Exploratour - Comparing the Surfaces of Earth and Mars

Where are Volcanoes Located on Earth and Mars?

The table below shows where volcanoes can be found on Earth and Mars.

Earth


This map shows to location of earthquakes around the Pacific Ocean - the "Ring of Fire".
Click on image for full size version (104K GIF)
Image from: The U.S. Geological Survey

The picture above shows the locations of earthquakes from 1980 through 1990 around the Pacific Ocean. If you look at the large version of this image, you can see that earthquakes tend to occur along crustal plate boundaries - as do many volcanoes.

On Earth, groups of volcanoes form together in strings, like pearls in a necklace. Some of these form strings of islands, like the Aleutian Islands in Alaska. Other strings of volcanoes form within a mountain ranges, like the Cascade range along the western coast of the United States. The Pacific Ocean is surrounded by areas of high earthquake activity and numerous volcanoes, from Asia through South America. This forms the famous "Ring of Fire".

The Hawaiian Islands, in the central Pacific, are not located at a crustal boundary, and are formed by a long-lived hot spot in the Earth's crust. Numerous earthquakes also occur along the Atlantic Ocean mid-ocean ridge, where new crust is formed from undersea volcanoes.


Mars


A color map of the altitude of the surface of Mars (red high, blue low), showing where volcanoes are located.
Click on image for full size version (163K GIF)
Image from: NASA

On Mars, the Tharsis Ridge is the home of several volcanoes, including Olympus Mons. The volcanoes are the yellow and red dots in the sea of blue in this image. Olympus Mons is the leftmost volcano in the image. The three large volcanoes which accomp any Olympus Mons on the Tharsis Ridge are Arsia Mons, Pavonis Mons, and Ascraeus Mons.

Other volcanoes named Tharsis Tholus, Ceraunius Tholus, Elysium Mons, and Albov Tholus are found in the right-hand side of the large version of the map above (click on the image to bring it up).

On this map of Mars, the lightly cratered Tharsis Ridge can be seen, as well as the heavily cratered Martian highlands (near the bottom of the picture), and Valles Marineris to the right.

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