Page 62 - Volcano and Geothermal Tourism

Africa’s Great Volcanoes of the Albertine Rift Valley 39

Figure 2.4 The snow-covered peaks of Mt Stanley, Ruwenzori mountain range
Source: Photo courtesy of Jurgen Wohlfarter (Peakware.com).

Virunga volcanic range: the border between the Congo to the west and
The belt of fire Rwanda and Uganda to the east: Nyamulagira,
Nyiragongo, Karisimbi, Mikeno, Visoke, Sabinio,
The Virunga volcanic range is said to be one of Mgahinga and Muhavura (from west to east;
the most spectacular volcanic areas on Earth. The Figures 2.2, 2.3). All of these volcanoes are higher
range’s volcanoes are all related to the African than 3000m, and the first six are located in the
Great Rift system, in the same way as their well- Virunga National Park. Karisimbi, the highest
known relatives on the Eastern Rift – Kilimanjaro, (4507m) of them has its round top covered by
Mt Kenya and Ngorongoro – are (see Case Study 3). snow, while Nyiragongo and Nyamulagira are
Tectonic hotspots and rifting or a combination of still strongly active, accounting for nearly 40 per
the two are pointed to as the major causes of most cent of eruptions recorded in African history.
of the African volcanoes, from the highest to the Recently, in January 2002, about 40 per cent of
lowest (Simkin et al, 1981). Goma City on the shores of Lake Kivu was
The Virungas acquired much of their scientific destroyed in an eruption of Nyiragongo, and
and media exposure following intensive research later on in the same year, Nyamulagira erupted
by Haroun Tazieff, the French volcanologist twice. More than a hundred other old craters and
(Diallo, 1975; Tazieff, 1979). This mountain range vents are found here and there all over the
stands across the Albertine Rift Valley between Virunga lava highland, testifying to its intense
Lakes Kivu and Rutazinge for a distance of volcanic activity and the underlying tectonics.
120km, thus separating the Nile and Congo This range is also famous for the renowned
basins. It consists of eight main volcanoes along mountain gorillas.

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