Where is the safest place to be if Yellowstone erupts?

A: For the most likely type of volcanic eruption in Yellowstone, everywhere would be safe except in the immediate vicinity of the advancing lava flow. In the highly improbable event of a large catastrophic eruption, the great the distance from the eruptive center, the safer it would be.



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Major US cities like Denver, Salt Lake City, and Boise would also possibly destroyed upon eruption.

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Those parts of the surrounding states of Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming that are closest to Yellowstone would be affected by pyroclastic flows, while other places in the United States would be impacted by falling ash (the amount of ash would decrease with distance from the eruption site).

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The total energy released would be equivalent to an 875,000 megaton explosion. The shockwave would kill 90,000 people. Most of the lava would fall back into the crater. Any flows would be slow and only spread 40-50km or so.

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If you live anywhere near an active or dormant volcano, you should be prepared to evacuate at a moment's notice as eruptions are not always predictable. The danger area around a volcano covers approximately a 20-mile radius; however, some danger may exist 100 miles or more from a volcano.

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If the big volcano, which last erupted 640,000 years ago, were to blow up again, it would spew enough ash to send particles as far away as New York City.

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It would kill around 100,000 people instantly and make most of North America uninhabitable as huge amounts of ash and dust would be thrown into the atmosphere.

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Yellowstone volcano eruption simulations show an unexpected blast would produce ash fallout from the Northwest US down to the southern tip of Florida. Volcanic ash fallout of more than 39.4 inches (one metre) would blanket Yellowstone's immediate vicinity in the states of Wyoming, Montana and Utah.

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Yellowstone's greatest geological threat isn't a supervolcano. It's a magnitude-7 earthquake. YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK, Wyo. – While concerns about a potential eruption of the supervolcano beneath this iconic park may garner the most alarming headlines, a more likely hazard in the coming decades is a large earthquake.

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Would Arizona be affected by Yellowstone? It could wipe out all life on Earth: A gigantic explosion could blanket entire states with ash and lower the temperature of the Earth. The last time this supervolcano erupted, which was hundreds of thousands of years ago, ash spread all the way to Arizona and beyond.

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If heat could be bled off of the magma chambers, cooling and solidifying them, not only would that (theoretically) stop the volcano from erupting, but the heat could be used to generate electric power with a geothermal energy plant.

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Geologists believe the ash from the eruption would encircle the globe in as little as 48 hours, and make temperatures drop by a minimum of two degrees celsius for as long as 20 years. The cooling of the Earth could be catastrophic for the planet's fragile ecosystem, kicking off a chain reaction of extinctions.

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Definitely no, says Poland. “It is very unusual for an earthquake to trigger volcanic activity. We know this, for one, because in 1959 there was a M7. 2 on the northwest border of Yellowstone and it did not result in a major eruption,” Poland said, referring to the Hebgen Lake earthquake on Aug.

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