Fallen volcanoes: what danger they have

Volcanoes are fire-breathing mountains, a place where you can look into the bowels of the Earth. Among them there are active and extinct ones. If the active volcanoes show activity from time to time, then the eruptions of the extinct have not been preserved in the memory of mankind. And only the structure and rocks composing them, allow us to judge their turbulent past.

Intermediate position is occupied by sleeping, or asleep volcanoes. They are characterized by a lack of active activity for many years.

Sleeping volcanoes

The division of volcanoes into sleeping and acting is very conditional. People may simply not know about their activity in the not so distant past.

Sleeping are, for example, the famous volcanoes of Africa: Kilimanjaro, Ngorongoro, Rungwe, Menengai and others. There were no eruptions of them for a long time, but light streams of gas rise above some. But knowing that they are in the zone of the Great East African graben system, one can assume that at any moment they can wake up and show themselves in all their might and danger.

Dangerous peace of mind

Fallen volcanoes can be very dangerous. A proverb about a quiet whirlpool and devils in it is well suited to them. The history of mankind remembers many cases when a volcano, long considered to be asleep or even extinct, woke up and brought many misfortunes to people living in the neighborhood with it.

The most famous example is the famous eruption of Mount Vesuvius, which, apart from Pompeii, destroyed several cities and many villages. The life of Pliny the Elder, a well-known ancient military commander and naturalist, was cut off precisely in connection with it.

Interrupted dream of volcanoes

The Ruiz volcano in the Colombian Andes was considered asleep since 1595. But on November 13, 1985, he denied this, bursting with a series of explosions, one stronger than the other. Snow and ice, located in the crater and on the slopes of the volcano, began to melt rapidly, forming powerful mud-stone streams. They poured into the valley of the river La Gunilla and reached the town of Armero, located 40 km from the volcano. A stream of mud and stones hit the city and the surrounding villages with a raging mash of 5-6 m thick. About 20 thousand people died, Armero became a huge mass grave. Only those residents who could have escaped rescue at the beginning of the eruption rose to the nearest hills.

The release of gas from the mouth of the Nyos volcano caused the death of more than 1,700 people and a large number of cattle. But he was considered extinct long ago. In its crater even formed a lake.

Volcanoes of Kamchatka

The peninsula of Kamchatka is the focus of a large number of active and sleeping volcanoes. It would be wrong to consider them extinguished, because the border of collision of lithospheric plates is located here , which means that any activity in tectonic movements can awaken the sleepy, threatening forces of nature.

The Bezymyanny volcano, south of Klyuchevskaya Sopka, was considered an extinct volcano for a long time. However, in September 1955, he awakened from sleep, an eruption began, the clouds of gas and ash rose to a height of 6-8 km. However, this was only the beginning. The prolonged eruption reached its maximum on March 30, 1956, when a powerful explosion sounded, which carried the top of the volcano, forming a deep crater with a diameter of up to 2 km. The blast destroyed all the trees at a distance of up to 25-30 km in the district. A giant cloud, consisting of hot gases and ash, rose to a height of 40 km! Minor particles fell out at great distances from the volcano itself. And even at a distance of 15 km from Nameless, the thickness of the ash layer was half a meter.

As with the eruption of the Ruiz volcano, a stream of mud, water and stones, which swept to the Kamchatka River, was formed, which is almost 100 km.

The fallen volcanoes of Kamchatka are very dangerous, because they look like the infamous Vesuvius, Mont-Pele (Martinique), Kathmai (Alaska). They sometimes happen explosions, which in more densely populated areas would become a real catastrophe.

An example is the eruption of Shiveluch in 1964. The explosion power can be judged by the size of the crater. Its depth was 800 m, and the diameter - 3 km. Volcanic bombs weighing up to 3 tons flew for a distance of up to 12 km!

Such powerful eruptions in the history of Shiveluch happened more than once. Near the small village of Klyuchi, archaeologists managed to dig a settlement, covered with ashes and stones several centuries ago, even before the Russians arrived in Kamchatka.

Threat to mankind

Some scientists believe that it is the asleep volcanoes that can cause a global catastrophe that will destroy humanity. In doing so, they talk about long-extinct giants, such as Yellowstone in North America. The super volcano, after its last eruption, left the caldera at 55 km for 72 km, is in the "hot spot" of the planet where the magma is close to the earth's surface.

And there are a lot of such giants, asleep or close to awakening, on Earth.

Deserted volcanoes (list)