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These gas bubbles within the magma accumulate and coalesce into large bubbles, called gas slugs. These grow large enough to rise through the lava column. [14] Upon reaching the surface, the difference in air pressure causes the bubble to burst with a loud pop, [13] throwing magma in the air in a way similar to a soap bubble.
A block and ash flow or block-and-ash flow is a flowing mixture of volcanic ash and large (>26 cm) angular blocks [1] commonly formed as a result of a gravitational collapse of a lava dome or lava flow. [2] Block and ash flows are a type of pyroclastic flow and as such they form during volcanic eruptions. [3]
Because the magma is viscous, the bubbles remain trapped in the magma. [2] As the magma nears the surface, the bubbles and thus the magma increase in volume. The pressure of the magma builds until the blockage is blasted out in an explosive eruption through the weakest point in the cone, usually the crater.
Tephra is a generalized word for the various bits of debris launched out of a volcano during an eruption, regardless of their size. [4] Pyroclastic materials are generally categorized according to size: dust measures at <1/8 mm, ash is 1/8–2 mm, cinders are 2–64 mm, and bombs and blocks are both >64 mm. [5] Different hazards are associated with the different kinds of pyroclastic materials.
Silica-rich magmas cool beneath the surface before they erupt. As they do this, bubbles exsolve from the magma. As the magma nears the surface, the bubbles and thus the magma increase in volume. The resulting pressure eventually breaks through the surface, and the release of pressure causes more gas to exsolve, doing so explosively.
A further control on the morphology and characteristics of a deposit is the water to magma ratio. It is considered that the products of phreatomagmatic eruptions are fine grained and poorly sorted where the magma/water ratio is high, but when there is a lower magma/water ratio the deposits may be coarser and better sorted. [4]
Pyroclasts include juvenile pyroclasts derived from chilled magma, mixed with accidental pyroclasts, which are fragments of country rock.Pyroclasts of different sizes are classified (from smallest to largest) as volcanic ash, lapilli, or volcanic blocks (or, if they exhibit evidence of having been hot and molten during emplacement, volcanic bombs).
Magma is typically also viscoelastic, meaning it flows like a liquid under low stresses, but once the applied stress exceeds a critical value, the melt cannot dissipate the stress fast enough through relaxation alone, resulting in transient fracture propagation. Once stresses are reduced below the critical threshold, the melt viscously relaxes ...