Tuesday, June 29, 2010

LAS CAÑADAS - TENERIFE

Las Cañadas caldera, Mount Teide – Not dead just sleeping! The UN Committee for Disaster Mitigation has listed Teide for close observation due to its history of powerful eruptions and its location near several large towns.

At the summit of Mount Teide, one of the largest Island volcanoes in the World is the Las Cañadas caldera. The crater, which is an enourmous sixteen kilometres across, is a picture of what Hell might look like if it cooled a little. Shear walls that formed when the caldera first collapsed encircle this dry and alien place. And, with an arrogance than can only be accepted as typical, humanity has built roads and observatories across this no mans land that is little more than a plug over a sleeping yet still active and very large volcano. When we visited it some years ago we were standing in the viewing gallery when the ground beneath our feet trembled and several windows suddenly cracked. The sleeping giant was grumbling in its sleep. The land mass created by the volcano is Tenerife in the Canary Islands.

No comments:

Post a Comment