Old Faithful

In the afternoon of September 18, 1870, the members of the Washburn-Langford-Doane Expedition traveled down the Firehole River from the Kepler Cascades and entered the Upper Geyser Basin. The first geyser that they saw was Old Faithful. Nathaniel P. Langford wrote in his 1871 Scribner's account of the expedition:

{{blockquote|It spouted at regular intervals nine times during our stay, the columns of boiling water being thrown from ninety to one hundred and twenty-five feet at each discharge, which lasted from fifteen to twenty minutes. We gave it the name of "Old Faithful."|Nathaniel P. Langford, 1871{{cite journal |last=Langford |first=Nathaniel P. |author-link=Nathaniel P. Langford |date=May–June 1871 |title=The Wonders of the Yellowstone |journal=Scribner's Monthly |volume=II |issue=1–2 |page=123}}}}

In the early days of the park, Old Faithful was often used as a laundry:

{{blockquote|Old Faithful is sometimes degraded by being made a laundry. Garments placed in the crater during quiescence are ejected thoroughly washed when the eruption takes place. Gen. Sheridan's men, in 1882, found that linen and cotton fabrics were uninjured by the action of the water, but woolen clothes were torn to shreds.{{cite book |last=Winser |first=Henry J. |title=The Yellowstone National Park-A Manual for Tourists |url=https://archive.org/details/yellowstonenati00winsgoog |location=New York |publisher=G.P. Putnam Sons |year=1883 |page=[https://archive.org/details/yellowstonenati00winsgoog/page/n75 46]}}}}

File:OldFaithful.ogv

More than 1,000,000 eruptions have been recorded. Harry Woodward first described a mathematical relationship between the duration and intervals of the eruptions in 1938.{{cite web |url=http://www.nps.gov/yell/historyculture/arch_interp.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080211000902/http://www.nps.gov/yell/historyculture/arch_interp.htm |url-status=dead |archive-date=February 11, 2008 |title=Season Report on the Naturalist Activities at Old Faithful Station |year=1939 |first= Harry R. |last=Woodward}} Old Faithful is not the tallest or largest geyser in the park; those titles belong to the less predictable Steamboat Geyser.{{cite web |title=Old Faithful Geyser |work=Old Faithful Area Tour |publisher=National Park Service |url=https://www.nps.gov/yell/learn/photosmultimedia/webcams.htm}} The reliability of Old Faithful can be attributed to the fact that it is not connected to any other thermal features of the Upper Geyser Basin.{{cite web |title=Old Faithful slows, but grows |first= Michael| last= Milstein|work=The Billings Gazette | date= September 14, 1999| url= http://www.billingsgazette.com/wyoming/990914_wyo01.html |access-date=July 21, 2007 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20071009200545/http://www.billingsgazette.com/wyoming/990914_wyo01.html |archive-date= October 9, 2007}}

Eruptions can shoot {{convert|3700|to|8400|USgal|L}} of boiling water to a height of {{convert|106|to|185|ft}} lasting from 1½ to 5 minutes. The average height of an eruption is {{convert|145|ft}}.{{cite book |last = Chapple|first = Janet|title = Yellowstone Treasures|publisher = Granite Peak Publications|year = 2013|location = Lake Forest Park, WA|page = 79|isbn = 978-0-9706873-8-8}} Intervals between eruptions have ranged from 34 to 125 minutes, averaging 66½ minutes in 1939,{{cite journal |journal=Northwest Science |title=Old Faithful, An Example of Geyser Development in Yellowstone Park |volume=13 |year=1939 |pages=50–5 |first1=Clyde Max |last1=Bauer |first2=George |last2=Marler |url=http://www.vetmed.wsu.edu/org_nws/NWSci%20journal%20articles/1927-1939/1939%20vol%2013/13-2/2008-02-11/v13%20p50%20Bauer%20and%20Marler.PDF |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110610041553/http://www.vetmed.wsu.edu/org_nws/NWSci%20journal%20articles/1927-1939/1939%20vol%2013/13-2/2008-02-11/v13%20p50%20Bauer%20and%20Marler.PDF |archive-date=June 10, 2011 |df=mdy-all }}[http://www.geyserstudy.org/geyser.aspx?pGeyserNo=OLDFAITHFUL Old Faithful] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120221235615/http://www.geyserstudy.org/geyser.aspx?pGeyserNo=OLDFAITHFUL |date=February 21, 2012 }}, Geyser Observation and Study Association, August 17, 2011; {{Cite web|url=https://www.nps.gov/yell/learn/photosmultimedia/webcams.htm|title=National Park Service Webcam|website=www.nps.gov|access-date=January 1, 2017}} slowly increasing to an average of 90 minutes apart since 2000, which may be the result of earthquakes affecting subterranean water levels.{{cite gosa|OLDFAITHFUL|Old Faithful|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191024141724/http://www.geyserstudy.org/geyser.aspx?pGeyserNo=OLDFAITHFUL|archive-date =October 24, 2019}} The disruptions have made earlier mathematical relationships inaccurate, but have actually made Old Faithful more predictable in terms of its next eruption.{{citation needed|date=September 2017}} After the Borah Peak earthquake in central Idaho in October 1983, the eruption intervals of Old Faithful were noticeably lengthened.{{cite news |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=W4RfAAAAIBAJ&pg=3884%2C2019027 |work=Lewiston Morning Tribune |location=(Idaho) |agency=(Washington Post) |last=Reid |first=T.R. |title=Idaho quake upsets, yet befriends Old Faithful geyser |date=October 7, 1984 |page=5E}}

