Chiliques is a stratovocano
at 5.778 m asl with a 500-meter (1,640-foot)-diameter circular
summit crater in northern Chile, with an edifice height of 1.300 m.
So far it has ben classified as a dormant volcano. Chiliques is situated
at
23º34'S og 67º42'W. That is not so far south of the Lascar-volcano,
and north of
a chain of old volcanoes, Cordon Puntas
Negras - Chalviri.
April 15th, 2002
At January 6, 2002 nighttime thermal infrared image from Aster found
a hot spot in the summit crater, as well as several others along the
upper flanks of the volcano's edifice, indicating
new volcanic activity. Examination of an earlier nighttime thermal
infrared image from May 24, 2000 showed no such hot spots. That should
indicate without any doubt that Chiliques
is wakening up (I believe....)
Detail of map from
http://www.gochile.cl/Info/Map/MapNGrande.asp
with additions made by us.
Stratovolcanoes such as Chiliques account for approximately
60 percent of Earth's volcanoes. They are marked by eruptions of cooler,
stickier lavas such as andesite, dacite and rhyolite. Because these
lavas tend to plug up volcanic plumbing, gas pressures can more easily
build up
to high levels, often resulting in explosive eruptions. They are typically
made up of about half lava and half loose or fragmented rock ejected
from the volcano, and are therefore also commonly known as composite
volcanoes. Mount Saint Helens in Washington
and Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines
are examples of stratovolcanoes.
The
daytime image of Chiliques was acquired on November 19, 2000 and was
created
by displaying Aster bands 1, 2 and 3 in blue, green and red. The image
cover an area of
7.5 by 7.5 kilometers (4.7 by 4.7 miles), and are centered at 23.6 degrees
south latitude,
67.6 degrees west longitude.
Structure & Evolution
Chiliques is a simple volcano located directly south of Laguna Lejia
. The most recent activity
in its vicinity may have been the eruption which formed the Cerro
Overo craterlake(q.v.), 8 km to the north. Chiliques has a 500 m diameter
circular summit crater and several young flank lava flows; the largest
of these, is found on the northwest flank of the volcano extending
for about 5 km
from the summit. Lava flows belonging to two older phases of activity
from the ancestral
Chiliques are also present. These older flows are more extensive than
those from the present volcano and extend for up to 10 km from the
present summit.
Cordons Puntas Negras & Chalviri
TM
image of the Cordon Puntas Negras - Chalviri. Centers indicated Cerros
Cenizas (CC),
Aguas Calientes (A), Laguna Escondida (E), Chinchilla(C) and a small
craterlake-like vent (M).
Also indicated are Volcan Puntas Negras (VPN) and Cerro Tuyajto (CT).
Cerro Overo craterlake
and Laguna Lejia can be seen in the top left hand corner of the image.
The salar to the
north is Aguas Calientes.
Picture and text: http://volcano.indstate.edu/cvz/chal.html
This volcanic area is located from 23º37'S; 67º40'W
to 23º41'S; 67º34'W.
Maximum Elevation is 5600m asl and the maximum Ridge Height is 1100m
Structure & Evolution
This confusing collection of numerous vents, lava flows, domes, and
small cones forms two main chains ; Cordon Puntas Negras (CPN), a 20
km long volcanic complex trending roughly
southeast from Chiliques towards Volcan Punta Negra (VPN), and Cordon
Chalviri
extending15 km southwards from Volcan Puntas Negras to Cerro Tuyajto
(T).
At least 25 different vents are present within the complex, distributed
over an area of
about 500 km2. Although this complex broadly resembles the smaller Escalante-Sairecabur
complex (q.v), Cordon Puntas Negras is the result of a several different
styles of activity which have produced constructs of differing character.
Typical structures are generally small cones a few hundred meters in
height with well preserved summit craters (for example Cerros Cenizas
(CC), Aguas Calientes Laguna Escondida (E)
and Chinchilla(C)) and short (5 km) lava flows, although it is difficult
to locate the source
of many of the individual flows, or to relate them to a particular cone.
Much of the activity has been post-glacial as evidenced by the pristine
morphology of the
features. The dominant style of activity appears to have been the eruption
of andesitic lavas.
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