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Passion for Volcanoes
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Along a 40,000-mile underwater mountain range, volcanoes erupt and grow day by day in the secret depths of the Atlantic Ocean.
Only on Iceland do they break the surface. Fire Mountain is the newest peak in the range.
Here, the Earth's crust is subjected to enormous pressure.
Every five years since records began it has split open.
For geologists, each new eruption is an opportunity.
For Magnus Tumi Gudmundson, his favourite volcano - Grimsvotn - presents a special problem - it is hidden half a mile down under Europe's largest glacier.
Eruptions under glacier have been my main interest - or passion. Since I was 15 or so I got fascinated with the stories of the Grimsvotn volcano where you had eruptions - causing these enormous water floods. I felt that really fascinating.
Once in a volcanologist's lifetime there may come a chance when, for a millisecond in geological time, he may get a glimpse of what goes on during an eruption.
For Magnus Tumi, that chance came in October 1996.
A seismometer on Grimsvotn showed that molten rock was moving under the volcano.
Then I really got excited. My heart gave a jump. I felt I must be up in a plane right away. This is what I'm going to monitor. I'm going to watch this from beginning to end.
Then began for Magnus, an extraordinary six weeks. Every day weather permitting - he was up in reconnaissance planes flying over the glacier.
The weather was absolutely brilliant on the first day of the eruption, so we could see everything very clearly.
The glacier was no longer silky smooth but pitted and fractured.
You know that there is a powerful eruption-taking place, but you don't see any eruption, you just see this collapsing ice.
The volcano was sending out incredible energy. Every second, it was melting 6,000 tons of ice. But still there was nothing to be seen. Then, on the third day:
When we got closer, the pilot said there was something on the radar that hadn't been there yesterday.
Like a blowtorch, the eruption had blasted its way through 2,500 feet of ice.
We saw for the first time what was happening in the crater, we saw this black ice's walls black covered with ash and water with floating ice blocks and ash at the bottom. This was just a very brief glimpse, you really felt you were seeing something nobody had seen before.
The volcano had melted a canyon in the glacier - 6 miles long and 2 miles wide. But there was no sign of the 4 billion tones of melt water.
Hawaii lies far from Earth's danger lines but it is still the child of Earth's violence.
This entire island is born of fire. People often come here and say, "Where's the lava?" You're standing on it. So, there are different ages of the lava and you have different volcanoes that have created the different volcanoes that have created the different lava at different times but, here we have the newest land on earth and this is Kilauea.
Kilauea is one of the most active volcanoes in the world and on Kilauea it is easy to believe that the Earth is alive.
For here the Earth is constantly redesigning itself. Constantly creating new land.
Intoxicated by the spectacle and the spiritual appeal of volcanoes, Steve and Donna Omeara were drawn to Hawaii, and live in the village of Volcano on the slopes of Kilauea itself.
Our passion is volcanoes and we travel all over the world photographing volcanoes and mainly having fantastic adventures.
We decided, because we were chasing volcanoes already as single people, we wanted to be married on a volcano.
They flew by helicopter to a lava lake on the side of Kilauea.
We were married on a lava flow that was just about 3 hours old.
And then it’s covered over now, so no one will ever step on it again...
No one will ever step on that land again.
It's history already.
To Steve and Donna the earth is a living entity.
They share the ancient Hawaiians' reverence for the powerful goddess Pele.
What we have here is a fissure, a crack in the earth and rainwater is seeping down into the earth and is coming out as steam. But that's a trivial explanation. Really the ancient Hawaiians would have seen this as the breath of Pele, the goddess of volcanoes and to me this is a very special spot because here the earth is alive.
I always like to say the volcano smells like sulphur wrapped in tarnished silver and the sounds of the volcano are actually what get me the most. But it also talks. I think it talks to you. It chatters and as it's moving along it's crystallizing as it's moving you see. To me it seems like a lot of different people, saying, "Where do we go now?" The lava's flowing along, tinkling and it's making all these chattering noises and that's opposed to maybe a lava flow a really strong lava flow where actually there is no sound, just beauty in motion.
We're inside a lava tube, which is sort of an underground channel that transports lava, generally to the sea.
Wow. This whole section of the tube is, it looks like it was the final surge of lava flow that came out, it solidified and then probably had a final surge that broke a hole through the whole section of the flow and you can actually crawl through that hole. It's pretty remarkable I've actually never seen anything like it.
Ultimately the lava drains out and you're left with this memory of prehistoric Kilauea. It's pretty bizarre and wonderful at the same time.
Half a million years on, Kilauea is still growing.
But it is far from any of Earth's danger lines.
The volcano here is fed by a plume of extra hot molten rock- a "hot spot" deep below the Earth's crust. Over millions of years this hot spot has created every one of the Hawaiian Islands.
I never forget my first eruption. The most amazing aspect of it was when it died. And it went from sounding like a waterfall.
Then more gas started coming out of lava. And it was breathing it was choking, it was inhaling first the gas would go..aagghh!..and then it would cough...caagh!..and all this molten phlegm would fly out, spat all over the ground. And you're in awe.
And the sound's echoing off the caldera. All the phlegm would fall back in the throat, the stuff would go flying out, and it would fall back into the throat. Ultimately the volcano made its last gasp...ooohh!...And that was it.
