Is the Yellowstone National Park Supervolcano Actually About To Erupt?

Curiously, animals are leaving the famed Yellowstone National Park en masse, leading many to speculate on the reasons why this is happening. The current, most popular rumor making its way around the digital world is that the Yellowstone supervolcano is poised to erupt; animals, sensing this impending eruption, are fleeing in large numbers before it is too late.

Is there any truth to this current rumor, which has long been a "what if?" that scientists have pondered for years?

Below, we report on the current state of the Yellowstone National Park supervolcano and whether or not scientists believe there is any truth to the widely held concern that the supervolcano is about to erupt.

As a word of caution, if you plan on visiting Yellowstone National Park right now, it is recommended that you follow all posted advisories and those on the official Yellowstone website, as well as give wildlife sufficient room so as not to spook them more than they already are.

No, experts do not believe that the Yellowstone National Park supervolcano is about to erupt, leading to animals allegedly leaving the national park en masse. According to USA TODAY, the rumors of animals leaving Yellowstone are completely fabricated, and there is no scientific evidence that animals can sense an impending volcano eruption.

"Wildlife is not leaving Yellowstone National Park in large numbers,” National Park Service spokesperson Linda Veress told USA TODAY on July 21.

Indeed, as the video above attests, it was a fake, AI-generated video that caused the mass hysteria that animals are leaving in droves as the Yellowstone National Park supervolcano prepares to erupt.

"Yellowstone is also, arguably, the best monitored volcano on the entire planet," Cameron Fetter says in his video debunking the misinformation.

Scientists from the Yellowstone Volcano Observatory monitor important events at Yellowstone, such as volcanic and earthquake activities, per USA TODAY. "These monitors would detect sudden or strong earthquake activity, ground shifts, and volcanic gases that would indicate increasing activity," Veress said in a statement. "No such evidence exists at this time."

While Veress acknowledged that an eruption is "theoretically possible," this isn't likely to happen, "even [over the next] 10,000 years."

"Yellowstone isn’t erupting," one TikTok user commented on Fetter's misinformation-debunking TikTok video. "The magma chamber is mostly solid, nowhere near the 50% melt needed to erupt. These elk videos are years old, and are purely showcasing a disturbed migration that was caused by human activity, not some apocalyptic event. Stop trusting TikTok over science."

Nevertheless, misinformation persists. As the volcanic activity page on the National Park Service website notes, the Yellowstone volcano last erupted "Approximately 174,000 years ago, creating what is now the West Thumb of Yellowstone Lake. There have been more than 60 smaller eruptions since then, and the last of the 60–80 post-caldera lava flows was about 70,000 years ago."

Will it erupt again? "Over the next thousands to millions of years? Probably. In the next few hundred years? Not likely."