Atacazo is a volcano of the Western Cordillera located 25 kilometers southwest of

Quito Quito (; ), officially San Francisco de Quito, is the capital city, capital and second-largest city of Ecuador, with an estimated population of 2.8 million in its metropolitan area. It is also the capital of the province of Pichincha Province, P ...

Ecuador Ecuador, officially the Republic of Ecuador, is a country in northwestern South America, bordered by Colombia on the north, Peru on the east and south, and the Pacific Ocean on the west. It also includes the Galápagos Province which contain ...

. Atacazo is a

stratovolcano A stratovolcano, also known as a composite volcano, is a typically conical volcano built up by many alternating layers (strata) of hardened lava and tephra. Unlike shield volcanoes, stratovolcanoes are characterized by a steep profile with ...

formed by the action of a Late-Pleistocene to

Holocene The Holocene () is the current geologic time scale, geological epoch, beginning approximately 11,700 years ago. It follows the Last Glacial Period, which concluded with the Holocene glacial retreat. The Holocene and the preceding Pleistocene to ...

caldera A caldera ( ) is a large cauldron-like hollow that forms shortly after the emptying of a magma chamber in a volcanic eruption. An eruption that ejects large volumes of magma over a short period of time can cause significant detriment to the str ...

. The last eruption of the Atacazo was nearly 2300 years ago.

Aerial tragedy

On November 7, 1960 a Fairchild F-27

turboprop A turboprop is a Gas turbine, gas turbine engine that drives an aircraft Propeller (aeronautics), propeller. A turboprop consists of an intake, reduction drive, reduction gearbox, gas compressor, compressor, combustor, turbine, and a propellin ...

passenger plane, operated by the now-defunct national airline AREA Ecuador, struck the Atacazo in bad weather during its approach to the newly-inaugurated Mariscal Sucre International Airport after a flight from Simón Bolívar International Airport, in

Guayaquil Guayaquil (), officially Santiago de Guayaquil, is the largest city in Ecuador and also the nation's economic capital and main port. The city is the capital (political), capital of Guayas Province and the seat of Guayaquil Canton. The city is ...

. The crash, south of Quito and 150 meters to the summit of the Atacazo, killed all the 37 occupants of the plane. At the time, it was the worst aerial crash in the history of

, the first and worst fatal loss of an F-27 passenger plane, and the first accident involving the then-recently-opened Quito airport.

References

Stratovolcanoes of Ecuador Four-thousanders of the Andes Pleistocene stratovolcanoes Holocene stratovolcanoes Pleistocene calderas Holocene calderas {{Ecuador-geo-stub

Aerial tragedy

See also

References