Quote:
Originally Posted by strongmanmike
Awe inspiring...One thing you would have to be very careful of though, is taking unopened bags of chips and nuts, heck, just about anything sealed near sea level, probably even cans?..up there in your car, they would all pop/explode or distend on the way  ...this happens just going up to my observatory 
Mike |
Absolutely! And anything you open and then close at the top, like my
water bottle here, gets mercilessly crushed on the descent.
Mauna Loa itself is impressive by any world standards.
It composes over half of the Big Island and by itself amounts
to about 85% of all the other Hawaiian Islands combined.
It rises gradually 4km above the sea floor but descends a further 5km beneath it.
The sea floor, in turn, is depressed another 8km by its sheer mass.
Together, this makes Mauna Loa the largest volcano on the planet whose summit
stretches some 17km (56,000') above its base. It last erupted in 1984.
The flows then stretched for 50km, falling only 7km short from the east coast town of Hilo.