Giant 'balloon of magma' inflates under Santorini

A new survey suggests that the chamber of molten rock beneath Santorini's volcano expanded 10-20 million cubic metres – up to 15 times the size of London's Olympic Stadium – between January 2011 and April 2012.

Bizarre rock 'ice shelf' found in Pacific

A huge cluster of floating volcanic rocks covering almost 26,000 square kilometres (10,000 square miles) has been found drifting in the Pacific, the New Zealand navy said Friday.

Volcano F is the origin of 'floating stones'

Stones do not float in water—this is a truism. But there is hardly a rule without exception. In fact, some volcanic eruptions produce a very porous type of rock with a density so low that it does float: Pumice. An unusually ...

A hitchhiker's guide to pumice

A floating raft of pumice created by an underwater volcanic eruption near New Zealand, and teeming with marine hitchhikers, has been spotted in the northern Great Barrier Reef.

Microbes go rafting on floating volcanic rocks

Volcanoes bring death and destruction, but out of the ashes life soon finds fertile ground. A unique experiment is sifting through floating debris from an ongoing volcanic event to see how microbes move in. The results may ...

Volcano's legacy still washing up on beaches

Pieces of pumice from the same volcanic eruption that caused the largest pumice raft seen in 50 years have continued to wash up on Queensland shores this week.

Pumice arrives delivering 'vitamin boost' to the reef

The giant pumice raft created by an underwater volcanic eruption last August in Tonga has begun arriving on the Australian eastern seaboard, delivering millions of reef-building organisms that researchers say could be a 'vitamin ...

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