7 Volcanoes We Should Be Watching
Forty-three miles southeast of Mexico City, 17,802-foot Popocatépetl (the name means smoking mountain) lay dormant the first half of the 20th century but has been increasing in activity since the early 1990s, when it exploded in a plume of gas and ash that carried more than 15 miles.
Now "Popo" is rumbling again. In April, the volcano put on a show of glowing rock and spewing vapor. At some points the volcano even emitted a low-pitch roar, blasting ash upward and hurling superheated rock fragments into the airâ€"a result of built-up pressure from magma beneath its slopes.
Popocatépetl is a stratovolcano, a type that is conical in shape and produces thick, slow-moving lava, which scientists say is unlikely to do much physical dam age to the area. Still, if Popocatépetl continues to gush ash clouds and steam plumes, it could wreck havoc on air travel to and from Mexico City and dislocate tens of thousands of nearby residentsâ€"particularly in the area's farming villages.
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