Thorthormi Glacier Lake, Bhutan

As glaciers grind their way across the landscape, they pile up rocky debris, forming moraines. At the terminus of a glacier, moraines can act as natural dams for lakes filled with melt water. When they fail, they can create catastrophic glacial outburst floods. On October 7, 1994, in the Bhutan Himalaya, a partial collapse of a moraine along the edge of the Luggye Lake released a glacial outburst flood that killed 21 people and swept away livestock, crops, and homes.

This natural-color image of the southern slopes of Bhutan’s Table Mountain shows where the 1994 glacial outburst flood occurred. Luggye Lake broke through the moraine at the southwest corner, and the flood scoured a path down the Pho Cho River. Unfortunately for residents down the valley, Luggye is not the only dangerous glacier in the region. Officials are also concerned about the Thorthormi Glacier Lake and the unstable moraine separating it from Raphstreng Lake, to the west.

Raphstreng Lake is roughly 80 meters (260 feet) lower in elevation than the lake forming at the terminus of Thorthormi Glacier, and an outburst flood from Thorthormi into Raphstreng could easily cause the lower lake to overflow as well. The combined outpouring of meltwater and rock debris could be even more devastating than the 1994 disaster.

To reduce the likelihood of a glacial outburst flood, Bhutan has begun a project to lower the water levels of both glacial lakes. In area where heavy equipment could tumble down the slopes, the government of Bhutan has relied on human muscle and low-tech tools to widen the outlet channels and allow the lake water to drain in a more controlled way.

El Misti Volcano and Arequipa, Peru

Several Latin American cities have grown up on the flanks of active volcanoes. This mosaic of two astronaut photographs illustrates the closeness of Arequipa, Peru, to the 5,822-meter- (19,100-foot-) high El Misti Volcano. The symmetric conical shape of El Misti is typical of a stratovolcano, a type of volcano characterized by alternating layers of lava and debris from explosive eruptions, such as ash and pyroclastic flows. Stratovolcanoes are usually located on the continental crust above a subducting tectonic plate. The magma feeding the stratovolcanoes of the Andes Mountains, including El Misti, is associated with ongoing subduction of the Nazca Plate beneath the South American Plate. El Misti’s most recent—and relatively minor—eruption occurred in 1985.

The city center of Arequipa, Peru, lies only 17 kilometers (11 miles) away from the summit of El Misti; the gray urban area is bordered by green agricultural fields (image left). With almost 1 million residents in 2009, it is the second largest city in Peru in terms of population. Much of the building stone for Arequipa, known locally as sillar, is quarried from nearby pyroclastic flow deposits that are white. Arequipa is known as “the White City” because of the prevalence of this building material. The Chili River extends northeastwards from the city center and flows through a canyon (image right) between El Misti volcano and Nevado Chachani to the north. Nevado Chachani is a volcanic complex that may have erupted during the Holocene Epoch (from about 10,000 years ago to the present), but no historical eruptions have been observed there.

Astronaut photographs ISS021-E-8370 and ISS021-E-8371 were was acquired on October 16, 2009, with a Nikon D3 digital camera fitted with an 800 mm lens, and are provided by the ISS Crew Earth Observations experiment and Image Science & Analysis Laboratory, Johnson Space Center. The image was taken by the Expedition 21 crew. The image in this article has been cropped and enhanced to improve contrast. Lens artifacts have been removed. The International Space Station Program supports the laboratory to help astronauts take pictures of Earth that will be of the greatest value to scientists and the public and to make those images freely available on the Internet. Additional images taken by astronauts and cosmonauts can be viewed at the NASA/JSC Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth. Caption by William L. Stefanov, NASA-JSC.

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