Santa Clara shield volcano, seen on the SW horizon beyond the rim of Cráter Elegante maar, is of late-Pliocene to Pleistocene age. The broad edifice is largely mantled by pyroclastic ejecta and lava flows of the basaltic Pinacate monogenetic volcanic series, which began erupting about 1.2 million years ago. More than 500 scoria cones and associated lava flows have formed across the Pinacate field and extend into the surrounding desert.

Photo by Bill Rose, 1969 (Michigan Technological University).

This image is made available under the Creative Commons BY-NC-ND 4.0 license terms.

Galleries: Shield Volcanoes | Craters

Keywords: crater | stratigraphy | geology | outcrop | shield volcano

Pinacate