Cameras Capture Antarctic Eruptions

All-environment cameras from Extreme CCTV, Vancouver, British Columbia, have managed to capture rare footage of an eruption at Antarctica’s most active volcano. The company’s MX4 Mechanical Filter LXR image sensors were used to capture video surveillance of eruption sequences at Mt. Erebus, one of two active volcanoes on Ross Island, located on the edge of the Ross Ice Shelf.

The resulting video was transmitted via 2.4 GHz and 5.8 GHz wireless links to a remote monitoring station and then relayed via satellite to the Geochronology Research Laboratory in Socorro, N.M. Modified to enhance its sensitivity to lava circulation, explosion details and distribution of lava cooling bombs, the cameras used infrared filter technology to capture images despite less-than-optimal lighting conditions. The cameras also had to withstand severe Antarctic temperatures and acidic volcanic gases. More of their resulting images can be viewed at the observatory’s website, www.ees.nmt.edu/Geop/mevo/mevo.html.