VOLCANIC ASH AND AVIATION SAFETY (BASED ON THE STUDY OF ASH PARTICLE PROPERTIES)

Abstract

Based on the data on 26 volcanic eruptions in Kamchatka, Alaska, and the Aleutian Islands, relationships were established between the melting points of ash particles and their granulometric and elemental compositions with a view to assessing the hazards posed by volcanic ash to aviation. It was proved experimentally that volcanic glass particles started suffering morphological alterations at a temperature as low as 670-800°C, which is much lower than the melting point of volcanic glass equal to 1100-1400°C. This suggests that tuff welding can occur at substantially lower temperatures than supposed earlier. The greatest potential hazard for aviation can be posed by the volcanoes of Kamchatka and the Kuril Islands that erupted in the past decade, namely Bezymyannyi, Karymsky, Klyuchevskoi, Gorelyi, and Ebeko.