Chaos Crags is the youngest group of lava domes in Lassen Volcanic National Park, California, having been formed as five dacite domes 1,100-1,000 years ago. The cluster of domes is located north of Lassen Peak.
From the base of the crags and extending toward the northwest corner of the park is Chaos Jumbles, a cold rock avalanche which undermined Chaos Crags' northwest slope 300 years ago. Riding on a cushion of compressed air (see air-layer lubrication), the rock debris traveled at about 100 miles per hour (160 km/h), flattened the forest before it, and dammed Manzanita Creek, forming Manzanita Lake.
In 1974 the United States Park Service took the advice of the USGS and closed the visitor center and accommodations at Manzanita Lake. The Survey stated that these buildings would be in the way of a rockslide from Chaos Crags if an earthquake or volcanic eruption occurred in the area.
Famous quotes containing the word chaos:
“Figure him there, with his scrofulous diseases, with his great greedy heart, and unspeakable chaos of thoughts; stalking mournful as a stranger in this Earth; eagerly devouring what spiritual thing he could come at: school-languages and other merely grammatical stuff, if there were nothing better! The largest soul that was in all England.”
—Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881)