so.... who's going to be the first to test out the law and go on the crossing? hmm?
I wont be going up there till those half damed creeks have stabilised. Dont fancy a high speed rocky swim
he he he,, intersting doc say they want to open the track as soon as possible. but the geologists dont have a clue what is going to happen next, it could start up aggain anytime soon or it could do nothing... dormant volcanoes are always a lottery. its been bad weather this wekend down there, some rain might sort out the mud flows in the streams.
aparently th volcano most likely to have a major eruption is mt taranaki, prediction it could possibly go in the next 50 years....
te mari doesnt have a history of massive eruptions.
Both the Tongarero and Ruapehu complexes do have a history of large eruptions but not in the last few thousand years. It has to be a big eruption to endanger the general public as they are quite isolated.
Taranaki may or may not have a decent eruption but it doesnt have to be very big to cause major problems in Stratford and New Plymouth.
There are at least a dozen other maybe dangerous volcanos in the Taupo volcanic zone. These are considered extinct but nothing in that zone really is dead.
More interesting is the pumice raft near the Kermadecks that was originally thought to come from Monawai but it turns out didnt. The erupted material is estimated to be 21 cubic miles in volume.The siesmic data shows it to have come from 72km north west of Curtis Island but there are no volcanoes there. Here we have evidence of the biggest eruption since Pinitubau but no one knows where it happened
nz has been more volcanically active than previously thought
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10826444
We went up to the Treble Cone viewpoint a couple of weeks ago, twice.
The first time we asked about going to the viewpoint when we bought our ticket and again at the top of the chairlift and they told us how to get there. When we got within 100 metres there was a sign AREA CLOSED AVALANCHE RISK.
So we returned a couple of days later and asked again, they said it was ok, then we told them the area was closed, and so they changed their mind but then decided to call patrol who said it was ok for walking.
Not quite related to DOC land, but just goes to illustrate how misleading signs can be.
the routeburn, doc tell you the track is closed in areas of avalanche risk, but they do nothing when people go anyway,
doc tell you you have to take a helicopter flight to get around the avalanche risk, normally at the harris bluffs.
ive never heard of anyone getting hit let alone killed by an avalanche when the track is fully serviced from october. possibly because most people listen to doc?
i've never heard of the helicopter option on the milford,
the helicopter comes in anyway for teh guided walkers. you have to pay$80 before you start the track for hwat can be a flight lasting literally less than a minute.....
80 bucks could be cheap insurance for doc especially when they can pass on the cost. The cost to doc of a serious avalanche industry would be millions in both litigation and lost business. The flight might be 1 minute but you have to add the time it takes to get the chopper there.
Weve all seen pictures of what an avalanche can do
I know of someone swamped by an avalanche on the Routeburn in April. He was lucky. It was witnessed by someone behind him, and dug out.
