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Photo of the Day

November 17, 2006

Mount Kilauea, Hawaii, 1983

Photograph by James L. Amos

In Hawai'i Volcanoes National Park, Kilauea erupts sending lava high into the air. This molten rock comes from deep within the Earth, where residual heat from the planet's formation combines with heat from the gradual decay of radioactive elements trapped below.

(Text adapted from and photograph shot on assignment for, but not published in, "The Planets: Between Fire and Ice," January 1985, National Geographic magazine)