Abstract

Sulfur dioxide in volcanic eruption clouds was detected from space using data from the Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer (TOMS) instrument on the Nimbus 7 satellite (Krueger, 1983) and confirmed in data from the SBUV instrument on the same satellite (McPeters and Heath, 1984). The detection was possible because sulfur dioxide has strong absorption bands in the same wavelength region of the near ultraviolet that was selected for measuring total ozone with these satellite instruments. The background levels of sulfur dioxide are so low that the measurement of ozone can normally be made without accounting for any interference from this gas. However, volcanic eruptions can produce millions of tons of sulfur dioxide in compact clouds which locally dwarf the absorption by ozone. Even as the eruption cloud is dispersing the absorption by sulfur dioxide can be comparable to that of ozone.

© 1990 Optical Society of America