An Amazing New Development Inside Yellowstone National Park

Yellowstone has been a National Park for 153 years, and researchers continue to discover new features within the park.

It's crazy to think that new amazing features are still developing, and you can tell your kids and grandkids that you were alive when geologists discovered a blue water spring. The last time the researchers visited the area known as 'Tree Island' was last fall, and since then, a new incredible pool has formed.

The pool is approximately 13 feet wide, light blue, and is maintained at a temperature of 109 degrees. The pool resulted from a hydrothermal explosion, and thanks to new monitoring equipment installed in 2023 and other tools, geologists from the USGS are now able to track its latest developments.

One of the tools they used to track the pool is high-resolution satellite imagery. The data showed that the pool developed between mid-December of last year and mid-February of this year.

The monitoring station, installed in 2023, utilizes infrasound (low-frequency acoustic energy) to detect hydrothermal activity and determine its direction of origin. When geologists examined the data, they found no signs of a major explosion in the general direction of the new pool. Still, they did detect low-level signals emanating from that direction.

The data gave the researchers clues that the new blue pool likely began to develop on Christmas night in 2024, when the first signal was recorded. Two other similar signals were recorded on January 15 and February 11, and likely contributed to the development process.

The latest discovery is another indication of the park's remarkable wildness, and not just the animals that live there.