Popocatepetl

Cambridge-Conference Digest, 23 October 1997
from: New Scientist, 25 October 1997, p. 27
Mammoth Graveyard

A violent eruption of the Popocatepetl volcano in central Mexico 12,500 years ago trapped a herd of mammoths. While digging a cistern at the base of a mountain near Popocatepetl last year, construction workers found the skeletons in a layer of ash 1.3 metres deep. Claus Siebe of the National Autonomous University of Mexico says the eruption engulfed areas to the north with a thick layer of ash. Rain washed the ash down the mountains in a thick slurry that Siebe says "has the consistency of wet concrete". This week, Siebe told the Geological Society of America in Salt Lake City that the slurry must have spread over the plains where the mammoths were grazing. At least seven died in an area of just 28 square metres.