We are pleased to announce that the Hotstuff Seminar will be delivered by our very own Professor Matt Watson.

Title: That's another fine mess you've got me into: measuring volcanic ash in-situ using remotely piloted aircraft

Abstract

Remotely piloted aircraft are providing unprecedented access and proximity to active volcanism. Amongst other uses, such as photogrammetry, thermal remote sensing and deployment of geophysical equipment, there is the possibility to directly sample volcanic emissions to the atmosphere. In this talk I will present results from a series of field campaigns conducted since 2019 at Fuego volcano, Guatemala. In collaboration with aerospace engineers, volcanologists have collected and analysed samples from over thirty flights at different distances including some of the most proximal ash samples ever acquired. The collection methodology has been tested in a number of ways, using computational fluid dynamics and by comparison with mini-wind tunnel experiments to determine the efficiency of capture of ash particles of different sizes. I will present some exemplars of captured ash particles, imaged by SEM, demonstrating different fragmentation mechanisms, and estimates of distributions of size and shape and some preliminary discussion of atmospheric processes that appear to influence, or not, those distributions, such as fallout with and without aggregation.

All staff and students welcome.