The 7km long cracks that cut across the "hell gate" in Ethiopia erupt with boiling lava flows.
Images published by the US Aeronautics Agency (NASA) show that the Erta Ale, a shield-shaped volcano near the Ethiopian border and Eritrea, appears many new cracks that spill large amounts of lava, Live Science on 31st. / 1 reported.
Researchers found that at least one of the many lakes in the mouth of the mountain is undergoing a major change in the amount of lava, leading to intense overflowing and boiling phenomena.This geographic phenomenon was broken by three tectonic plates in Africa's Danakil depression.
When tectonic plates split, some active volcanoes jutted along the seams. One of the most active volcanoes is the Ertha Ale , also known as "smoke mountain" or "hell gate" in Afar.
Erta Ale has a long-standing lava lake that has been boiling for decades, but the most active is the southeastern slope of this comfortable mountain.
The most recent eruption occurred in September 2005, killing 250 cattle, forcing people in the surrounding area to evacuate.
According to the Volcano Discovery report, the new crack opened on January 21, about 7 km long from the basin at the top of the mountain, spraying a large amount of lava.
Image taken by Operational Land Imager (OLI) sensor on NASA's Landsat 8 satellite on January 26, 2017.
The lava lake is located in Afar, Ethiopia, flows continuously since 1906 and lies inside the 600-meter Erta Ale volcano.