http://environment.newscientist.com...-surge-causes-record-rise-at-yellowstone.html If you're gonna panic every time a caldera twitches, you probably won't be getting much sleep in the near future. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
You could say that about any volcano anywhere. The question really is "is there any evidence to suggest it will?" The seismologists who study it are saying no, not at the moment. Things could change, but what's the point in guessing until we've got some evidence?
Ok. Let's evacuate a couple of million people to be on the safe side and make the area a complete no-go for anything up to a million years. I'm sure no one will mind.
Not only that, but the next time the caldera erupts it will most likely be a huge outpouring of lava...just like the last time.
Since the last big BOOM! 600,000 years ago, there have been a dozen or more lava flows. Some are of truly impressive scale...see this photo, the lava front is the escarpment that runs from the foreground to the background! And yes, this was a very slow moving but massive flow. This one alone dwarfs anything Hawaii has produced in the last couple of centuries. http://volcanoes.usgs.gov/yvo/images/19770717-rc-madplateau_large.jpg Here's a good overview: http://volcanoes.usgs.gov/yvo/history.html