Deformation Behavior of Persistently Restless Telica Volcano, Nicaragua, during Unrest in 2015

Persistently restless volcanoes experience frequent eruptions with Volcanic Explosivity Index of 2 or lower. Telica Volcano, located in Western Nicaragua, experienced major unrest beginning in May 2015 that lasted throughout the year, and that consisted of hundreds of events with several ash and gas explosions. Geodetic GPS measurements show ground deformation of approximately 1-2 cm occurring at Telica during these eruptions. An analysis of Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) Sentinel 1 images during this eruptive period confirm such deformation signals, but due to the relatively low spatial ( 15 m) and temporal resolutions of the Sentinel-1 data, and the high level of noise they contained, deformation patterns are difficult to discern and interpret. For a clearer view of the deformation behavior at Telica during this unrest, we analyze a dataset consisting of 63 images from the COSMO-SkyMED satellite, characterized by a spatial resolution of 1 m and a much higher temporal resolution than Sentinel 1. A multi-temporal analysis of this SAR dataset spanning December 2014 to December 2015 should provide more insight into the complicated eruptive patterns of Telica and persistently restless volcanoes in general.