Lava - Volcanic Morphologies

Volcanic Morphologies

The physical behavior of lava creates the physical forms of a lava flow or volcano. More fluid basaltic lava flows tend to form flat sheet-like bodies, whereas viscous rhyolite lava flows forms knobbly, blocky masses of rock.

General features of volcanology can be used to classify volcanic edifices and provide information on the eruptions which formed the lava flow, even if the sequence of lavas have been buried or metamorphosed.

The ideal lava flow will have a brecciated top, either as pillow lava development, autobreccia and rubble typical of ʻaʻā and viscous flows, or a vesicular or frothy carapace such as scoria or pumice. The top of the lava will tend to be glassy, having been flash frozen in contact with the air or water.

The centre of a lava flow is commonly massive and crystalline, flow banded or layered, with microscopic groundmass crystals. The more viscous lava forms tend to show sheeted flow features, and blocks or breccia entrained within the sticky lava. The crystal size at the centre of a lava will in general be greater than at the margins, as the crystals have more time to grow.

The base of a lava flow may show evidence of hydrothermal activity if the lava flowed across moist or wet substrates. The lower part of the lava may have vesicles, perhaps filled with minerals (amygdules). The substrate upon which the lava has flowed may show signs of scouring, it may be broken or disturbed by the boiling of trapped water, and in the case of soil profiles, may be baked into a brick-red terracotta.

Discriminating between an intrusive sill and a lava flow in ancient rock sequences can be difficult. However, some sills do not usually have brecciated margins, and may show a weak metamorphic aureole on both the upper and lower surface, whereas a lava will only bake the substrate beneath it. However, it is often difficult in practice to identify these metamorphic phenomenon because they are usually weak and restricted in size. Peperitic sills, intruded into wet sedimentary rocks, commonly do not bake upper margins and have upper and lower autobreccias, closely similar to lavas.