The volcano eruption on La Palma | DW Documentary

 

[Music] thank you

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on the afternoon of September the 19th 2021 an eruption occurred at the Cumbria

Vieja volcanic Ridge on La Prima

the rare chance to experience Earth's history [Music]

is part of a group of volcano experts whose task it is to assess the danger

posed by the volcano to the population the volcanic crater is located above a

densely populated area on the west side of the island it is the second day of the eruption

that's impressive how big they are it's incredible that a pyroclastic Rock of

this size can reach such a spectacular height

it's as if cars would fly but it's not so heavy right no it is of course it is

it petrifies in the air and becomes a volcanic bomb and it has an enormous

density it's like watching a car or a truck fly through the air

the fear of large-scale destruction of inhabited areas is increasing on the second day lava has already

flowed over 180 houses and the volcano is spewing out more and more material

driven by gas explosions pyroclastic rocks are hurled up to 300 meters in the

air now we are keeping an eye on the

direction of the lava flows so and all these people is trying to find out what

is the path or the way of the lava flow towards the sea it depends on the way

depend the amount it depends the amount of houses are going to be affected and

the people that are going to be affected the material of this volcanic ash comes from a depth of 40 to 50 kilometers the

volcanic processes have transported it upwards with gaseous magma particles are thrown into the air with

each explosion as gas is released forming a column as high as three kilometers

have been evacuated and as you can see we have volcanic ashes covering the

roads this is probably the most recent soil in the world at the moment

many millions of years ago driven by the Earth's inner core

hot magma flowed upward and penetrated the Earth's crust

no one knows how many eruptions followed until the lava piled up enough to reach

the water surface from 4 000 meters below at the bottom of the ocean

La Palma was born a block of lifeless volcanic rock in the middle of the

Atlantic Ocean over the past two million years it has evolved into a Green Island La Isla

Verde one of the steepest Islands on Earth [Music]

attention [Music]

and we are going to because it's too much gas you can see his sulf Friedrich

acid so the activity of the gas is increasing and it could be poisoned for the people

so whenever you smell it we have we should move

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we are being witness of how the environment the Earth is is able to

create new material we are watching that the volcanoes create a territory they

create ground and we have been witnessed of the power of the nature creating but we

are also winners of how the nature of the environment the volcano destroy

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when large amounts of magma press against the Earth's surface huge layers of rock start to move

and also Pablo Gonzalez a volcanologist from

Tenerife and Edgar Swan and Alina chefchenko from the German Research Center for geosciences are particularly

interested in changes in the Island's surface fractures could indicate possible

instability of the volcanic structure

disorruption for good or for bad is the type of eruption that was postulated to

be a possible treasure for a collapse so we are here to test this hypothesis we

want to put instruments that they can record if any movement will happen

that could have drastic consequences

which is a sensitive inclinometer wherever we see movement in the Mountainside

for example when there is a magma the surface tilts we can track that here

with our instruments under the Earth and then we can see when and how and in which direction the slope is tilted

there are a special type of volcanoes intraplate hotspot volcanoes Canary

Islands is one of these very special and different type of volcanoes they are

characterized from growing very very fast those volcanoes

increases its size so much so that this base is not

expanding and catching up so so big with a little base means that

this material could be in a stable

not far from the eruption site the emergency workers have established their base

this is where the evacuation is organized and the coordination of research groups happens

[Applause] has been researching the Flora and Fauna

of the Canary Islands for 40 years with his colleague Felix Medina he moves

around the volcano to study animal behavior and the effects of the eruption on plants

what what can't think of the name

have marked various research areas around the volcano originally there were

45 individual places that they wanted to visit every day but the volcano and its

lava Fields have already cut off many of these places float over them or made them inaccessible to the researchers

it's not easy to do research when the area is buried under 1000 degree lava

Medina observed birds and lizards writing down their occurrence and behavior

their study will examine how nature evolved during and after an eruption to

what extent will the volcano change life on the island which species Will Survive the

catastrophe [Music]

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we are keeping it in an eye on the on the lava flow because we are thinking

that this lava flow is going towards the cliff over there so it's going to go

down and it's going to go to uh it's going to reach a place that is

completely full of houses [Music]

oh lava is erupting in at least seven

places on the volcano at times several lava flows push their way down the

Mountainside at speeds of 120 meters per hour whatever is in their way is

destroyed in the meantime 5 000 people have been

evacuated the lava flows pile up to six meters high

at the end of the eruption they will be 60 meters high in some places and 1200

hectares of land will be buried under them

the eruption the pine forests on the western slope of Cumbre Vieja are massively struggling with the effects of

the volcano Ash has settled on the plants and impaired photosynthesis

Medina find seed capsules full of Ash

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there's lots of needles is relatively new it's been going on for five days now you can write that down October the 25th

