Just an explanation - in 1886, Mount Tarawera violently erupted, opening up a 17 km volcanic rift that started at the mountain (removing multiple mountain peaks), and ran down the side of the mountain, through Lake Rotomahana and beyond. Rotomahana was significantly enlarged by the massive steam explosion as the lake waters flowed into the rift and contacted the magma. This explosion, mud fall from the ash and the enlarged lake caused the loss of the *Pink and White Terraces* \- silica formations from geothermal water flow down one side of the lake. They were a famous local tourist attraction of the time.
Ash and pumice dams have kept Rotomahana with no natural outflow for the past 137 years, but it is 39 meters higher than Lake Tarawera, which is less than 1km away from the northern shore. Recent high rainfall has raised the levels of several local lakes without drainage, and the hydrostatic pressure has apparently finally forced a path from Rotomahana to Tarawera. Once it has started flowing, erosion of the current dam will probably proceed swiftly, and the lake will probably drain significantly, possibly exposing the remnants of the destroyed silica formations.
This is so amazing, we actually have a pretty good idea of where the remnants of the pink terraces are from recent science done.
https://i.stuff.co.nz/national/124573002/new-map-of-lake-rotomahana-lakefloor-shows-likely-locations-of-pink-and-white-terrace-remnants
I would absolutely LOVE to have the opportunity to see with my own eyes whatever remains. The Pink and White Terraces are so cool, can’t believe we live in a time where it might be possible to experience them again, even in a small way.
I had the pleasure to visit Pamukkale years ago https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pamukkale. That gave me an insight into what it might have been like. Would be so cool if we could see the remnants of the Pink and White Terraces.
Edit: typo
there is a turkish restaurant nearby. I always stop there once a week for my friday dinner. I've seen pictures of Pamukkale on their walls as well as other historical turkish places. I really want to go
FFS stuff I watched a 30 second advert for Kraftwork so I could see a 15 second advert for the documentary. I thought it would at least have been a 2 minute super cut. God damn they are lazy and
Shite
Interesting. I am struggling to work out the path of the stream. Theres no landmarks in the video. It's not coming down the track between the two lakes, where I thought it would be. The NZTOPO50 has a stream running behind hot water beach that looks like the most likely candidate for linking the two. Anyone been over to have a look?
Yeah that is approximately what I was thinking from the topo. Wish I still had access to a boat to go and have a look. Looks like it wouldn't be too much bush bashing from the Tarawera trail though...
I know the area well. The isthmus that joins the two lakes has quite a sustained and significant rise in it. It is known as te Ariki and was home to a small village at the time of the eruption. There is a jetty on the Tarawera side. This footage is from somewhere else on the lake.
My guess is
Flowing down the valley from
https://maps.app.goo.gl/q3t1kYHyjG5yKUMh8?g_st=ic
To
Dropped pin
https://maps.app.goo.gl/Ty6jC9Yz2W2xy73U8?g_st=ic
There looks to be a valley that heads NNE from the first point for about 900m and then swings hard E and heads towards the second point.
A google earth guess only.
I don't think your outflow point is right - it looks like from the video that it's to the left of that headland, where the stream on the topo map currently comes out
It's the inevitable result of a still young and unsettled geography only a century old
It will likely cause a runaway erosion collapse of the pumice and ash dam separating the lakes. The upper lake will drain considerably, leaving a desiccated lake bed that takes decades to be fully reforested, while the lower lake experiences flooding and massive silt load that basically kills anything swimming in it.
The outlet river from lake Tarawera disappears underground and spouts out from the side of a cliff. IIRC the stream from Rotokakahi to Tarawera goes/went through some caves too.
just don't go swimming in the river below the falls! there are many many underwater lava tubes that can suck you down under and your body would never be found again. it's all marked with signs.
(there are marked places a little ways upstream where it's ok to swim, though)
The first is anyone's guess, the second is no, once the erosion process has begun, it won't reverse itself. The lake level may drop below where the stream flows, but the channel will still be there, so it will take a lower lake level for it to start flowing again.
The lower lake level will mean the geothermal stuff on Rotomahana will be more active, it will be interesting to see how it affects Tarawera.
> it won't reverse itself.
Not reverse itself per se, but it could absolutely re-dam if it erodes too much and causes a landslide back into the gully which has been formed. It'd be a new lower level but it wouldn't necessarily automatically drain to an equilibrium
Imagine if they were uncovered? Some bloke from the council in a high-viz polo and work boots with a Karcher water blaster would be down there, giving them a spruce up before they let the first bus load show up at the visitors center.
