How much water does old faithful

They also found that the famous geyser was dormant for several decades during the 13th century due to a megadrought that gripped much of western North America. Despite its being one of the most popular and recognizable geologic features on Earth, scientists know surprisingly little about Old Faithful, such as how old it is or what its eruption patterns looked like through prerecorded history.

As geysers erupt over the course of hundreds to thousands of years, dissolved silicate minerals in the discharged water slowly build up around their bases, forming a slightly elevated landscape known as a sinter mound. Plant growth is conspicuously absent near these mounds due to high soil temperatures, an alkaline pH, and a high concentration of silica—so any fossilized plants found buried within the mound likely grew at a time when the geyser was inactive.

Scientists have known there was fossilized plant material buried near Old Faithful since at least the early s, when a geologist working for the U. Radiocarbon dating indicated the wood was about years old with an estimated error of years. This meant that sometime in around the 12th or 13th century, Old Faithful ran dry. Their radiocarbon results matched almost perfectly with the date obtained more than a half century ago. Watch the Old Faithful Live Webcam at www. The geyser-viewing area is the most accessible and visitor-friendly in the park with bench seating, a large parking lot, and a ranger station that tracks the time, height and length of an eruption to predict the next eruption.

Old Faithful can vary in height from feet with an average near feet. This has been the historical range of its recorded height. Eruptions normally last between 1. These eruptions are predicted with a 90 percent confidence rate, within a 10 minute variation, based on the duration and height of the previous eruption. During visitor center hours, geyser statistics and predictions are maintained by the naturalist staff.

This is done by good old-fashioned observation, timing with a stopwatch, and writing in a log book. Visitors can check for posted prediction times in most buildings in the Old Faithful area and on the webcam web page www. This is no longer the case. Sin-Mei Wu is a geologist at the University of Utah who's studied the physics of geysers and related structures. Usually the heat comes from magma, liquid or semi-liquid rock found below the Earth's crust which is called "lava" when it bursts onto the surface.

Yellowstone is positioned over two magma chambers — including a nice long one that's just 3 to 10 miles 5 to 17 kilometers underground. Their maker was a localized swell of abnormally hot material beneath the crust. Classified as a " mantle plume ," it's the reason why Yellowstone has the world's largest geyser collection. The chambers warm up subterranean reservoirs of liquid groundwater. Although the physics here aren't entirely settled , we do know that some of this water gets superheated.

That means its temperature climbs above and beyond H2O's normal boiling point. Since this water is held in tight corridors, it's got nowhere else to go — at first. Bearing down on the superheated liquid is a combination of overhanging rock and colder water.

Add cramped quarters to the mix and you've got a recipe for high pressure. But the pressure doesn't last forever. In a geyser like Old Faithful, hyperactive steam bubbles eventually push a small percentage of the groundwater through a narrow opening at the surface.

Just like that, the pressure decreases and sets off an explosion of hot water and steam. If you're wise, you'll give Old Faithful a wide berth. Visitors can safely watch the geyser erupt from a boardwalk maintained by Yellowstone. Besides, getting too close to hydrothermal features like geysers or hot springs might have fatal consequences. When Old Faithful goes off, the water temperature around its vent can hit degrees F Meanwhile the steam gets even hotter, sometimes exceeding degrees F Viewed from an appropriate distance, Old Faithful's eruptions are thrilling spectacles.

Even if you've seen one before, you might want to revisit the geyser someday.