| I am going to talk about a place that fascinat me for its geological history : Lanzarote, which is located in the Atlantic Ocean. It is one of the seven Spanish islands that make up the Canary archipelago. The island is 1000 kilometres from Spain and 140 kilometres from Morocco. Niknamed the ' island of volcanoes ' , it is said to be the oldest island at 23 million years old. Althoug the volcanoes are anciant, there were two major volcanic eruptions creating the ' Mountains of Fire ' , located in the Timanfaya Park. In 1730, a massive volcanic eruption with the creation of 100 volcanoes reduced a third of the island to ash and burned everything in its path. Andrés Lorenzo Curbelo, the island ' s parish prieste at the time of the great eruptions, reported in his book that the first eruption took place on the 1st September 1730, between nine and ten o ' clock in the evening. With a deafening noise, the ground opened up and an immense mountain rise from the earth, building more than thirty cones all aligned in a gigantic fissure of 18 km. This was the crater of the volcano, El Cuervo (the raven ), which exploded and relaesed a veritable tidale wave of lava. The 1824 eruption generated three volcanoes. The eruption lasted 86 days, covering about 49. km2. As a result, the relief of the island is hily as it is now composed of 300 volcanic cones, which have been eroded over the years. However, geothermal activity is still present. From experiments carried out in front of tourists, stagering temperatures are recorded with 277 ° C only 10 cm below ground and 610 ° C at 13 m depth. |
