Portal:Volcanism of Canada

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The Volcanism of Canada Portal

Volcanism of Canada, a country occupying much of the northern part of North America, produces lava flows, lava plateaus, lava domes, cinder cones, stratovolcanoes, shield volcanoes, submarine volcanoes, calderas, diatremes, and maars, along with examples of more less common volcanic forms such as tuyas and subglacial mounds. It has a very complex volcanological history spanning from the Precambrian period at least 3.11 billion years ago when this part of the North American continent began to form.

Although the country's volcanic activity dates back to the Precambrian period, volcanic activity continues to occur in Western and Northern Canada where it forms part of an encircling chain of volcanoes and frequent earthquakes around the Pacific Ocean called the Pacific Ring of Fire. However, because volcanoes in Western and Northern Canada are in remote rugged areas and the level of volcanic activity is less frequent than with other volcanoes around the Pacific Ocean, Canada is commonly thought to occupy a gap in the Pacific Ring of Fire between the volcanoes of western United States to the south and the Aleutian volcanoes of Alaska to the north. However, the mountainous landscape of Western and Northern Canada includes more than 100 volcanoes that have been active during the past two million years and have claimed many lives. Volcanic activity has been responsible for many of Canada's geological and geographical features and mineralization, including the nucleus of North America called the Canadian Shield.

Volcanism has led to the formation of hundreds of volcanic areas and extensive lava formations across Canada, indicating volcanism played a major role in shaping its surface. The country's different volcano and lava types originate from different tectonic settings and types of volcanic eruptions, ranging from passive lava eruptions to violent explosive eruptions. Canada has a rich record of very large volumes of magmatic rock called large igneous provinces. They are represented by deep-level plumbing systems consisting of giant dike swarms, sill provinces and layered intrusions. The most capable large igneous provinces in Canada are Archean (3,800-2,500 million years ago) age greenstone belts containing a rare volcanic rock called komatiite.

More about... Volcanism in Canada, and its volcanoes

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The Silverthrone Caldera is a potentially active caldera complex in southwestern British Columbia, Canada, located over 350 kilometres (220 mi) northwest of the city of Vancouver and about 50 kilometres (31 mi) west of Mount Waddington in the Pacific Ranges of the Coast Mountains. The caldera is one of the largest of the few calderas in western Canada, measuring about 30 kilometres (19 mi) long (north-south) and 20 kilometres (12 mi) wide (east-west). Mount Silverthrone, an eroded lava dome on the caldera's northern flank that is 3,160 metres (10,370 ft) high may be the highest volcano in Canada. The main glaciers in the Silverthrone area are the Pashleth, Kingcome, Trudel, Klinaklini and Silverthrone glaciers. Most of the caldera lies in the Ha-Iltzuk Icefield, which is the largest icefield in the southern half of the Coast Mountains; it is one of the five icefields in southwestern British Columbia that thinned between the mid-1980s and 1999 due to global warming. Nearly half of the icefield is drained by the Klinakini Glacier, which feeds the Klinaklini River. The Silverthrone Caldera is very remote and rarely visited or studied by geoscientists, such as volcanologists. It can be reached by helicopter or—with major difficulty—by hiking along one of the several river valleys extending from the British Columbia Coast or from the Interior Plateau.

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Did you know...

...that the Tseax Cone in British Columbia was the source for one of Canada's worst known geophysical disasters?
...that the Bowie Seamount on the British Columbia Coast is one of the most biologically rich submarine volcanoes on Earth and was an active volcanic island throughout the last glacial period?
...that the Sturgeon Lake Caldera in Northwestern Ontario is one of the world's best preserved mineralized Neoarchean caldera complexes?
...that Mount Meager in southwestern British Columbia poses a significant long-distance threat to communities across southern British Columbia and Alberta?
...that the Mount Pleasant Caldera in southwestern New Brunswick has a long history of exploration and development in mining?

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Pyroclastic Peak on left and Mount Cayley on right

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The Volcanism of Canada Workgroup is the central point of coordination for Wikipedia's coverage of Canadian volcanoes, volcanology, igneous petrology, and related subjects. Please feel free to join the workgroup and help!

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Clickable panorama of the Mount Edziza volcanic complex.

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International volcanism news

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13 February 2013: Kelud in Indonesia erupts sending ash covering an area 500 kilometres in diameter.
4 June 2011: An eruption occurs on Puyehue, Chile.
21 May 2011: Grímsvötn, in Iceland, erupts, disrupting European air travel.
19 February 2011: Mount Etna in Italy erupts for the second time this year. The event is of Stromobolian-type activity.
17 February 2011: Earthquake activity occurs at Mount St. Helens, USA. The earthquake swarms occurred in the same area as those preceding St. Helen's famous 1980 eruption. No actions have yet taken place.

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