Volcano flights

Recently, we got a contract with a government agency to do what we call volcano flights. Of the volcanoes in Ecuador, 3 are highly active. We are talking about 3 highly active volcanoes in a country the size of my home state of Colorado. We have an airplane based in Quito right now, and it is being flown by one of our pilots that lives there to do these flights. The group he is flying are using special thermal imaging cameras to take pictures as well. They said they will make us a disk of their photos. I will be sure to share those if they indeed share some stuff with us. Our Quito pilot brought back some neat pictures from one of his recent flights this past week. It is good to realize these were taken from 23,000 feet with the window open. Can you say Brrrrr?!

This is Tungurahua. It is always emmiting at least an ash cloud at the present time.

This is Sangay as seen from 23,000 feet. There is snow on it still, but it is on the east face. This view is taken from the western face. Notice all of the fumeroles steaming from the top. There isn't a defined crater in Sangay, meaning it might create one at any moment from one of the many steaming vents.


Here you can see El Altar, and Sangay. El Altar is the one that has the snow on it, and directly behind it is Sangay, looking like a big snowcone. Althought the picture doesn't show it, Tungurahua would be right out the front window of the airplane.

The other volcano that is active is called Reventador. It has been shrouded in clouds for a long time, and the volcano crew haven't been able to get any pictures of it yet.