How does the Earth making new lava?

[kool-aide]

Ok. We were watching Mike Rowe narrate an underwater documentary on the Discovery channel. It was about under water volcanoes, new islands, etc.

I thought ran through my head. If volcanoes spew lava, gas, and what not from under ground. How does the Earth create new stuff to keep the cycle going?

I was thinking about the conservation of mass and energy. There are a few active volcanoes that put out a regular flow of lava. I never heard any one explain how the Earth makes new lava? Doesn't something have to go into the Earth's crust to make lava so a volcano can blow it out?

Time to Google until I pass out.

[SHines-IT]

To my understanding, lava is just melted rock...

[86 IROC-Z]

Sometimes when I have to sneeze I create lots of saliva, then rest the side of my head of my desk, open my mouth really wide and sneeze; and then admire the explosion-shaped mass of spit and mucus that remains on my desk.

[kool-aide]

Close, I know what Lava is, but how does the Earth keep the cycle producing.

We put gas in our car. If we only put gas in the car once. Our combustion will eventually stop, no gas.

Or compare it to a sink hole. When you have a cavity full of say water there is some kind of stability. If you pump all of that water out, thus creating an empty cavity. You have the potential for that cavity to collapse.

if the Earth pushes out lava, gasses and stuff. What fills the Earth back up to do it again?

So if a volcano spews stuff into the world from deep in the Earth. The Earth needs a source to keep the cycle going.

I wonder if there is a correlation between earthquakes and volcanoes.

[kool-aide]

Sometimes when I have to sneeze I create lots of saliva, then rest the side of my head of my desk, open my mouth really wide and sneeze; and then admire the explosion-shaped mass of spit and mucus that remains on my desk.

I hope your desk has a really good varnish on it. I would hate to see the desk fall to the glory of that sneeze.

[kool-aide]

I like the picture near the bottom of this site.

http://blogs.oregonstate.edu/volcano...ral-questions/

Ask the Internet what is lava and you won't run out of stuff to read. Ask how does the cycle replenish and you get cricket music, lol...

Maybe I will send an email or post to the smart people at Oregon State. They must be smart, they bribed their way to the top of the Google food chain, .

[tep98ws6]

im glad im not the only one that wonders things like this.

[0rion]

lava is made from heat/pressure/friction so it will recycle if you think about it like that. What happens when you take the card off of the bottom of the deck and put it on top? The next card is now the one on the bottom of the deck.

[SandmanWs7]

Lava is melted rock,right? You also probably know what the plate tectonics are too. When two plates collide one is pushed upward and one downward. Therefore mixing with lava and melting and creating more lava to erupt from volcanoes.

I think.

[67CamaroRSSS]

Lava is melted rock,right? You also probably know what the plate tectonics are too. When two plates collide one is pushed upward and one downward. Therefore mixing with lava and melting and creating more lava to erupt from volcanoes.

I think.

The technical term for this is "subduction"...

[SandmanWs7]

The technical term for this is "subduction"...

What he said.A pic to better help...

[86 IROC-Z]

itt: middle school geology review

[Sommer86@6LE]

Lava is melted rock,right? You also probably know what the plate tectonics are too. When two plates collide one is pushed upward and one downward. Therefore mixing with lava and melting and creating more lava to erupt from volcanoes.

I think.

The technical term for this is "subduction"...

Atta boy. fellas!! I was just about to type that.

Subduction occurs when 2 massive land forms collide and one is forced under the other. Usually volcanic eruptions occur between 20-40 miles below the ground....which is so hot and full of pressure that "hard rock" melts and turns into magma....which in turn feeds volcanoes. Also the pacific rim of fire has the most active volcanoes in the world and has tons of subduction happening....that's why those volcanoes always seem to be going off.

Fun fact: Those same subductions also cause earthquakes and tsunamis!

Fun fact II: The Hawai'ian islands are actually millions of years of eruptions that have happened over and over and have built upon themselves!....Hawai'i is still growing and keeps getting bigger and bigger every year.

This was all just a stab in the dark, i have no idea what i'm talking about.













































j/k

[dklowrider]

speaking of the Hawai'ian islands, did you know all the islands were formed by moving over the same hot spot? the plate is continually moving across a volcanic hot spot which is where the big island is right now. this is why Kiluea is the active volcano currently, spewing lava continually for about 4 decades now. the furthest north island [ i forget which one it is ] was the first formed by volcanic activity, and as the plate moved new islands were formed as the old island moved off of the hot spot. certainly not in our near future, but eventually the big island will move off the hot spot and a new Hawai'ian island will be formed. i can only assume that the reason for not just making one big long island is that once the path to the surface is off of the hot spot, the lava has to find a new outlet. and in the time it takes to build a cone back to the surface from the ocean floor, the previously formed island has moved far enough away that a new land mass appears.

[toi tyme]

lava is just the earths mantle once it reaches the earths surface. Mantle is melted rock. Rock is chemicals and when pressurized and melted it releases gases.. Because gas is lighter than lava, therefore it would rise... the process repeats, just like how Orion explained a deck of cards. Same with subduction and earthquakes. Plate tectonics... they plates are always continuously moving melting the earths crust and thus starting the cycle all over again.


Just like rain, water evaporates, crystallizes and falls back on to the earth.


Rocks, lava, mantle - all different forms of the same things, given mixtures and compounds of chemicals change rather than a physical change like rain/water.

[SiggyZ]

It makes it. That is all.

[dklowrider]

It makes it. That is all.

that's the easy way out.
reminds me of when my kid was little and he asked me why it rains. i said there's too much water in the sky and some has to fall out.

[wheeliE-maxx]

Simple explanation, lava and new layers form up top, old layers pushed down and melt, old rock is then skeeted out as fresh lava

[fbod91]

strawberry banana smoothies are good too

[The Project]

Lava is created because Chuck Norris wills it to happen.....