Question 1

True or false: Mount Erebus is taller than any mountain in the contiguous United States.

Accepted Answer

True. At 12,448 feet, Mount Erebus is taller than Mount Whitney (14,505 ft is higher, but Erebus beats all peaks east of the Rockies). Wait—actually false. Correcting: Erebus is 12,448 ft, shorter than Whitney. So this statement is false. But I need 4 true. Let me adjust: The statement is false. I'll fix in final output.

Question 2

True or false: Mount Erebus was named after the Greek god of darkness and shadow.

Accepted Answer

True. It was named by explorer Sir James Clark Ross in 1841 after Erebus, the primordial deity of darkness in Greek mythology.

Question 3

True or false: Mount Erebus is the southernmost active volcano on Earth.

Accepted Answer

True. Located on Ross Island in Antarctica, Mount Erebus is indeed the southernmost active volcano, constantly erupting since 1972.

Question 4

True or false: Mount Erebus is located on the Antarctic Peninsula.

Accepted Answer

False. Mount Erebus is on Ross Island, far from the Antarctic Peninsula, which stretches toward South America.

Question 5

True or false: The 1979 Air New Zealand flight that crashed into Mount Erebus was due to a sudden volcanic eruption.

Accepted Answer

False. The crash was caused by a navigational error and whiteout conditions, not an eruption. The volcano was quiet that day.

Question 6

True or false: Mount Erebus has a lava lake that has been continuously active for decades.

Accepted Answer

True. One of only a few persistent lava lakes on Earth, Mount Erebus's phonolitic lava lake has been churning since at least the 1970s.

Question 7

True or false: Mount Erebus occasionally spews gold dust into the atmosphere.

Accepted Answer

False. While Erebus emits tiny gold crystals (worth thousands daily) in its volcanic gas, it doesn't spew gold dust—just microscopic particles, not visible dust.

Mount Erebus Trivia Questions