Mt. Redoubt erupted again on April 4th (13:58 UTC), spewing a plume of ash, water vapor and sulfurous gases at least 50,000 feet high. While the gaseous emissions are entering the stratosphere and blowing away, much of the ash is falling back to Earth. "This photo," reports Thomas Kerns, "is from our home near Beluga Lake in Homer, Alaska," where falling ash has turned the ground moondust-gray:
"Later," he says, "the wind picked up and began blowing the dust around." His photo of the ash storm shows why dust masks are selling briskly in Alaska these days.
Meanwhile in Earth orbit, the GOME-2 (Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment) sensor onboard Europe's MetOp-A satellite is tracking a sulfur dioxide cloud emitted by the April 4th eruption: image. The cloud will probably move across North America in the days ahead. Sky watchers should keep an eye out for volcanic sunsets.
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