This geyser erupting on a frigid day will make your winter solstice
The famed Old Faithful geyser erupts into a clear blue sky in a new video taken on Dec. 18 and shared by Yellowstone National Park.
The steam shot forth by the geyser matches the snow blanketing the ground on the frigid winter morning this was filmed, with the cold, dry air causing a billowing cloud to condense and rise high into the sky.
Old Faithful -- so named for the regularity with which it erupts -- is not the largest or even the most predictable geyser in the park, but it does "erupt more frequently than any other of the large geysers," Yellowstone says on its website.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.
Geysers are hot springs that occasionally (or regularly) boil over, shooting water high up into the air.
Before erupting, steam rises up through the geyser, eventually displacing the water above it, shooting it out into the air.
"This decreases pressure on the system, and violent boiling results," according to the park's statement.
"Tremendous amounts of steam force water out of the vent, and an eruption begins. Water is expelled faster than it can enter the geyser's plumbing system, and the heat and pressure gradually decrease. The eruption stops when the water reservoir is depleted or when the system cools."
Yellowstone's Upper Geyser Basin plays host to Old Faithful along with about 300 other active geysers, according to the National Park Service.
Upper Geyser Basin is known as "the largest concentration of geysers in the world," the Park Service added.
If you can't make it to Wyoming to see Old Faithful yourself, you can check out live streaming views of the geyser provided by a Yellowstone webcam.
UPDATE: Dec. 22, 2016, 10:59 a.m. EST This story was updated to state when the video was shot at Yellowstone National Park.
Miriam Kramer worked as a staff writer for Space.com for about 2.5 years before joining Mashable to cover all things outer space. She took a ride in weightlessness on a zero-gravity flight and watched rockets launch to space from places around the United States. Miriam received her Master's degree in science, health and environmental reporting from New York University in 2012, and she originally hails from Knoxville, Tennessee. Follow Miriam on Twitter at @mirikramer.
