Table Of ContentActive Volcanoes of the World
Franco Tassi
Orlando Vaselli
Raúl Alberto Mora Amador Editors
Poás Volcano
The Pulsing Heart of Central America Volcanic
Zone
Active Volcanoes of the World
Series editors
Corrado Cimarelli, Section for Mineralogy, Petrology and Geochemistry,
Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich, Department of Earth and
Environmental Sciences, München, Germany
Sebastian Müller, Mainz, Germany
About 500 active volcanoes presently exist on the Earth’s surface, of which
around 50 erupt each year. Volcanoes played a crucial role in the evolution
of the planet and early life, and are constantly reshaping the morphology of
Planet Earth. Many active volcanoes are located in dense settlement areas,
with over 500 million people living in close proximity of still active or
dormant volcanoes.
On one side, volcanoes provide valuable soil and rock basis for
agriculture, but often the “mountains of fire” cause disastrous societal and
economicaldisasterscausedbyashclouds,lahars,lavaflows,andpyroclastic
flows. Eruptions are still difficult to predict, although volcanologists around
the world are constantly working on new ways to understand the character
and behavior of volcanoes.
ActiveVolcanoesoftheWorldisanofficialbookseriesoftheInternational
Association of Volcanology and Chemistry of the Earth's Interior (IAVCEI).
The series aims to be a scientific library of monographs that provide
authoritative and detailed reviews of state-of-the art research on individual
volcanoes or a volcanic area that has been active in the last 10.000 years,
e.g.theTeideVolcanoortheChiapasRegion.Thebooksintheseriescover
the geology, eruptive history, petrology and geochemistry, volcano moni-
toring, risk assessment and mitigation, volcano and society, and specific
aspects related to the nature of each described volcano.
The Active Volcanoes of the World series contains single and
multi-authored books as well as edited volumes. The Series Editors, Dr.
Corrado Cimarelli (LMU Munich) and Dr. Sebastian Müller (Universität
Mainz) are currently accepting proposals and a proposal document can be
obtained from the Publisher, Dr. Johanna Schwarz (johanna.
[email protected]).
More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/10081
Franco Tassi Orlando Vaselli
(cid:129) (cid:129)
Raúl Alberto Mora Amador
Editors
Poás Volcano
The Pulsing Heart of Central America
Volcanic Zone
123
Editors
Franco Tassi Orlando Vaselli
Department ofEarth Sciences Department ofEarth Sciences
University of Florence University of Florence
Florence, Italy Florence, Italy
RaúlAlberto Mora Amador
Escuela Centroamericana deGeología
TheUniversity of CostaRica
SanJosè, CostaRica
ISSN 2195-3589 ISSN 2195-7029 (electronic)
ActiveVolcanoes of the World
ISBN978-3-319-02155-3 ISBN978-3-319-02156-0 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-02156-0
LibraryofCongressControlNumber:2019930645
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Foreword
The April 2017 strong phreatomagmatic eruption of Poás dramatically
changed the morphology of the active crater and temporarily stopped the
usualcrowdoftourists.AyearlaterattheendofAugust2018,theNational
Park at the Poás crater partially re-opened to the public.
Poás volcano represents an excellent site for common people worldwide
to be a bit educated about “how our Earth works”. A perfect shape of the
crater, a steaming crater lake, roaring fumaroles, smell of sulphur, beautiful
outcropsofvolcanicsequencesandintensehydrothermalalterationarejusta
few examples of what this volcano can offer to tourists and scientists. The
observations of these geological attractions are facilitated by a comfortable
waytogettotherimofthecrater.Itislikelythatthegoodaccessibilitytothe
Poás volcano crater has allowed to become this site one of the most studied
areas for volcanologists working on the origin and dynamics of a powerful,
veryactive,volcano–hydrothermalsystem.Thisisanaturallaboratorywhere
in situ one can observe how Nature performs experiments on the magmatic
fluid–water–rock interaction; and not only to observe but also by some way
to participate by performing sampling and analyses of the products of this
interaction. The “Laguna Caliente”—the Poás´ crater lake—decades ago
becameoneofthefirstsiteswherevolcanologistsstartedtostudyandmodel
the heat and mass balance of an active crater lake and made detailed and
precisestudiesofthemaximumofpossibleisotopic,elementalandmolecular
geochemical systems.
