Fissure vent

A fissure vent, also identified as a volcanic fissure or simply fissure, is a linear volcanic vent through which lava erupts, typically without any explosive activity. The vent is frequently a few meters broad and may be many kilometers long. Fissure vents can cause big flood basalts and lava channels. This type of volcano is more often than not hard to recognize from the ground and from external space because it has no central caldera and the surface is mostly flat. The volcano can usually be seen as a break in the ground or on the ocean floor. Narrow fissures can be filled in with lava that hardens. As erosion removes its surroundings, the lava mass could stand on top of the surface as a dyke. The dykes that feed fissures arrive at the surface from depths of a small number of kilometers. Fissures are usually found in or the length of rifts and rift zones, such as Iceland and the Great Rift Valley in Africa.