Mauna Kea is a dormant volcano on the island of Hawai’i. Its peak is 4,207. 3 m above sea level, making it the highest point in the state. When measured from its underwater base, it is the tallest mountain in the world. The volcano continues to slip and flatten under its own weight at a rate of less than 0. 2 mm per year.
About Mauna Kea in brief
Mauna Kea is a dormant volcano on the island of Hawaiʻi. Its peak is 4,207. 3 m above sea level, making it the highest point in the state. When measured from its underwater base, it is the tallest mountain in the world. It is over 32,000 km3 in volume, so massive that it and its neighbor, Mauna Loa, depress the ocean crust beneath it by 6 km. The volcano continues to slip and flatten under its own weight at a rate of less than 0. 2 mm per year. It began as a preshield volcano driven by the Hawaiian hotspot around one million years ago, and became exceptionally active during its shield stage until 500,000 years ago. It entered its quieter post-shield stage 250,000 to 200,000 years ago and is currently dormant. With its high elevation, dry environment, and stable airflow, the summit is one of the best sites for astronomical observation. Since the creation of an access road in 1964, thirteen telescopes funded by eleven countries have been constructed at the summit. They are used for scientific research across the electromagnetic spectrum and comprise the largest such facility in theworld. Mauna Ke a has been created as the Pacific tectonic plate has moved over the Hawaiian plate’s underlying mantle. The island volcanoes are the most evidence of this process, while there remains no definite explanation of the prevailing prevailing theory of Hawaiian volcanism, though it is not completely settled, though not completelysettled, though the prevailing view is that the hotspot has been largely stationary within the planet’s mantle for much of the Cozoic Era, if not all of the past 2.5 million years.
The peak is about 38 m higher than its more massive neighbor. It has an alpine climate at its summit, a Sophora chrysophylla–Myoporum sandwicense forest on its flanks, and an Acacia koa–Metrosideros polymorpha forest, now mostly cleared by the former sugar industry, at its base. In Hawaiian religion, the peaks of the island are sacred. An ancient law allowed only high-ranking ali’i to visit its peak. The construction of a road on a landscape considered sacred by Native Hawaiians continues to be a topic of debate to this day. The most recent court case has forced the Hawai’i Department of Land and Natural Resources to eradicate all feral species on the volcano. A former summit caldera may have been filled and buried by later summit eruption deposits. It does not have a visible summitcaldera, but contains a number of small cinder and pumice cones near its summit. The summit is the highest in Hawaii, and is significantly greater than the elevation of Mount Everest above sea level. It was once the most active volcano in the Hawaiian–Emperor seamount chain, but is now considered dormant.
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This page is based on the article Mauna Kea published in Wikipedia (as of Dec. 03, 2020) and was automatically summarized using artificial intelligence.