File:Old Faithful eruptions graph.jpg

The time between eruptions has a bimodal distribution, with the mean interval being either 65 or 91 minutes, and is dependent on the length of the prior eruption. Within a margin of error of ±10 minutes, Old Faithful will erupt either 65 minutes after an eruption lasting less than 2½ minutes, or 91 minutes after an eruption lasting more than 2½ minutes.{{cite web |title=Video: Predicting Old Faithful |url=https://www.nps.gov/yell/planyourvisit/geyser-activity.htm |website=National Park Service}}

Between 1983 and 1994, four probes containing temperature and pressure measurement devices and video equipment were lowered into Old Faithful. The probes were lowered as deep as {{convert|72|ft}}. Temperature measurements of the water at this depth were {{convert|244|F|C}}, the same as was measured in 1942. The video probes were lowered to a maximum depth of {{convert|42|ft}} to observe the conduit formation and the processes that took place in the conduit. Some of the processes observed include fog formation from the interaction of cool air from above mixing with heated air from below, the recharge processes of water entering into the conduit and expanding from below, and entry of superheated steam measuring as high as {{convert|265|F|C}} into the conduit.{{cite journal |vauthors=Hutchinson RA, Westphal JA, Kieffer SW | author3-link=Susan Kieffer | title=In situ observations of Old Faithful Geyser | journal=Geology | volume=25 | issue=10 | year=1997 | pages=875–878 | url=http://geology.geoscienceworld.org/cgi/content/abstract/25/10/875 | doi=10.1130/0091-7613(1997)025<0875:ISOOOF>2.3.CO;2|bibcode = 1997Geo....25..875H | url-access=subscription }}

• Strokkur, another naturally-occurring geyser known for erupting frequently and predictably.

{{Gallery

|title=Images of Old Faithful Geyser

|width=155

|file:CraterofOldFaithful1872.jpg|Old Faithful Crater, 1872 William Henry Jackson

|File:Old Faithful geyser, Yellowstone National Park - NARA - 517017.jpg|From the 1878 U.S. Geological and Geographic Survey of the Territories

|file:Bierstadt Albert Old Faithful.jpg|Painting by Albert Bierstadt, circa 1881

|file:OldFaithfulPhilKonstantin.jpg|From Observation Point, 2003

|file:The Old Faithful Faithful.jpg|Spectators gathering to watch the geyser at Yellowstone National Park, 2019

|File:On rare occasions at the right point, Beehive will synchronizing eruptions with the larger nearby Old Faithful.png|On rare occasions at the right point, Beehive (seen in the distance) will synchronize eruptions with the larger nearby Old Faithful

}}

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• {{cite web |title=Old Faithful Live-streaming Webcam |url=https://www.nps.gov/yell/learn/photosmultimedia/webcams.htm |website=Webcams – Yellowstone National Park|publisher=U.S. National Park Service |language=en}}
• {{cite web |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8RUmvolwUQ |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211211/i8RUmvolwUQ| archive-date=2021-12-11 |url-status=live|title=A day in the life of Old Faithful Geyser, as timelapse video |date=September 27, 2007 |publisher=YouTube.com}}{{cbignore}}
• {{cite web |url=https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=36014 |title=Old Faithful |date=November 30, 2008 |publisher=NASA Earth Observatory}}
• {{cite web |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTfRAGRjsnI |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211211/wTfRAGRjsnI| archive-date=2021-12-11 |url-status=live|title=Full eruption of Old Faithful Geyser |date=June 19, 2020 |publisher=YouTube.com}}{{cbignore}}

{{Upper Geyser Basin}}

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Category:Geothermal features of Yellowstone National Park

Category:Geysers of Wyoming

Category:Geothermal features of Teton County, Wyoming

Category:Geysers of Teton County, Wyoming

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