle at mail.sisna.com>
To: <geysers at wwc.edu>
Sent: Sunday, April 23, 2006 5:57 PM
Subject: [Geysers] Two Mastiff eruptions and one Giant eruption (Stephens)


>I made a quick trip to the Park this weekend, driving down from Bozeman 
>Saturday morning and returning to Bozeman Sunday afternoon.
> I spent most the day at Giant on Saturday, leaving after the hot period 
> that Mike Keller and Matthew McLean have already reported.
>
> I went to Fountain.  Fountain is having 7 plus hour intervals, with 
> durations of 42 minutes Saturday morning (per Nancy and Robert Bower) and 
> 35 minutes Saturday evening.  Clepsydra shut off about 6 minutes after 
> Fountain started Saturday evening, attempted to restart 4 minutes later, 
> then stayed off for 16 minutes after Fountain ended, for a total pause of 
> 22 minutes.  Nancy and Robert Bower said Spasm was not erupting before the 
> start of the morning Fountain; it was erupting prior to the start of the 
> evening Fountain.  More than one person made a comment to me about 
> "Fountain's long intervals and long durations."  These 7 - 8 hour 
> intervals and 35-45 minute durations are longer than those we've had in 
> recent years, but the ones we've had in recent years have been short.  One 
> other note from the area--Old Cone is active.
>
> This moring Grand was about 6:15 ie, 2 bursts, and again at 12:49ns, 2 
> bursts.  I think we all missed the start of Grand because we were watching 
> Giant erupt.
>
> I'll just give a quick rundown of the preceding events.
>
> Grotto Fountain was at 18:11 Saturday evening, with Grotto starting at 
> 18:30.  Grotto erupted most of the night.
>
> This morning water levels in Mastiff and the Giant Indicator Pool were 
> high.  Water levels seemed to be running several hours ahead of where they 
> had been yesterday.  At about 9:15 Paul and Suzanne said the water levels 
> looked about the same as they had about 3:30 or 4 yesterday afternoon.  I 
> was updating prediction boards, so arrived at the Giant platform about 
> 9:50.  Standing on the boardwalk, I could see water in Mastiff's pool at 
> 10:07, then again at 10:24.  There was a surge from Mastiff's front vent 
> at 10:25 and Posthole was "blipping" at 10:26.  Bijou turned on strong at 
> 10:27, the first eruption of Bijou we had seen this morning.  Bijou turned 
> off at 10:32.
>
> Water was once again visible to me standing on the boardwalk at 10:47. 
> Feather turned on at 10:47:48 and Feather's Satellite turned on within 7-8 
> seconds.  Mastiff was in overflow at 10:49:33.  Mastiff started to drop 
> and Bijou turned on at 10:51:09.  As had happened yesterday, Feather and 
> Feather's Satellite stayed on, with Feather erupting to the height of 
> Giant's cone most of the time.  Mastiff had dropped such that I couldn't 
> see any water in the front pool while standing on the platform.  There 
> were occasional "fingers" splashing up from back Mastiff.  For the next 
> 24+ minutes, Paul would periodically announce "We're 13 1/2 minutes in and 
> nothing's changed."  Bijou, Feather, and Feather's Sat. were the only 
> things erupting.  There was almost no steam from the Southwest Vents or 
> from Turtle.  20 minutes and still Bijou, Feather, and Feather's 
> Satellite.  Then at 23 minutes the people watching the GIP said it was 
> rising fast, Bjou turned off for about 30 seconds, the GIP
> dropped, Feather's Sat turned off and Feather turned off.  Total duration 
> of Feather 24 minutes 42 seconds.
>
> Some of us waited to see how long it would take Bijou to turn off, while 
> others started to drift away to look at other geysers.
> Less than 8 minutes after Feather had turned off, Suzanne said "Bijou's 
> off" at about the same time Paul said "Mastiff's rising.  No joke, 
> Mastiff's rising."  Feather turned on at 11:22:00, the Satellite turned on 
> within 15 seconds, and about 10-12 seconds later the southwest vents 
> turned on.  This time Mastiff had periodic surging but the pool always 
> stayed up such that water was pouring off the platform from Mastiff's 
> overflow even when Mastiff wasn't surging.  Bijou turned on at 11:28:40 
> and Catfish turned on for a few seconds.  Bijou continued, but Mastiff 
> continued to have surging.  Some one jokingly said, the third burst is the 
> biggest, then said the fifth burst is the biggest, "I knew it was a prime 
> number."  Mastiff was in full eruptoin at 11:31:45 with both vents 25-30 
> feet, pounding, and then Mastiff was 40-45 feet high.  Giant finally 
> started showing water and erupted at 11:33.  Total duration of Giant 85 
> minutes.
>
> What an opening weekend!  (Several of us were hoping for April 22 since 
> we'd seen an eruption of Giant on opening weekend April 22, 2000, but this 
> time we not only got Giant, we also got a solo eruption of Mastiff.)
>
> Lynn Stephens
>
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