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An area of black glassy sand and gravel that we observed on the summit of the western volcano in the Galapagos Rift valley. The black streak from upper left to lower right is an accumulation of sand-sized volcanic glass in a shallow trough. We often observed this material next to talus or debris slopes associated with faults. The whitish coating on the rock at the upper left corner of the photo is low temperature hydrothermal clay. This suggests that the faults may be tapping into a hydrothermal fluid cell beneath this portion of the Galapagos Rift. The bottom of photo is about 4 meters across.

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