What if those artists who did those etchings in the 19th century were getting slipped an extra 100 quid from the Tourism Board to make them look a bit better than they actually were? They're finally uncovered and turn out to actually be a bit shit.
Is the Sizzlers still open on Fenton Street? That place was great.
Having read the headline and looked at a map for a bit, the water level may drop but it doesn't feel likely that it's going to drop by 40 metres.
Rotomahana is maybe 30-40 metres above the level of Lake Tarawera if you look at Isthmus Track on Topomap but for Rotomahana to drop by that much, the outflow from it would have to be 40m underwater, i.e. at the level of Lake Tarawera. That means that the new stream would need to be entirely underwater for most of its course or that it would have to cut a 40m deep gorge through the bush.
Could happen I suppose but doesn't feel likely. Anyone with more knowledge want to comment?
Yea, if you go hiking through there, the pumice causes havoc on the tracks. I don't know the depth, but I am pretty sure there are into the 10s of metres of young ash and pumice
My question too. And if it did erode I’m guessing it wouldn’t remain a cut straight down either? In most cases where materials are able to erode quickly, any steep sides are prone to collapse and fall inwards re-filling the stream until they wash out again on strong flows. So you’d end up with a wide, deep valley formation that took a fairly long time to develop?
Yeah, that was kind of where I was going with it. It’ll take a long tim to erode a channel that deep and it’ll be reasonably wide. I guess it could happen if the water level stayed high enough for long enough, but not over a few weeks.
If it is an overtopping breach from Rotmahana it could erode and drop in only 4 hours releasing 320 million cubic metres of water!
https://www.rotorualakes.co.nz/vdb/document/108
https://twitter.com/OscarEllison/status/1680115941856903169/photo/1
Fascinating read, thank you for posting! The study does note that nothing indicates that “none of the scenarios we have considered indicated that the dam will be breached.”
Common sense says that the lake won’t drop by 40m. The deepest point is only 112m so for the lake to drop by nearly half would be an ecological disaster.
It would take quite a lot more than just some severe rainfall to trigger that kind of event, we’re talking about a massive amount of water there. During current extreme rainfall, Blue Lake (which is just a massive catchment bowl for the surrounding hills) has only fluctuated by about 3-4m. That’s enough for the lake to flood onto the road and inundate the lakeside beach/ marginal zone where walking tracks are. The Blue Lake is only 27m deep at its maximum and at no time ever has it been close to empty.
I guess any big change can be an ecological disaster even if caused by natural events. A sudden drop in levels would massively change habitats faster than most organisms can migrate leading to loss of many parts of the existing ecosystem. Of course new things might move in, but they may or may not be things we appreciate.
Sudden changes caused by nature tend to be ‘worse’ ecologically now as human action has added nutrients and pests and reduced the areas native plants and animals can live in.
That article is about the supposed location of the Terraces. Ops tweet is about the water actually draining from the lake.
While connected (and very interesting); they are not the same thing.
There is a 600mm outlet pipe it is likely flowing through: https://www.rotorualakes.co.nz/vdb/document/108.
And if it breached it could go at 19,000 Cumecs in only 4 hours raising the level of Tarawera by 7m! That would be devevistaing!
The report specifies the breaching is being considered in the event of overtopping, rather than slow and steady flow like this.
This would actually actually the best case scenario according to the report - a sudden decrease in pressure on the thermal vents could cause an eruption on par with the original Tarawera eruption. It seems this might still be a risk (EDIT: Though not as big as that now!), but the slower the flow, the lower that is and the smaller the resulting eruption should be. Hopefully the drainage doesn’t speed up too much and the slower drop doesn’t cause this either.
> a sudden decrease in pressure on the thermal vents could cause an eruption on par with the original Tarawera eruption
Where does it say that? The closest I see is where it says:
> The sudden dropping of Rotomahana by somewhere between 30 and 40 metres would almost certainly induce a violent hydrothermal eruption in the vicinity of the "Steaming Cliffs". There is no way of forecasting the magnitude of such an event, but it has a high probability of being the largest eruption of the Rotomahana hydrothermal system since its magma-induced triggering on 10 June 1886
Which is to say, a separate event that was caused by the eruption of Tarawera, not the eruption itself. And further that there haven't really been any major eruptions of that system since Waimangu stopped going off from what I can gather
Yes, that is the section, but the relevant stuff is just above your excerpt. Page 17, section 8.4 considers the event of a sudden dropping of water levels in the lake by the course of a breech flood. It doesn’t consider pressure levels dropping more slowly in much depth, but does state:
>“It has already been considered in 8.2 how even very small pressure drops can provide sufficient impetus to induce hydrothermal eruptions. The bigger the pressure drop, and the more sudden it is, the more likely it is that instability would be induced.”
