Instruct: Given a question, retrieve passages that can help answer the question.
Query: What is the big plateau rock in Australia called?
Uluru (, Pitjantjatjara: '), also known as Ayers Rock () and officially gazetted as UluruAyers Rock, is a large sandstone rock formation in the southern part of the Northern Territory in central Australia. It lies south west of the nearest large town, Alice Springs.
The continent primarily sits on the Indo-Australian Plate. Because of its central location on its tectonic plate Australia doesn't have any active volcanic regions, the only continent with this distinction. The lands were joined with Antarctica as part of the southern supercontinent Gondwana until the plate began to drift north about 96 million years ago. For most of the time since then, Australia–New Guinea remained a continuous landmass. When the last glacial period ended in about 10,000 BC, rising sea levels formed Bass Strait, separating Tasmania from the mainland. Then between about 8,000 and 6,500 BC, the lowlands in the north were flooded by the sea, separating New Guinea, the Aru Islands, and the Australian mainland.
Inferno Crater Lake is a large hot spring located in the Waimangu Volcanic Rift Valley on the North Island of New Zealand, and the largest geyser-like feature in the world. The actual geyser is not visible, as it plays underwater at the bottom of the lake, however, fumaroles are visible on the lake's shore and the rock wall behind it.
It has one of the more colourful names of any British mountain, translating as "slippery peak of the witch", perhaps in reference to the boggy conditions underfoot, or because of the resemblance of its pointed profile to an archetypal witch's hat.
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and numerous smaller islands. It is the largest country in Oceania and the world's sixth-largest country by total area. The neighbouring countries are Papua New Guinea, Indonesia and East Timor to the north; the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu to the north-east; and New Zealand to the south-east. The population of / 1000000 round 0 million is highly urbanised and heavily concentrated on the eastern seaboard. Australia's capital is Canberra, and its largest city is Sydney. The country's other major metropolitan areas are Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide.
Mount Victoria Railway Station Group is of state significance as a large complex of buildings illustrating clearly the pattern of development of railway facilities in the Blue Mountains area. It is the most substantial railway station complex in the Blue Mountains and indicates the former importance of the location with the former locomotive depot (now demolished) to service terminating trains for railway tourism associated with Jenolan Caves and handling goods trains over the steep grades of the Blue Mountains, particularly the section to Lithgow. The structures indicate the importance of Mount Victoria as a health and holiday resort, the RRR accommodation provided in the station building reinforcing this.
The largest national park in the world is the Northeast Greenland National Park, which was established in 1974 and currently protects
In July 2012, The Nature Conservancy, alongside IPA alongside the Central Land Council and government representatives from Australia’s National Reserve System, helped announce the launch of the Southern Tanami Indigenous Protected Area.This Indigenous Protected Area is Australia’s largest land reserve, spanning 10.15 million hectares. It protects important pieces of the Northern Territory’s natural legacy. Included in the Southern Tanami reserve are much of Lake Mackay—Australia’s second-largest lake—and an enormous swath of the Tanami Desert. This IPA links a variety of habitats that includes deserts and savannas, giving plant and animal species the space they need to maneuver around threats like wildfires and climate change.
The Big Pasture Plateau ( ) is a karstified mountain plateau in the Kamnik–Savinja Alps northeast of Kamnik, Slovenia. It measures and has an average elevation of above sea level. Its highest point is Mount Gradišče, at . There are numerous herders' dwellings that comprise several settlement areas: "Velika Planina" 'Big Pasture', "Mala Planina" 'Little Pasture', "Gojška Planina" 'Gozd Pasture' (named for the village of Gozd), "Tiha Dolina" 'Quiet Valley', and others. The Big Pasture Plateau is a tourist destination both in winter as a ski resort and in summer as a place for relaxation.
North of this area, on the slope of Mt Haszard, is Inferno Crater, filled with a striking pale blue lake of highly acidic water with a pH as low as 2.2. The crater was blasted into the side of the mountain as part of the 1886 Mount Tarawera eruption event and remains the site of the largest geyser-like feature in the world. Although the actual geyser plays at the bottom of the lake and cannot be seen, a handful of active fumaroles are visible on the shore and the cliff face behind the lake. The water level of this up-to- lake follows a complicated rhythmic cycle that is interconnected with the nearby Frying Pan Lake.
