Pyroclastic Flows

• The temperature of the volcanic gases can reach about 600 to 700 °C. 
• The velocity of a flow often exceeds 60 miles per hour and may attain speeds as great as 100 miles per hour.
• Reaching such temperatures and velocities, pyroclastic flows can be extremely dangerous.
• Pyroclastic flows have their origin in explosive volcanic eruptions, when a violent expansion of gas shreds escaping magma into small particles, creating what are known as pyroclastic fragments.  
• Pyroclastic materials are classified according to their size, dust , ash, cinders, blocks , and bombs. 
• Both the incandescent pyroclastic particles and the rolling clouds of dust that rise above them actively liberate more gas. 
• The expansion of these gases accounts for the nearly frictionless character of the flow as well as its great mobility and destructive power.

• What other factors make a volcano so dangerous?

• ProQuest Platinum (Database)

• The transition from sedimentation to flood volcanism in the Kangerlussuaq Basin, East Greenland: Basaltic pyroclastic volcanism during initial Palaeogene continental break-up (Title)