29 October 2010

Geological Frightfest: El monstruo de los volcanes

Posted by Jessica Ball

Tonight’s post will be a short one, because it’s Friday and I just spent the last hour carving a pumpkin. This Frightfest offering comes via the suggestion of a devoted reader (thanks, Mom!), and I had to post it, even though I can’t find out a lot about the movie. This is the best I could dig up for El Monstruo de los Volcanes: A yeti-like creature with the power to hypnotize its victims stalks the slopes of Mount Popocatepetl, attacking construction workers who are building an inclined railway on the volcano.

Yep, a 1962 horror movie about a volcano yeti. I don’t think I can add much to that. (Here’s a Spanish website with a short blurb about the movie, for those of you who can read it. Oh, and funicular is another word for an inclined railway, if you get stuck translating it.)

On the volcanic side of things, Volcan Popocatepetl (the name means “smoking mountain” in the Aztec language) is a large stratovolcano about 70 km SE of Mexico City. Its most recent  eruption began in January 2005 with a series of phreatic explosions, and has continued since with explosive eruptions of ash and the extrusion of a lava dome. (Check out the GVP’s monthly and weekly summaries for more details!)