STRUCTURING AND ANALYSIS OF TEMPERATURE DATA FROM UPPER GEYSER BASIN IN YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK

With over 500 active geysers and 10,000 thermal features, Yellowstone National Park is renowned for its hydrothermal activity. For nearly 20 years geologists at Yellowstone have recorded temperatures at a selection of geyser outflow channels across the Park. Thermal data retrieved from Onset HOBO temperature loggers were previously in a disorganized storage format that was not conducive to geostatistical analysis. We developed the system architecture of geyser monitoring data from geyser runoff channels by aggregating and processing the data. Disparate components of geyser monitoring data were collected and organized into a database system that allows users to navigate to the measured temperatures for any geyser in a given year. Files from the last two decades for each data logger have been processed from their proprietary data format and into a standardized database readable by programs such as ArcGIS, R, Matlab, and Python. These developments improved our ability to easily access data for a monitored geyser and conduct geostatistical analyses. Temperature data in Upper Geyser Basin is the most robust dataset of any thermal area in the Park in terms of spatial distribution and temporal continuity. Temperature data from each monitored geyser in Upper Geyser Basin has been analyzed for average activity intervals and duration. Analyses between geysers and geyser groups have been conducted to determine the potential relationships for these features. Geyser activity in Upper Geyser Basin has been analyzed for its correlation to deformation data collected by the USGS and UNAVCO, as well as seismic data collected and processed by Utah State University. Preliminary results from the correlative analyses reveal complex relationships between geyser activity, seismicity, and deformation in Upper Geyser Basin.