Volcanoes

A volcano is where there is a opening in the planets  surface or crust , which allows hot magma , ashes , and gases to escape from below the surface. Volcanoes are normally found where tectonic plates are deverging or converging .  They can also form when there is a  stretch or thinning of the Earth's crust of the interior plates,some examples are East African Rift , Wells - Grey Clearwater volcanic field, and the Rio Grand rift in  North America.













Divergent Plate Boundaries
Around the mid-oceanic  ridges there are two tectonic plates that are diverge from one another , the new oceanic crust is  being formed by hot molten rock which is slowly  cooling ans solidifying. This crust is very thin because of the tectonic plates .An example of this would be Black smokers or deep sea vents .









Convergent  Plate Boundaries
Subduction zones are places with two plates where the oceanic plate and the continental plate collide with one another .When this happens the oceanic plate submerges under the continental plate which forms a deep ocean trench offshore. Water released from this subducting plate lowers the melting temperature of the overlaying mantle wedge , which creates magma. Examples of this would be the Mount Etna, and the Pacific Ring of Fire.







Volcanic Features
The most common volcano that we know today would be the conical mountain , that spews lava and  poisonous gases from a carter at the summit.The structure and behavior of volcanoes depends on many different factors . A few volcanoes have rugged peaks , while others have landscape features such as a plateau .


Different  Volcanoes
Fissure vents - are flat linear cracks where lava emerges.

Shield Volcano-  named for their  broad-shield shape ,  are formed by the eruption of the low viscosity lava which can flow a great distance from the vent  but normally  don't explode catastrophically.

Lava Domes - are built by slow  eruptions of the high viscous lavas , or in other cases can be formed within the crater of a previous volcano or independently. 

There are other  types of volcanoes such as cryptodomes , volcanic cones , stratovolcanoes , super volcanoes, and submarine volcanoes.


My Personal Opinion

My thoughts on this matter is that I never knew that there could be so many different types of volcanoes , in a way it is  interesting how you can learn so much about one thing if you do the research. I had an idea of that it had something to do with tetonic plates , but I never knew about the rest of the other information. It surprised me that there were two kinds of plate boundaries I only thought there would be one or something.