"columns of steam" is a correct and usable phrase in written English.
It is typically used to describe a visible and vertical release of steam, such as from a boiling pot or a steam-powered machine. It can also be used metaphorically to describe a large or continuous output of something, such as "columns of steam rising from the busy city streets." Example: As I approached the factory, I could see columns of steam billowing out of the chimneys, a sign that the production line was in full swing.
Columns of steam and gas rise from fissures in the ground.
Yet the geysers of Yellowstone, spewing turbulent columns of steam, had diabolical connotations for the public, and Yellowstone was full of satanic place names.
The warming in relations comes, however, as columns of steam were observed rising from North Korea's decrepit nuclear complex at Yongbyon, causing speculation that the reactor there had been restarted.
WITHIN days of the tenth anniversary of the first "six-party" talks, aimed at getting North Korea to give up its nuclear-weapons programmes, two columns of steam rose from the nuclear complex at Yongbyon, north of the capital, Pyongyang.
We arrived at sunrise because the steaming fumaroles look more impressive when you can actually see the columns of steam condensing in the frigid air.
Ash, which is fragmented lava, has already been emitted, as has a column of steam produced from water heated by the magma.
MOSCOW — In the snowy silence of a Moscow park, a 26-year-old businessman named Aleksandr Pushkov stood naked except for his Speedo, a column of steam rising from his body.
He could see his comrades in the distance, one of them slipping away into the dead trees where, a few moments later, a column of steam indicated a hot spring.
As The New York Times described, "Mount St. Helens exploded at 8 39 a.m. today with a thud felt 100 miles away and with a drifting column of steam and pumice that turned day into night".
A column of steam escaped, making a faint whooshing sound that was not nearly as loud as the chug-a-chug of my grandmother's cooker.
As the water boils, the resulting pressure forces a superheated column of steam and water to the surface through the geyser's internal plumbing.