2021 massive natal drop in pine trees probably due to aerosols that kill the needles this is absolutely not natural

close to the new crater lies the lava field of the San Juan volcano which erupted in 1949

over the decades lichens have settled on the normally inorganic volcanic rock

[Music] we're trying to uncover some lichens covered by several centimeters of

volcanic ash that has rained down over the last few days life goes on under the volcanic ashes

Canary gecko has sold shelter among the boulders [Music]

thank you in fact just a few days ago we found

some animals that were completely disoriented close to these exact plants and obviously they can't find food

because practically all plants have perished it is a desert in which the animals wander around and in which

survival becomes close to Impossible

you have Ash on the new color flows okay

thank you

volcanoes have been erupting on La Palma for millions of years although you would

not expect any life in such an extreme location thousands of species populate the Island today

with steep Ravines and the differences in altitude up to 2500 meters La Palma

has a number of different climate zones and where living conditions are diverse different plants settle and adapt

[Music] hundreds of Island endemic species can

be found on La Palma the only comparable biodiversity exists

in Hawaii some claim that here you can watch Evolution at work and So La Palma is

considered the Galapagos of Europe among biologists but how is it possible that life forms

on the inorganic lava fields at all Professor Severin ill is researching the

development of biodiversity he wants to know what strategies plants develop to adapt to environmental

conditions 24 centimeters

chlorophyll content is 57.0 leaf width is

1.310 on La Palma eel researchers natural recolonization after the eruption of

tanagua 50 years ago the dark fields of inorganic material appear hostile to life nutrients that

are actually present in the volcanic rock are initially trapped inside all the more surprising but life is able to

form here at all we have Ferns and lichens and also

taller plants like this one that act as pioneer species and they start the process of succession by bringing in

organic materials you can already see it here the leaves are falling to the ground therefore

leaving organic material the roots are also slowly breaking up this very hard

volcanic rock and through that they release the nutrients that are actually present in this volcanic rock

um volcanic soil is actually relatively but the fertility here is not accessible

to most plants for now and it needs these kinds of pioneer plants that initiate the soil formation and prepare

the soil so that other species can settle here [Music]

the processes of recolonization can take Millennia one would need to travel

through time to study significant changes in lava surfaces Severin eel takes a different approach instead of

traveling through time he travels across the land visiting lava fields of different ages the development of 370

years can be studied at the Saint Martin Lava Flow here over nearly four centuries Pioneer plants have encouraged

the development of life

of the young volcano which is very dark black and down here is the brownish soil

so a soil formation has already started the brown color indicates that there is

humus in the soil and humus is an organic soil substrate

this means that organic materials have been introduced and the formation process has been initiated specifically

it's the other one basis of life for other species is

established the more species are created the more growth takes place in the fields the more intensively life spreads

and the faster and increasingly complex ecosystem develops [Music]

so it doesn't really look like it now but we are on a lava flight one of the older lava flows here in the south of La

Palma it's about 3 200 years old so much older than the other lava flows that

we've visited so far and we can already see that something has changed here we're in a Pine Forest it's much softer

and gentle here because of the soil process and also because of the litter layer so it looks significantly

different it was significantly more evolved than the lava flows that we visited before and it's now blending in

more and more with the Ceramics so it's almost indistinguishable from the surrounding vegetation the volcanic

eruption is both destructive and creative it destroys what was there

before it creates new land new Earth new Surface which nature then reclaims

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thank you [Music] on the 10th day of the eruption the

first lava flow reaches the Atlantic Ocean [Music] glowing lava meets the cold salty

seawater explosions can occur and gases mixed with hydrochloric acid are

produced the lava penetrates the ocean to a depth of up to 400 meters and forms a Delta

half a kilometer wide expanding the island

marine biologists Sarah Gonzalez is diving approximately 20 kilometers further south

pairs living beings within and around a very special region

the undersea lava Delta of tanegua allows her to peer into the future

foreign

is already hosting conditions that biologists anticipate the world's oceans to experience in 50 to 80 years due to

