THERMAL ACTIVITY.

Manawatu Times, Volume XLIX, Issue 2713, 22 June 1925, Page 10

THERMAL ACTIVITY.

BLOW-OUT AT ROTORUA. HIGH LEVEL OF THE LAKE. ROTORUA. June 39. Much thermal activity prevails in the district, Pohutu and other geyseys giving great displays. Mud geysers are also intensely active. Rotorua Lake is abnormally high owing to tho wet season, and it is thought that tills has much influence on thermal action. No further ground movement has taken place at Whakarewarewa. A blow-out occurred on the road to Koutu yesterday. The road is used by a number of people and the disturbance was seen from a distance. It is computed that the shot, composed of mud. sand and water, reached a height of over 100 ft. The spot is situated about 100 yards from the footbridge at the mouth of the Utahlna Stream. One woman living in a house only about 300 yards away happened to be on the verandah, and states that the top of the column was over the line of the hills in the distance. The whole lake shore extending to Kawaha Point and for a distance into the fake has always been the scene of thermal activity. Steam has always been noticed issuing through the sand at, the place in question, only about six yards from the lake, and has been a source of curiosity and inspection, especially by children. Only the day before five little children were observed right on it, poking sticks into the sand and warming their hands, the morning being frosty. The opening is about 12ft. wide, and filled nearly to-the top with boiling water. It played for two hours. The recent activity is probably caused by the rise of water in the lake and consequent percolating of cold water into the steam hole areas, this generating steam so fast that it can only escape by erupting.