Vn. San José, Chile

The San José Volcano (5.856 msnm), known as Cerro Ardiente by the German naturalist Meyen, the first hiker to climb the massif in 1831, stands out as a Quaternary stratovolcano with several eruptions in the last 130 years that have had a negative impact on the morphometry and destruction of its craters (Brüggen, 1950). Covered by ice fields on the eastern flank and with less volume in the western sector, the La Engorda and Nieves Negras snowdrifts stand out on its slopes, exhibiting an intense dynamism of geomorphological agents and processes due to its location in the Andes Mountains. In fact, it coexists in a zonal environment, with direct climatic action on rocks plus temperature or humidity factors and water, wind and gravity agents, reinforcing erosive processes on this massif. The San José Volcano becomes one of the main threats to the city of Santiago, Capital of Chile, being located only 60 km away and being susceptible to geomorphological or eruptive scenarios.