The Yellowstone caldera gets its chilling label as a supervolcano due to its capability to inflict devastation worldwide. Hidden beneath the US states of Idaho, Montana and Wyoming, the volcano is constantly monitored by the United States Geological Survey (USGS) for any signs an eruption is on the way. Researchers were left hot under the collar more than a decade ago when more than 900 earthquakes mysteriously struck below Yellowstone Lake.
Chief of the Volcano Disaster Assistance Program Jacob Lowenstern revealed the anxiety caused during a lecture at Stanford University in 2015.
He told students: “At the end of 2008, and early 2009, there was a big swarm beneath Yellowstone Lake and then there was another swarm out here beneath the Madison Plateau and by the time that was over uplift had ceased and a period of subsidence had begun.
“This is something that had been noticed in the past back in 1985, there was a big earthquake swarm out in the western part of the caldera, that time it was noticed by the University of Utah.
“So here’s a map of the two swarms, this one here at the north end of Yellowstone Lake and this one here in the Madison Plateau.
“This particular swarm had everybody pretty tense I’d say, it had most the scientists tense and a lot of people were on holiday, it was between Christmas and New Year.
“Any time you have earthquakes going on beneath a lake it freaks people out, just things happening beneath lakes are not good.”
Dr Lowenstern went on to detail how the earthquakes caused some to demand answers, but eventually, it passed.
He added: “People want you going down there in the ice-covered lake – (they say) ‘get down there with your ROV and see what’s going on’.
“But we didn’t do that and it did end.
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“These are seismograms from the 27th, they’re both near Yellowstone Lake, each line represents 15 minutes.
“Each one of these little lines represents a separate earthquake, they get bigger, there’s a two, a three-and-a-half (magnitude) and the largest was a four.
“Very intense earthquake activity going on, about 900 located earthquakes in the end from this swarm.”
In 1959, Yellowstone National Park faced one of its most shocking events – the Hebgen Lake earthquake.
The natural disaster caused massive damage, including 28 fatalities and a considerable £9million in repairs to highways and timbers.
Martin Stryker was 15 when it struck, while he was camping with his father, stepmother and two brothers.
He detailed his horror to Earth Magazine in 2009, stating: “At first, I thought it was a thunderstorm.
“When you’re in something of that magnitude, you can almost hear the plates grinding together.”
Turning towards the tent where his father and stepmother were sleeping, Stryker tragically saw something that made his blood run cold.
A boulder almost two metres high had fallen where they were sleeping.
Mr Stryker detailed: “I didn’t immediately alert my brothers.
“I went to see if there was anything I could do, and there wasn’t.
“I told them that Dad and Ethyl have been killed, there’s a major earthquake going on, and we need to get out of here.”
After only three weeks the damned river created a lake more than 170 feet deep.
The lake the quake created now covers an area five miles long and a third of a mile wide.
Today, tourists to the area can stop by the Earthquake Lake Visitor Centre, which is situated 27 miles north of West Yellowstone to re-live the horrors from more than half a century ago.