Nighttime Monitoring of Volcanic Eruptions with Satellite-Based Multispectral Infrared Radiometers

Abstract:

The Nightfire algorithm for detection of night-time infrared sources with multispectral radiometers from the Suomi NPP and Landsat 8 satellites can be used for global monitoring of volcanic activity. By searching the spatio-temporal database of the Nightfire detections in the vicinity of active volcanoes we can reconstruct the day-by-day history of recent eruptions, including the temperature and size of the lava flow. By correlation of the detections from different satellite zenith angles in some cases we can derive the 3D geometry of the lava lake. Potential application may be an early alert system to monitor remote volcanoes which are out of reach for permanent ground instrumentation network.