The tallest of the peaks is Cerro del Pinacate (also called Volcan Santa Clara), elevation 3,904 feet (1,190 m). This rugged volcanic terrain made the Pinacate a … Part of El Pinacate y Gran Desierto de Altar Biosphere Reserve — Sonora. Among hundreds of volcanic vents and cinder cones are rare maar craters, formed when rising magma met underground water to create pockets of steam that blew nearly circular holes in the … Determining the 40 Ar/ 39 Ar ages of young basaltic volcanic rocks is complicated by many factors, including the possible presence of excess argon and low potassium content. The Biosphere Reserve contains young volcanoes, basalt lava flows, and giant maar craters on the Pinacate Volcanic field. The source vent of the eruption is Tecolote volcano (27 ± 6 ka, 40 Ar/ 39 Ar). The larger circular craters seen in the image are a type of volcano known as a "maar", which erupts violently when rising magma encounters groundwater, producing highly pressurized steam that powers explosive eruptions. It is a protected Biosphere Reserve and World Heritage site. your own Pins on Pinterest Pinacate volcanism is monogenetic and has been intermittently-continuous since initiation in the early … The Spanish name for the Pinacate Peaks geographic feature is the Sierra Pinacate, which is used in their homeland of Mexico. The field comprises 2,000 km2 of basaltic volcanic rocks. Located in far northwest Sonora, Mexico, the Pinacate volcanic field comprises a 1,500 km2 area of Pleistocene lava flows with over 400 cinder cones and 8 maars. The crest of the East Ridge subsided into a graben, and three valleys formed in the South Wall, each at the head of a short lava flow. Volcanic Field James T. Gutmann The Pinacate is a special place thanks largely to its geology. Detailed Description. The crater rim in the center of the photo is that of Crater Elegante, a 1.6-km-wide maar. It is dominated topographically by the Sierra Pinacate, a broad, composite volcanic pile in the southern half of the field with a maximum elevation of 1,206 m. Many of these volcanic rocks evidently are of late The volcanoes in the Pinacate are monogenetic—meaning they erupt only once and each have a unique magmatic signature. This website is my Pinacate book. El Pinacate Volcanic Field (PVF) is located on the NNW region of Sonora, Mexico, and it consists on older lava flows, covered and surrounded by some cinder cones and younger lava flows, result of two different volcanic events, the older one, the event Pre Pinacate (Miocene) and the younger one Pinacate (Quaternary). The shield Volcan Santa Clara is the largest volcano in the field and is pimpled with smaller cinder cones. Pinacate Volcano Field (Public domain.) P-47415 September 19, 1996 This spaceborne radar image shows the Pinacate Volcanic Field in the state of Sonora, Mexico, about 150 kilometers (93 miles) southeast of Yuma, Arizona. This booklet is your field guide to the geology of these splendid desert landscapes. I reconstructed the third youngest eruption in the PVF. 1970. Here we reconstruct one of the youngest eruptions in the Pinacate volcanic field (Sonora, Mexico)and estimate the volumes of the lava flows, scoria cone, and tephra units. Most of the rock fell into the space formerly occupied by gravel beneath the flows. This tube-fed pahoehoe flow contrasts sharply with other Pinacate lavas in its great volume, alkali-poor composition and morphologic features, which include novel small structures named "spatter tubes." Pinacate’s volcanoes are all on continental crust of the Southern Basin & Range geologic province; a colorful background of preCambrian gneisses, Permian and Laramide granites, and mid-Tertiary andesites. The United States/Mexico border runs across the upper right corner of the image. One of the small cones, Tecolote, is unique in the world. Monogenetic volcanic fields of Quaternary age like this one are scattered across all the tectonically active regions of the Earth; more than fifty lie within 1000 km of Pinacate. Excavating a crater like the one pictured requires Herculean energies; that hole once held half a billion tons of rock and gravel that was ejected by steam explosions. Pinacate volcano is a young volcanic field of maars, tuff rings, more than 500 basaltic cinder cones in the Sonoran desert in NW Mexico, a nearly unpopulated region between Arizona and the Gulf of California. The Pinacate Peaks (Sierra Pinacate, O'odham: Cuk Doʼag) are a group of volcanic peaks and cinder cones located mostly in the Mexican state of Sonora along the international border adjacent to the U.S. state of Arizona, surrounded by the vast sand dune field of the Gran Desierto de Altar, at the desert's southeast.[1]. In 1981, Dan Lynch completed his Ph.D. dissertation, "Genesis and Geochronology of Alkaline Volcanism in the Pinacate Volcanic Field, Northwestern Sonora, Mexico" at the University of Arizona. Pinacate is a 1500 km oval of Lower Sonoran Desert covered with lava flows and cinders of more than 450 small volcanoes distributed across the area. The Gran Desierto de Altar is one of the major sub-ecoregions of the Sonoran Desert, located in the State of Sonora, in northwest Mexico.It includes the only active erg dune region in North America.The desert extends across much of the northern border of the Gulf of California, spanning more than 100 kilometres (62 mi) east to west and over 50 kilometres (31 mi) north to south. The Pinacates (the name means stink bug!) The field today is part of El Pinacate and Gran… Tecolote volcano, Pinacate volcanic field (Sonora, Mexico): A case of highly explosive basaltic volcanism and shifting