It has been a up and down past year for Cleveland volcano in the Aleutians. The alert status for the volcano has bounced back and forth from Yellow/Advisory to Orange/Watch multiple times due to the growth of a dome of lava in the summit crater area. This dome has the potential to “plug” the conduit, causing the pressure behind the dome to rise until an explosive eruption occurs. This is exactly what happened on December 25 and 29 of 2011 when Cleveland had one of its first major explosive eruptions in years and the dome that grew in the crater over much of 2011 was destroyed
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