[Geysers] July 3 Giant details - Part 3

[Tara Cross]

A message from Tara Cross <fanandmortar at hotmail.com>


Part 3 - The Eruption


...Let's see, where was I?

Oh, right.  After Bijou paused at 1913, water was seen rising in Mastiff, this time quite purposefully.  As Mastiff neared overflow the Southwest Vents began to sputter, and went into full eruption at 1916.19.  Feather overflowed and tried to start once, then dropped, then started for good at 1916.59.

For nearly a minute, the hot period looked a lot like all of the others; Feather, Southwest Vents, and Mastiff just at overflow.  Then Mastiff began to overflow a little more, and Feather Satellite came on 54 seconds after Feather.  Immediately Mastiff began to boil, mostly a few inches to a foot.

After the 2-minute mark Mastiff's boiling began to widen.  First it could be seen sizzling along to the left on the back side of the vent, then wide surges began to push outward and upward to 1, 2, and then 3 feet.  The surging was wide and sustained to 2-4 feet, and copious overflow began to pur off of the platform.  Cave's activity progressed from bubbling to vigorous boiling, increasing in height to about 6 inches by the 3-minute mark.  Mastiff had continuous boiling to 1-4 feet, then more sustained surging to 5 feet, accompanied by a huge wave of discharge.  The surging was so strong that it was almost bursting.

Then Mastiff went flat for about 20 seconds around the 4-minute mark, but already India was covered.  When boiling resumed, it burst up to 2-3 feet immediately.  Several shouted out that Cave was erupting, and indeed it was, sustained to a full 3-4 feet.  Mastiff's boiling was holding at 3-4 feet high.  Then it pushed upward to 5 feet, then wider, then 6 feet.

With Julie, Kitt, Nellie, and Donna urging Mastiff on, I had to move out to the main boardwalk to make my calls.  I looked towards Oblong and saw the procession of gazers arriving breathlessly from Grand, with interested visitors tagging along to see what all the fuss was about.

Mastiff surging continued to strengthen until it was bursting, with spikes reaching to the top of the cone and then over the top.  Even with gazers cheering, Mastiff was so noisy that it could easily be heard.  I glanced at Bijou and saw it have several blips while Mastiff was still surging (it later built to full eruption).  For a moment I thought that Mastiff would start erupting, but the surging died down again.  I looked at my watch in disbelief--it had been only 6 minutes since the start of Feather.

Mastiff was suddenly very calm, hovering at overflow for 20-30 seconds.  Then, at approximately the 6:30 point in the hot period it quickly dropped out of sight.  Ordinarily I might have worried that Feather and Feather Satellite would slow down, but they must have missed the memo that Mastiff had dropped because they showed no signs of stopping.

Instead, Giant quickly began to have large surges within its cone--first to one-third of the way up, then two-thirds.  The surges were voluminous and dumped water out of the cone.  With every surge the excitement in the monkey cage grew.  When the surges reached the top of the cone, mass hysteria overtook the assembled throng as inch-high waves of water poured off the front of the platform.  The geyser wanted OUT.

At about 1925.15, Giant burst up with a thick surge to 30 feet.  I called "Giant, 1925!"  Then the water disappeared, and I had to say, "...I think."  After a few low bursts, Giant rose again, this time with a sustained surge that rose upwards and outwards, almost precisely 2 minutes after Mastiff had dropped.

"GIANT, 1925!!!  GIANT, 1925!!!!!!!"

This time the water held, lifting out of the cone in a massive flood.  The signs rolled and the column rocketed skyward.  I craned my neck to see the top spikes, and the water came crashing down in front of us.

On the boardwalk at Old Faithful, Dave Monteith managed to get about half of the crowd to turn down basin as Giant reached and held its peak height, estimated at 180 feet.  He said the general consensus among the visitors was, "What are we doing HERE??"  Dave later commented that when Grand started at 1937, it was completely dwarfed my Giant, even 12 minutes into the eruption.

The conditions were not ideal, as the storm clouds that had moved in around 1700 were still covering the sky, but nobody cared.  It sprinkled rain a few times during the eruption, but it hardly detracted from the joyous experience.  I was thrilled for the many gazers who were seeing Giant start for the first time--congratulations to all.

Lynn called Grotto Fountain at 1953, with Grotto starting at 1958.  As Giant's eruption waned, the setting sun cast light on the clouds on the western horizon, giving a pale orange-pink glow to the sky.  The wind blew the spray back and forth along the boardwalk, then directly into the monkey cage.  Gazers milled about, grinning, cheering, crying, hugging, taking pictures of each other, and playing in the spray.

As darkness began to set in, we watched the final bursts of the eruption.  I stopped seeing water at 2109, for a total duration of 104 minutes.

I said it last time, but I'll say it again:  WHAT A GEYSER.

--Tara Cross
fanandmortar at hotmail.com


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