[Geysers] Fan & Mortar 0439 9/20/08--The third time's a charm

[Lynn Stephens]

This will be my final report since I am leaving Yellowstone sometime today.
 
All summer I have been saying that I don't do night work anymore.  Partly that's because I know once I get started, I won't stop and I'll get sleep deprived and then sleep depraved.  But the last week of the season, with a full or nearly full moon, elk bugling, decent (for fall) weather, and Fan & Mortar on a short schedule is an exception to the no night work rule.
 
As already reported Dean Lohrenz & I split the night schedule the night of 9/14-9/15, although both of us ended up out there most of the night.  Finally, Dean went to Daisy, saying that Main Vent was often splashing when he returned to Daisy.  So that morning I started the event cycle calls with "Dean, it worked" referring to the fact that Main Vent had started splashing.  Steve Bezore was the only person listening that night who responded to the call.  That event cycle failed.  F&M was left unattended from 21:30 9/15 to 0445 9/16 and then erupted at 1222 on 9/16.
 
For this eruption, F&M were left unattended until just after the 2-1/2 day mark.  I arrived at 0140.  I called an event cycle that started at 0348, included 3 River Vent pauses, plenty of Main Vent activity.  Water levels held until 10 minutes into Gold, when they suddenly crashed out of sight.  Steve Bezore had just gotten to Grotto when I made the 10 minute call that water levels had disappeared.
 
At that point I went way out on a limb and told Steve I thought F&M would erupt on the next event cycle.  Oh, foolish me.
 
As Barbara reported, Jim Schrier took over the early morning shift and called the event cycle that started with Main Vent splashing at 0857, included two River Vent pauses, plenty of Main Vent activity, and a Lock that started 17 minutes into River Vent.  Unfortunately, water levels dropped 9 minutes later, came back for a couple minutes, then disappeared.  F&M really, really tried to erupt, but instead made me regret every voicing any type of prediction about F&M.
 
At 1755 River Vent went into a series of dribbles with Gold.  Main Vent started having steam rushes from 1809 to 1813 but nothing developed into an event cycle.
 
So, once again I decided to go out to F&M in the early morning.  At 0130 I heard Grand start and saw the steam could go up as I was biking toward Castle.  I stopped to watch Grand, which had a two-burst eruption.  Grotto was ie at 0145 and stopped about 0245.  As I was walking toward Grotto to check to make certain that the 0300 ie steam cloud was Oblong, I saw Artemisia 0301ie.  
 
Riverside erupted at 0324 and as I was standing on the bridge, something sounded different at F&M.  River Vent turned on at 0326, with Gold, and Angle had been erupting continuously since 0150 through three River Vent cycles.  At 0331 Main Vent gave a huff and snuffed out all three Fan Vents.  At 0339 Main Vent had a splash.  At 0342 I noted that Bottom Vent and Lower Mortar were both showing water.  Main Vent kept huffing, but I couldn't see much water.  At 0348 there was one white water splash in Main Vent and at 0351 there was a vent filling splash--the only one that occurred.
 
River Vent came on at 0352, off at 0358 for River Vent pause #1.  At this point Bottom Vent's splashing had sent water halfway to the river and Lower Mortar was fuzzballing, but Main Vent wasn't doing much except steam rushes.
 
River Vent came on at 0402, then off at 0408 for River Vent pause #2.  Then I announced that Main Vent appeared to have gone to sleep.  It wasn't even putting out much steam, and wasn't having any huffing and puffing let alone any splashing.
 
River Vent came on at 0413, River Vent at 0414, Angle at 0418 and water levels sounded really good the entire time.  Kitt Barger arrived first, followed by Steve Bezore.  The vents went into lock at 0429.  About halfway into the lock we heard tromp, tromp, tromp, tromping.  We could see someone coming dressed in a white, long-sleeved shirt.  I told the person to hurry, assuming it was someone responding to the radio calls.  But, it was just an early morning jogger/fast walker.  As he walked past, Kitt warned him the area was going to get wet soon, but he just kept on going.
 
The water levels tried to decline twice during the lock, but thankfully came back.  Upper Mortar boomed and may have had water during the later stages of the lock.  East Vent started the eruption at 0439, with about a 20 second lead on Main Vent.  (During that time I was protesting that I would NOT be satisfied with an East Vent solo.)  
 
Viewing conditions were good with the half moon still high in the sky and very little wind.  We were able to position ourselves so we could see both Fan and Upper Mortar, which once again started about 1-1/2 minutes after Main Vent took off.  Fan went well across the boardwalk.  Duration of the water was 28 minutes.
 
About five minutes into the eruption, the Energizer Jogger came tromp, tromp, tromping back--walking across the wet portion of the jugwalk before he resumed his jogging once he reached less slippery footing.  I don't think he even looked over at Fan & Mortar as he determinedly clomped past.
 
As Steve said, we would much rather have had a daylight eruption than a moonlit one. But I decided it was his third 4 am visit that was the charm that resulted in the eruption.
 
Until next year (probably, unless I decide to make a quick trip over near the end of October.)
 
Lynn stephens
 
_________________________________________________________________
See how Windows Mobile brings your life together—at home, work, or on the go.
http://clk.atdmt.com/MRT/go/msnnkwxp1020093182mrt/direct/01/
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: </geyser-list/attachments/20080920/1dd6e8c4/attachment.html>