The island is known for its diversity of mammalian fauna, including several species now extinct or greatly reduced on mainland Australia. 13 mammal species exist on the island, including the spectacled hare-wallaby, burrowing bettong (or boodie), golden bandicoot, black-flanked rock-wallaby, Barrow Island euro and Barrow Island mouse ("Pseudomys nanus ferculinus"). The island is also home to 43 species of terrestrial reptiles including a variety of dragons, legless lizards, geckos, skinks, snakes and monitors. The most recognisable of these is probably the perentie, Australia's biggest lizard and the island's top predator. The island represents important turtle nesting habitat for the green turtle and flatback sea turtle.
There are many examples of chalk dry valleys along the North and South Downs in southern England. Notably the National Trust-owned Devil's Dyke near Brighton covers some of downland scarp, and includes the deepest dry valley in the world – created when melting water eroded the chalk downland to the permafrost layer after the last ice age. The three-quarter mile long curved dry valley is around in height and attracts tourists with its views of Sussex, Hampshire and Kent.
A supervolcano usually has a large caldera and can produce devastation on an enormous, sometimes continental, scale. Such volcanoes are able to severely cool global temperatures for many years after the eruption due to the huge volumes of sulfur and ash released into the atmosphere. They are the most dangerous type of volcano. Examples include Yellowstone Caldera in Yellowstone National Park and Valles Caldera in New Mexico (both western United States); Lake Taupo in New Zealand; Lake Toba in Sumatra, Indonesia; and Ngorongoro Crater in Tanzania. Because of the enormous area they may cover, supervolcanoes are hard to identify centuries after an eruption. Similarly, large igneous provinces are also considered supervolcanoes because of the vast amount of basalt lava erupted (even though the lava flow is non-explosive).
Yellowstone National Park spans an area of , comprising lakes, canyons, rivers and mountain ranges. Yellowstone Lake is one of the largest high-elevation lakes in North America and is centered over the Yellowstone Caldera, the largest supervolcano on the continent. The caldera is considered an active volcano. It has erupted with tremendous force several times in the last two million years. Half of the world's geysers and hydrothermal features are in Yellowstone, fueled by this ongoing volcanism. Lava flows and rocks from volcanic eruptions cover most of the land area of Yellowstone. The park is the centerpiece of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, the largest remaining nearly-intact ecosystem in the Earth's northern temperate zone. In 1978, Yellowstone was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Yellowstone National Park has one of the world's largest petrified forests, trees which were long ago buried by ash and soil and transformed from wood to mineral materials. This ash and other volcanic debris are believed to have come from the park area itself as the central part of Yellowstone is the massive caldera of a supervolcano. The park contains 290 waterfalls of at least , the highest being the Lower Falls of the Yellowstone River at .
The Mount Victoria Railway Station Group has a high degree of research potential for its ability to demonstrate construction techniques and architectural character of various types of buildings in one station. The station is a fine example of railway architecture including Victorian Regency and Federation buildings and is an important landmark in the townscape of Mt Victoria being located at the lower end of the town at the termination of the main street vista. The Mount Victoria Railway barracks is an unusual surviving example of a purpose built rest-house still used by the railways for staff accommodation. The signal box is one of a few examples of brick on platform elevated signal boxes that remain in operation in the state. The footbridge is rare as an intact example of a standard Warren Truss trestle and stairway with channel iron stair stringers. The overall aesthetic character of the station is further enhanced by the setting of the station within the rock escarpment, a typical natural setting of the Blue Mountains stations, featuring a collection of numerous flora ranging from mature trees, shrubs and potted plants along both platforms.
The Waimangu Volcanic Rift Valley is the hydrothermal system created on 10 June 1886 by the volcanic eruption of Mount Tarawera, on the North Island of New Zealand. It encompasses Lake Rotomahana, the site of the Pink and White Terraces, as well as the location of the Waimangu Geyser, which was active from 1900 to 1904. The area has been increasingly accessible as a tourist attraction and contains Frying Pan Lake, which is the largest hot spring in the world, and the steaming and usually pale blue Inferno Crater Lake, the largest geyser-like feature in the world although the geyser itself cannot be seen since it plays at the bottom of the lake.
The highest mountains above sea level are generally not the highest above the surrounding terrain. There is no precise definition of surrounding base, but Denali, Mount Kilimanjaro and Nanga Parbat are possible candidates for the tallest mountain on land by this measure. The bases of mountain islands are below sea level, and given this consideration Mauna Kea ( above sea level) is the world's tallest mountain and volcano, rising about from the Pacific Ocean floor. Ojos del Salado has the greatest rise on Earth— from the summit to the bottom of the Atacama Trench about away, though most of this rise is not part of the mountain.