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火山之恋
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在大西洋深邃的海底沿一道绵延近4万英里的水下山脉。火山天天在酝酿，爆发。
这些火山只在冰岛露出了海面。火山是这一山脉中最新的巅峰。在这里 地壳承受着巨大的压力。历史记载表明，每隔5年地壳就要裂开一次。
对地质学家来说，每一次火山爆发都是一次机会。
马格努斯·图米·古德蒙德森面临着一个特别的难题。他最喜爱的格里姆斯火山藏在欧洲最大的冰川下面半英里处。
我对发生在冰川下的火山爆发一直非常感兴趣。从15岁左右起，有关格里姆斯火山爆发，引起洪水泛滥的故事就让我着迷。我觉得这一切非常令人神往。
火山学家终其一生才可能有一次机会亲眼目睹火山爆发。而这段时间只相当于地质时间的百万分之一秒。
1996年10月，马格努斯·图米得到了机会。安置在格里姆斯火山口的测震仪显示熔岩正在火山下面移动。
我当时兴奋极了。心在砰砰跳。我必须马上坐飞机过去。
这就是我要看的。我要把它从头看到尾。
接下来的6个星期，对马格努斯来说， 简直太精彩了。
只要天气允许，他都要乘侦察机在冰川上空盘旋。
火山爆发的第一天，天气非常好。一切都能看得很清楚。
冰川表面不再像丝绸那样平滑了，开始出现凹陷，裂缝。
你知道，火山正在猛烈喷发，却根本看不到任何喷发的场面，看到的只是塌陷的冰川。
火山正在释放出令人难以置信的能量。它每秒钟融化6000吨冰，但仍然看不到爆发的场面。后来， 在第三天，我们离火山更近了。飞行员说雷达上出现了一种昨天没有的东西。
如同喷灯一样，火山从2500英尺深的冰川下喷射而出。
我们第一次看到火山口内的情景。火山灰覆盖了黑色的冰墙，底部有浮着冰块的水和火山灰。
虽然只是匆忙的一瞥，但你会感到你看到的一切。
以前从未有人见过。火山在冰川上融出了一条6英里长， 2英里宽的峡谷。但40亿吨融化的冰水却消失得无影无踪。
夏威夷远离地球的危险地带，但它仍是地球暴力的产物。
整个岛屿都是火山形成的。人们经常来到这儿问“哪里有熔岩呀”。
其实熔岩就在你脚下，这里有不同时代的熔岩，不同时代的火山创造了不同时代的熔岩。但地球上最年轻的一块陆地就是基拉韦厄。
基拉韦厄火山是世界上最活跃的火山之一。在这里，你很容易相信地球是有生命的。
地球在这里不断重新设计自己，不断创造新的陆地。
陶醉于火山的雄伟和精神感染力，史蒂夫和唐娜·奥迈拉来到了夏威夷。住在基拉韦厄斜坡上的火山村里。
我们对火山简直着了迷。我们游遍了全球，拍摄火山。感受令人惊心动魄的冒险经历。
我们两个单身的时候，曾考察过许多座火山。所以我们决定就在火山上结婚。
他们乘直升飞机来到了基拉韦厄边缘的一个熔岩湖。我们在这条3小时前形成的熔岩流旁结了婚。
现在它已经被覆盖了，没有人能再接近它了。也没有人能再次踏上那块土地了，它已成为历史。
对史蒂夫和唐娜来说，地球是一个有生命的实体。他们和古夏威夷人一样，对威力无边的派丽神充满敬意。
这是一个大裂缝。是地壳的断裂层。雨水不断从这里渗下去，又变成雾气蒸发出来。但这只是一种世俗的解释。实际上，古夏威夷人把它看作火山神派丽的呼吸。对我来说，这是一个特殊的地方。因为在这里，地球是有生命的。
我总喜欢说火山闻起来像包裹在失去光泽的银子里的硫磺。而最让我着迷的是火山的声音，它也能说话。我觉得它在和你交谈。它边运动，边定型，边和你聊天。
我觉得它就像一群特点各异的人，不停地叫嚷“现在我们去哪儿”？
熔岩一边流动，一边发出叮当声。各种唠唠叨叨的吵闹声。这和真正强大的熔岩流正相反，真正强大的熔岩流没有任何声音。只有动感的美。
我们正在一个熔岩通道里。这是一条地下隧道，将熔岩流送入大海。哦， 这段通道看上去像是最后一股熔岩流形成的。熔岩凝固后，也许最后一股熔岩，从这里冲了出来，留下一个洞。你甚至能爬过这个洞。
这太壮观了。我从没见过这样的景象。最后，熔岩流尽，留下的一切。让我们想起了史前的基拉韦厄。这一切既离奇，又壮观。
50万年来，基拉韦厄一直在不断生长。但这里距离地球的危险带都很远。一个位于地壳深处的“热点”给这里的火山提供高温熔岩流。
数百万年来，这个“热点”创造了夏威夷群岛的全部岛屿。我永远不会忘记第一次看到的火山喷发。最令人震惊的还是它熄灭时的情景。声音像瀑布。
许多气体从熔岩流中释放出来，它不停地呼吸，呛噎。它吸气，气体都进去了。然后它开始咳嗽，咳出一些粘稠的岩浆，溅得到处都是。令人敬畏！ 声音在火山口回荡。所有的熔岩都将流回喉咙里。
有的喷射出去之后，又重新落到火山口里，最后，火山奄奄一息。哦，就这样安静下来了。
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