A photo of Mount Erebus, taken a few days ago. Mount Erebus is one of only 3 volcanoes in the world that has a permanent lava lake. It is also the world’s southern most historically active volcano. The phonolite lava contains unusually large crystals of anorthoclase feldspar, and is similar to lavas found on Mount Kenya and Mount Kilimanjaro in East Africa. The volcano is a polygeneric volcano, starting out life as a shield volcano. The rocky outcrop on its left flank is the remains of the previous crater to this shield volcano. The younger portions of the volcano are a strato-volcano built on top of the older shield volcano. Mount Erebus is located on Ross Island which is made up of 4 volcanoes in total: Mount Erebus, Mount Terror, Mount Terra Nova and Mount Bird. Ross Island is also home to the historic huts of Scott and Shackleton, and is home to the modern research bases of McMurdo an d Scott Base.
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