Mt. Fitzherbert

Potential ash hazards: Wind forecasts from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), coupled with eruption models, show that any ash clouds that rise above the crater rim today would drift eastward.

Recent observations: Broken clouds partly obscure the volcano this morning. However, analysis of images from the Sugar Bowl camera and GPS data from the west arm of the glacier shows that the northern part of the lava dome continues to move westward. Over the past several days, an obvious steam plume has developed by mid morning. This steam plume results mostly from changes in atmospheric conditions and not from changes in eruptive conditions. As air temperature and humidity change in the crater during the day, a steam plume becomes visible as warm moist vapor emitted by the volcano condenses. Yesterday, field crews repositioned GPS spiders, retrieved seismic equipment, and installed an additional camera.