The Blue Hole is an attraction on the island of Big Pine Key in the Florida Keys. It is an abandoned rock quarry that was used for nearby road fills and Henry Flagler's Overseas Railroad. The water it contains is mostly fresh and is used by various wildlife in the area, such as birds, snakes, alligators, key deer and green iguanas. It is part of the National Key Deer Refuge.
Mauna Kea ( or , ) is a dormant volcano on the island of Hawaii. Its peak is above sea level, making it the highest point in the state of Hawaii. Most of the mountain is under water, and when measured from its oceanic base, Mauna Kea is the tallest mountain in the world measuring over . Mauna Kea is about a million years old, and has thus passed the most active shield stage of life hundreds of thousands of years ago. In its current post-shield state, its lava is more viscous, resulting in a steeper profile. Late volcanism has also given it a much rougher appearance than its neighboring volcanoes due to construction of cinder cones, decentralization of its rift zones, glaciation on its peak, and weathering by the prevailing trade winds. Mauna Kea last erupted 6,000 to 4,000 years ago and is now considered dormant. The peak is only about higher than its more massive neighbor, Mauna Loa.
The island of Hawaii (commonly called the "Big Island") is the currently active volcanic center of the Hawaiian Islands formed over the Hawaii hotspot. The two active volcanoes on the Big Island are Kīlauea and Mauna Loa with a newer submarine volcano forming the Loihi Seamount to the southeast of the island. Continued growth of the southeastern part of the island is accompanied by major slumping and southeastward movement of the flanks of the two volcanoes.
The Allegheny Plateau, the Cumberland Plateau, the Ozark Plateau, and the Catskill Mountains in the United States and the Blue Mountains in Australia and the Deccan Plateau in India are examples of dissected plateaus formed after regional uplift. These older uplifts have been eroded by creeks and rivers to develop steep relief not immediately distinguishable from mountains. Many areas of the Allegheny Plateau and the Cumberland Plateau, which are at the western edge of the Appalachian Mountains of eastern North America, are called "mountains" but are actually dissected plateaus. One can stand on the top of one of these high "mountains" and note that all the other tops are nearly the same height, which represents the original elevation profile of the plain before uplift, and thereafter the subsequent weather erosion.
A recent study of the plateau conducted in 2008-2009 by Geoscience Australia surveyed 65,000 square kilometers of the area to gain a broader geologic understanding.(Harris 2003) A multibeam swath bathymetry along with 8000 line kilometers of high-resolution gravity, magnetic and Acoustic Doppler Current Profiler measurements were collected along with several rock and sediment samples(Nelson 2009). A total of eleven rock dredges, three sediment grabs, four box cores, one sea floor trawl, eight camera and temperature tows, conductivity (salinity) and depth profiles through the water column. Data from this survey revealed and reaffirmed early studies that volcanic activity was a major factor in the early formations of this vast plateau. Along with three large volcano complexes, and two other small and steeper cone-shaped complexes, several valleys, scarps, and ridges were discovered as well as a new seafloor. Additionally, on the northeast of the plateau, what researchers believe are volcanic hills, were discovered from the bathymetry data from the survey.
The Australian Shield, also called the Western Australian Shield or Western Plateau, occupies more than half of the continent of Australia. The word shield is used because it refers to ancient, molten rock which has cooled and solidified. The Australian Shield has a characteristic depth of 4.5 km and an estimated age of 2.8 to 3.5 billion years. In places younger sedimentary rock covers the shield's Precambrian surface.
The Wallaby Plateau, which is also known as the Cuvier Plateau, is a large bathymetric high about west of Carnarvon, Western Australia. The Wallaby Plateau covers approximately and is in water depths of to greater than . In the west, the Wallaby Plateau is separated from the Zenith Plateau by a wide, north to northeast-trending bathymetric trough. "Wallaby Plateau" is the name used by the Australian geologists and government for this undersea plateau. This name was first used in a "Hartog" AGSO bathymetric map and formally recognized in a peer-reviewed paper by Symonds and Cameron in 1977. In contrast, the internationally recognized name for it is "Cuvier Plateau". "Cuvier" is a historical name that is presumably derived from the adjacent Cape Cuvier. Cape Cuvier was named for Georges Cuvier, zoologist and statesman, by a French expedition led by Baudin in 1800 – 1803. The Wallaby Plateau lies inside the Australian Exclusive Economic Zone.