Volcanoes: limits to the growth The highest volcano in the world is Cerro Ojos del Salado. It is a stratovolcano in South America’s Central Volcanic Zone, reaching an impressive 6893 meters above sea level (or at least above what sea level used to be). It doesn’t look much: the volcano is a mess of overlapping domes with two separate summits,…
https://www.volcanocafe.org/vo....lcanoes-limits-to-th

The Vredefort impact The centre of South Africa is an amazing place. The long drive from Cape Town in-land is exciting for the first two hours, while the road climbs up through the mountains, past vineyards and valleys full of fynbos. Once on the high interior plateau of South Africa, the landscape becomes dry and monotonous – and…
https://www.volcanocafe.org/the-vredefort-impact/

Time for komatiite People mellow with age. (At least, most of us do.) The emotions of youth become less all-important and less demanding of our attention. Young people feel that every perceived slight needs addressing. The heat goes to the head and mistakes are made. Older people consider more before responding. The Earth, too, went through a youthful…
https://www.volcanocafe.org/time-for-komatiite-2/

Gold! Rainbow’s end It is an amazing and powerful image. The wide lava fountain in the caldera like a wall flower in full bloom, with the cloud of volcano seeds above, the lava flowing from the bleeding flower, slowly re-filling one of the largest holes on Earth, and the distant rainbow linking the lava, the caldera,…
https://www.volcanocafe.org/gold/

Istanbul and the Marmara Sea There are San Andreas faults in many places. They happen where two rigid continental masses slide past each other at fairly rapid pace. The San Andreas fault separates (‘connect’ would be the wrong word) the American plate from the continental edge of the Pacific plate. It runs along the length of California, in-land up to…
https://www.volcanocafe.org/is....tanbul-and-the-marma