Well thats interesting!

[Capt Nemo]

While looking at map photos of the area I'm looking to prospect next summer, I noticed some dead patches of trees that were alive in other older photos. It's either disease, or a new volcanic gas seep. I sent off a email to USGS/AVO to go have a look. If it's a new seep, I'll have to bring along air monitors and possibly respirators, as I'm allergic to sulfur. (Few too many years breathing pyro smokes) If it's the start of a new volcano, it's going to suck for mining in the Talkeetna's. If you have claims in the Peter's, Willow, or Purches Creek area, you may want to start mining them hard.

We'll see what USGS says...

 

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[Clay Diggins]

While looking at map photos of the area I'm looking to prospect next summer, I noticed some dead patches of trees that were alive in other older photos. It's either disease, or a new volcanic gas seep. I sent off a email to USGS/AVO to go have a look. If it's a new seep, I'll have to bring along air monitors and possibly respirators, as I'm allergic to sulfur. (Few too many years breathing pyro smokes) If it's the start of a new volcano, it's going to suck for mining in the Talkeetna's. If you have claims in the Peter's, Willow, or Purches Creek area, you may want to start mining them hard.

We'll see what USGS says...

I wouldn't worry about your allergies around volcanic gasses. Humans can be allergic to sulfites and sulfonamides volcanoes produce neither. I suspect that is what you are experiencing when you say you are "allergic to sulfur".

Volcanoes produce Sulfur, sulfates and sulfur dioxide but never sulfites. Humans are not allergic to Sulfur, sulfates or sulfur dioxide although the gasses can be a significant irritant or if in great enough concentration they can replace oxygen and cause suffocation. Sulfur Dioxide (SO[SUB]2[/SUB]) can not cause an allergic reaction in humans but if you have asthma it's a good idea to stay far away from the gasses because they can be a trigger.

There are a lot of reasons trees can appear dead in an aerial photo. Beside disease and volcanic activity winter, floods, earth movement, human harvesting, seasonal changes and insects can change the appearance of vegetation in aerial photos.

I've never even heard of a productive mine in an active volcanic field except elemental sulfur gathered by hand. The area you are studying has quartz diorite, pegmatites and schist. None of those deposits are associated with active surface magmatism. The volcanic activity in the region consists of slip fault earthquakes generated from subduction movements 150 miles below the surface. The tonalite base at Hatcher pass is more than 80 million years old and the pegmatites to the west are 67 million years old the schist is of sedimentary origin.

Here is the USGS report.

Perhaps some of the other possibilities for what appear to be dead trees would be more likely?

Heavy Pans

 

[Gambrinus]

Very likely the result of "Bark Beetles".

https://www.fs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_MEDIA/fseprd572602.pdf

 

[Capt Nemo]

It could be bears using the trees as scratch n' sniff posts, but even the grass looks to be a different color. It's gray instead of brown. If it were hot enough to steam, that'd make determination easy. It's in the same area the salmon stop in the stream.

I'm allergic to Neosporin and the products in black powder based pyrotechnic ash. Mining on the 4th wasn't so bad until the kids showed up with their fireworks around midnight. Had the damp wetsuit drying on the top of the car. The next day I was rash all over.

Finding this is a potential threat, as we would have to go through this area if we had to hike out of the valley for any reason. Hopefully USGS tests the area, and says it's nothing to worry about.

 

[Capt Nemo]

The beetles aren't there yet from those maps. I assume it's lodgepole pine at the treeline, and those don't seem to be attacked by that bug.

 

[akflyer]

I live here and have flown around the area.. its not volcanic activity.. yes, the beetles are in the area and yes, they have killed a lot of trees.. millions of acres. That should be the last of your worries in the area you are headed to.

 

[oneguy]

it'll be the beetles and yes they kill lodgepole...……...

 

[Capt Nemo]

Found a full winter photo and the spots aren't melted, so if it is gas, it's not warm. Could only find one spot in the photo, so google is probably the latest photo that shows dead spots on both sides of the creek.

USGS says there's no volcanos in that area, so it's not their problem! You'd think that for a possible new gas seep, they'd want to at least give it quick sniffer test. The gray grass around the trees would be an indication of hydrogen sulfide or sulfur dioxide as both can bleach things. The grass won't be affected by a bark beetle. I'm also starting to wonder about how soon a fish kill will happen if sulfur dioxide is bubbling into the creek.

Sounds like I'll have to go down there and figure it out next summer.

 

[juneaupanner]

It’s spruce beetles dude...

 

[Capt Nemo]

The pic that I'm looking at on Google is spring 2018, and the map in the above article says the bugs haven't caused any damage in this area yet. And that's 2017-18 info on the map. Next summer they should overrun this area, and start showing damage the year after.

It's not the bugs!...soon!...but not yet!

 

[juneaupanner]

I’ve lived in Alaska my whole life things change here constantly.

 

[Capt Nemo]

Here's a pic with all the dead spots roughly connected or within 50'-100' of the line. I did find another 2 spots on the north side of the bald knob at center. The line between them is parallel to the main line.



Had a 3.0 aftershock one mile south following that line at the very corner of that pic. So it's a fault line. So we have possible gas seepage on 4 miles of fault line. Now the question is, is this a magma intrusion, or is it a magma chamber. An intrusion might give gas seeps and hot springs, but a chamber could give us a volcano. If this is a chamber, we have to worry about how fast the gas is escaping. If it escapes too fast, the magma turns to foam and we get a pumice eruption like Novarupta. If it's slow, it might just dud out.

I think another call to the USGSAVO is in order.

 

[63bkpkr]

Likely your spot is far from the recent Anchorage 7.0 & 5.8 quake but would it not be sweet if Google has recently re-imaged the area, due to the quake, with possible new clues showing?

 

[Capt Nemo]

About the only clues now will come from boots on the ground. They need to meter the gas flow, temperature, tilt, and seismic activity.

This is a summer pic of one of the dead areas, I don't know how far back. Trees were just starting to die.


Here's the current Google image from spring of this year.


Here's the winter 2017 shot from Bing. The gas isn't very warm, or there'd be less snow in the dead areas.

 

[Sockeye1730]

Spruce beetles

 

[Capt Nemo]

Red line = Path of dead patches.
Yellow dot = Earthquake epicenter.



Bugs don't do this! A fault line can!

 

[Capt Nemo]

Did some more earthquake research and something IS happening!

Went back and found how to get smaller listed quakes from M1.0<. The red dots are epicenters that correspond to the dead patches within 100'. The Southeastern most corresponding dead patch is boxed by epicenters. So it does look like there's a crack there and something may be coming out. Also the kill seems to have started at the treeline and moved to the Northwest opposite of the path of the bugs from the USGS sat photo. Earthquakes are from 1990 to present. The earliest quake that matches is 2002, and the latest 2017, largest M2.8. I was really surprised at how most of the quakes were dead on target.

 

[akflyer]

Your making a big issue out of nothing. Your not going to get gassed there. You take images of the spring when the leaves are off the shrubs and the grasses are brown. If there is anything that's killing spruce trees in the area it is the beetles not gasses. What do we know though, we only live here and fly around the area all the time.

 

[russau]

I sure wouldn't want to buy some land along that line for my home! Bugs or whatever !!

 

[Capt Nemo]

If it's volcanic, I can then tell the state to go F itself with it's permits. At that point, I'm evacuating the resources before it blows. And when it does, I don't need to do any reclamation! The lava flows and ash do it for me.

Here's that Southeastern dead spot. White dots are the epicenters. Whatever was killing the spruce was killing other vegetation as well.