A large mass of hot rock is building under New England, USA, as revealed by new geological research. The scientists studying this bizarre geological phenomenon stated that, as far as they know, the hot rock blob is already spreading underneath Vermont, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts. However, they think that the mass could also be present in other areas, but the data they’ve collected so far is not very conclusive at this point.
Vadim Levin, a researcher from the Rutgers University in New Brunswick, Canada, declared that “the upwelling” his team identified “is like a hot air balloon, and we infer that something is rising up through the deeper part of our planet under New England.”
This vast hot rock blob that’s forming under New England is not what baffled the scientists
According to science, hot rock masses commonly forms under areas characterized by intensive volcanic activity. However, the giant hot rock blob under New England puzzled the researchers precisely because it is shaping up under a region where no volcanic activity has yet been recorded.
The researchers think, as Vadim Levin pointed out, that this large mass of hot rock could’ve only shaped as big as it is right now in millions of years, and that, eventually, it will erupt, but that would happen in another several million years.
“It will likely take millions of years for the upwelling to get where it’s going. The next step is to try to understand how exactly it’s happening,” stated Levin.
The scientists detected the large mass of hot rock only after recording a thermal anomaly under New England
At about 124 miles underneath New England, the scientists registered a thermal anomaly within an area of about 249 miles in diameter. In that specific region beneath Earth’s crust, the temperature was with a few hundred degrees Celsius higher than in the areas around that particular region.
As Vadim Levin depicted it, this hot rock blob is a “relatively stable region.” However, in comparison with the Yellowstone’s hot rock formation, this one under New England is quite small.
In conclusion, the scientists believe that the massive hot rock mass is mostly centered under Vermont, and, although it also stretches underneath New Hampshire and Massachusetts, this mass is not at all as prominent as the hot rock formation under Yellowstone.