ThePoáscraterhasbeentheobjectofmanyinternationalfieldworkshops
and fieldworks for generations of specialists in Earth Sciences. This active
and potentially dangerous volcano is monitored by specialists from both
OVSICORI-UNA(theVolcanologicalandSeismologicalObservatorysettled
in Heredia) and University of Costa Rica in collaboration with many for-
eigner scientists. Such intensive scientific attention to the volcano has
exponentially increased the knowledge about Poás, and new data are con-
tinuously produced. A very fast development of the modern analytical and
fieldtechniquesrequiresregular“summingup”,e.g.ascientificreportabout
the latest results obtained by the scientific community related to Poás.
This book compiles a set of papers that covers a wide spectrum of
topics—fromageneralmodernviewonthetectonicsandgeodynamicsofthe
Costa Rican segment of the Central American Volcanic Arc to an historical
essay about the place of Poás in the life of the Central American people.
v
vi Foreword
A reader will find here approaches and data, which are generally interesting
andimportantformanyresearchersandstudentsintheEarthSciences.Many
thanks to the editors and authors for this excellent issue.
YuriTaran
InstituteofGeophysics,UNAM
Coyoacan, Ciudad de Mexico, Mexico
Institute ofVolcanologyand
Seismology FEB RAS
Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, Russia
InstituteofExperimental
Mineralogy RAS
Chernogolovka, Moscow, Russia
Contents
Overview of the Tectonics and Geodynamics of Costa Rica.. .... 1
Paola Vannucchi and Jason P. Morgan
GeochemicalandGeochronologicalCharacterisationofthePoas
Stratovolcano Stratigraphy... .... .... .... .... .... ..... .... 13
Paulo Ruiz, Sara Mana, Esteban Gazel, Gerardo J. Soto,
Michael J. Carr and Guillermo E. Alvarado
The Extraordinary Sulfur Volcanism of Poás
from 1828 to 2018. .... ..... .... .... .... .... .... ..... .... 45
Raúl Alberto Mora Amador, Dmitri Rouwet, Priscilla Vargas
and Clive Oppenheimer
Coseismic Landslide Susceptibility Analysis Using LiDAR Data
PGA Attenuation and GIS: The Case of Poás Volcano,
Costa Rica, Central America . .... .... .... .... .... ..... .... 79
Paulo Ruiz, Michael J. Carr, Guillermo E. Alvarado,
Gerardo J. Soto, Sara Mana, Mark D. Feigenson and Luis F. Sáenz
Seismicity of Poás Volcano, Costa Rica. .... .... .... ..... .... 119
Mario Fernández-Arce and Raúl Alberto Mora Amador
Diffuse CO Degassing and Thermal Energy Release
2
from Poás Volcano, Costa Rica ... .... .... .... .... ..... .... 135
Gladys V. Melián, Nemesio M. Pérez, Raúl Alberto Mora Amador,
Pedro A. Hernández, Carlos Ramírez, Hirochicka Sumino,
Guillermo E. Alvarado and Mario Fernández
Behaviour of Polythionates in the Acid Lake of Poás Volcano:
Insights into Changes in the Magmatic-Hydrothermal Regime
and Subaqueous Input of Volatiles .... .... .... .... ..... .... 155
María Martínez-Cruz, Manfred J. van Bergen, Bokuichiro Takano,
Erick Fernández-Soto and Jorge Barquero-Hernández
GeophysicalandGeochemicalPrecursorstoChangesinActivity
at Poás Volcano... .... ..... .... .... .... .... .... ..... .... 203
Hazel Rymer, María Martínez, Jorge Brenes, Glyn Williams-Jones
