CIMSS Satellite Blog

Himawari-8 False-color RGB images [click to animate]

The first in a renewed series of eruptions of the Mayon Volcano in the Philippines began around 0450 UTC on 22 January 2018. As seen in Himawari-8 False-color Red-Green-Blue (RGB) images from the NOAA/CIMSS Volcanic Cloud Monitoring site (above), the ash cloud was transported to the northwest.

Multi-spectral retrievals of the Ash Cloud Height (below) indicated that the ash reached altitudes of at least 10 km (dark blue).

Himawari-8 Ash Cloud Height product [click to animate]

A plot of rawinsonde data from nearby Legaspi at 00 UTC on 22 January (below) indicated that the 10 km altitude corresponded to a pressure of 285 hPa.

Plot of rawinsonde data from Legaspi, Philippines [click to enlarge]

A Suomi NPP VIIRS True-color RGB image from RealEarth (below) revealed some of the lower-altitude ash (shades of tan to brown) drifting toward the west at the satellite overpass time of 0507 UTC. Thermal anomalies — signatures of hot lava flows — are indicated by red dots.

Suomi NPP VIIRS True-color RGB image [click to enlarge]

from CIMSS Satellite Blog http://cimss.ssec.wisc.edu/goes/blog/archives/26833