climate change the species of sea urchins that you can

find here resemble Sea Urchins in other places

in the lab we noticed something strange they have a much more robust shell why

is that they need to protect themselves from these extreme environments

this volcanic zone is already enabling researchers to study changes in Marine

communities that may occur in 80 years here it is possible to observe how

species develop under pressure [Music]

they live in water so acidic and brackish it should destroy their shells

and technically there is no food for them here oh

okay look at the fireworms they're really special

this is the exact species that exists appear in the lagoon it survives and a

new very acidic and extreme environment there are probably only two or three

individuals that arrived here from the ocean but they found an environment in which they quickly divided and

reproduced what is the perfect condition for a new species to emerge from an existing one

because the two populations occupy completely separate habitats

so maybe in the future we will have two species one in the lagoon and one in the sea yeah

Rafael Garcia becera is an entomologist in the 140 lava caves discovered so far

on La Palma he looks for life that exists Underground is what the locals Call Lava Tubes like

these they form during an eruption when the cooler surfaces of the lava flows solidify and the hot lava inside

continues to Flow Away crazy amount of water

in the past the the locals the locals from the mazzo area is to come to this

cave for 30 years Rafael Garcia becera has been studying species that have adapted

to the darkness of lava caves

[Music] La fauna troglofona are very rare in

lava tubes therefore it is really hard to spot them

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the species that live here don't encounter any light and they find hardly

any food United

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energy they are Energy Services maximum see they have to save energy to the

maximum because there is nothing here to get energy from they save energy for the development of

eyes for the growth of wings their existence is reduced to the most

necessary functions and they have really completely slowed down their metabolism

so they end up living five times longer than similar species outside the case

wow

It's relatively small island the necessary adaptation to new habitats

favors the formation of new species thus La Palma became a hot spot of

biodiversity and a true laboratory of evolution [Applause] [Music]

Darwin had traveled to the Canary Islands his theory of evolution probably

would have been based on his observations and findings here

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[Music] from the highest point of the island

Roque de los mochachos you can watch how the ash cloud of the volcano pierces the

cloud cover thank you

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between Todoke and Las mancheso Bravo and his colleagues visit

a new lava flow

they do this every day lava is not always the same geologist Raquel Herrera

is able to read it

it's very crystalline look how many crystals it has awesome

super crystalline

you might get burned if you touch this you'll burn yourself

we are standing on a lava flow that formed earlier today

has been right here since this morning

the idea is to take samples from each emerging lava flow to see how their composition changes we want to analyze

whether the magma had previously accumulated in a chamber or whether it has risen directly from greater depths

some minerals are only formed this way in magma Chambers the composition of the lava is the key

is if you look closely you can see onovine minerals they are green or black because

they have just emerged it's not very easy to see them but they're sparkling

these are smaller than the others we saw this morning but the rock is full of them yes

this morning we saw some larger olives these are smaller

that means in the other sample the Olivine minerals must have already crystallized long before the outlets

these on the other hand are not so Christians Theory this means that this magma Rose

to the surface without stopping [Music]

on the other hand the amphiboll found in the first lava flows and the absence of

Olivine minerals tell us that the magma of the first day is probably stayed in a kind of deep chamber for thousands of

years there are researchers who therefore

claim that there must be several magma Chambers one about eight kilometers below us the

other 15 to 20 kilometers foreign

[Music] what goes on in the depths below the

Earth's surface what does it look like down there and how does magma reach the surface

Pablo Gonzalez has made a strange discovery today we visit a fracture field that

opened in the between the third and the 4th of December recently this fracture

fill has been used by laba to come close to the surface this is something I was

not expecting at all we are three kilometers from the main eruption site very far and magma has been coming

beneath the volcano and coming and erupted in this location so this fracture system that is not aligned with

the main one has to have a specific physical reason to appear it should be part of the weakening of the volcano you

know is using this magma weak lines in the volcano that were not

used before so it is informing us that the volcano is is in itself heavily

fractured and weak in certain directions the fractures are clearly visible from

above [Music]

says flow through the cracks [Music]

cracks I'm going to draw here La Palma Island La Palma island has an

order site that is inactive and the southern side that this Cumbria

cumbrebieja as you can see the island is pointing like an arrow has a line of

weakness along this Arrow this liniment and most of the historical eruptions

happen in this part and alone using this lineaments

this eruption just happened in this location and in a certain angle

this is relatively unusual but what is extraordinarily unusual is the fact that

the cracks that we saw today were in this location in this direction as you

can see it's almost in a night right angle with respect to the traditional

direction of weakness of the island in 1949

that fracture system displays a block

closer to the Sea four meters downwards and towards the

sea now the pressing activity open the question is this block is going to move

the volcanologists will install more measuring instruments around the volcano

so we are roughly at 500 meters from the active vents

and this new location allow us to get more sensitivity measurements by being

and putting the instrument closer to the volcano [Music]

