page_title: Coropuna
section_title: Present day status
hierarchical_section_title: Coropuna / Eruption history / Present day status
caption_attribution_description: Vents on the summit ridge produced crevasses which became wider downward.
context_page_description: Coropuna is a dormant compound volcano located in the Andes mountains of southeast-central Peru. The upper reaches of Coropuna consist of several perennially snowbound conical summits, lending it the name Nevado Coropuna in Spanish. The complex extends over an area of 240 square kilometres and its highest summit reaches an altitude of 6,377 metres above sea level. This makes the Coropuna complex the third-highest of Peru. Its thick ice cap is the most extensive in Earth's tropical zone, with several outlet glaciers stretching out to lower altitudes. Below an elevation of 5,000 metres, there are various vegetation belts which include trees, peat bogs, grasses and also agricultural areas and pastures.
  The Coropuna complex consists of several stratovolcanos. These are composed chiefly of ignimbrites and lava flows on a basement formed by Middle Miocene ignimbrites and lava flows. The Coropuna complex has been active for at least five million years, with the bulk of the current cone having been formed during the Quaternary.
context_section_description: The volcano is still hydrothermally active. Six hot springs are found on Coropuna, mostly on the southeastern foot, such as at Acopallpa, Antaura, Viques, Ccollpa, and Aguas Calientes and, on its northern flank, at Huamaní Loma. Their water temperatures range between 18 and 51 °C (64 and 124 °F). With the exception of the last two, which are situated in glacial terrain, these hot springs rise within valleys via rock fractures. Geochemical analyses of the water from these springs published in 2015 show no major variations in composition, implying a stable volcanic system. Whether solfataric or fumarolic activity occurs at Coropuna is unclear, and the thick glaciation indicates that the summit craters have no thermal activity.
  Some of the hot springs on Coropuna are used for bathing. The volcano had been considered a potential site for geothermal power production, but research published in 1998 concluded that the available energy of the Coropuna area was insufficient.
  The first volcano activity report published in 2018 noted ongoing seismic activity involving volcano-tectonic earthquakes. Seismic swarms were observed at Coropuna after the 2001 southern Peru earthquake and were possibly triggered by that earthquake. Observations of deformation of the volcanic edifice have shown that gravitational instability and soil water absorption result in movements of part of the volcano but, as a whole, Coropuna shows no evidence of volcanic deformation.
caption: Steam rising on Coropuna Este
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