Geoheritage values of one of the largest maar craters in the Arabian Peninsula: the Al Wahbah Crater and other volcanoes (Harrat Kishb, Saudi Arabia)

2013 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohammed Moufti ◽  
Károly Németh ◽  
Nabil El-Masry ◽  
Atef Qaddah

AbstractAl Wahbah Crater is one of the largest and deepest Quaternary maar craters in the Arabian Peninsula. It is NW-SE-elongated, ∼2.3 km wide, ∼250 m deep and surrounded by an irregular near-perpendicular crater wall cut deeply into the Proterozoic diorite basement. Very few scientific studies have been conducted on this unique site, especially in respect to understanding the associated volcanic eruption processes. Al Wahbah and adjacent large explosion craters are currently a research subject in an international project, Volcanic Risk in Saudi Arabia (VORiSA). The focus of VORiSA is to characterise the volcanic hazards and eruption mechanisms of the vast volcanic fields in Western Saudi Arabia, while also defining the unique volcanic features of this region for use in future geoconservation, geoeducation and geotourism projects. Al Wahbah is inferred to be a maar crater that formed due to an explosive interaction of magma and water. The crater is surrounded by a tephra ring that consists predominantly of base surge deposits accumulated over a pre-maar scoria cone and underlying multiple lava flow units. The tephra ring acted as an obstacle against younger lava flows that were diverted along the margin of the tephra ring creating unique lava flow surface textures that recorded inflation and deflation processes along the margin of the post-maar lava flow. Al Wahbah is a unique geological feature that is not only a dramatic landform but also a site that can promote our understanding of complex phreatomagmatic monogenetic volcanism. The complex geological features perfectly preserved at Al Wahbah makes this site as an excellent geotope and a potential centre of geoeducation programs that could lead to the establishment of a geopark in the broader area at the Kishb Volcanic Field.

2011 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Karoly Németh ◽  
Corina Risso ◽  
Francisco Nullo ◽  
Gabor Kereszturi

AbstractPayún Matru Volcanic Field is a Quaternary monogenetic volcanic field that hosts scoria cones with perfect to breached morphologies. Los Morados complex is a group of at least four closely spaced scoria cones (Los Morados main cone and the older Cones A, B, and C). Los Morados main cone was formed by a long lived eruption of months to years. After an initial Hawaiian-style stage, the eruption changed to a normal Strombolian, conebuilding style, forming a cone over 150 metres high on a northward dipping (∼4°) surface. An initial cone gradually grew until a lava flow breached the cone’s base and rafted an estimated 10% of the total volume. A sudden sector collapse initiated a dramatic decompression in the upper part of the feeding conduit and triggered violent a Strombolian style eruptive stage. Subsequently, the eruption became more stable, and changed to a regular Strombolian style that partially rebuilt the cone. A likely increase in magma flux coupled with the gradual growth of a new cone caused another lava flow outbreak at the structurally weakened earlier breach site. For a second time, the unstable flank of the cone was rafted, triggering a second violent Strombolian eruptive stage which was followed by a Hawaiian style lava fountain stage. The lava fountaining was accompanied by a steady outpour of voluminous lava emission accompanied by constant rafting of the cone flank, preventing the healing of the cone. Santa Maria is another scoria cone built on a nearly flat pre-eruption surface. Despite this it went through similar stages as Los Morados main cone, but probably not in as dramatic a manner as Los Morados. In contrast to these examples of large breached cones, volumetrically smaller cones, associated to less extensive lava flows, were able to heal raft/collapse events, due to the smaller magma output and flux rates. Our evidence shows that scoria cone growth is a complex process, and is a consequence of the magma internal parameters (e.g. volatile content, magma flux, recharge, output volume) and external conditions such as inclination of the pre-eruptive surface where they grew and thus gravitational instability.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Boxin Li ◽  
Károly Németh ◽  
Julie Palmer ◽  
Alan Palmer ◽  
Jing Wu ◽  
...  

