Garibaldi Volcanic Belt facts for kids
The Garibaldi Volcanic Belt is the northern part of the Cascade Volcanic Belt. It is in British Columbia and the northwestern United States. Its volcanos are the most explosive in Canada.
The volcanoes are also the closest to British Columbia's densely populated southwest corner. These volcanoes are the result of subduction of the Juan de Fuca tectonic plate: the plates meet just seaward of the west coast of Vancouver Island. The volcanoes of the Garibaldi Volcanic Belt are stratovolcanoes typical of subduction zones, and include Mount Garibaldi, Mount Cayley and Mount Meager. Meager's eruption 2,350 years ago is the youngest explosive eruption in Canada. It was similar to that of Mount St. Helens in 1980 and the ongoing eruption of Montserrat in the Caribbean.
Images for kids
-
Area of the Cascadia subduction zone, including the Cascade Volcanic Arc (red triangles). The Garibaldi Volcanic Belt is shown here as three red triangles at the northernmost end of the arc.
-
The edge of The Barrier ice-marginal lava flow. Debris extending down the edge of The Barrier is where historical landslides have occurred.
-
North face of Mount Garibaldi. The Table is the flat-topped steep-sided edifice in the foreground rising above Garibaldi Lake.
-
The Black Tusk viewed from the southeast. Its craggy edifice is the result of prolonged erosion.
-
Mount Fee and its jagged ridge
-
South face of Pyroclastic Peak, the second highest peak of the Mount Cayley massif.
-
Volcanic rubble in the Mount Cayley area. Its ridge-like structure provides easy travel to the north towards Mount Fee.
-
Northern flank of the Mount Meager massif. The volcanic vent that produced its latest eruption 2,350 years ago is the bowl-shaped depression in the middle of this image.
-
Geologic map of the Silverthrone volcanic field and nearby rivers. The white circular feature is the inferred boundary of the Silverthrone Caldera.
-
A volcanic hot spring near Meager Creek related to volcanism at the Mount Meager massif. This hot spring lies in one of the few hot spring clusters near Meager.
-
The Table, a flow-dominated tuya rising above the southwestern side of Garibaldi Lake.
-
Keyhole Falls, the largest waterfall along the Lillooet River. The solid-looking rock cliffs formed when a lava flow front repeatedly collapsed and collected downslope from the vent associated with the eruption of Plinth Peak 2,350 years ago.
