Using magnetotellurics, researchers produced a detailed picture of the magma beneath Yellowstone, offering insights into a distant future of possible volcanic activity

"This number is based simply on averaging the two intervals between the three major past eruptions at Yellowstone—this is hardly enough to make a critical judgment," the USGS Yellowstone fact sheet reads. "Catastrophic geologic events are neither regular nor predictable."

New research reveals why the famously steamy park, hosting over 500 hot geysers, shows no signs of blowing its top. These days, the reservoirs of magma (molten rock) that feed Yellowstone hold pretty low concentrations of this magma. They simply don't contain enough volcanic fuel to drive the heat and pressure that would stoke an eruption.

Yellowstone supervolcano ’s last eruption covered most of what is now the USA in volcanic ash and lava that flowed for hundreds of kilometres. It left a 70 by 45 kilometre-wide crater with geysers spewing jets of water that’s sometimes hotter than boiling point.

It’s not hard to see why researchers are worried about a Yellowstone eruption. If the supervolcano were to erupt, the consequences would be devastating. The ashfall alone could render vast areas uninhabitable,

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