The Arxan-Chaihe Volcanic Field, Inner Mongolia, NE China is a Pleistocene to Recent volcanic field still considered to be active. In this chapter we provide an update of current volcanological research conducted in the last four years to describe the volcanic architecture of the identified vents, their eruptive history and potential volcanic hazards. Here we provide an evidence-based summary of the most common volcanic eruption styles and types the field experienced in its evolution. The volcanic field is strongly controlled by older structural elements of the region. Hence most of the volcanoes of the field are fissure-controlled, fissure-aligned and erupted in Hawaiian to Strombolian-style creating lava spatter and scoria cone cone chains. One of the largest and most complex volcano of the field (Tongxin) experienced a violent phreatomagmatic explosive phase creating a maar in an intra-mountain basin, while the youngest known eruptions formed a triple vent set (Yanshan) that reached violent Strombolian phases and created an extensive ash and lapilli plains in the surrounding areas. This complex vent system also emitted voluminous lava flows that change the landscape by damming fluival networks, providing a volcanological paradise for the recently established Arxan UNESCO GLobal Geopark.


1980 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
pp. 251-276 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. R. D. King

In studies of Islamic architecture dealing with the earliest periods, a natural emphasis has fallen on the mosques of the Holy Cities of Arabia, the Ḥaramayn, whenever the architecture of the Arabian Peninsula has been discussed. In later periods, extensions and restorations in the Ḥaram in Mecca and the Mosque of the Prophet in al-Madīna have likewise been discussed, but until recent times, little has been said of any other Arabian mosques. As far as mosques beyond the Ḥaramayn are concerned, this neglect has been caused largely by their inaccessibility; but as a result of the imbalance, students of Islamic architecture have been left to judge Arabia by the Prophet's Mosque, which was only truly Arabian at its foundation, and the Ḥaram and the Ka'ba, which were always unique in Islam in terms both of religion and of architecture. As for later extensions and restorations of either mosque, these tell more of the development of Islamic architectural style and taste beyond the Peninsula than of any Arabian religious architectural tradition.


Zootaxa ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 4514 (3) ◽  
pp. 341 ◽  
Author(s):  
MAHMOUD S. ABDEL-DAYEM ◽  
IFTEKHAR RASOOL ◽  
ALI A. ELGHARBAWY ◽  
PETER NAGEL ◽  
HATHAL M. ALDHAFER

Study of ground beetles of the Garf Raydah Nature Reserve, located in the Asir Mountains of southwestern Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) resulted in one species, Paussus abditus Nagel, sp. n. described as new to science. Thirteen species (21.3%) are reported as new country records and fifteen species (24.6%) are new records for Asir Province. Adult beetles were collected from 2013 to 2017. The determination of this material yielded a total of 61 species in 40 genera and 17 tribes belonging to nine subfamilies of Carabidae. The species richness represented approximately 36.1% of carabid species previously reported from KSA. The most species rich tribes were the Lebiini (20 species), the Harpalini (10 species), and the Bembidiini (6 species). The life form analysis of adults indicated 18 life form types that are grouped into three categories, Zoophagous (77.1%), Mixophytophagous (18.0%), and Myrmecophilous (4.9%). Zoogeographical analyses indicated that the Afrotropical (19.3%) and the Saharo-Arabian (19.3%) species dominate the carabid fauna of this region of KSA. Coryza cf. maculata (Nietner, 1856) is considered the only Oriental representative. Only one cosmopolitan species, Perigona nigriceps (Dejean, 1831), was collected. Eleven endemics were identified; six species are considered KSA endemics and five are Arabian Peninsula endemics. 


2019 ◽  
Vol 750 ◽  
pp. 9-21 ◽  
Author(s):  
V.E. Langenheim ◽  
B.T. Ritzinger ◽  
Hani Zahran ◽  
Adel Shareef ◽  
Maher Al-dahri

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