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	Huaynaputina
Synonyms: Omate, Quinistaquillas, Chiquimote, and Chequepuquina
Location: 16º35'S; 70º52'W
Country: Peru
Summit Elevation: 4800m
Edifice Height: 200m
Type: Explosive Silicic Center

Huaynaputina, Peru (16° 35'S 70° 52'W)

This volcano has also been variously known as Omate, Quinistaquillas, Chiquimote, and Chequepuquina and consists of a complex 2.5 km diameter explosion crater with a maximum elevation of 4,800 m a.s.l. and edifice height of no more than 500 m (Figure M2a & b). It is remarkably situated on the western rim of the canyon of the Rio Tambo, which is more than 2 km deep immediately below the volcano. To the west, a roughly rectangular plateau of ash has buried the local pre-eruption topography over an area of about 50 km2. Several relatively small ash cones are located within the crater (Bullard, 1962). Earliest activity in this region was apparently manifested by Cerro Las Chilcas, a small extrsuve lava dome 3 km to the south.

Huaynaputina was the site of a single catastrophic eruption in February 1600, which was remarkable not only for its intensity, but because it was the only major explosive eruption in historic times in the Central Andes. A colourful account of the eruption is to be found in the journals of Vasquez de Espinoza (translated from the Spanish in 1942). The eruption completely destroyed the pre-1600 edifice which was described as " a low ridge in the centre of a sierra". Ash from the eruption is widespread and still mantles much of the surrounding countryside as far as Arequipa, 80 km away. It now forms a useful regional stratigraphic marker horizon throughout Peru (e.g. in the Quelccaya ice cap (see Chapter 1, Figure 8; Thompson et al., 1986). In the Greenland ice core acidity profile, the eruption produced an acid "spike" larger in magnitude than the Krakatau 1883 eruption (Hammer et al., 1980; de Silva & Francis, 1990) and remarkable optical effects were reported from the northern hemisphere in 1601 (Lamb, 1970). Notwithstanding the magnitude of this eruption, its deposits have never been examined.