[Music] get the camera

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all right

when the wing blows opposite to the direction of the plume you are safe

because the plume and the gases are away from you but still several times we have

to abort the visit to this station so yeah there is an intrinsic risk to work

on a volcano [Music]

and then it is silent on December the 13th 2021 the volcano

comes to rest after 85 days it was the longest eruption on the

island but it is not over yet Gases such as sulfur dioxide or carbon

monoxide are still deadly sources of danger [Music]

a few days after the end of the eruption kaimiko hello Bravo visits the crater of

the volcano three months ago the small hill on which he stands was the highest point in the

landscape both mountains left and right behind him did not exist in early September

foreign

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buildings have been destroyed the lava has buried about 70 kilometers

of Road and 370 hectares of banana plantations

foreign [Music]

for the next few weeks the invisible gases will still be harmful sulfur

dioxide and hydrogen sulfide are lethal above a certain concentration the odorless and highly toxic carbon

monoxide worries the emergency workers as well [Music]

the gas is being released by The magma but that magma has not completely

reached the surface there is still pockets of magma that are underneath the

volcano and that Gap magma wants to as

exalt uh separate discuss because the gas it doesn't want to belong to the

magma when it's shallow in the crust you know a few kilometers down the the surface so it's going to use all the

possible permeable paths the pathways of the gas to to the surface [Music]

for 30 days now the volcano has been still Felix Medina and Manuel nojales search

for remnants of life in the meter high volcanic ash near the crater

they walk through a landscape not unlike the Moon everywhere volcanic bombs lie in their

impact craters [Music]

some birds use the updraft winds above the crater of the dormant volcano

[Music] others never flew away

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impressed when I saw how big birds such as crows Eagles and kestrels were in the

middle of the big they're in the middle of it

right to the end I was impressed it's fantastic how within two weeks they

adapted to the new sound and light conditions created by the big lava flag and how they seem to be right in the

middle of it taking advantage of the thermal updraft Felix and I kept wondering what they

were doing what all these animals were accomplishing before our eyes in the midst of this real catastrophe

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hello Bravo and Severin ill have climbed the crater Edge together

they are small bombs different sizes everywhere see if you think about the amount of of

uh bombs you know that fall down you could imagine the

house okay the process you know is every few seconds you have uh lava bombs

you know falling everywhere that's a volcanic bomb see all the round

form and this is a different one fly this way and start to go that way

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I've several of them everywhere it's alive though it's hard to believe

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these are the fcomic shoots yeah that produce needles from below below the park

even even in the stem even it's a special feature of the of canary Pine

the canary I'm fine just three months after the eruption

young needles are sprouting on this tree they're necessary for producing energy

so I got a little warm it's still warm isn't it

for millions of years

this perfectly explains how well adapted the pine is to the volcanoes of the

Canary Islands [Music]

surprisingly the bark isn't too Burnt Pine forests are burnt black after a

fire but this looks surprisingly healthy and burned only very little yeah even though we're only 50 meters away from

the volcanoes

just push away the oxygen and you know that for the fire to occur you need

certain level of oxygen that that was not possible to get because of the volcanic eruption so so the volcano

prevents fire the pores to burn expire a strange idea isn't it

it's a small insect here could you see it life is returning yeah life is returning

life turning Dory of Destruction and evolution

a story about volcanoes

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this volcanic eruption reminds us how extreme the living conditions on our

earth once were and how it nevertheless became more and more populated by plants

and animals please

it reminds us how in the course of evolutionary history natural catastrophes have repeatedly caused the

extinction of entire groups of living beings at the same time other creatures were

given the opportunity to populate the niches with new forms of life

[Music] in each case a new geological Epoch

arose a catastrophe is also a chance for the life of other groups of animals and

plants which will prevail until the next catastrophe comes and then the same

thing will happen again this is undoubtedly the great lesson

that the volcano has taught us

oh [Music]

English (auto-generated)