eruptive styles April 2019 Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research 379 Here we reconstruct one of the youngest eruptions in the Pinacate volcanic field (Sonora, Mexico) and estimate the volumes of the lava flows, scoria cone, and tephra units. In addition, there are a number of maar volcanoes, the most prominent of which is the Elegante Crater. The Pinacate Peaks lie just north of the fishing resort of Puerto Peñasco. Here we reconstruct one of the youngest eruptions in the Pinacate volcanic field (Sonora, Mexico) and estimate the volumes of the lava flows, scoria cone, and tephra units. At its core lies the Sierra Pinacate, a central massif of old lava flows that is mantled with and surrounded by younger flows and cinder cones. These magmas were evolved from basalt by fractional crystallization and constitute the entire alkaline rock series from basalt to trachyte. The crater rim in the center of the photo is that of Crater Elegante, a 1.6-km-wide maar. NASA sent astronauts here starting in 1965 for geologic training, given the similarity of the terrain to the lunar surface, and included training models of lunar surface equipment. The volcanoes here have erupted here sporadically since about 4 million years ago, probably in association with the opening of the Gulf of California. This is an active volcanic field and future eruptions are anticipated. More than 300 volcanic vents occur in the Pinacate field, including cinder cones that experienced small eruptions as recently as 1934. [2], A variety of flora and fauna occur in the Pinacate Mountains, including the sculptural Elephant Tree, Bursera microphylla.[3]. Thumbnail Medium Original. The volcanic cinder cone field stains the landscape of bright sand and tall dunes in the El Pinacate y Gran Desierto de Altar Biosphere Reserve. The Pinacate volcanic field is located in northwestern Sonora, Mexico, near the northern end of the Gulf of California. The source vent of the eruption is Tecolote volcano (27 ± 6 ka, 40 Ar/ 39 Ar). Tecolote appears to have melted internally but Iâll be damned if I know how. [4], The El Pinacate y Gran Desierto de Altar Biosphere Reserve is a biosphere reserve, in the spanish language Reserva de la Biosfera el Pinacate y Gran Desierto de Altar, managed by the Mexican Federal Government's SEMARNAT - the Ministry of the Environment and Natural Resources, in collaboration with the government of the State of Sonora's IMADES agency. The Pleistocene-Holocene Pinacate volcanic field encroaches on the Gran Desierto of Sonora, Mexico. Maar-calderas created by steam activity are common enough to be considered major features of monogenetic volcanic fields; sixteen of those "Fifty Fields" have them. U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The United States/Mexico border runs across the upper right corner of the image. This giant maar-caldera and the trachyte shield volcano on the horizon are two of the features that make what Sykes called "The Pinacate Lava Fieldsâ extraordinary. This volcanic field extends over an area of nearly 600 square miles between the Gulf of California and the International Boundary, and a small part of it projects northward into Arizona. False-color … Dan Lynch’s love affair with the Pinacate Volcanic Field – Pinacate in Stereo. [5], El Pinacate y Gran Desierto de Altar Biosphere Reserve. It is a kilometer-tall Cerro (mountain) rather than Sierra (range) dotted with younger cone volcanoes like Pinacate Peak, the highest point in the field. Pinacate has three giants that rival anything in Africa as well as a bunch of smaller ones. The field is prominent in satellite photos of this arid region of NW México near the head of the Gulf of California. English: The Pinacate volcanic field is a roughly 55 x 60 km area containing numerous maars, tuff rings, and cinder cones in NW México near the head of the Gulf of California. The trachyte shield could be called a point-source volcano because its low viscosity magmas seem to have erupted through a small summit conduit system and flowed easily outward and downslope to build a volcanic shield. NASA Information and Satellite Image: Pinacate Mountains, http://www.biology.ed.ac.uk/research/groups/jdeacon/desertecology/pinacate.htm, http://www.desertinvasion.us/areas/pinacate_res.html, Official Pinacate y Gran Desierto de Altar Biosphere Reserve website, Global Volcanism Program: Pinacate Mountains, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Pinacate_Peaks&oldid=929892691, Articles containing O'odham-language text, Articles containing Spanish-language text, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, This page was last edited on 8 December 2019, at 22:52. Strong sulfur fumarole activity followed the bomb eruption, indurating some of the bomb-covered surfaces solidly enough to hold vertical scarps when the cone melted and the surface cracked apart along a profusion of faults. All of the Pinacate magmas came through at least some ground water under the field but only about a dozen out of 465 eruptions even noticed the water and interacted with it. Apollo 14's Alan Shepard and Ed Mitchell, and Apollo 17's Jack Schmitt trained here in Feb. Cover: The Pinacate volcanic field as imaged by the Spaceborne Imaging Radar-C/X-band Synthetic Aperture Radar (SIR-C/X-SAR) carried onboard the space shuttle Endeavour on April 18, 1994. The field covers 1800 km2 of desert. From space its a landmark at the head of the Gulf of California. Copyright ©2013 by Dan Lynch, geologist, beholden to nobody. Oct 14, 2013 - This Pin was discovered by Lynn Recker. 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