Oh, my --- a minor (but maybe not so minor correction): Mt. Baker isn't considered dormant. It's active, as you can see from the south side looking into the crater where a group of fumaroles routinely send up steam clouds laced with sulfur. None of the Cascade volcanoes in WA are considered dormant, actually. They all show evidence of recent (geologically speaking) eruptive activity, to easily qualify them as active. Baker last erupted in the mid-19th century. So they all are significant geo-hazards. Baker's biggest threat would be a big mudslide (lahar) off it's E slope which goes directly down into Baker Lake. A lahar there would likely displace the water in Baker Lake and send it roaring down into Shannon Lake which would then roar down and obliterate Concrete, and wipe out much of what is now built in the Skagit Valley as if filled the entire channel of the Skagit River and fanned out across the delta. Glacier Peak's lahar deposits go as far as Sedro-Woolley, for another scary thought! Dorme vu?
Thanks for the correction, Phil. (I'll change and note it.) But this kind of scenario is exactly why I shuddered and didn't want to think about eruptions!
Oh, my --- a minor (but maybe not so minor correction): Mt. Baker isn't considered dormant. It's active, as you can see from the south side looking into the crater where a group of fumaroles routinely send up steam clouds laced with sulfur. None of the Cascade volcanoes in WA are considered dormant, actually. They all show evidence of recent (geologically speaking) eruptive activity, to easily qualify them as active. Baker last erupted in the mid-19th century. So they all are significant geo-hazards. Baker's biggest threat would be a big mudslide (lahar) off it's E slope which goes directly down into Baker Lake. A lahar there would likely displace the water in Baker Lake and send it roaring down into Shannon Lake which would then roar down and obliterate Concrete, and wipe out much of what is now built in the Skagit Valley as if filled the entire channel of the Skagit River and fanned out across the delta. Glacier Peak's lahar deposits go as far as Sedro-Woolley, for another scary thought! Dorme vu?
Thanks for the correction, Phil. (I'll change and note it.) But this kind of scenario is exactly why I shuddered and didn't want to think about eruptions!