Where is it all Coming From?
Mt St Helens, in the north west of the United States, has been erupting continuously for the last 15 months. Every three seconds around 10 cubic metres of lava comes out of the volcano but scientists don’t know where all the lava is coming from.
If the lava was being generated by the mountain itself then scientists would expect to see the mountain begin to change shape but apart from reshaping the crater now and again there has been no real change to the mountain’s shape.
So where the 102 million cubic metres of lava that has been blown out of the mountain since it started erupting has come from is basically anyone’s guess.