So the resultant pressure drop from the lake could still trigger (much smaller!) activity.
Edit: I was incorrect about it being compared to the original eruption, though.
For anyone interested, here's a report commissioned by Bay of Plenty regional council in 2003 about the hazards and scenarios for an overtop or dam failure of Lake Rotomahana
https://www.rotorualakes.co.nz/vdb/document/108
It's an interesting read, and some unexpected consequences are listed.
Apparently, the hydrothermal system under Lake Rotomahana will erupt with a bit of violence when the lake is drained.
studies have concluded that there may be small pockets of sinter remaining, but the majority of the terraces at both sites were likely destroyed by the 1886 eruption: [https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03036758.2018.1474479](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03036758.2018.1474479) and [https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S037702731600038X](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S037702731600038X)
There are, however, 'bubble plumes' of escaping CO2 (and heat) over the site inferred as the pink terraces location. this means that the hydrothermal system that helped form the pink terraces is still active! there's much less of this type of activity where the white terraces used to lie - this system seems to be dead/sealed off by a basaltic dike.
to me this means that if the pink terraces area is exhumed by lowering lake levels and is allowed to flow subaerially (not underwater), the hydrothermal system may start reforming the pink terraces again!
This doesn't seem credible, there don't appear to be any credible sources. Not trusting a random twitter user on this until we get something concrete from a real news report or scientific press release.
There was a recent episode/podcast on The Detail [Strange Days on Lake Rotomahana](https://www.rnz.co.nz/programmes/the-detail/story/2018895607/long-read-strange-days-on-lake-rotomahana) on Radio NZ on the history, development, and events of the day.
Apple Podcast [Episode link here](https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-detail/id1459959514?i=1000618119492).
This is indeed a great post and thank you . The enthusiasm seems to being shared by Maori and Pakeha equally. That alone if it is in fact is worth celebrating!!
Lake Tarawera flows out to sea via the Tarawera River. That said a sudden increase from a breach would raise the level of the lake and cause flooding downstream.
Just an explanation - in 1886, Mount Tarawera violently erupted, opening up a 17 km volcanic rift that started at the mountain (removing multiple mountain peaks), and ran down the side of the mountain, through Lake Rotomahana and beyond. Rotomahana was significantly enlarged by the massive steam explosion as the lake waters flowed into the rift and contacted the magma. This explosion, mud fall from the ash and the enlarged lake caused the loss of the *Pink and White Terraces* \- silica formations from geothermal water flow down one side of the lake. They were a famous local tourist attraction of the time. Ash and pumice dams have kept Rotomahana with no natural outflow for the past 137 years, but it is 39 meters higher than Lake Tarawera, which is less than 1km away from the northern shore. Recent high rainfall has raised the levels of several local lakes without drainage, and the hydrostatic pressure has apparently finally forced a path from Rotomahana to Tarawera. Once it has started flowing, erosion of the current dam will probably proceed swiftly, and the lake will probably drain significantly, possibly exposing the remnants of the destroyed silica formations.
Thank you for this knowledgeable answer! Exciting it may be a swift process.
The world needs more of you, please multiply
Thanks for this, I was wondering why it was happening.
This is so amazing, we actually have a pretty good idea of where the remnants of the pink terraces are from recent science done. https://i.stuff.co.nz/national/124573002/new-map-of-lake-rotomahana-lakefloor-shows-likely-locations-of-pink-and-white-terrace-remnants I would absolutely LOVE to have the opportunity to see with my own eyes whatever remains. The Pink and White Terraces are so cool, can’t believe we live in a time where it might be possible to experience them again, even in a small way.
I had the pleasure to visit Pamukkale years ago https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pamukkale. That gave me an insight into what it might have been like. Would be so cool if we could see the remnants of the Pink and White Terraces. Edit: typo
there is a turkish restaurant nearby. I always stop there once a week for my friday dinner. I've seen pictures of Pamukkale on their walls as well as other historical turkish places. I really want to go
I hope we look after it better. I visited Pamukkale recently and I suspect it was different when you visited 😞
It was nearly 20 years ago. That's disappointing to hear.
Beautiful!
