A powerful volcanic eruption spewed an ash plume as high as 40,000 feet into the sky from Russia’s Klyuchevskoy volcano on Thursday. The plume extended for 1,000 miles to the east-southeast, forcing the closure of schools in two nearby towns and raising the aviation color code to red, the highest warning level.
The eruption of Klyuchevskoy, Eurasia’s tallest active volcano, has been ongoing since June 2023. Strombolian eruptions were first noted by the Kamchatka Volcanic Eruption Response Team (KVERT) in June 2023, followed by explosive eruptions and lava flows in the ensuing months.
The false-color image of the ash plume was captured by the Operational Land Imager (OLI) on Landsat 8 on November 1, 2023.