and Andrea Borgia
vii
viii Contents
39YearsofGeochemicalMonitoringofLagunaCalienteCrater
Lake, Poás: Patterns from the Past as Keys for the Future.. .... 213
Dmitri Rouwet, Raúl Alberto Mora Amador, Laura Sandri,
Carlos Ramírez-Umaña, Gino González, Giovannella Pecoraino
and Bruno Capaccioni
The Last Eighteen Years (1998–2014) of Fumarolic Degassing
at the Poás Volcano (Costa Rica) and Renewal Activity .... .... 235
Orlando Vaselli, Franco Tassi, Tobias P. Fischer, Daniele Tardani,
Erick Fernández, María del Mar Martínez, Marteen J. de Moor
and Giulio Bini
Volcanic Hazard Assessment of Poás (Costa Rica) Based on the
1834, 1910, 1953–1955 and 2017 Historical Eruptions. ..... .... 261
Raúl Alberto Mora Amador, Dmitri Rouwet, Gino González,
Priscilla Vargas and Carlos Ramírez
History, Legends, Customs and Traditions of Poás Volcano,
Costa Rica... .... .... ..... .... .... .... .... .... ..... .... 301
Raúl Alberto Mora Amador, Mario Fernández and Dmitri Rouwet
Poás Volcano Biodiversity.... .... .... .... .... .... ..... .... 309
Frank González, Carolina Seas, Zaidett Barrientos,
Sergio Gabriel Quesada-Acuña and Raúl Alberto Mora Amador
Introduction
“…duringthepreviousyear’sMiguelAlfarohimselfhadseenavapourcolumn,which
alsothrewstonesupwards,andaroundthosesulphuraccumulationsandinthe
volcanicashablueflameburned.Inthesurroundingsashalsofoundconicalmasses
ofpuresulphur,withanaltitudeof3to4feet.Thelakethenwasalotsmaller;
nevertheless,thewaterroaredwithmorepowerandappearedmoreacidicandhotter
thannow.Itseemedthatatthattimethevolcanowouldhavebeenalotmore
active in throwing ash, and that it went gradually slowing down” (descriptions
ofMiguelAlfaroof1828).
VonFrantzius(1861)
It was a privilege to edit this book on the Poás volcano (Costa Rica), which
consistsof13contributionsaboutdifferentaspectsandapproachesrelatedto
geodynamics, volcanology, seismology, fluid geochemistry, botany and
zoologyandlegendsrelatedtooneofthemostactivevolcanoesintheworld.
InApril2017, whena new eruptive phase commenced, we startedreceiving
thecontributionsbytheauthorsandsomeofthechaptershadtobemodified
tohaveasmuchaspossibleanupdaterelatedtotherenewalactivityatPoás.
This was one of the reasons why this book was a little bit delayed with
respect to what was planned.
Poásisacomplexstrato-volcano,locatedintheProvinceofAlajuela,with
analtitudeof2708ma.s.l.andispartofthelocalnationalpark.Thisvolcano
can be regarded as one of the most important touristic attractions of Costa
Rica. The turquoise colour of the acidic lake (Laguna Caliente) and the
intensefumarolicactivityarelikelythemostphotographedshotsinthewhole
country.
ThePoássummitischaracterizedbythreevolcaniccones:VonFrantzius,
Botosandtheactivecrater,thelatterbeingthesitewherethelatesteruptions
occurred.Thesurroundingareahostedvigorousfumaroles,particularlyclose
toapyroclasticcone(oftenreportedintheliteratureasadome)formedinthe
early fifties. The fumarolic gas discharges are responsible for the absence of
vegetationinseveralportionsoftheparkduetotheacidicgasesemittedfrom
the crater. The outlet temperatures of the fumaroles close to the pyroclastic
ix