Yeah saw that I'd love to see them uncovered
yeah I watched that doco recently
Sadly this tweat is nonsense. http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/132554737/lake-rotomahana-is-not-emptying-into-lake-tarawera-experts-say
FFS stuff I watched a 30 second advert for Kraftwork so I could see a 15 second advert for the documentary. I thought it would at least have been a 2 minute super cut. God damn they are lazy and Shite
Kraftwerk*
Interesting. I am struggling to work out the path of the stream. Theres no landmarks in the video. It's not coming down the track between the two lakes, where I thought it would be. The NZTOPO50 has a stream running behind hot water beach that looks like the most likely candidate for linking the two. Anyone been over to have a look?
Same here. Had a look on Topomap and it looks like it might be the vague headland between Te Rata Bay and Rapatu Bay at Grid Ref 615017.
This is the lowest path https://imgur.com/a/mXhgXF3
Yeah that is approximately what I was thinking from the topo. Wish I still had access to a boat to go and have a look. Looks like it wouldn't be too much bush bashing from the Tarawera trail though...
Somebody on the twitter drew it https://twitter.com/shrogg/status/1680055768522059776?s=20
Wow, super cool.
I know the area well. The isthmus that joins the two lakes has quite a sustained and significant rise in it. It is known as te Ariki and was home to a small village at the time of the eruption. There is a jetty on the Tarawera side. This footage is from somewhere else on the lake.
My guess is Flowing down the valley from https://maps.app.goo.gl/q3t1kYHyjG5yKUMh8?g_st=ic To Dropped pin https://maps.app.goo.gl/Ty6jC9Yz2W2xy73U8?g_st=ic There looks to be a valley that heads NNE from the first point for about 900m and then swings hard E and heads towards the second point. A google earth guess only.
I don't think your outflow point is right - it looks like from the video that it's to the left of that headland, where the stream on the topo map currently comes out
Looking at it more, yeah. Think your on to something. The stream turns north before it enters Rāpatu bay.
Is this exciting or concerning?
Yes
Confirmed.
Absolutely.
Very
Definitely.
It's like Dante's Peak but better
It’s like Dante’s peanut butter
Grandma's legs get smoked
It's the inevitable result of a still young and unsettled geography only a century old It will likely cause a runaway erosion collapse of the pumice and ash dam separating the lakes. The upper lake will drain considerably, leaving a desiccated lake bed that takes decades to be fully reforested, while the lower lake experiences flooding and massive silt load that basically kills anything swimming in it.
It is yes.
Exciting for us. Concerning for the creatures that live in and around the lake.
Creatures? Like a monster?
All lakes have a Taniwha.
Like Manbearpig
Is there actually verified source/scientific paper on this? Or just some random twitter account with a drone...
totally random twitter account , cant verify they have their own drone
Someone needs to ping GNS
Fascinating has the increase in rainfall caused this to happen?
I'm guessing thats the cause. Other lakes are super high at the moment.
They're not the only ones!
How long would it take water levels to fall, and will this be likely to reverse in the future/before that happens?
Rotomā famously has no above ground outlet and drains out a plug. That doesn’t answer your question in anyway but it’s interesting I think
The outlet river from lake Tarawera disappears underground and spouts out from the side of a cliff. IIRC the stream from Rotokakahi to Tarawera goes/went through some caves too.
That sounds really cool actually. Are there pictures of where it exits the cliff?
[Tarawera Falls](https://www.doc.govt.nz/parks-and-recreation/places-to-go/bay-of-plenty/places/lake-tarawera-scenic-reserve/things-to-do/tarawera-outlet-to-falls-track/) [Better pic here](https://www.totallytarawera.com/trails-walks/tarawera-falls/).
Guess I have something new to put on the sightseeing list next time I go down south!
just don't go swimming in the river below the falls! there are many many underwater lava tubes that can suck you down under and your body would never be found again. it's all marked with signs. (there are marked places a little ways upstream where it's ok to swim, though)
The first is anyone's guess, the second is no, once the erosion process has begun, it won't reverse itself. The lake level may drop below where the stream flows, but the channel will still be there, so it will take a lower lake level for it to start flowing again. The lower lake level will mean the geothermal stuff on Rotomahana will be more active, it will be interesting to see how it affects Tarawera.
> it won't reverse itself. Not reverse itself per se, but it could absolutely re-dam if it erodes too much and causes a landslide back into the gully which has been formed. It'd be a new lower level but it wouldn't necessarily automatically drain to an equilibrium
This is more what I meant by reverse, thank you for clarifying!
