[Geysers] Great Fountain / Fountain news

[Maureen Edgerton]

Great Fountain / Fountain news

Wild Phase appears to be over.

I decided to drive in for my lunch break though I did not even know if Firehole Lake Drive would be open.  Kind of a long lunch break...so I arrive to the flats and some big steam is obscuring the Fountain platform.  The sun is shining and I can see the platform, which is a bonus.  It is 1248.  

So my quest was to check out Wild Phase at Great Fountain.   I drive down Firehole Lake Drive, which is open!  The drive was bare roads.  More snow in West than the park.  A tiny bit of snow on the Firehole Lake Drive.   I settle in to observe Great Fountain and "poof", there is Fountain steam, huge cloud.

It is 1254.  I move to Fountain and get out there to see Twig start at 1312.   Seemed early.
Fountain was awesome.  Cold out, yet only windy, not crazy windy.  Blue bursts, bursts against the wind, fun, fun, fun.  Then the end comes.  Seems early.  It is.  Only 1325, or 31 minutes since the cloud went up.  So maybe 32 minute eruption tops.  That would match the shortest eruption of the season for me.  So now what?

Morning's Thief again before Fountain...short duration...early Twig...I do not know if more intervals are now happening per day?  

Great Fountain is quiet now.  Crater is very empty.  Very empty.  I hung about for awhile and things did not change at all.  So it wore itself out and now we wait.  I am so glad the road was open today.  It became a white out again, heavy wet snow is falling, so I am not sure if this will be the case tomorrow.

I am very grateful for the calm in the storm to go visit Fountain.  Just wish it would have erupted a little longer...

The past years I watched Great Fountain come out of wild phase there were some awesome eruptions.  It took it a while though, to get back to erupting at all.  Maybe I will go peruse GOSA data to see what happened in 2009 and 2010.

Here's hoping it stops snowing.  We have plenty of time once the park closes for the season for winter.  If only people would heed the "snow tires required" sign, the rangers would not be so busy with accidents.

Not many people about though.  Very quiet.

That's it for now.

Maureen Edgerton




Sent from my iPad