Kilimanjaro with its three volcanic cones, Kibo, Mawensi, and Shira, is an inactive strato-volcano in north-eastern Tanzania. It is the tallest free-standing mountain in the world, rising 4,600 m from its base, and includes the highest peak in Africa at 5,895 meters. While the volcano appears to be dormant on the inside, events on top of the mountain draw global attention. The top of the mountain has seen a retreat of the most recent covering of glaciers, with the most recent ice cap volume dropping by more than 80%. Sources disagree when the glaciers will be gone due to melting. In 2002, a study led by Ohio State University ice core paleoclimatologist Lonnie Thompson predicted that ice on top of Africa's tallest peak would be gone between 2015 and 2020. In 2007, a team of Austrian scientists from University of Innsbruck predicted that the plateau ice cap will be gone by 2040, but some ice on the slope will remain longer due to local weather conditions. Yet, another, the California Academy of Sciences, predicts that the will be gone by 2050. A comparison of ice core records suggests conditions today are returning to those of 11,000 years ago. A study by Philip Mote of the University of Washington in the United States and Georg Kaser of the University of Innsbruck in Austria concludes that the shrinking of Kilimanjaro's ice cap is not directly due to rising temperature but rather to decreased precipitation. In May 2008 The Tanzanian Minister for Natural Resources, Ms Shamsa Mwangunga, said that there were indications that snow cover on the mountain was actually increasing. In January 2006, the Western Breach route was closed by the Tanzanian government following a rockslide that killed four people at Arrow Glacier Camp. On December 1, 2007 the Western Breach route was reopened for climbing.
Mount Kilimanjaro is one of the largest stratovolcanoes in the world. Otherwise known as a composite volcano, it comprises numerous layers of lava, tephra and volcanic ash. Tephra is rhyolitic (an igneous, extrusive rock) in composition, and is formed by air-fall material of an eruption, which suggests the composite volcano was once active. However, at the moment it is dormant. According to experts there have been no eruptions in living memory. Recent studies suggest the last eruptions on the mountain were between 150,000 and 200,000 years ago.[14] Mount Kilimanjaro is in the shape of a mountainous volcano; it is formed by ejecta being thrown up by the volcano vent, which then piles around the vent in the shape of a cone. Due to the fact that Mount Kilimanjaro is made up of tephra, it has a cinder cone. This is because the mountains cone is made up of tephra cinders. They are made up of blobs of congealed lava and particles. When the mountain did erupt millions of years ago, the gas-charged lava would be blown violently into the air, then breaking the smaller fragments which would solidify and fall as cinders. This left Mount Kilimanjaro with a bowl-shaped crater. In geologic history, it would not be uncommon for a stratovolcano such as Mount Kilimanjaro to have experienced explosive eruptions. The lava from the mountain is viscous (viscosity is a measure of the thickness of a fluid which is deformed by shear stress or extensional stress) which cools down before it spreads very far. The lava's viscosity helps explain why Mount Kilimanjaro has relatively small crater formations. The rock on the mountain is felsic and has high levels of silica, especially tephratic silicate. This silica is also in alternating sectors, with lava flows and ejecta in different formations. This is called stratum, which is usually formed by natural forces (i.e. volcanic eruptions) from Mount Kilimanjaro.
Kilimanjaro is the highest mountain in Africa, located in Northeast Tanzania, near the Kenya border. Kilimanjaro is an extinct volcano, and is one of the most massive in the world. It towers 15,000 feet above the surrounding arid plains, and 2.5 square miles of its surface are over 18,500 feet. Beneath its ice dome, snow extends down long gullies that have been eroded in the mountain sides. Kilimanjaro's summit crater, known as Kibo, measures an incredible 1.5 miles across. The highest point on Kibo's steep rim is Uhuru, the highest peak in Africa. Nestled in the center of Kibo is a smaller crater, 600-feet deep in sulfurous ashes. Mawenzi (16,893 ft), Kilimanjaro's smaller second cone, is seven miles east of Kibo, separated by a long saddle. Mawenzi is an older cone, jagged from erosion, with sheer faces on all sides. Despite its lower elevation, Mawenzi is the more difficult climb, and no approach is possible without rock climbing and/or snow and ice climbing skills. Mawenzi is the third highest peak in Africa. Mount Kenya (17,057 ft.) is second. The approach and climb provides spectacular diversity, from scrub-lands thick with African wildlife to lush forests to flowering alpine tundra. All this finally gives way to snow and rock above 15,000 feet. Kilimanjaro's summit crater, known as Kibo, measures an incredible 1.5 miles across. The highest point on Kibo's steep rim is Uhuru, the highest peak in Africa. Nestled in the center of Kibo is a smaller crater, 600-feet deep in sulfurous ashes. Mawenzi (16,893 ft), Kilimanjaro's smaller second cone, is seven miles east of Kibo, separated by a long saddle. Mawenzi is an older cone, jagged from erosion, with sheer faces on all sides. Despite its lower elevation, Mawenzi is the more difficult climb, and no approach is possible without rock climbing and/or snow and ice climbing skills. Mawenzi is the third highest peak in Africa. Mount Kenya (17,057 ft.) is second. The approach and climb provides spectacular diversity, from scrub-lands thick with African wildlife to lush forests to flowering alpine tundra. All this finally gives way to snow and rock above 15,000 feet.