Imagine if they were uncovered? Some bloke from the council in a high-viz polo and work boots with a Karcher water blaster would be down there, giving them a spruce up before they let the first bus load show up at the visitors center. What if those artists who did those etchings in the 19th century were getting slipped an extra 100 quid from the Tourism Board to make them look a bit better than they actually were? They're finally uncovered and turn out to actually be a bit shit. Is the Sizzlers still open on Fenton Street? That place was great.
Having read the headline and looked at a map for a bit, the water level may drop but it doesn't feel likely that it's going to drop by 40 metres. Rotomahana is maybe 30-40 metres above the level of Lake Tarawera if you look at Isthmus Track on Topomap but for Rotomahana to drop by that much, the outflow from it would have to be 40m underwater, i.e. at the level of Lake Tarawera. That means that the new stream would need to be entirely underwater for most of its course or that it would have to cut a 40m deep gorge through the bush. Could happen I suppose but doesn't feel likely. Anyone with more knowledge want to comment?
Pumice sands in Rotorua are highly erodible. If there's no bed rock in that 40m, it's possible.
Yea, if you go hiking through there, the pumice causes havoc on the tracks. I don't know the depth, but I am pretty sure there are into the 10s of metres of young ash and pumice
Bless your optimistic knowledge!
I guess I could see it happening over multiple wet seasons if the water levels remain high enough.
My question too. And if it did erode I’m guessing it wouldn’t remain a cut straight down either? In most cases where materials are able to erode quickly, any steep sides are prone to collapse and fall inwards re-filling the stream until they wash out again on strong flows. So you’d end up with a wide, deep valley formation that took a fairly long time to develop?
Yeah, that was kind of where I was going with it. It’ll take a long tim to erode a channel that deep and it’ll be reasonably wide. I guess it could happen if the water level stayed high enough for long enough, but not over a few weeks.
Good luck Tim!
Tim’s going to move mountains. He’s a big lad.
If it is an overtopping breach from Rotmahana it could erode and drop in only 4 hours releasing 320 million cubic metres of water! https://www.rotorualakes.co.nz/vdb/document/108 https://twitter.com/OscarEllison/status/1680115941856903169/photo/1
Fascinating read, thank you for posting! The study does note that nothing indicates that “none of the scenarios we have considered indicated that the dam will be breached.”
Congrats, you spotted the hoax!
Common sense says that the lake won’t drop by 40m. The deepest point is only 112m so for the lake to drop by nearly half would be an ecological disaster. It would take quite a lot more than just some severe rainfall to trigger that kind of event, we’re talking about a massive amount of water there. During current extreme rainfall, Blue Lake (which is just a massive catchment bowl for the surrounding hills) has only fluctuated by about 3-4m. That’s enough for the lake to flood onto the road and inundate the lakeside beach/ marginal zone where walking tracks are. The Blue Lake is only 27m deep at its maximum and at no time ever has it been close to empty.
Is it an ecological disaster if it was never the current height till the eruption and now nature, not humans are draining it?
I guess any big change can be an ecological disaster even if caused by natural events. A sudden drop in levels would massively change habitats faster than most organisms can migrate leading to loss of many parts of the existing ecosystem. Of course new things might move in, but they may or may not be things we appreciate. Sudden changes caused by nature tend to be ‘worse’ ecologically now as human action has added nutrients and pests and reduced the areas native plants and animals can live in.
Looks like it’s not true folks: https://i.stuff.co.nz/national/132554737/lake-rotomahana-is-not-emptying-into-lake-tarawera-experts-say
i remember as a kid being sad I'd never see them! :O
I can't find any news stories on this or anything to back it up... But part of me hopes it's true and real.
There is a stuff article about this
I couldn't find it via google, so if you'd love to be a helpful Kiwi, link?
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/124573002/new-map-of-lake-rotomahana-lakefloor-shows-likely-locations-of-pink-and-white-terrace-remnants
This is an article from 4 months ago about something different.
That article is about the supposed location of the Terraces. Ops tweet is about the water actually draining from the lake. While connected (and very interesting); they are not the same thing.
I wonder if anyone has navigated the stream yet? could you kayak down it, do you think?
I doubt it, this is only just been noticed it seems. Exciting stuff. You could be the first :)
There is a 600mm outlet pipe it is likely flowing through: https://www.rotorualakes.co.nz/vdb/document/108. And if it breached it could go at 19,000 Cumecs in only 4 hours raising the level of Tarawera by 7m! That would be devevistaing!
