Volcano Type: Stratovolcanoes
Volcano Status: Historical
Last Known Eruption: 2010 (continuing)
Summit Elevation: 5426 m 17,802 feet
Latitude: 19.023°N 19°1’24″N
Longitude: 98.622°W 98°37’20″W
Volcán Popocatépetl, whose name is the Aztec word for smoking mountain, towers to 5426 m 70 km SE of Mexico City to form North America’s 2nd-highest volcano. The glacier-clad stratovolcano contains a steep-walled, 400 x 600 m wide crater. The generally symmetrical volcano is modified by the sharp-peaked Ventorrillo on the NW, a remnant of an earlier volcano. At least three previous major cones were destroyed by gravitational failure during the Pleistocene, producing massive debris-avalanche deposits covering broad areas south of the volcano. The modern volcano was constructed to the south of the late-Pleistocene to Holocene El Fraile cone. Three major plinian eruptions, the most recent of which took place about 800 AD, have occurred from Popocatépetl since the mid Holocene, accompanied by pyroclastic flows and voluminous lahars that swept basins below the volcano. Frequent historical eruptions, first recorded in Aztec codices, have occurred since precolumbian time.
Volcán Popocatépetl Eruption
Popocatepetl is a large, partly glacier-covered, composite andesitic volcano. It is located 60 km southeast of Mexico City on the volcanic front of the central Mexican magmatic arc. Popocatépetl is the third highest active volcano in the Northern Hemisphere. The volcano presents a great hazard to Mexico City and to other nearby cities and towns from a possible major volcanic eruption.
Sunset in Popocatépetl (Diana Aguirre)
Volcán Popocatépetl
Popocatépetl at sunset (Gloria Zelaya)
Popocatépetl Eruption (Edgar Xolot)
Originally posted 2010-08-07 04:35:32.
