NewsTracker Answers for week of Dec. 05, 2022

Q: The Earth’s largest active volcano, Mauna Loa on Hawaii’s Big Island, is spewing a river of lava after erupting for the first time since 1984. Where is the state of Hawaii?

Circle the area on this map


Q: Mauna Loa rises 30,085 feet from its base on the ocean floor to its summit. That is taller than the mountain of …

A. Aconcagua in Argentina

B. Denali in Alaska

C. Mount Everest in Nepal

D. All of the above


D. Mauna Loa is taller than the 29,031 feet of Mount Everest, which is the world’s highest peak above sea level followed by the summits Aconcagua and Denali. When measured from the center of the Earth, the highest point is Mount Chimborazo in Ecuador, very near the equator where the planet bulges. Earth flattens out at the poles.


Q: Hawai’i is the largest of the eight main islands of the state of Hawaii, and it has 62.7 percent of the state’s combined land area. What is a chain of islands called?

A. Acme

B. Archipelago

C. Arroyo

D. Atoll


B. The state of Hawaii comprises nearly the entire Hawaiian archipelago, 137 volcanic islands spanning 1,500 miles. The islands have been formed as the Pacific tectonic plate moves northwest over an undersea magma source called the Hawai'i hotspot. The only currently active land volcanoes in the state are on the Big Island of Hawai’i.


Q: The Hawai’i hotspot is in the middle of the Pacific plate, but most volcanoes form on the edges of the continually moving tectonic plates that make up the Earth’s crust. What else does this movement create?

A. Earthquakes

B. Mountains

C. Tsunamis

D. All of the above


D. The collisions of the plates trigger earthquakes and the giant ocean waves that can spread destruction thousands of miles away from the epicenter of a quake. As the tectonic plates push under and over each other, they push up giant mountain ranges like the Himalayas in Asia or the Andes in South America.


Q: Hawaii is the only state ...

A. In the tropics

B. Outside North America

C. Once was a kingdom

D. All of the above


D. Hawaii is about 2,000 miles southwest of the U.S. mainland, making it the southernmost state. Hawaii became a unified, internationally recognized kingdom in 1810, remaining independent until American and European businessmen overthrew the monarchy in 1893 with the help of U.S. Marines. It was annexed as a U.S. territory in 1898.