Aniakchak (United States)

Status Normal Eruption 1931 1341m
Caldera (Subduction zone / Continental crust (> 25 km))

Aniakchak

One of the most dramatic calderas of the Aleutian arc, the 10-km-wide Aniakchak caldera formed around 3,400 years ago during a voluminous eruption in which pyroclastic flows traveled more than 50 km N to the Bering Sea and also reached the Pacific Ocean to the south. At least 40 explosive eruptions have been documented during the past 10,000 years, making it the most active volcano of the eastern Aleutian arc. A dominantly andesitic pre-caldera volcano was constructed above basement Mesozoic and Tertiary sedimentary rocks that are exposed in the caldera walls to elevations of about 610 m. The ice-free caldera floor contains many pyroclastic cones, tuff cones, maars, and lava domes. Surprise Lake on the NE side drains through The Gates, a steep-walled breach on the east side of the 1-km-high caldera rim that was the site of catastrophic draining of a once larger lake about 1850 years BP. Vent Mountain and Half Cone are two long-lived vents on the south-central and NW caldera floor, respectively. The first and only confirmed historical eruption took place in 1931 from vents on the west and SW caldera floor.

Calderas are very large depressions that form by collapse. Many, like this 10-km-wide caldera that truncates Alaska's Aniakchak volcano, are created by very powerful explosive eruptions that empty a magma chamber beneath a volcano, causing it to collapse inward. Other calderas, such as those on Hawaiian volcanoes, are produced by collapse following major lava extrusion. Calderas often form incrementally, during widely spaced eruptions. Later activity can cover their floors with a wide variety of volcanic landforms.

Photo by M. Woodbridge Williams (National Park Service).

Last updated 2021-08-03 18:00:02

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