Blog Post Two

Forming Olympus Mons

Yes we get it, Olympus Mons is massive. However, I did not mention just how big it actually is. Towering all the other volcanos in the Tharsis Montes region near the equator it stands at 16.7 miles (26.87 kilometers) and stretches 374 miles (601.8 kilometers) across (which is about the size of Arizona!). In other words,  that would be 88,176 feet tall and 1,974,720 feet wide. Take Mount. Everest, for example it stands at 29,029 feet, compare both and that means that Olympus is roughly three time bigger. Thats ridiculous... An interesting fact about the mountain is that if you were to stand on the edge of the caldera you wouldn't be able to notice the base beyond the horizon because it wraps around the planet. Mind blowing I know...

Now that we understand how big it is we can cover how it was formed. First of all it important to note that that Olympus Mons is a shield volcano. This means that instead of shooting out violently from the top, lava fluid slowly flows down the side of the mountain onto the surface, spreads out and as a result cools into a broad, low angled slope.  Although it is has taken a very very long time to form, certain regions of the mountain are only a couple of million years old. So why is it so big? According to space.com, scientists believe that it is because of the lack of tectonic plate movement, low surface gravity, high eruption rates, and a concentration of hot spots. For instance, take the Hawaiian islands, tectonic plate movements have prevented the volcanos from building up steady lava in one hot spot. Instead, the plate moves and creates a small collection of islands above that hot spot each time it erupts.