Exploring the influence of vent location and eruption style on tephra fall hazard from the Okataina Volcanic Centre, New Zealand

Abstract

Uncertainties in modelling volcanic hazards are often amplified in geographically large systems and in volcanoes which have a diverse eruption history that comprises variable eruption compositions and styles from different vent locations. The large ~ 700 km2 Okataina Volcanic Centre (OVC) is a large silicic caldera complex in a geodynamic region of New Zealand which has displayed a range of eruption styles and compositions over its current phase of activity (26 ka - present), including one basaltic maar-forming eruption, one basaltic Plinian eruption, and nine rhyolitic Plinian eruptions. All three of these eruption styles have occurred within the past 3.5 ky, and any of these styles could occur in the event of a future eruption. The location of a future eruption is also unknown. Future vents could potentially open in one of three different possible areas of the OVC: the Tarawera linear vent zone (LVZ) (5 eruptions over the past 26 ky), the Haroharo LVZ (5 eruptions over the past 26 ky), or outside of these LVZs (1 eruption over the past 26 ky). A future rhyolitic or basaltic Plinian eruption from the OVC is likely to generate widespread tephra fall in loads that will cause significant disruption and socio- economic impacts throughout the surrounding region. Past OVC tephra studies have focused on evaluating hazard from a rhyolitic Plinian eruption at select vent locations in the OVC's Tarawera LVZ. Here, we expand upon these past studies by evaluating tephra hazard for all possible OVC eruption vent areas and for both rhyolitic and basaltic Plinian eruption styles, and exploring how these parameters influence tephra hazard forecasts. Probabilistic volcanic hazard model BET_VH and advection-diffusion tephra hazard model TEPHRA2 were used to assess the hazard of accumulating ≥ 10 kg m-2 of tephra from both basaltic Plinian and rhyolitic Plinian eruption styles, occurring from within the Tarawera LVZ, the Haroharo LVZ, and other potential vent areas within the caldera. We present the results of these analyses as a first-order tephra hazard assessment for the entire OVC. Our results highlight the importance of considering all the potential vent locations of a volcanic system, in order to capture the full eruption catalogue in analyses (e.g., 11 eruptions over 26 ky for the OVC, versus only 5 eruptions over 26 ky for the Tarawera LVZ), as well as the full potential distribution of tephra hazard. Although the Tarawera LVZ has been prominently discussed in studies of OVC hazard because of is recent activity (1886 and ~1315 AD), we find that, in the event of future eruption, the likelihood of a vent opening within the Haroharo LVZ (last eruption 5.6 ka) is equivalent (< 1% difference) to that for the Tarawera LVZ (31.8% compared to 32.5%). We also find that an eruption from within the Haroharo LVZ presents a relatively higher hazard to several localities, such as the town of Kawerau, where the average absolute probability of accumulating ≥ 10 kg m-2 of tephra is 1.3 times greater than for an eruption from within the Tarawera LVZ. While the absolute probabilities of accumulating ≥ 10 kg m-2 of tephra in the next one year from a basaltic Plinian eruption are on average 7.2 times lower than for a rhyolitic Plinian eruption throughout the surrounding region, our results suggest that the hazard posed by a basaltic Plinian eruption does contribute to the overall OVC tephra hazard, raising absolute probabilities for the entire OVC by an order of 0.14, which may have implications when considering sensitive decision-making thresholds.