RUAPEHU ACTIVE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25799, 21 March 1945, Page 4

RUAPEHU ACTIVE

GREAT CLOUD OF STEAM PROFESSOR’S OBSERVATIONS (P.A.) WELLINGTON, Mar. 20. The changes at present being observed in the crater of Mount Ruapehu are just a renewal of activity by the volcano and probably will noi increase. That is the opinion of Professor C. A. Cotton, professor of geology at Victoria University College an acknowledged authority in New Zealand on physiography and geomorphology. He said he did... not know of any serious eruption of Ruapehu within the memory of man. .. Professor Cotton was in a Works Department plane which flew round the crater' to-day shortly after 10 a.m. He said the conditions were very clear for observation. Previously the mountain and been clouded. V Coming in on the leeward side, the plane swept down to within 150 feet of the crater lake. Steam was coming out of the lake, not from the crater itself, which was not boiling, but from an island about one. square chain in extent and six to eight feet high. The lake islet, said Professor Cotton, might be solid rock lava with cracks in it, or a heap of boulders. It was a stony chimney «for the terrific volume of steam which was issuing forth. It was reported on Monday that a glow could be seen in the cracks on the island, but nothing of this was observed to-day by Professor Cotton. He said that if the island had been red hot it had cooled off. Stretching for 100 miles a long flat steam cloud extended right across to the east coast and the sea. A slightly sulphurous smell could be detected. The lake of Mount Ruapehu has boiled before and volcantic steam has been emitted, but the mountain has never been so closely observed previously when steaming vigorously.