When the Okmok volcano in Alaska’s Aleutian island chain erupted several weeks ago, it sent a cloud of ash and gas about 35,000 feet in the air. The volcanic plume drifted south toward Hawaii, then was caught by the jet stream which brought it toward Washington.
That’s when George Mount, professor of civil and environmental engineering and director of WSU’s Interdisciplinary Center for Environmental Research, Education, and Outreach, received a call from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Mount has worked closely with NASA in the measurement of air pollution from space and ground-based validation of satellite data. He participated heavily in the development of the OMI, or Ozone Monitoring Instrument, which was launched on the NASA AURA satellite in summer 2004. OMI makes global measurements of a number of atmospheric pollutants including ozone, nitrogen dioxide, formaldehyde and sulfur dioxide. Observations from space allow air pollution to be measured worldwide and enable better predictions of pollution effects than are possible with ground-based instruments.
The volcanic plume, which contained relatively high concentrations of sulfur dioxide, posed a potential threat to busy trans-Pacific air routes. Mount and his graduate student Elena Spinei were able to provide NASA with accurate measurements of SO2 as the cloud passed over WSU using a research grade ground-based instrument developed over the past several years with NASA funding, thus making a direct validation of the satellite measurements. The accuracy of the satellite measurements helps quantify the effect of such volcanic eruptions.
For more on the AURA satellite, see https://aura.gsfc.nasa.gov/
=en&start=1&um=1&tbnid=5d__vf7V760KGM:&tbnh=94&tbnw=122
&prev=/images%3Fq%3DOkmok%2Bvolcano%26um%3D1%26hl%
3Den%26rls%3Dcom.microsoft:en-us%26sa%3DN
