[FunOnTheNet] Nyiragongo Crater: Journey to the Center of the World-(Part-3)

 

Nyiragongo Crater: Journey to the Center of the World-(Part-3) In June 2010, a team of scientists and intrepid explorers stepped onto the shore of the lava lake boiling in the depths of Nyiragongo Crater, in the heart of the Great Lakes region of Africa. The team had dreamed of this: walking on the shores of the world's largest lava lake. Members of the team had been dazzled since childhood by the images of the 1960 documentary "The Devil's Blast" by Haroun Tazieff, who was the first to reveal to the public the glowing red breakers crashing at the bottom of Nyiragongo crater. Photographer Olivier Grunewald was within a meter of the lake itself, giving us a unique glimpse of it's molten matter. (The Big Picture featured Olivier Grunewald's arresting images of sulfur mining in Kawah Ijen volcano in East Java, Indonesia, in a December 2010 post.) -- Paula Nelson (28 photos total)   Marc Caillet is the first member of the team to reach the lake's rim.   Olivier Grunewald prepares his photographic equipment to protect it from temperatures that can reach 1,300 degrees.   Approaching 282 million cubic feet of lava requires extensive protections.   Encumbered by equipment, Olivier Grunewald must be GUIded by radio to where he can place his hands and feet.   Grunewald, on the lava lake's first close-up: "I was so overwhelmed by the spectacle of this surface and trying to take pictures, I had no idea of time, of heat ... suddenly the radio told me that it was time to go, the activity being too close.'   A major risk is the frequent overflows of the lake. Members surveying the lake from the second terrace help alert others to any threatening lava movements.   At dawn, the light becomes magic, but gases could cover the bottom of the crater in a matter of seconds.   An overflow starts at the beginning of the night. Year after year, the lava reaches higher along the crater walls, until another breach or an eruption empties the vessel.   The goal of the expedition is to increase volcanologists' knowledge and ability to predict such an event and prevent another disaster.

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