Mount Cleveland 2003

Mount Cleveland 2003

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clev33P8051919 The next thing I tried to do was get a good zoomed in photo of the summit of Mt. Cleveland. It was difficult to get a good one while in this close because of the up and down rolling of the boat. The summit was photographed while looking to the southwest.

clev34P8051931 Once we came around to the northwest the volcano came into the clear again.

clev35P8051944 Now we came up on the 2001 volcaniclastic debris flow fan deposit on the western flank of the volcano.

clev37P8051956 The area on the fan deposit that is right in front of the 2001 lava flow is where we set up our camp for the couple days that we were on the island (the western flank and lava channel of Mt. Cleveland are also seen in the background; my tent is the teal one). Later that night Mike Brown almost lost his tent and everything inside of it because of the gail force winds and rain that hit us the night of the 5th. The next day on the 6th of August the weather was also not favorable to field work because the low clouds prevented climbing up the cliffs to get around to other parts of the island, and wind and rain continued to keep everything in camp. Mike did move his tent to a different part of the fan to keep it from flying away again, and he did manage to find most of his things that he thought he lost - the sleeping bag ended up being blown down to the beach, but not out to sea!

clev38P8072036 (August 7, 2003) This day was much better than the previous two, though some intermittent rain came through every once and a while throughout the day. Before getting started on the mapping of the volcaniclastic fan deposit with Jon, I set out to the southern end of the fan deposit to check some things out. While on the side of the fan I came across some Puffins just hanging out in the rocks...

clev39P8072038 ...and on the rocks.

clev40SouthBeachDelta There was also a cool vent from a previous eruptive episode in the past that was on this side of the fan (as seen in panoramic view).

clev40SouthBeachDelta

clev41P8072111 After checking out the perimeter of the fan deposit, Jon and I went to the northern beach and checked out some of the cliff areas including a cool pinnacle that ended up marking the former edge of the beach two years previously in some photos that were taken after the eruption. We got over two-thirds of the fan mapped, so it was time to end the field work for the day.

clev42ClevelandSummitRegular (August 8, 2003) The next morning started out very nice. As the sun was coming up it was giving a nice back light to the summit of Mt. Cleveland as seen in this panoramic photo.

clev42ClevelandSummitRegular

clev43P8082216 This was another good day to get some field work done, and even became a little warm so that we could take our coats off. While finishing up the mapping of the fan deposit we got a great view of the summit of Mt. Carlisle that is similar to Mt. Cleveland.

clev44P8082218 I got a good zoomed in photo of Mt. Carlisle's summit,...

clev45P8082221 ...and then saw Jon scratching his head while Carlisle looked on.

clev46P8082225 The last shot of Carlisle came right before the fog rolled in that day for most of the early afternoon. The fog prevented any further work from being done higher up on the volcano, so we all hung out in camp. It finally cleared around 4:00-4:30 PM, but was too late in the day to really try and accomplish anything else.

clev47P8082261Me I did manage to get a good shot of myself with the 2001 lava flow in the background by putting the camera on a rock and using the timer.

clev47P8082261Me

clev49DeltafromAaFlow2 The last thing I did was climb up on top of the lava flow a short distance to take higher resolution images of the fan deposit. We finished the day knowing that we would most likely not be working the next day since the weather was expected to get bad again.

clev49DeltafromAaFlow2

clev50P8092359 (August 9, 2003) Like we thought this day started out great, but due to the poor forecast on the weather and the experience from the first night on the island, we took the opportunity to have the boat come and get us while we had a window. Once the boat got to the island we were rushing to finish up taking everything from the fan to the north beach to be loaded on the skiff to be transferred to the 28 foot boat. Here Mike and Scott finishing loading up another round in the skiff to bring out to the boat.

clev51P8162470 (August 10) We tried to get out of Nikolski by plane, but the air carrier, Pen Air screwed us over when we had a window of good weather. That resulted in bad weather for the next 4 days. On the fourth day, though (August 14), we managed to catch a ride on a fishing boat that was anchored in Nikolski and headed to Dutch Harbor. They left that day for Dutch Harbor. Fifteen hours later we were in Dutch Harbor. We were hoping to get out on a plane that same day, but due to the bad weather from a couple days previously we had to wait till the next day. On August 16 we had a good sign with a cool sunrise in Dutch Harbor (pictured). We all headed to the airport and waited on standby for an early flight out. We all had tickets for the afternoon flight, but as luck would have it Jon and I were the last ones selected for the early flight. We managed to get home by the late afternoon in Fairbanks, thus ending the adventure that was Mt. Cleveland 2003.

clev362001AaFlowfromBoat2 In this panoramic photo you can see where the 2001 a'a lava flow came down the west flank on top of the volcaniclastic deposits.

clev362001AaFlowfromBoat2

clev482001AaFlowChannel I also took the chance to take more photos of the deposits and lava flow (panoramic of the northern fork) while the fog was lifted on August 8th.

clev482001AaFlowChannel

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