Erta Ale, Addis Abeba, Ethiopia

This is a list of lists of active and extinct volcanoes sorted by country. There are separate lists of Antarctic, submarine, and extraterrestrial volcanoes.

This is a list of active and extinct volcanoes in Ethiopia.

A volcano is an opening, or rupture, in a planet's surface or crust, which allows hot magma, volcanic ash and gases to escape from below the surface.

Volcanoes are generally found where tectonic plates are diverging or converging. A mid-oceanic ridge, for example the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, has examples of volcanoes caused by divergent tectonic plates pulling apart; the Pacific Ring of Fire has examples of volcanoes caused by convergent tectonic plates coming together. By contrast, volcanoes are usually not created where two tectonic plates slide past one another. Volcanoes can also form where there is stretching and thinning of the Earth's crust in the interiors of plates, e.g., in the East African Rift, the Wells Gray-Clearwater volcanic field and the Rio Grande Rift in North America. This type of volcanism falls under the umbrella of "Plate hypothesis" volcanism. Volcanism away from plate boundaries has also been explained as mantle plumes. These so-called "hotspots", for example Hawaii, are postulated to arise from upwelling diapirs with magma from the core-mantle boundary, 3,000 km deep in the Earth.

Erta Ale is a continuously active basaltic shield volcano in the Afar Region of northeastern Ethiopia, the most active volcano in Ethiopia. It is in the Afar Depression, a badlands desert area spanning the border with Eritrea, and the volcano itself is surrounded completely by an area below sea level,^{[citation needed]} making it a relatively low-elevation volcano.

Erta Ale is 613 metres (2,011 ft) high, with one or sometimes two active lava lakes at the summit which occasionally overflow on the south side of the volcano. It is notable for being the longest-existing lava lake, present since the early years of the twentieth century (1906). Volcanoes with lava lakes are very rare: there are only four in the world.

Erta Ale means "smoking mountain" in the local Afar language and its southernmost pit is known locally as "the gateway to hell". In 2009 it was mapped by a team from the BBC using three dimensional laser techniques. As the lakes have searingly hot temperatures, laser scanning, which can map any surface at a distance, was used.

There was a major eruption on 25 September 2005 which killed 250 head of livestock and forced thousands of nearby residents to flee. There was further lava flow in August 2007, forcing the evacuation of hundreds and leaving two missing. An eruption on 4 November 2008 was reported by scientists at Addis Ababa University. Not much is known about Erta Ale as the surrounding terrain is some of the most inhospitable on earth and the native Afar people have a legendary reputation for viciousness towards outsiders; one travel guide recommends hiring "one or maybe two armed guards or police" to visit Erta Ale. However, they welcomed and helped a team from BBC.