Water geysers and Waterfalls explanations

 What are hot water geysers?

A geyser is a hot water spring that shoots big streams of water into the air through a hole. The hole called a tube goes down to the underground reservoirs which are the storage basins for hot water. The water that goes down inside the earth is the rain or snow water.

Deep inside, the earth is very hot. In some places, the gases from the hot rocks, mostly steam, rise through cracks in the rock and reach the underground reservoirs. The water stored there is heated to high temperatures. This makes a hot spring.

When in a hot spring the steam and water can come to the surface without any interference, and the spring remains steady. But if the water and steam are unable to find an easy way out, the water system is heated to the boiling point and turns into steam.

Steam requires more room than the water which makes it expand and so it pushes the column of water above it. When the steam moves up, the pressure below it is lowered and turns more water into steam. Due to the excess push, there is a violet eruption of the steam from a point where the crust of the earth is weak. This beautiful sight of the steam and hot water gushing upwards is what is called a geyser.

How are waterfalls made?

Waterfalls are beautiful to look at and they are found in many places, especially where there are rocks and hills around. When a stream or a river reaches a wall of rocks and the water falls down from a height over the wall of rocks, we call it a waterfall. A waterfall of a very big size is called a cataract.

Niagara Falls gives us an example of how an overhanging rock ledge can help in creating a waterfall. The upper layer of these rocks is hard while below this hard dolomite lies the weak shale. As the river water thunders and falls over the dolomite cliff into a great pool below, the shale keeps wearing away and undermines the hard dolomite above.

Big and small pieces of rocks then are swept away with water. This causes a constant enlargement of the space behind the fall. The site of this great waterfall is thus actually receding upstream all the time.

The three most famous cataracts in the world are Niagara Falls in Canada and USA Victoria Falls in Africa, and Iguassu Falls between Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay.

Sometimes ancient glaciers play a role in making a waterfall by cutting deep into mountain valleys and leaving the sides as steep cliffs and precipices from which the water gushes down.

The Yellowstone fall was formed because of a molten rock that was pushed up from below during ancient times. When it cooled down, it hardened and later acted as a wall in the path of the river route.