Second boiling of the Long Valley Caldera resolved by fiber-seismic tomography

Geophysical characterization of calderas is fundamental in assessing their potential for future catastrophic volcanic eruptions. The mechanism behind the unrest of Long Valley Caldera in California remains highly debated, with recent periods of uplift and seismicity driven either by the release of aqueous fluids above the magma chamber or by the intrusion of magma into the upper crust. We employ distributed acoustic sensing data recorded along a 100-km fiber-optic cable traversing the caldera to image its subsurface structure. Our images highlight a definite separation between the shallow hydrothermal system and the large Pleistocene magma chamber intruded at ~12 km depth. The combination of the geological evidence with our results shows how fluids exsolved through second boiling provide the source of the observed uplift and seismicity.

Speaker: Ettore Biondi, CalTech