Balagan-Tas

Balagan-Tas
Balagan-Tas
Балаган-Тас
	Balagan-Tas Sakha Republic, Russia
Highest point
Elevation	993 m (3,258 ft)
Prominence	300 m (980 ft)
Coordinates	65°57′N 145°54′E / 65.95°N 145.9°E
Naming
Native name	Балаҕан Таас (Yakut); Balaghan Taas (Yakut);
Geography
Location	Sakha Republic, Russia
Parent range	Chersky Range
Geology
Age of rock	266,000 ± 30,000 years
Mountain type	Cinder Cone
Last eruption	1775

Balagan-Tas (Yakut: Балаҕан Таас, Russian: Балаган-Тас) is a cinder cone volcano in Russia. It was discovered by V.A. Zimin in 1939^[1] and is one of the main features of the Moma Natural Park.^[2]

Description

This volcano is located in the Chersky Range,^[3] in the Moma River valley and is the only clearly Quaternary volcano in the area; the existence of another volcano active in the 1770s has not been confirmed.^[4] The supposed Indighirsky volcano may be actually Balagan-Tas.^[5] Its location has often been given incorrectly.^[6]

Balagan-Tas is a volcanic cone with a crater of which little remains. It covers a surface area of 1.8 square kilometres (0.69 sq mi).^[7] The crater is 200 metres (660 ft) wide and 40 metres (130 ft) deep, the cone is 300 metres (980 ft) high and has a base diameter of 1,200 metres (3,900 ft).^[8] It may be considered a composite volcano.^[9] The volcano has generated three lava flows which cover a surface area of 45 square kilometres (17 sq mi).^[6] They reach a thickness of 10 metres (33 ft).^[7]

The volcano has erupted alkali basalts typical for rift zone volcanoes.^[6] Its composition has been characterized as hawaiite.^[5] Titanium dioxide contents of 3.81% have been measured. The helium-3/helium-4 ratios approach these associated with mantle plumes.^[1]

Balagan-Tas lies on an anticline.^[10] It is associated with faulting.^[11] Further it is related to the Moma-Zoryansk rift and the Gakkel ridge, which extends to the Laptev sea.^[12] The De Long Islands and a potentially Quaternary dyke complex of the Viliga river may also be related.^[3] This tectonic activity is related to the interaction between the Eurasian Plate and the North American Plate.^[13]

Other volcanoes are found in the neighbourhood.^[6] Northwest of Balagan-Tas lies the Uraga Khaya volcano;^[14] it is located 66°06′N 145°24′E / 66.1°N 145.4°E / 66.1; 145.4 and is a lava dome formed by rhyolite. Its age is unclear, potassium-argon dating has yielded an age of 16.6 mya but its appearance indicates it may be considerably younger. A further volcano may exist northwest of this centre.^[6] A liparite dome named Majak is located at 66°27′N 147°09′E / 66.45°N 147.15°E / 66.45; 147.15,^[7] but it may be the same as Uraga Khaya and the coordinates wrong.^[6]

Potassium-argon dating of Balagan-Tas has yielded an age of 266,000 ± 30,000 years ago, comparable to Anyuj volcano,^[15] and may reflect a regional or global pulse of volcanic activity.^[16] Other sources consider the volcano late Holocene in age,^[17] or even as active during historical time.^[1] Hot springs are found southeast of Balagan-Tas. They reach temperatures of 30 °C (86 °F),^[18] which together with the other activity indicates a hot upper mantle.^[1] If reports of activity of the supposed Indighirsky volcano in the 1770s refer to Balagan-Tas,^[7] this volcano may have had historical activity,^[7] one of the few outside of Kamchatka in continental Asia.^[19]

References

^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Grachev, A. F. (31 October 2003). "The Arctic rift system and the boundary between the Eurasian and North American lithospheric plates: New insight to plate tectonic theory". Russian Journal of Earth Sciences. 5 (5): 307–345. doi:10.2205/2003ES000135. S2CID 129810650.
^ "Moma Natural Park Official site". Archived from the original on 2019-09-29. Retrieved 2019-11-06.
^ ^a ^b Silantyev, S.A.; Bogdanovskii, O.G.; Fedorov, P.I.; Karpenko, S.F.; Kostitsyn, Yu.A (June 2004). "Intraplate magmatism of the De Long Islands: A response to the propagation of the ultraslow-spreading Gakkel Ridge into the passive continental margin in the Laptev Sea" (PDF). Russian Journal of Earth Sciences. 6 (3): 172. doi:10.2205/2004ES000150. Retrieved 23 September 2016.
^ Maria Shahgedanova (2002). The Physical Geography of Northern Eurasia. Oxford University Press. p. 300. ISBN 978-0-19-823384-8.
^ ^a ^b Whitford-Stark 1983, p. 199.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f Fujita, Cambray & Velbel 1990, p. 110.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e Whitford-Stark 1987, p. 24.
^ Whitford-Stark 1987, p. 48.
^ Whitford-Stark 1987, p. 29.
^ Whitford-Stark 1983, p. 213.
^ Matveyenko, V. T.; Shatalov, E. T. (February 1963). "Fractures, Magmatism and Mineralization in the Northeast of the U.s.s R. (Part 1 of 2)". International Geology Review. 5 (2): 153. Bibcode:1963IGRv....5..127M. doi:10.1080/00206816309473762.
^ Richard E. Ernst; Kenneth L. Buchan (1 January 2001). Mantle Plumes: Their Identification Through Time. Geological Society of America. p. 213. ISBN 978-0-8137-2352-5.
^ Whitford-Stark 1987, p. 39.
^ Fujita, Cambray & Velbel 1990, p. 111.
^ Pevzner, M. M.; Gertsev, D. O.; Romanenko, F. A.; Kushcheva, Yu. V. (6 July 2011). "The first data on isotopic age of Anyui volcano (Chukotka)". Doklady Earth Sciences. 438 (2): 737. Bibcode:2011DokES.438..736P. doi:10.1134/S1028334X11060109. S2CID 128991774.
^ Pevzner, M. M.; Gertsev, D. O.; Fedorov, P. I.; Romanenko, F. A.; Kushcheva, Yu. V. (January 2017). "Anyui Volcano in Chukotka: Age, structure, pecularities of rocks' composition and eruptions". Lithology and Mineral Resources. 52 (1): 45. Bibcode:2017LitMR..52...20P. doi:10.1134/s0024490217010059. S2CID 132021660.
^ Whitford-Stark 1987, p. 35.
^ Fujita, Cambray & Velbel 1990, p. 112.
^ Whitford-Stark 1987, p. 31.

Sources

Whitford-Stark, J. L. (1987). "A Survey of Cenozoic Volcanism on Mainland Asia". Geological Society of America Special Papers. Vol. 213. pp. 1–74. doi:10.1130/SPE213-p1. ISBN 978-0-8137-2213-9. ISSN 0072-1077. {{cite book}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
Whitford-Stark, J.L. (December 1983). "Cenozoic volcanic and petrochemical provinces of Mainland Asia". Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research. 19 (3–4): 193–222. Bibcode:1983JVGR...19..193W. doi:10.1016/0377-0273(83)90110-5.
Fujita, Kazuya; Cambray, F.William; Velbel, Michael A (June 1990). "Tectonics of the Laptev Sea and Moma rift systems, northeastern USSR". Marine Geology. 93: 95–118. Bibcode:1990MGeol..93...95F. doi:10.1016/0025-3227(90)90079-Y.