Mount Nyiragongo is a volcano in the Virunga Mountains associated with the Great Rift Valley. It is located in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, about 20 km north of the town of Goma and Lake Kivu and just west of the border with Rwanda. The main crater is 250 m deep, two km wide and sometimes contains a lava lake.

Congo DR (1997) 1 Centime (back) - Volcano - Mount Nyiragongo

Nyiragongo and nearby Nyamuragira are together responsible for 40% of Africa's historical volcanic eruptions.

Not much is known about how long the volcano has been erupting, but since 1882, it has erupted at least 34 times, including many periods where activity was continuous for years at a time, often in the form of a churning lava lake in the crater.

<==== Lava Lake In The Crater of Mt Nyiragongo

Lava lakes reformed in the crater in eruptions in 1982-1983 and 1994. Another major eruption of the volcano began on January 17, 2002, after several months of increased seismic and fumarolic activity. A 13 km fissure opened in the south flank of the volcano, spreading in a few hours from 2800 m to 1550 m elevation, reaching the outskirts of the city of Goma the provincial capital on the northern shore of Lake Kivu. Lava streamed from three spatter cones at the end of the fissure and flowed in a stream 200 to 1000 m wide and up to 2 m deep through Goma. Warnings had been given and 400,000 people were evacuated from the city across the Rwandan border into neighbouring Gisenyi during the eruption. Lava covered the northern end of the runway at Goma International Airport, leaving the southern two-thirds usable, and reached Lake Kivu. This raised fears that the lava might cause gas-saturated waters deep in the lake to suddenly rise to the surface, releasing lethally large amounts of carbon dioxide and methane - a similar event to the disaster at Lake Nyos in Cameroon in 1986. This did not happen, but volcanologists continue to monitor the area closely.

About 45 people died in the eruption from asphyxiation by carbon dioxide and buildings collapsing due to the lava and earthquakes. At least 15% of Goma comprising 4500 buildings were destroyed, leaving about 120,000 people homeless.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Mount Nyiragongo"