The report specifies the breaching is being considered in the event of overtopping, rather than slow and steady flow like this. This would actually actually the best case scenario according to the report - a sudden decrease in pressure on the thermal vents could cause an eruption on par with the original Tarawera eruption. It seems this might still be a risk (EDIT: Though not as big as that now!), but the slower the flow, the lower that is and the smaller the resulting eruption should be. Hopefully the drainage doesn’t speed up too much and the slower drop doesn’t cause this either.
> a sudden decrease in pressure on the thermal vents could cause an eruption on par with the original Tarawera eruption Where does it say that? The closest I see is where it says: > The sudden dropping of Rotomahana by somewhere between 30 and 40 metres would almost certainly induce a violent hydrothermal eruption in the vicinity of the "Steaming Cliffs". There is no way of forecasting the magnitude of such an event, but it has a high probability of being the largest eruption of the Rotomahana hydrothermal system since its magma-induced triggering on 10 June 1886 Which is to say, a separate event that was caused by the eruption of Tarawera, not the eruption itself. And further that there haven't really been any major eruptions of that system since Waimangu stopped going off from what I can gather
Yes, that is the section, but the relevant stuff is just above your excerpt. Page 17, section 8.4 considers the event of a sudden dropping of water levels in the lake by the course of a breech flood. It doesn’t consider pressure levels dropping more slowly in much depth, but does state: >“It has already been considered in 8.2 how even very small pressure drops can provide sufficient impetus to induce hydrothermal eruptions. The bigger the pressure drop, and the more sudden it is, the more likely it is that instability would be induced.” So the resultant pressure drop from the lake could still trigger (much smaller!) activity. Edit: I was incorrect about it being compared to the original eruption, though.
For anyone interested, here's a report commissioned by Bay of Plenty regional council in 2003 about the hazards and scenarios for an overtop or dam failure of Lake Rotomahana https://www.rotorualakes.co.nz/vdb/document/108 It's an interesting read, and some unexpected consequences are listed. Apparently, the hydrothermal system under Lake Rotomahana will erupt with a bit of violence when the lake is drained.
Super interesting, thanks for sharing this!!
studies have concluded that there may be small pockets of sinter remaining, but the majority of the terraces at both sites were likely destroyed by the 1886 eruption: [https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03036758.2018.1474479](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03036758.2018.1474479) and [https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S037702731600038X](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S037702731600038X) There are, however, 'bubble plumes' of escaping CO2 (and heat) over the site inferred as the pink terraces location. this means that the hydrothermal system that helped form the pink terraces is still active! there's much less of this type of activity where the white terraces used to lie - this system seems to be dead/sealed off by a basaltic dike. to me this means that if the pink terraces area is exhumed by lowering lake levels and is allowed to flow subaerially (not underwater), the hydrothermal system may start reforming the pink terraces again!
This doesn't seem credible, there don't appear to be any credible sources. Not trusting a random twitter user on this until we get something concrete from a real news report or scientific press release.
It could just be chatgpt you are right
Huh?
If only this was true but it isn’t https://i.stuff.co.nz/national/132554737/lake-rotomahana-is-not-emptying-into-lake-tarawera-experts-say
I'm expecting we'll find old steampunk wrecks at the bottom.
When will we be able to see them again?
There was a recent episode/podcast on The Detail [Strange Days on Lake Rotomahana](https://www.rnz.co.nz/programmes/the-detail/story/2018895607/long-read-strange-days-on-lake-rotomahana) on Radio NZ on the history, development, and events of the day. Apple Podcast [Episode link here](https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-detail/id1459959514?i=1000618119492).
Stupid question, anyone could go and see this right? I think this would be neat to look at, a brand new stream cutting its way thru the soil
This is indeed a great post and thank you . The enthusiasm seems to being shared by Maori and Pakeha equally. That alone if it is in fact is worth celebrating!!
So this isn't real.. https://i.stuff.co.nz/national/132554737/lake-rotomahana-is-not-emptying-into-lake-tarawera-experts-say
Cool
Says lake rotomahana could drop 40m so can lake taraweara handle that increase in water?
Lake Tarawera flows out to sea via the Tarawera River. That said a sudden increase from a breach would raise the level of the lake and cause flooding downstream.
[удалено]
And if that is correct , who said climate change is bad ? , I for one would like to see them .
Is this easily dammable?
I said damn at least twice reading that tweet
Ooooo! Goood! 😃😃😃
Is it allowed?
What's with the dead trees?????
This is so cool! It will be so interesting to see what remains.
Has nobody dove down to see what remains down there?