The Kari Kari caldera, Bolivia, and the Cerro Rico stock

The rocks comprising the Kari Kari massif southeast of the city of Potosi, Bolivia, consist entirely of welded ignimbrites. It is argued that the massif constitutes the resurgent centre of a 20-m.y.-old resurgent caldera. Plutonic rocks are exposed in the south, but volcanic rocks of the caldera rim are exposed in the north, and indicate a shallower erosion level there. The volcanic rocks consist of a coarse moat deposit, consisting of angular fragments of basement material and juvenile clasts, overlain by an extensive garnet-bearing ignimbrite. A plant-fossil-bearing lacustrine deposit was laid down in a lake within the caldera. The Cerro Rico stock, noted for its silver-tin mineralisation, may be a late intrusion along the caldera ring fractures.