Diatremes and Craters Attributed to Natural Explosions: Usgs Trace Elements Memorandum 1090

By Eugene Merle Shoemaker

Diatremes - volcanic pipes attributed to explosion - and craters have been studied to infer the ultimate causes and physical conditions attending natural explosive processes. Initial piercement of diatremes on the Navajo reservation, Arizona was probably along a fracture propagated by a high-pressure aqueous fluid. Gas rising at high velocity along the fracture would become converted to a gas-solid fluidized system by entrainment of wall- rock fragments. The first stages of widening of the vent are probably accomplished mainly by simple abrasion of the high-velocity fluidized system on the walls of the fracture. As the vent widens, its enlargement may be accelerated by inward spalling of the walls. The inferred mechanics of the Navajo-Hopi diatremes is used to illustrate the possibility of diatreme formation over a molten salt mass.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1288670885
• ISBN13: 9781288670888
• Release Date: January 2013
• Publisher: Bibliogov
• Length: 30 Pages
• Weight: 0.16 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.1" x 7.4" x 9.7"