[Geysers] Fan & Mortar August 5

[Polly Panos]

Hello All,

  I watched the rock pile a good part of the day August 4. It was mostly quiet, except for one interesting note.  In the afternoon, I saw a large splash in Main Vent when River, High and Angle were on.  (There had been nothing of significance before.)  When Gold came on, there were nice water levels to start.  About a half hour later, I heard several huffs from Upper Mortar, and in some of them there was visible spray.  Nothing came of it all, though.  (Over Memorial Day weekend, I also saw a steam rush with water spray from Main Vent while River was on.  F & M erupted a couple of days later.)
  On August 5, we had 2 event cycles during the day.  The first one started at 10:40 with a Gold pause.  The pause lasted about 40 minutes, with Bottom Vent erupting for much of the pause.  Fan's vents were not very high when they came on, but Upper Mortar did surge and try to start a few minutes in.  The second event started with a River pause at 1755.  Again, the pause lasted for about 40 minutes.  We had more splashing in Main Vent and less Bottom Vent this time.  Fan's water levels started out okay, but faded.
  After Beehive, we were chased in because of an approaching storm.  Doppler radar showed large storms coming our way.  We knew that F & M could have another event cycle, but with lightning near the basin, Kitt Barger and I watched from the parking lot after dark.  Sometime after 2300, we saw lights down basin.  At one point the lights, including a strobe light, shone on a steam cloud, but we thought that it was Grotto or Sawmill.  It didn't seem large enough to be F & M.  We finally ventured out a while after midnight, only to find that F & M had already erupted.  The vents were all very quiet.  There was a water line just past the boardwalk from Fan and some fresh sinter on the boardwalk.  As far as we know, no Gazers saw the eruption.

Polly Panos