New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science

 

Chuska-Shp Rock (Navajo) Field: Narbona Pass Volcano, Chuska Mountains


Location: 35°, 13' N latitude, 107°, 35' W along the summit of the Chuska Mountains, County
Type: Large maar-type volcanic center
Age: Mid-Tertiary
Significance:

Composition:

 Basic Geology

The Narbona (also “Washington Pass”) Pass volcano is a little known exam- ple of
the explosive vent structures that may have ben common to many of the Chuska-Ship Rock volcanoes before they were eroded to their current deeper levels of exposure.

Narbona Pass volcano is a volcanic crater that formed from violent explosive activity. Filling with lavas and ash between explosive phases of the eruption resulted in a complex intermingling of sheets of thick trachytic lava flows and plugs. 

 

Additional Information:

Petrology/ General Geology:

Appledorn, C.R., and H.W. Wright,Jr., Volcanic structures in the Chuska Mountains, Navajo Reservation, Arizona-New Mexico. Geol. Soc. America Bulletin, 68, 445-467, 1957.

Beaumont, E.C., Preliminary geologic map of the Ship Rock and Hogback quadrangles, San Juan County, New Mexico. U. S. Geol. Survey Coal Investigation Map C-29, scale 1:48,000, 1955.

Ehrenberg, S.N., Petrology of potassic volcanic rocks and ultramafic xenoliths from the Navajo volcanic field, New Mexico and Arizona. Los Angeles, Univ. California. Ph.D. thesis, 259p., 1978.

Gregory, H.E., Geology of the Navajo country. U. S. geol. Survey Professional Paper 93, 161p., 1917.

Naeser, C.W., Geochronology of the Navajo-Hopi diatremes, Four Corners area [Colorado]. Jour. Geophys. Res., 76, 4978-4985, 1971.
Nicholls, J. W., Studies of the volcanic petrology of the Navajo-Hopi area, Arizona. Berkely, Univ. California, Ph.D. thesis, 107p., 1969.
Semken, S.C., The Navajo volcanic field, Volcanology in New Mexico, New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science Bulletin 18, p. 79-83. Williams, H., Plocene volcanoes of the Navajo-Hopi country. Geol. Soc. America Bulletin, 47, 111-171, 1936.

Volcanology/Dike Mechanics:

Delaney, P. T., and D. Pollard, Deformation of host rocks and flow of magma during growth of minette dikes and breccia-bearing intrusions near Ship Rock, New Mexico. U. S. Geol. Survey Professional Paper 1201, 61p., 1981.