Sotra Facula, Cryovolcano? Options

[rlorenz]

I'd like to point out that I predicted explosive cryovolcanism, and caldera-like ignimbritic deposits (with Sotra Facula in mind) in my 2007 paper - not that anyone ever takes a blind bit of notice...

If stating that something were possible was the same as 'predicting'........... well, never mind. I still
have dibs from my 1996 PSS paper on pillow lava forming when a cryovolcano erupts in an ethane sea.... ;-)

But your notion that an explosive cryovolcanic eruption might occur when ammonia-water magma
encountered a methane clathrate deposit was surely suggested by Lunine and Stevenson in 1987 (IIRC they
talk about maars, although not the ash/ignimbrite specifically - but they didnt have to try to explain
the dune sands - which appear to be organic of photochemical origin anyway, not ice from volcanos...)