[Geysers] Molten sulphur producing springs

[Ron Keam]

New Zealand has a couple of molten sulphur producing springs, both at 
Waiotapu.  In view of the fact that there have been some recent 
postings about such springs at YNP it might be of interest for list 
readers that I found a few minutes ago that Ted Lloyd's paper on 
Waiotapu, including details and photographs of quenched molten 
sulphur globules, is now to be found on-line at
www.rsnz.org/publish/nzjgg/notable/
Even as late as the 1970s or 1980s I remember finding a battered 
globule lying on the sand flat between the Alum Cliffs and Ngakoro 
lake.  It was clearly not a newly deposited item and presumably had 
been emplaced in the 1954 events.

I would recommend your perusing Ted's paper not only for the molten 
sulphur aspect but also because of its consideration of the 
hydrothermal eruptions at Waiotapu and the suggested triggering 
mechanism.  (Ted and I wrote a much later paper about the Trinity 
Terrace Eruption in 1973 at Waimangu where Ted had installed 
instruments which worked right through the night-time outbreak and 
gave a clear record of the progress of the event which lasted about a 
quarter of an hour.)

A few years ago Stuart Simmons sounded into the molten sulphur pool 
on the floor of Te Whangi o te Rangi crater lake at Waiotapu, and was 
unable to retrieve his sampling devices from that pool - molten 
sulphur is very viscous!

A different paper in the on-line reference quoted above has details 
of the hot lakelet soundings and the boat used for the bathymetric 
surveys at Inferno Crater and Frying Pan Lake at Waimangu in the 
1970s.  That might also be of interest to list users.  The maps 
reproduced in this paper are much reduced and simplified versions of 
the full bathymetric maps which are at scales of 1:250 and 1:500 and 
were published as separate items.

Ron Keam
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Ron Keam
The Physics Department
The University of Auckland
Private Bag 92-019
Auckland
New Zealand
Phone +64 9 373-7599 extension 87931
FAX +64 9 373-7445
EMail r.keam at auckland.ac.nz
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