Extinct volcanoes are those that have not erupted or showed no other signs of activity for more than ten thousand years. In fact, even after such a long period of time, it is impossible to unequivocally assume that the volcano is no longer active - sometimes they erupt even after a longer "hibernation". In addition, volcanoes are often called extinct, which erupted not so long ago, but on a small scale. Often they include Ararat, Kazbek, Elbrus and other famous mountains.
Ararat
Ararat is an ancient stratovolcano in the Armenian Highlands. It is located on the territory of Turkey, but since ancient times it belonged to Armenia and is a symbol of this state. The mountain consists of two peaks - Big and Small Ararat, the cones of which were formed after the eruption of the volcano. The first has a height of 5165 meters, the second - 3925 meters above sea level. They are located at a fairly large distance from each other and look like two separate mountains. Both peaks are extinct, although in the bowels of this area activity clearly did not stop: in 1840, a small eruption occurred in the vicinity, causing an earthquake and an avalanche.
Elbrus and Kazbek
The highest point of Europe - Elbrus - is also often called an extinct stratovolcano, although this title can be disputed, since the last eruption occurred in a historical period, in the 1st century AD. Although the scale of this eruption was insignificant compared to what this volcano did in prehistoric times. It was formed more than twenty million years ago, at the dawn of its existence, it erupted many times, throwing out a huge amount of ash.
Kazbek is also called extinct, but its last earthquake occurred in 650 BC. Therefore, many scientists rank it as active, because not much time has passed by geological standards.
Other extinct volcanoes
There are more truly extinct volcanoes, which have not shown their activity for more than ten thousand years, than active ones - several hundred, but they are almost unknown among the broad masses, since most of them, due to their antiquity, do not differ in height and large size. Many of them are located in Kamchatka: Klyuchevaya, Olka, Chavycha, Spokoiny, and some of them are in the oceans in the form of islands formed as a result of the eruption. Several volcanoes, presumably incapable of eruption, are located in the Baikal region: Kovrizhka, Podgorny, Talskaya peak.
One of the Scottish castles is built on the remains of a very ancient extinct volcano that last erupted over three hundred million years ago. Almost nothing remained of its slopes - during the Ice Age, glaciers broke them. In New Mexico, there is Sheep Rock, also a remnant of an ancient volcano: its walls are almost completely destroyed, and the channel with frozen magma is partially exposed.
For a long time, the Mexican volcano El Chichon was considered extinct, but in 1982 it suddenly began to erupt. Scientists began to study it and found out that the previous eruption happened not so long ago - just over a thousand years ago, they just did not know anything about it.
